“How many others, Giselle?”

I shift around on the chair. “You make me feel like I’m in the principal’s office.”

“How many?”

My hand clenches. Oh, he’s so aggravating!

“I don’t understand why you need to know, but there was only one other one, Barry, a bit on the slick side. His bio said he was a chemistry major, so I thought, ‘He likes science, and so do I,’ so I swiped right. Turned out he just wanted me to sign up for some pyramid scheme to sell kitchen things like Pampered Chef but not. I passed on being a rep but ended up buying a spatula from him.” I sigh. “I even paid for his latte. Then came Rodeo, and he had that adorable emu . . .”

“Giselle.” There’s a heavy dose of frustration in his voice, and it makes me lift my chin defiantly.

“Sometimes you have to go through a bunch of duds, Devon. Don’t pretend like you know a thing about it. You have a new girlfriend every month. Who was the girl at the reception? Pity I never got introduced.”

A long exasperated breath leaves his broad chest. “Who’d you come with tonight?”

“Is this twenty questions?”

A small knowing smile tugs at his lips. “I know you have to answer me. Elena told me about your little question problem.”

“That little minx,” I breathe. She’s on her honeymoon in Hawaii with the man of her dreams, yet I feel as if she’s right next to me. My beautiful, sweet older sister, whose shadow I’ve never truly been able to escape. I sigh. At least she’s happy, and no one deserves it more than her. Before she met Jack, I ruined our relationship last year when Preston, her then boyfriend, kissed me that awful day in his office—right before she walked in. Is it any wonder that he and I never felt right? We started off wrong.

A ball of emotion clogs my throat, and I gather myself, trying to push those memories away. It takes effort.

“Topher drove me,” I say grudgingly. “When I took my car to the shop in Daisy, I walked to the library, and he was closing up. He drove me back to Nashville and insisted on coming with me here since I’d never met anyone at a bar before.”

Devon wants to know about my car, and I tell him how I came down this morning to a failed attempt to steal my older-model Camry.

“Are these dates about getting over Preston?” he asks in a careful tone as he gingerly sits down across from me.

“Best way to get over someone is to find someone new.”

A few ticks of silence go by, and the air around us resonates with tension, and as soon as I catch on, I sit up straighter and focus. I don’t understand why the space between us feels charged, but it’s crackling.

“Right,” Devon grinds out as his eyes drape over me, lingering on my blouse before coming up to my face. Our eyes cling until he looks away and scrubs his jaw. “You should get a friend to introduce you to someone—”

“Uh-huh. You’re my friend. Right?”

He frowns. “Of course. Why would you even ask?”

Oh, I don’t know, because I can’t figure you out. Why did you give me a level-five gaze at the wedding? Was it the ugly dress? Was it me?

“Fine. Who do you suggest I date? He needs to be kind and good in bed—no, scratch that, spectacular. I’m talking fireworks, Devon—mind blowing.”

His gets up and paces away from me.

“Did someone say spectacular? If so, I have arrived,” says Aiden as he swaggers in the door and over to the table. About six-two with short brown hair and glittering ice-blue eyes, he’s a farm boy from Alabama with a megawatt smile that makes female hearts patter. Currently, he’s the Tigers’ backup quarterback, but he has his sights set on Jack’s starting position.

After settling down in the seat vacated by Devon, he hands me a glass of water, the one he dashed off to get after Devon ordered him to. “Word to the wise, I have excellent hearing. Part of my superhuman quarterback skills. Can you define how many orgasms you need? I’m good for five a day and have references.”

I burst out laughing, and he joins me. He’s about my age, and I’ve never seen him without a grin or a girl. He showed up at my sister’s wedding with two. Twins, no less, and he danced with both of them at the same time at the reception, slow, one in front with her arms around his neck, and one behind him, her hands around his waist. It worked better than I thought it would.

“You are ridiculous,” I say. He reminds me of a puppy, sweet and rambunctious, begging for you to throw the ball during the day, then curling up next to you at night.

Devon, on the other hand, is a panther; one minute you think he’s lazing in the sun, twitching his tail, and the next he’s vibrating with barely suppressed power. Like he is now as he scowls at Aiden.

What’s his deal?

The football guys joke around me all the time.

Aiden watches me drain the glass. “I didn’t mean to hit you in the face. Sorry, Giselle. I didn’t even realize it was you until you landed on the floor.”

I glance at Devon, who’s taken a couple of steps back to lean against the wall. He has his phone out, seeming to have forgotten about me. Good.

“I didn’t know it was you either,” I murmur.

He leans in closer. “Dude. Your date left with some brunette. Hope it wasn’t a love connection.”

I laugh. “Guess he found a little filly to take home.”

He guffaws.

“He said he’d let me play with his bridles and spurs. I half expected him to whip out a . . . whip.”

Aiden roars with laughter as I recount the date, reciting Rodeo’s words about his God-given talent and his angry-sex suggestion, all the way to his offer of putting organic blueberries on pancakes. When I finish, he wipes a tear from his eye. “What a douche.”

“She met him on some app,” Devon growls, stuffing his phone in his jeans.

“Perfectly acceptable,” I reply coolly.

“You can do better.”

“I’m not Nashville’s sexiest woman!”

“You’re not unattractive!” He glares at me.

Well. I blow out a breath.

There’s several ticks of silence as Aiden looks at him, then back at me, a thoughtful expression on his face. He taps his fingers on the table, seeming to come to a decision. “So about these fireworks. How do you feel about—”

Devon straightens up from the wall, moving faster than I anticipated, and slaps a heavy hand on Aiden’s broad shoulders. “Give it up, Alabama. She’s off limits.”

My spine straightens. Off limits?

Back in February when I was engaged, yes, but now that I’m single?

Aiden brushes Devon’s hand off and flashes me a grin so big it looks like his cheeks might crack. When he speaks, his words are directed to Devon, but he’s looking at me like I’m a slice of pie. “If you think I give one rat’s ass what Jack Hawke thinks about who I talk to, then you need to check yourself. I was the Tigers’ first-round pick in the draft—”

“You aren’t special, pup,” Devon growls.

“And no one, even the team captain, tells me who I can chat up,” Aiden adds. “He isn’t even here. We’re in the middle of training camp, and he’s at the beach.”