Читать книгу What Lies Between Lovers - Sophia Shaw - Страница 10

“Let go of me, Gary!” Tao demanded.

Gary had his arms wrapped around Tao’s chest, forcibly pulling him away.

“Sam, man, just let it go,” said Gary.

“I’m cool, I’m cool. It’s over,” replied Tao. His fists were clenched tight, ready to respond if provoked.

On the other side of the gym, a Wild Dog player was limping and cursing at Tao with every possible dirty word. The referee was standing between the two teams to ensure the conflict didn’t escalate. Everyone else was standing still, wondering exactly what went down and waiting to see what would happen next. It took a few minutes, but the agitated Wild Dogs player was eventually led out of the room by his teammates.

“You tripped him on purpose, didn’t you?” Gary asked after things had quieted down.

“Tsk! The idiot tripped over my foot,” Tao told him.

“Yeah, sure he did.”

“He’s lucky I didn’t shove my fist down his throat after what he did to Monique.” Tao made this statement in a quiet, emotionless voice, but his face was hard with smothered fury. Gary nodded in agreement.

They both looked over at the bench as Monique touched her bruised shoulder and rolled it to check mobility and pain. Her oval face revealed a little discomfort, with slender, shapely lips pulled back and her even white teeth clenched hard.

Tao found his eyes drawn to her most dominant features: deep, smoky eyes, now surprisingly enhanced with a little makeup. They were one of the first things he had noticed when he had met Monique Evans over a month ago at the start of the basketball season. Even with her hair pulled back and in sweaty gym clothes, those eyes held the promise of sensuality. His first reaction was the natural male instinct to make a move. Then he saw her game skills, and any interest he felt was replaced with respect, almost admiration. Now, Tao tried to think of her as one of the guys.

“How does it feel?” Gary asked when they reached her.

“It’s okay, just a little sore.”

“You’ll have to put some ice on it,” Tao told her.

She nodded, and the three of them made their way out of the now empty gym.

“Are we going to get something to eat?” asked Gary once they reached the men’s locker room.

It was a routine for the three of them, and anyone else on the team who was free, to clean up then go to one of the nearby restaurants for dinner after the game.

“I think I’ll pass, Coop,” Monique told him.

“I’m out too,” Tao added. He was about to explain why, when they were interrupted by a woman walking toward them from the front of the building.

“Tao, are you coming?”

The question was more like a command. She stopped behind him, and Tao didn’t have to turn around to imagine the annoyed look on her face or the tight fist planted aggressively on her hip. His back straightened with annoyance.

“The game’s been over for, like, twenty minutes or something. I’ve been just standing out here waiting.”

“Hey, Tanisia, how are you?” Gary asked after several seconds passed and Tao did not respond to her.

“Okay, well, I’ll see you guys later,” Monique told them, clearly wanting to avoid the awkward situation. She turned and headed for the changing room. Gary took her cue and did the same.

“What’s going on, Tao?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Tanisia,” he replied, finally turning around to face her.

“You don’t know what I’m talking about? Do I look like an idiot?”

Tao could not contain the condescending smirk that spread on his lips. But, he managed not to say anything.

“What’s going on between you and that chick?”

His brows lowered quickly, and his confusion was very obvious.

“What?”

“That chick,” she uttered, pointing to the spot that Monique had just vacated. “What’s going on? And, don’t tell me that I imagined the way you looked at her!” demanded Tanisia, her voice getting louder with each sentence. “Then you go and attack the guy because he bumped into her. What the hell!”

Tao closed his eyes and let out a long breath, partly because her screeching was giving him a headache, but also because he didn’t really know what to say. He had been really concerned about Monique and had let his anger get the better of him. But it was just because she was his teammate, right?

“Tanisia, I’m not talking to you while you’re shouting in my face, all right? So, just calm down and stop being ridiculous. You’re embarrassing me.”

“Oh, please! I’m embarrassing you? How do you think I feel coming down here to watch your game, and you go to the rescue of some other woman? Then practically ignore me while I wait forever for you? And who do I find you talking to when you finally decide to show yourself?”

“Tanisia…!”

“You think you can treat me like this?”

She was a petite girl, maybe five feet, three inches, and no more than 110 pounds. Yet Tanisia had no problem getting up in his face with her finger wiggling under his nose. Her head shook and bobbed to enunciate every statement.

“Like I said,” Tao replied, stressing his words and keeping his voice deadly quiet. “I don’t know what you’re going on about, and I’m not talking to you while you’re shouting and getting on.”

“Oh, so you’re not going to answer me, huh?”

He looked her dead in the eyes to show how serious he was, then turned to walk away. Unfortunately, Monique chose that moment to step out of the changing room and was just in time to hear Tanisia blow her lid.

“Fine then! Walk away like you always do, you bastard! You better lose my number, ’cause there are plenty of men who want some of this! You ain’t nothin’, do you hear me? LOSE MY NUMBER!”

Tao’s back was still turned to Tanisia, but from the corner of his eye, he could see Monique’s expression, a mix of guilty curiosity, disgust, and humor as she watched Tanisia storm off, her high-heel boots clicking loudly on the tiled floors. Monique then gave him an assessing glance, as though seeing him for the first time, before also walking away.

Tao could only shake his head, wondering exactly what had happened to send this evening in such a weird direction.

Inside the men’s changing room, Gary and a couple of other players were getting dressed after showering. The look on their faces made it obvious that everyone in the room had heard the confrontation.

“So I guess you’re free to go get a meal, huh?” Gary asked before bursting into rolling, riotous laughter.

“Tsk! I don’t know what’s wrong with that girl,” Tao said once his friend calmed down a little. “We’ve only been hanging for a few months. You’d think we were married or something.”

“Who told you to invite her to the game? That’s always a mistake.”

“I didn’t invite her! She invited herself, going on about where am I playing and why can’t she come? I just got tired of hearing about it.”

“Sam, my man, I’ve got to say, you knew her ass was a little crazy, but you went there anyway,” stated Gary, chuckling again at his own words. “She’s cute and all, but we’re talking ‘slash your tires,’ ‘boil your rabbit’ crazy!”

Tao just gave him an annoyed glance then headed to the shower.

“How about Mexican? I’m craving tacos,” Gary continued while still laughing.

Tao could still hear the guys ribbing him until he was standing under the spray of water. Now that the drama had passed, he could see the humor in the bizarre situation. His lips curved into a smile and he started to laugh silently.

Gary was right. Tao should have known that things would not work out between him and Tanisia. He had met her at the grocery store near his old apartment. They had both been picking out bunches of bananas, and their eyes had connected. He could tell right away that she was interested in him, just by the way she flipped her hair, and discreetly looked him up and down. Tao had not said anything to her at that moment, but gave in later when they passed each other twice in the frozen food aisle.

There was no doubt that Tanisia was an attractive girl. She had a tight, petite body and a nice, if not exactly pretty, face. But he had hesitated to make a move on her at first. She was a little too made up and obvious for his taste, wearing butt-hugging yoga pants and a tank top that clung to her torso like a second skin. She could have been coming from the gym, except she had on a full face of makeup.

When she finally spoke to him, he was standing near the ice-cream section, looking at the frozen desserts and trying to remember what he still had in his freezer.

“Excuse me? Have you seen any caramel crunch?”

Tao had not been surprised that she approached him. He had been anticipating it, but it still took him a few seconds to figure out what she was talking about. She must have mistaken his confused glance for flirtation, because she gave him a big smile and came several steps closer to him.

“I’m Tanisia,” she added.

“Hey,” he immediately replied. “I’m Tao.”

“Tao?” she repeated, mispronouncing it. “That’s interesting. Is it Spanish?”

It was the typical response he got to his foreign name, so it didn’t faze him. His face, skin tone, and particularly his eyes often had people confused about his nationality.

“No, it’s Chinese,” he explained.

“Really? You’re Chinese?”

Tao almost smiled as she looked him up and down, her gaze lingering around his crotch as through trying to assess how Asian he really was.

“Half Chinese actually,” was his brief response.

Tanisia just nodded, a sparkle in her eyes.

They spoke for a few minutes and eventually exchanged numbers. Things took a casual course after that, where they spoke a few times on the phone, and then went out to dinner. On the second date, Tanisia invited him back to her apartment and into her bed.

Though Tao wasn’t dating anyone else at the moment, he had not considered their relationship to be exclusive or committed. Things between them were fine, and the sex was okay, but nothing more than that. It did not take long for him to realize that they had very little in common.

Clearly, after tonight’s outrageous behavior it was over between them, and Tao wasn’t at all upset about it. Her loud voice and unnecessary attitude had gotten tiresome really quick. She wasn’t that cute.