“You look ridiculous,” Mason said to Ryker.
“No, I look like a fucking prideful American.”
“You look like a dumbass.”
“You’ll be dressing the same way after a year with me.”
Mason rolled his eyes and doubted him very much. He would never be caught dead in that outfit. For one thing, Mason had a good fifty extra pounds of muscle on Ryker, so he would look like a giant tool in that outfit and then, of course, he did not have the outlandish personality to pull something off with so much…pattern. No, he was known as the asshole badass of the team, so he had to keep with that image and, thanks to Brooke’s breakup, he was able to maintain said status.
Mason turned to Parker and lightly jabbed him in the arm. “You’ve been quiet. What’s going on, man?” If Mason didn’t know any better, he might think Parker was feeling sad that Lexi was getting married. They were best friends since freshman year in college and they tried once to make things romantic between them, but it never panned out. Mason was thinking maybe Parker wished it had.
“Nothing. Just thinking about the season.”
“Are you sure you’re not upset that Lexi is marrying Jake?
Parker shot Mason a death glare. “You know I don’t think about her like that, so please, God, do not go saying that around anyone, especially Jake. I don’t need him pummeling my ass.”
Mason held up his hands in defense. “Sorry, it’s just that you’re acting weird.”
Parker shrugged. “I’m trying to sound like a pussy, but the fact that Lexi is getting married this weekend, while I don’t even have one good prospect in my life, makes me a little…I don’t know…bummed I guess.”
Ryker, who was sitting in the front of the cab turned around and raised his eyebrows at Parker. “Dude, you are a pussy. You’re the starting shortstop for the Atlanta Braves right now and could have any woman you want. Find your balls and start living it up.”
They rode in silence the rest of the way to Jake’s house. Mason didn’t really know what to say to Parker; he wasn’t much of a touchy-feely type and he didn’t want to sound like an ass like Ryker, so he just kept his mouth shut.
When they got to the house, they were greeted by Lexi and her mom at the front door. Lexi had a robe on, her hair was half done and she had a scowl on her face. Looked like their boy didn’t handle his alcohol intake very well.
Mason went to go gather Lexi in a hug, but she held her hand at his chest. “Don’t even think about it. You are on Jake patrol. You made him like that, so you get to take care of him. Make sure he’s dressed and ready to go in half an hour. He better be sober enough to sit through dinner without falling asleep in the gazpacho.”
Mason looked toward Parker, “Brew some coffee, man. Ryker, come with me, we have to make sure he gets showered and shaved.”
“Not a problem, I’ve seen him naked too many times to count.”
Lexi shook her head and walked away, but not before she said, “It’s good to see you Mace. I’ve missed you.”
“Missed you too, hot stuff.”
Ryker and Mason went into the master bedroom and found Jake sprawled across the bed, face down the in sheets, shirtless, and with his pants halfway down his legs.
“Jesus,” Mason ran his hand over his face. “Start the shower. I’ll get him off the bed.”
After a lot of grumbling and Jake trying to kiss Mason, mistaking him for Lexi, they got him showered, pumped with coffee and halfway shaved. Ryker was helping him with the razor because they didn’t fully trust their friend yet. Mason took note of his surroundings and realized that his friend was living a really good life. His house was amazing, not too big, but big enough so they had room to grow. His soon-to-be wife was hot as hell and one of the sweetest girls he knew and the view out of the master bedroom was spectacular.
He was contemplating buying a place on the beach when the view from the master bedroom got a hundred times better. From where he was sitting, he could see a woman’s bare backside; she was wearing a silver thong bathing suit bottom that made her ass look like two perfectly round globes his hands itched to get in contact with. She was also topless and, when she turned while stretching, he got a great view of perky side boob. She had a tattoo that stretched across her back turning him on even more.
This girl was fucking gorgeous. He hadn’t seen a body like hers in a very long time. He couldn’t see her face, thanks to a stubborn palm tree, but he saw her shoulders down to her toes and what he saw, he liked a lot. She was tall, lithe, perfectly round in all the right places and sexy as hell with the tattoo trying to tell him a story.
Mason was just about to ask who the hottie was when he spotted another tattoo on a different body, but this one was disturbingly familiar. One he had run his hands over many times. A tramp stamp that spoke truths about the owner. Holy Shit! Mason sprang off the bed and went into the bathroom.
“Brooke is here?”
Jake winced, but it wasn’t from Ryker accidently nicking him with the razor. “Yeah, I meant to tell you, but I guess it slipped my mind.”
“Shit man, a little heads-up would have been awesome. Fuck, this is awkward.”
“I know. I’m sorry, but Brooke and Lex are good friends. I was afraid if I told you she was coming, you wouldn’t show up.”
Mason punched Jake in the arm. “Stop being a girl. Of course I would have come. I’ll just have to make sure I’m extremely intoxicated this weekend.”
“I can help with that,” Ryker said, while looking around. “Hey, where’s Parker?”
“Probably with Lexi,” Jake responded. “They’re good friends and it’s good for Parker. He’s been feeling lonely out there in Georgia while we’re all back here in the west. I know he likes his team and couldn’t be happier that he’s playing baseball for a living, but when he’s around us, he gets depressed.”
“That sucks,” Ryker said, not showing much compassion.
“You feeling better, man?” Mason asked, trying to change the subject.
“Yeah, I guess.” He clapped his hands together. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
The guys all walked out of the bedroom and out onto the deck where there were already a good number of people, along with waiters and alcohol being poured. This was what Mason needed, distractions and booze. Mason spotted Lexi being surrounded by friends with Parker at her side. She looked incredibly happy and…hot. She was wearing a white dress that did wonders for her curves. It was tight everywhere. Mason shook his head. Jake was seriously one lucky man.
Mason saw Brooke out of the corner of his eye, but ignored her; he didn’t want to have a scene with her right at the beginning of the weekend. If he was lucky, he could avoid her altogether. The girls were staying at Lexi and Jake’s house for the weekend and the guys would be at the hotel, so that helped out Mason’s chances of avoiding Brooke. He just hoped after the mishap on the airplane of being hung up on, she’d be so pissed off that she’d avoid him as well.
Mason grabbed a beer for him and the guys. He handed them out and they all clinked their bottles together. Mason was going to make sure he watched Jake’s intake because he didn’t want his friend hurting tomorrow from a hangover. Plus, if Jake was out of it, Lexi was going to have Mason’s head and, she might be short, but she was full of piss and vinegar.
Mason took a swig of his beer and scanned the room, while Ryker pushed Jake’s buttons. Something Ryker was really good at. Mason was eyeing some of the appetizers when a flash of red crossed his vision. He focused on the vision in front of him. It was the girl with the amazing body. She had deep red curly hair, creamy white skin and the dress she was wearing showed off her tattoo perfectly.
The dress was a beaded silver dress that sat low on her hips, like a dress from the twenties. The back dipped daringly low and, when she turned around, he found that it did the same in the front. The neckline went down to below her breasts in a V-neck perfection that left enough to the imagination for a man to drool. He t
ore his sight off her cleavage just long enough to take in the tattoo that stretched across her collarbone, a pleasant surprise. As his sight climbed, his mouth went dry; he needed to be closer to this woman.
He was just about to walk over to her when he stopped dead in his tracks once he’d made eye contact with the beauty. He knew that face…from where did he know that face? Then it came all flashing back to him, Jojo from the airplane. Mason ran a hand over his face. Of course, the goddess with the perfect body, to die for hair and intriguing tattoo had to be the hot mess from the airplane.
He nudged Jake in the side. “What is Jojo doing here? Do you know her?”
Jake scanned the room and raised his eyebrow at Mason. “Who the hell is Jojo?”
Mason nonchalantly pointed toward the red-headed temptress with his beer. “Jojo, the one in the drop-dead gorgeous dress.”
“There is only one drop-dead gorgeous woman…”
Mason nudged him again. “Honestly, focus and forget about your fiancé for one damn second. Jesus. The redhead over there, Jojo, do you know her?”
Jake spotted the girl he was looking at and turned toward Mason. “Why the hell are you calling her Jojo?”
“That’s the girl from the airplane, the hot mess. When we introduced ourselves, she said her name was Jojo.”
Jake stared at Mason for a second and then barked out a roar of laughter…so loud that everyone took a second to look at them. The outburst had Lexi coming over and wrapping her arms around Jake’s waist.
“What’s so funny, big guy?” she asked.
Jake wiped his eyes and chuckled to himself while saying, “Piper fake-named Mason.”
“What are you talking about?” Mason asked.
Lexi looked over at the girl in question and started laughing as well. “Pipe, come here,” she shouted.
Mason turned Lexi toward him. “What are you doing? Don’t bring her over here.”
Lexi shooed him off. Piper/Jojo, whoever the hell she was, came over and stood next to Lexi. She must be about five ten, because she was towering over Lexi and just shorter than Mason, who was six three. She was even more gorgeous up close. Mason now knew why she was always wearing silver, because her eyes were the same color. He had never seen anything like it.
Lexi grabbed the redhead around the waist and said, “Piper, I believe you might know Mason. Mason this is Piper, my best friend from my childhood and my maid of honor.”
Mason felt his jaw drop. Life wasn’t fair. The one girl he found infinitely attractive for the first time in a very long time was a bitch and a half, hot mess, crazy pants.
Mason took her slender hand in his and shook it. “So, it’s not Jojo?”
A huge grin spread across her face as she answered. “No, I prefer not to give my name to giant douche bags on airplanes.” The way she said that, with the smile on her face, made her seem like a conniving little bitch and he didn’t like conniving little bitches.
Mason could feel his temper rising because Ryker was poking him in the side and telling him what an idiot he was; Jake and Lexi could not stop laughing and Piper just stood in front of him smiling brightly. Jerks, all of them!
“You guys are idiots.” That was the best retort he could come up with. He left the cackling hyenas and went straight to the bar.
***
Piper watched Mason walk away with his tail between his legs. She looked over at Jake and Lexi, who were still laughing. Instead of laughing with her friends, she decided to put her plan into action, so she followed Mason to the bar. When she caught up to him, she nudged his shoulder with hers to let him know she was next to him.
“Don’t go crying, now.”
Mason looked her up and down and shook his head. “It’s a fucking shame.”
“What is?” she asked with a smile.
“That a body that hot belongs to a mouthy woman like you.”
She thrust her body toward him and said in a husky tone, “So, you think I’m hot?”
She watched his gaze glide over her, sending a burning sensation through her body. She might not care for the man, but by God, could he wear a pair of jeans. Plus, the way his button-up shirt clung to him and showed off his corded forearms from where he rolled up his sleeves, sent her mind into fantasy land. She couldn’t let her senses get to her, though; she had one mission and one mission only and that was to get Mason back.
“Yeah, you’re hot and you know it.”
She shrugged. “It’s the dress. I took about five minutes to get ready for this party. If I was more self-involved, I would have at least spent an hour getting ready.”
He gestured up and down. “That’s five minutes of getting ready? Jesus, I wouldn’t want to know what you look like after an hour of primping.”
“My, my, my, was that a compliment?”
He rolled his eyes and grabbed what looked like a scotch from the bartender. “Don’t let it go to your head. You are fuckable, but almost every woman here is.”
“And you think you could get any woman here to sleep with you?”
He laughed. “Uh yeah, look at me.”
Piper gave him a long scan, starting at his feet, up his legs where his jeans clung in all the right places, up his torso that stood out like a proud peacock, to his face that had a delectable five o’clock shadow framing his jaw, all the way to his deep brown eyes and perfectly styled hair.
She shrugged, grabbed her drink from the bartender and said, “You’re nothing to write home about. You’re a bit too tall, your eyes are brown, and you act like a Neanderthal. Now, Ryker, on the other hand, I will be introducing my breasts to him.”
With that, she walked away, but not too soon to get a glimpse at Mason’s outraged reaction. That was satisfying, she thought, but she wouldn’t be fully satisfied until she saw her plan to fruition. She just hoped that Mason couldn’t tell that she was lying because he was, by far, the most attractive man at the party. And those eyes, she knew she just passed them off as brown, but they were more than that. They had character in them, charm and kindness when he was caught off guard. His eyes spoke words, words that, for some odd reason, hit Piper in the heart.
She walked over to Ryker who had a very flamboyant way of dressing that Piper found odd, but it also worked for the man. If it wasn’t for the undressing of her he was doing with his eyes, she’d think that he might possibly be gay. That thought was quickly squashed when he licked his lips and continued to stare at her breasts when she was standing right in front of him. She got to get a good look at him while he stared at her. He was probably about six foot, maybe a little taller, but not as tall as Mason and Jake and he had dark hair, green eyes and dark skin almost like Mason, but where Mason was ruggedly handsome, Ryker was pretty-boy gorgeous. His hair was thick and stood straight up in a messy, but tamed mop on the top of his head; his face was freshly-shaven, whereas Mason sported the five o’clock shadow. To top it all off, Ryker had a dimple in his chin that only kicked up the charm radiating off of him.
Piper grabbed his chin and lifted his head so they made eye contact. She had to admit, he was one gorgeous man, but for some odd reason, she found Mason more appealing. She shook that thought out of her head because she didn’t want to think of Mason as an attractive human…at all.
“Eye’s up here, pervert.”
Ryker chuckled. “When you wear a dress like that, all gentlemanly decorum is thrown out the window.”
“Oh, so you know how to act like a gentleman? That surprises me. I assumed you walked around with your tongue hanging out of your mouth, popping a boner with every woman you see.”
Ryker stood in silence for a second observing Piper before he busted out in laughter, which caused everyone to look at them. He wrapped his arm around her waist and guided her toward the bar. Piper got a quick glimpse at Mason as she walked away with Ryker and she saw fury lacing those chocolate brown eyes. Perfect!
“You have a mouth on you; I like that. Do you do more with that mouth than come up with sma
rt ass remarks?”
“I do actually, but your sorry ass will never find out.”
“Ouch. Pretty sure of that aren’t you?”
Piper nodded her head while taking another look at Mason. Ryker turned and looked at who she was stealing glances at. When he turned back around, he had a huge smile plastered on his face.
“So, you’re trying to make Dash jealous.”
“Dash?”
“Yeah, Mason. That’s what we call him on the field, well what everyone calls him. He is a good looking man, I must say…if you’re into gargantuans.”
“I’m not into gargantuans…I mean Mason. I’m just hoping for a little revenge.”
Ryker set the down the drink he was holding and rubbed his hands together. “Ooo, revenge. I’m in. Tell me what I need to do.”
Piper gave him a skeptical look. “Why would I have you help me? You’re friends with him; I never should have told you…”
Ryker didn’t let her finish. “Holy shit, you are the hot mess from the airplane, aren’t you?” She just nodded, causing Ryker to laugh some more. “Oh, this is so perfect. Come on, you have to let me help.”
Piper knew she needed Ryker on her side because she didn’t want him and Mason ganging up on her and blowing up her spot. So, she conceded and let him help her. After hearing her plan for revenge, he gave her a high five and told her how he could help. This was turning out to be a great weekend, after all.
Chapter 4
Mason watched two of his best friends dance their first dance together. The wedding was heartwarming and made him think that it could have been him and Brooke. Thankfully, it wasn’t. He dodged that bullet and he couldn’t have been more grateful. Brooke had not even approached him since the weekend started. It was kind of shocking, but he knew it must be because she didn’t want to start a scene. Even though she was a self-absorbed bitch, she still had a little bit of a heart and wanted to make sure the night was special for their friends. Thankfully, she already took off, right after the pictures because she had to get back to LA for her auditions.