Chapter Ten
Adrian got the ball over the net with an underhand serve and then managed to send it back when she re‑ turned it in a high parabolic curve. They passed the ball back and forth for a few minutes. His confidence grew every time he returned the ball. She’d beat him, but he’d probably win a couple points, he decided. He didn’t play tennis or racquetball, but he ran several times a week. He was tall, so he had a good reach. He swung his shoulders to loosen them, smiling back at Caroline as he relaxed into the unaccustomed activity.
“If you’re still interested in a match, let’s see your serve,” he told her.
“Okay!” Caroline called, voice bright and eager. “Ready?”
Adrian bent over as he vaguely recalled tennis players did during matches, holding the racket in both hands.
“Ready,” he said.
Caroline tossed the ball into the air, going to her full height as she bounced on her toes and slammed the ball in his direction at the approximate speed of a cruising 747. It hit in the left corner of the service box and then careened off the chain‑link fence behind him with such force that the entire structure rang like a bell. Adrian had not even had the opportunity to move in the appropriate direction, let alone intercept it.
Adrian let his racket droop. He gave Caroline a look. “What?” she asked. “Were you not ready?”
He edged closer to the left side of the court. “No, I was as ready as I get,” he said.
“Okay,” Caroline said. “Fifteen – love.”
The next half hour was rough on his pride. His serves went mostly into the net. Caroline’s next serve of the following set hit the right pocket with enough spin on it that it arched out of his reach before he got close. Then the next one startled him by going into his racket. He got the sense that she was not so much trying to keep him on his toes as she was assessing what he could do, but that did not mean he managed to return the ball any more often than she seemed to want him to. She alternated sides with every return, and he was soon panting from the effort of running back and forth across the court. He almost wished she’d just hit the corner with her serves and save him the effort of running before losing every point.
As he stalked past her at the end of a set, she nearly sent him head over feet by smacking his ass with the flat of her racket.
“How are you sweating?” she snickered. “It’s forty degrees out here!”
Adrian tossed his sweatshirt off, glaring his scandalized objection at her. His undershirt was sticking to his body.
She seemed to think better of her attitude. Her teeth raked her lower lip as she wet it.
“Good hustle though,” she told him, searching for some possible praise in light of his abject subjugation on the court. She returned to the service line.
“Have you not won yet?” he demanded, assuming his position on the opposite side of the court for what felt like the millionth time. He was going to have a heart attack if he kept this up much longer.
“I won, like, two sets ago,” she admitted.
Adrian dropped his head back and stared up toward the floodlights above them.
“So, your biggest problem,” Caroline said, “is that you should be using your backhand when it comes toward your nondominant side, instead of trying to step around it to get it with your forehand. You’re running yourself ragged when you could just extend a little. Play smarter, not harder.”
“Oh, is that my biggest problem?” Adrian asked, breathing heavily.
“Well, that and your prereturn leaves a lot to be desired. Let’s try to work on it, Mr. Flatfoot,” she announced, as though their bodies weren’t steaming in the late‑night air of a decrepit Brookline tennis court, and they were instead discussing the finer points of form at his father’s country club in the New York suburbs on a fine May afternoon, and also he was fifteen.
Caroline sent another serve across the net, the ball passing a couple of feet to his left.
“Backhand,” she said. He watched the ball go.
“Sir, your attitude needs some work,” she said firmly, her accent deepening. “Don’t you want to win?”
“You are literally paying me to be here,” Adrian reminded her.
“I’m not paying you to suck!” she yelled back, a giggle beginning to work its way into her tone. She scooped up another ball from her bag. She sent it over to his left, slightly closer. “Backhand!”
Adrian made one last, abortive lunge for the ball but spun it off the edge of his racket.
“That was better,” Caroline chirped. She picked up an‑ other ball. “Backhand!”
“I’m done,” Adrian growled. “You win.”
“Noooo,” Caroline mock wailed. “We can make some real improvement on your backhand.”
She served another ball to his left, which he ignored. Then a second one that barely missed him. He looked up at her sharply to see if she’d done it on purpose.
“Backhand!” she called.
The next one grazed him. She was doing it on purpose. “Oh, come on!” she yelled. “You’re not that old. Are you tired already?”
Adrian squared his shoulders and gave her his sternest look, to no apparent effect. “I’m done,” he repeated. He turned to look at all the balls he’d need to pick up, and she hammered a serve directly into his shins. He yelped and swore as he jumped, turning to freeze her with a promise of vengeance. That was going to leave a bruise.
“Backhand?” she said.
He dropped her racket on the hard court.
“Uh‑oh,” she gasped, quickly bending to scoop up another couple of balls. As she continued to pelt him with tennis balls, he charged across the court, using his last surge of adrenaline to vault the net and barrel right at her. She was in the middle of a final volley when he caught her and wrapped his arms around her, trying to wrestle her racket out of her grip. She squealed and turned so that her back was against his stomach, both of their hands grappling to hold on to her tennis racket.
“Oh, no, no, no, you’re covered in sweat!” she yelped, barely able to form words over her desperate, hysterical laughter.
He ground the side of his face into her neck, wiping sweat into her skin and hair, which still smelled like drugstore shampoo and clean woman, with not even the faintest hint of exertion.
He should have let go then. She wasn’t letting go of the racket, and they were making a scene. If he’d let go first, he wouldn’t have had to think about it later. Holding on meant he had to admit that he wanted her, that an animal portion of his brain had noted that this position would do, and that Caroline pressed against the entire length of his body was a very good position indeed. In fact, she was the perfect height for this position, might as well have been designed for him to lean over and wrap around and press his hips into. It felt like sex, like living, like every sharp‑edged and vital impulse he’d smothered for years. You’re a disgrace, said a more rational part of his mind.
But that part was not in control anymore, and perhaps had not been for the entire length of time he’d known her. So he held on tighter until they stumbled and fell on the court, Caroline sprawled out over his chest, both of them panting.
His chest was on fire as he rolled to his back, exhausted, aroused, and bewildered. Every emotion and sensation was centered on the woman laughing on top of him. He couldn’t make himself let go. He couldn’t see how he ever would.
“I win,” she whispered, expression exultant.
Copyright Katie Shepard, Berkley, 2023
SWEETEN THE DEAL by Katie Shepard
She’s lonely, rich, and ten years too young for him—but she’s also his “sugar daddy,” and they couldn’t have less in common. Opposites attract in this charming new romance by Katie Shepard.
MBA student Caroline Sedlacek knows her personal balance sheet is a little lopsided. On the asset side, at twenty-two she’s got an NCAA trophy, a great education…and the two million dollars she unexpectedly inherited. Liabilities? She’s never had friends, a boyfriend, or any life experiences away from the tennis court or the classroom. She’d love to invest herself in everything else, but “everything else” never came easily for her.
In the ten years since he left art school as a vaunted prodigy, Adrian Landry has won shows and major prizes—and done his best to shed his reputation as a pretty man who makes pretty paintings. Though currently broke and sleeping off a bad break-up on his college roommate’s couch, he knows this is the chance to get his life back on track at thirty-three—he just needs the money to find a new gallery.
When Adrian’s roommate lists him on a thinly veiled escort site, Caroline is not the patron he expected. She’s way too young, way too naive, and loudly uninterested in having sex with him. Instead, they’re both going to get exactly what they want: a little culture on her side, and a lot of cash on his. Aside from their sugar baby arrangement, they’ve got nothing in common. But as they reel from the symphony to the Haymarket, they learn that what they want and what they need might be two very different things.
Women’s Fiction | Romance Comedy [Berkley, On Sale: October 17, 2023, Trade Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9780593549315 / eISBN: 9780593549322]
Buy SWEETEN THE DEAL: Amazon.com | Kindle | BN.com | Apple Books | Kobo | Google Play | Powell’s Books | Books-A-Million | Indie BookShops | Ripped Bodice | Love’s Sweet Arrow | Walmart.com | Target.com | Amazon CA | Amazon UK | Amazon DE | Amazon FR
About Katie Shepard
Katie Shepard studied Soviet history and worked in human rights law before burning way—way out—and achieved professional tranquility as a simple country bankruptcy lawyer. She lives in Texas with her husband, kids, and elderly rescue cat, but is often found hiking in the Rocky Mountains or the virtual woods of Thedas.
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