Page 23 of Risky Play

“I don’t want to do this, but my agent made me,” he growled.

I raised an eyebrow at him.

He gave me a pained look. “Sorry.”

I pulled my camera away from my face and peered at him. I had him sitting on the staircase at my brother’s house. Noah and Dinah had a gorgeous modern townhome, and the open staircase looked like a perfect place for photos, but Matt was being difficult.

“How about we do this outside?” I suggested.

He furrowed his brow. “Why?”

“I think it would be better. The exterior has the brick-yet-modern look. It would make the photos come out great.”

“Fine,” he grumbled.

For me doing him a favor, he sure was grumpy about it.

“Listen to her!” Dinah called down from her office on the second floor.

A grin spread across my face at D coming to my aid, but then I frowned. “Get back to your edits!”

I smirked when I was met with silence.

When I got here, I told Dinah to get working on her word count, and once I was done with Matt, we’d talk marketing. Someone had to crack the whip. My brother gave in to her demands too much, despite him trying to get her to work, too.

Once outside, I instructed Matt to sit on the steps; he obliged but still looked irritable. I set down my camera and repositioned him, angling his head down a little and having him show off the logo on his hoodie. When he said an athleisure company wanted to work with him, he neglected to mention it was one of the most popular brands. His agent should have a professional from the brand working with him, not me.

I pushed his hair behind his ear, and he flinched at my touch. “Sorry, just trying to make it look good.”

“Sorry. I’m grumpy.”

“What’s wrong? I promise this won’t take long. I’ll snap a bunch of shots, and you pick the best. Then I can help you schedule this.”

I didn’t have class until late, so I had all the time to help Matt with this before he had to get to the arena. But it was like he got up on the wrong side of the bed today.

“Nothing,” he muttered.

“Okay…” I trailed off but didn’t believe him.

I stepped back, put my camera up to my face, and took some shots. He was still a grumpasaurus.

“Matt, look like you enjoy my company,” I said.

The crease in his brow deepened. “Why would you say that?”

“Because you’re not smiling in any of these. Like you hate me.”

“I don’t hate you, sweet pea.”

I gave him an annoyed look, especially with that cheesy nickname again. “Doesn’t look like it.”

“I’m a healthy scratch today.”

Oooh. Well, that made sense. Definitely sucked being on the bench for no reason. Sometimes, it was just to shake up the lines. Other times, you pissed off the coach, and he was teaching you a lesson. Or Coach needed to give someone else minutes.

I looked at Matt’s stats this morning, and he was doing well. He played two seasons at the minor league affiliate before he got the call up last year when the old captain got injured. He made the team this year, but he was still on a two-way contract. He put up points in his last game, so it didn’t make sense for Coach to bench him.

“Maybe Coach needed to shake things up.”