CHAPTER FIFTEEN
BEAUX
I had fifteen minutes to get my head on straight. Fifteen minutes to try, again, to wipe away the way Paige had slammed the door in my face and hurried away from me like the time we’d spent together had meant absolutely nothing to each other.
Fifteen minutes to scrub away the memory of her that was seared into the deepest recesses of my brain.
Fifteen minutes to get over the fact she hadn’t returned a simple fucking text asking how her dad was.
I’d tried for the last two days and it hadn’t worked, but now I was playing like crap. I was making sloppy plays, slow in the pocket, hesitating when I usually envisioned the play before it ever happened. Hell, I’d even managed to get myself sacked.
We were getting our asses kicked, and I had no one to blame but myself.
I was sitting on the bench, knees spread, head in my hands. Damn Paige Halloway. She’d invaded my brain and I couldn’t shake her. Now was not the fucking time to be strung up on some girl who’d made it clear, time and time again, she wanted nothing to do with me.
Move the fuck on, Hale.
“What the hell is going on?” Coach Pomville asked. “Hale?”
I lifted my head. “Yeah, coach?”
“Coach.” He sneered the word like I’d cursed at him. “If I’m the fucking coach, why the hell aren’t you listening to me out there?”
“Off night. I’ll do better next half.”
I meant every damn word. I’d take the blame on this loss, but after looking so good in pre-season we were looking like fools out there.
He glared at me for a minute, and I took it. Absorbed it. Let his anger and frustrations fuel my focus. This was the season opener. I didn’t have time to be screwed up over a chick.
I didn’t let women screw with my head.
“Defense,” Pomville barked. He grabbed their attention and I muted out his instructions to them.
Oliver Powell sat down next to me.
“Don’t start with me,” I groaned, scrubbing my hands through my hair.
“Pussy can fuck a guy up, you know?” He laughed as he said it and bumped my shoulder.
I did not need the visual of the words pussy and fuck coming from my sister’s fiancé. “Don’t make me vomit either.”
He punched my thigh. “Just sayin’, never seen you like this. It’s like your first training camp all over again. Remember those fun days?”
“When you got in my face and screamed at me every two minutes? How could I forget?”
He snorted. “Yeah, but you’ve come a long way since then, and since I did so damn well making you the best quarterback in the league, I’m going to give you some more advice.”
I arched a brow at him. “You made me the best quarterback?”
Powell ignored me. Self-righteous asshole. “Leave it here, Beaux, in this locker room. Deal with it later. You got thirty minutes and then you can go back to trying to fix whatever the hell is screwing up your head, and from what Shannon said, it’s a woman. There’s not shit you can do about it now. Focus on the ball, do what you were born to do, and win us this fucking game. Everyone is fucking looking to you, more so this year than last. You let us down and you’re going to be the fool.”
He didn’t say anything I hadn’t thought. He didn’t say anything I didn’t already know. But Powell was one of the most experienced guys on my team and he took it upon himself to be a father-figure…sometimes, a super large prick of a father figure, but one all the same.
It helped. Sometimes, even a grown man needed a damn pep talk, someone in his corner. My jaw hurt from clenching my teeth so hard and I popped it twice. “Right. I’m on it.”
“I know. I only play with the best, which is why I worked you so hard last year.”
“To make me the best?”
He ignored my sarcastic tone and grinned. “See? I think we’re finally beginning to understand each other.”
I shoved him as he stood, making him lose his balance. He collapsed right into Quinten who pushed Powell to his feet.
I shook my head, grinning at the smirk on Powell’s face before he snagged his helmet off the floor and sauntered away.
“He help?” Quinten asked.
“Yeah.”
“Good. You got this.”
I fist pumped him. “Yeah, we got this.”
Thirty minutes.
I had the game. A comeback from fourteen points was nothing.
I would do it.
And when the game was done, and I was back in Raleigh, I was fucking calling Paige.
Then I’d deal with her, too.
***
I turned on my phone as soon as I slid into my truck in the valet parking garage.
We’d won the game. We came back, won twenty-one to fourteen. I played a second half that felt like instinct and not work, the ball sliding from my fingers on every pass, perfectly aimed for my target. The defense held Atlanta to less than sixty yards in the second half and had kept them from getting close to even kicking a field goal.
We ended the game feeling good, playing like we were trained and paid to do, like we loved to do, but I had other things on my mind as we dressed, boarded a bus and went straight to the plane. Three hours after the game ended and I was back in Raleigh.
I had one more play in mind for the night.
My phone pinged with incoming texts as soon as it was powered on and I quickly scanned the few from Shannon.
OMG you suck. What’s wrong with you.
Get your crap together.
My sister. So supportive. Those were all during the first half. I was used to her running commentary and since I hadn’t blown the game, I shook my head and kept scrolling.
Better, dipstick.
Amazing pass!
PS — Did you see how good Oliver looked in those pants tonight? Scrumptious.
Supportive and disgusting. I shook my head and went to her last text.
Woo-hoo! Knew you could do it baby bro.
I flipped through a few texts from Shannon’s best friend, Melissa, congratulating me along with a handful more from guys I played with in college.
Then two more showed up. My breath caught as I saw Paige’s name on the screen.
Great game.
Home from hospital with my dad. He had surgery.
Shit. My chest burned with worry. I’d gone so far as to call the hospital on Friday when I didn’t hear back from Paige but they wouldn’t tell me anything. I’d considered driving to the garage and seeing if I could find out information there, but then I picked my balls back up.
I was falling for a girl who slammed a door in my face. No way was I showing up at a garage with a bunch of men looking like a pussy.
Another text came after that and it took me a minute to process it.
Can we talk?
Oh. We were talking.
I pulled into the nearest parking lot and pressed the phone icon, dialing Paige’s number.
Pick up. Pick up.
Good God. I was desperate for the sound of her voice falling from her sweet lips.
“Hey,” Paige said, her voice quiet and breathy. “Good game tonight.”
“Is that why you called me tonight Paige? To talk about the game?” I couldn’t keep the coolness out of my tone. My fingers were tapping the steering wheel so hard I could punch a hole through the wheel.
“Well, no.” Her voice went softer. “I called to apologize, about…well…I wanted to say sorry for the other night.”
“I’m coming over.”
“No,” she half-whispered, half-shouted. “My dad’s sleeping, and I think it’s best if you don’t, Beaux, really. I just wanted to talk.”
Fuck that. She was giving me a sliver of an opening and I was sliding in.
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes, and you better answer your door.”
“Beaux—”
“Don’t worry, Paige, I can be quiet.”
I hung up on a breathy little gasp from her and tossed the phone into my cup holder. I expected a string of texts telling me not to come, giving me the brush off. Something.
I got nothing from her, which made me grin as I pulled back into traffic and hopped on the interstate, taking me straight to her.
We had things to talk about. Problems to figure out.
If I was getting to know Paige at all, she’d already concocted a list of reasons to keep me away.
Hell if I was listening to them.
I pulled up onto Paige’s street twenty-three minutes later, slowing down so the roar of my truck didn’t wake anyone even though it was only nine o’clock. But the neighborhood, while well-maintained, was still older and I already knew there was one elderly neighbor, Elsa, who lived nearby.
When I pulled up to Paige’s house, I slowed to a stop at the curb and hopped out of my truck, quietly closing the door.
She was sitting on her front porch, a glass of what looked like tea in her hands. She was rocking on a wooden swing, covered in the shade, feet pulled up on the swing, tan legs on full display with the short sweat shorts she was wearing.
Her brown hair was pulled into a mess on the top of her head, bits and pieces fraying around her temples and sides, and as I got closer, I could tell she wasn’t wearing any makeup.
She’d never looked more beautiful to me. She was always dressed casually when I saw her, but there was something about that picture, her lazily rocking back and forth, sipping what I assumed was sweet tea that hit me straight in the chest.
Visions of doing the same with her, night after night after a long day of work or a day off traveling, enjoying the quiet.
Doing nothing but being together and knowing it was the best thing to do.
That burn in my chest ignited all over again and I leapt up the stairs, settling myself against the railing.
“Hey,” I said, as I watched her gaze roam over my body, my eyes, my chest, dipping low quickly and snapping back up.
“Hey.”
“So you watched the game tonight?”
She sipped her tea and nodded. “We always do.”
“How is he?” I nodded toward the house. I didn’t need to specify I was asking about Sam.
She blew out her breath and brushed hair off her nape. “He broke his leg. Fell in a small hole off the sidewalk.”
“That doesn’t tell me if he’s okay.”
“He’s fine. Or he will be. He had surgery and…”
She bit her bottom lip, chin quivering.
I moved and pulled her next to me, rocking the swing and careful not to spill her drink. As soon as I pulled her into my arms, her head hit my chest and her shoulders shook.
“God, it was so damn scary, Beaux.”
“Had to be.”
I didn’t ask her more. I was perfectly content to bear her stress and her worry while she fought back tears and took deep shuddering breaths that made her entire body tremble.
When she’d calmed, she pushed against my stomach. I let her go reluctantly.
“I didn’t call to talk to you so I could cry on your shoulder,” she said, reaching for her tea.
I took it from her hand and set it on the railing behind us. “Then why did you?”