Isaac’s hotel bed was about as comfortable as a bed of nails on top of a concrete slab placed in an industrial freezer for the night. His phone buzzed with a text at a little after midnight, according to the neon digits on the nightstand clock that he was pretty sure was burning holes in his retinas. He rolled over, and when he saw the text was from Nat, the bed felt a little softer—or maybe that was him going girlishly gooey at the thought that his woman might be wanting some company after all.

He tapped his message icon and her text popped up.

Are you awake?

The gooey feeling spread through his gut and perked up another part of his anatomy. Awake being Natalie code for: I’m cold and alone in my bed. Come join me.

His fingers flew.

You know I am. Missing you, thinking about all the things I’d like to do to keep YOU awake.

The phone chirped as his message flew past the intervening rooms where the girls slept, into Nat’s phone at the end of the motor lodge. A long, drawn-out silence settled over the room as he waited for a reply or a series of emojis to arrive.

Finally—

Meet me outside in the parking lot.

For a good-night kiss? Yeah, the walls in the motor lodge were pretty thin, and if Nat wanted a good-night kiss, it would be the kind of kiss you didn’t want a bunch of teenage girls overhearing.

He dressed quickly and left his room, spotting a hunched silhouette on the other side of the parking lot next to the motor lodge sign. The night air was crisp and still, stinging his cheeks as he crossed to Nat. The smile on his mouth from thinking about warm kisses and the likelihood of a clear day for the game tomorrow slipped sideways as he caught a glimpse of her pale face under her jacket hood.

“Nat?”

She stared at him soundlessly, a flawless mannequin replica of his woman, with the soul sucked out of her eyes and her mouth a bloodless horizontal slash. Even a dumb jock like him could figure out something was wrong. Catastrophe level wrong.

“Let’s walk,” mannequin Nat said.

Without waiting for his agreement, she took off along the sidewalk, her booted heels a clicking staccato in the deserted street.

He caught up with her in a few strides, his knee aching in protest with the cold.

“What’s going on?” Isaac snipped off the term of endearment he’d been about to add.

The fact he impulsively curtailed his speech—that he was in deep enough to know calling Nat tahu, the only woman he’d ever assigned that particular endearment to, would upset her more—made his gut twist and his blood pressure soar. Not just what was going on, but what the hell had happened to make her look as if her heart had been torn out and stomped on?

Nat continued to walk, and Isaac clasped her elbow to slow her down. She started and hurled herself away from him, stumbling a few steps to the side.

“You don’t want to touch me right now,” she said.

Her arms crossed tightly across her chest were more effective than armor at keeping him at a distance. Shit, she was already miles away from him even though they stood only two feet apart on the sidewalk. He rubbed his fingers across his forehead, since banging his head against a nearby house’s brick walls probably wouldn’t help deescalate this situation.

Her gaze slid past him on the darkened street, and he followed it to a fenced-off grassy area, the distinctive inky outline of a children’s swing set swaying in the breeze near the sodium glare of streetlights.

“Why don’t we sit in the park for a bit?” Isaac kept his voice pitched at the same calming level he’d use with Eddie when his dad’s horse was in a skittish mood.

Not that he was comparing Nat to a horse—and goddamn, this was so fucked up. What the hell had happened in the few hours since he’d last seen her?

She gave him a brief nod and headed into the park, finding a spot on the very end of a bench seat positioned near the climbing frame. Subtle. Isaac gave her space and lowered himself onto the opposite end of the seat, leaving a wedge of dead air between them.

Dead air filled by her husband, his best mate.

Isaac couldn’t shake off the stupid, eerie image in his brain of Jackson in his old arrogant slouch, legs casually crossed at the ankles, arms stretched either side of the bench’s backrest, his fingers tapping a rhythmic and irritating tempo against the wood. In Isaac’s imagination, Jackson rolled his head toward him with his trademark grin in place, the one that had earned him endless hours of pretty-boy ribbing from his team mates, and said, “Zac, man, you are so busted.”

“Lucy Gilbert came to see me tonight,” Nat said.

The name, so unexpected, was a rugby high tackle slamming into his throat and knocking his world sideways.

Lucy had been here tonight? What the actual fuck?

He straightened against the hard planks of wood, half turning toward Nat, but she remained staring straight ahead.

“She wanted to confess what had really happened between you and Jackson and her.”

Told ya so, dickhead, Jackson whispered in his ear. Bust-ed.

“Natalie—”

She swiveled her head toward him, her Medusa gaze turning his tongue to icy stone. “She thought I knew the truth when I said you’d told me everything. She thought I knew that it was Jackson who invited her back to his hotel room. That it was my husband planning to screw a girl he’d picked up from a bar. She even told me how impressed she was that I could forgive Jackson and take up with the man who’d been lying to everyone for the past five years.”

Isaac’s diaphragm clenched, words sucked out of his mouth by the rack and ruin laid waste in Nat’s eyes. All this time he’d done everything in his power to prevent the truth from finding and shattering her, and yet the truth had found her anyway.

She blew out a long breath, a stream of misty white in the still night. “If you care anything about me at all, you’ll man up and tell me your side of the story.”

“Ask me,” he rasped.

Her eyes squeezed shut and her chin wobbled. When she opened her eyes again, she was back to the mannequin carved from ice.

“Was Lucy telling the truth?” she asked.

Isaac studied the drawn lines either side of her downturned mouth, the slump of her shoulders. She already knew the answer.

“Yeah.”

“Had Jackson cheated on me before that night?” she asked in the clinical tone of a telemarketer reading off a script.

It didn’t fool him for an instant. Jackson had broken her heart all over again.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“You don’t know? The two of you had been friends for years. Maybe it’s just that you don’t want to break the bro-code.” Bitterness slipped into her voice.

“There was no bro-code,” Isaac said. “And I wasn’t with him every moment of every tour. It’s possible he might have been with other women, but if he was, he never confided in me.”

“I’d know if one of my friends was cheating on their man,” she said. “You were his best friend.”

And wasn’t that rubbing salt into an already festering wound?

“Guy best friends and girl best friends are completely different. We never talked about our relationships or personal stuff in any more detail than ‘Nat’s got the flu, Livvy’s taken up ballet lessons, and hey, did you catch the game last night?’ Maybe some male friends Dr. Phil with each other about feelings, and probably some assholes boast about how they’re tapping all the women in their neighborhood, but not me and Jackson.”

She jerked back, her cheeks sucking in as if he’d struck her.

“I’m sorry,” he added gently. “If I’d known for certain Jackson was unfaithful before London I would’ve beaten him senseless for being such a fucking idiot. There’s no bro-code, because you were my friend, too, and I wouldn’t have seen you hurt for anything.”

Nat dipped her head in silent acknowledgement.

“What I don’t understand,” he found himself saying out loud, “is why that night he chose to hit on Lucy right in front of me. Almost as a test to see what I’d do, or a way to strike out at you. He must’ve known the risk of someone taking a photo of him and the girl if he took her back to the hotel.”

“Maybe it was a little of both,” she said. “And maybe his ego felt a little fragile from a wife he probably thought should be adoring him on the days he was home instead of reminding him the house needed painting and Olivia needed some quality time with her dad.”

“That’s a bullshit excuse.” But knowing what he did of Jackson’s character, it was harrowingly accurate.

She shrugged. “We’ll never know.” Then her face crumpled and she covered it with her hands, swearing quietly under her breath.

He couldn’t help himself, stroking a palm down her curved spine as she hunched into herself. But once again she jerked away, dropping her hands from her face and glaring at him.

“Don’t,” she said. “Just don’t. I can’t even begin to process all the shit swirling around my head about Jackson, because as devastating as that betrayal is, I’m so pissed you lied to me I want to punch you in the nuts.”

Heat rose like a lava tide up his throat. “I lied to protect you and Olivia.”

“I’m sure you thought you were doing the right thing so media wouldn’t savage us any more than they did, so I wouldn’t suffer any more than I was knowing the man I’d loved and lost wasn’t who I thought he was. I’m grateful you carried that burden for us in those first few soul-crushing months after he died.” Her mouth pinched shut. “But after that? After Jackson’s death became yesterday’s news and Livvy and I started to get back to some sort of normality, you still allowed us to cut you out of our lives. You still allowed me to blame you, grow bitterness toward you, all for something that wasn’t your fault.”

“I was better out of your lives and keeping my mouth shut. Telling you what had really happened would’ve only caused you more pain.”

“I’m in pain now.” She threw up her hands and leaped to her feet. “Pain you caused because, even after we’d had sex, you lied to my face.”

“It wasn’t the right time.” Isaac stood also, and moved closer to her. This time she didn’t flinch or back away. She stood toe to toe with him, her fists clenched at her sides, bristling with emotion.

“You’re right,” she said. “The right time was before we slept together. Before I fell in love with a man who doesn’t trust that I’m strong enough to deal with all the shit he’s had to carry alone. If you’re waiting for me to thank you for treating me like a poor, sensitive little buttercup of a woman these past few months, you can go to hell.”

Isaac blinked down at her outburst. What the—did Nat just say ‘fell in love’? With him? Nat was in love with him? He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t stop the bones in his legs dissolving into bendy straws that would at any second dump him on his ass. A car trundled past the park, its tires hissing on the wet road as it slowed to make a turn at the next street. His tongue remained firmly stuck to the roof of his mouth and stayed there, even as Nat’s mouth twisted and she took a giant step backward.

“Great time for the silent treatment.” She shoved her hands into her jacket pockets. “We’ve got a long day tomorrow. I’m going back to bed.”

Isaac watched her walk away, feeling as helpless as he had five years ago when he’d been caught in blinding headlights, his life about to change forever.

* * *

To say Nat was a zombie by the time she staggered out of her room the next morning was an understatement. All the teabags in the world couldn’t magic away her puffy, bloodshot eyes, just like all the coffee in the world would struggle to keep those eyes open after zero sleep.

And thinking about coffee led to thoughts about Isaac, and, God, how many more hits from this tsunami of grief, anger, confusion, and bone-deep betrayal could she cope with?

“Mum? Are you okay?”

Nat jumped, her teeth snapping together and clipping the edge of her tongue. Wincing, but shoving aside the urge to burst into a fresh spurt of tears, Nat poked her sunglasses farther up her nose.

“Jeez, Livvy, you scared me,” she said. “I’m fine.”

Olivia’s nose crinkled. “Well, you looked wrecked.”

“Bad hair day, huh, Auntie?” Rangi-Marie, who’d been Olivia’s roommate, grinned at her. “Happens to me all the time.”

“That plus a rock-hard mattress and the refrigerator humming all night. Nothing a good breakfast and a jumbo cup of coffee won’t sort out.” Nat thought she really should be nominated for her Oscar-winning performance.

Olivia gave her the side-eye. Yeah, Nat wasn’t really fooling anyone. She still fixed a fat, false smile on her face and did the mum thing by asking if they’d double-checked their room to make sure nothing had been left behind, and if they’d loaded their bags onto the bus that she could see in the parking lot.

“Yeah, yeah,” Olivia said. “I’m going to save a seat for Morgan.”

She took off, leaving Nat alone with Rangi-Marie.

“I saw Isaac before,” Rangi-Marie said when Olivia was out of earshot. “He looked scary pissed off.”

Pissed off? What did Isaac have to be mad about? Had he spent the whole night dissecting eight-and-a-half years of marriage, analysing every argument, every stony silence, every missed call and slightest inconsistency of Jackson’s time spent away from his family?

“That’s his default expression. Resting bitch face.” Nat caught hold of her suitcase handle and walked toward the bus, which was idling, plumes of white exhaust drifting in the chill morning air.

Rangi-Marie stuck close to her side. “Nah, not lately. And he didn’t just look like he was about to tear someone’s head off either—he looked sad.”

Sad? What did Isaac have to be sad about? She was the one betrayed and lied to by not one but two men she loved. And thanks, you good-for-nothing feelings, for springing that on her during the second worst night of her life.

“He’s probably worried about the outcome of the game today.” Nat quickened her steps toward the open baggage doors at the rear of the bus. She muscled her suitcase inside and turned back to give Rangi-Marie’s arm a reassuring rub. “It’s the coach’s job to worry, while you girls just need to have faith in yourself and go out there and kick ass. So let’s go and fuel up with breakfast.”

During breakfast at a nearby restaurant, it was like a choreographed dance between her and Isaac. She’d skilfully and without eye contact found a seat on the bus away from him. At the restaurant table, she’d inserted herself between two girls where she couldn’t see him, and after the bill was paid, she’d dithered in the restroom until Isaac boarded the bus before her and she was able to choose a seat far, far away from him.

By the time they reached St. Kilpatrick’s school grounds, Rangi-Marie and Olivia weren’t the only girls to notice the tension between her and Isaac, and the bus ride from the restaurant to the school was the quietest the girls had been since they’d left Bounty Bay. The glances Nat had sneaked in his direction confirmed Rangi-Marie’s assessment—the man looked as if he was on the cusp of completely losing his shit and going nuclear.

Owen met them in the parking lot, his smile of greeting slipping once he, too, sensed the discord among the group.

“Mate?” he asked Isaac, a thousand questions in that one word.

Isaac just shook his head and set to directing the girls with their kit bags to the locker rooms.

What should’ve been two hours of pride and excitement over the girls’ achievements of making the semifinals, Nat spent on autopilot. The most important game of the season for Olivia and her team passed by in a blur. She stood on the sidelines and cheered when she was supposed to cheer, and groaned when she was supposed to groan, but she was so tuned inward to the endless loop of memories and recriminations buzzing in her brain she couldn’t have said who scored a try, or who the ref called out on a penalty, or even which team was winning with two minutes left in the game.

Then the referee’s whistle blast cut through the air. It was over.

Nat didn’t need to look at the scoreboard to see Bounty Bay had lost; it was written in the slumped posture and grim faces of each of the girls as they shook hands with the other team. And Isaac, whose broad back was ramrod straight, his profile set in cold stone as he congratulated the other team’s coach.

She wanted to run onto the field and wrap her arms around Olivia, but it felt as if she were a satellite looking down at herself and her daughter from the depth of deep, dark space. The girls lost—Olivia lost. And more than just the game; Olivia had lost the dad she’d idolized, the dad who’d turned out to have feet of clay. How in God’s name did you explain to a thirteen-year-old the complexities of adult relationships? And should she even tell Olivia the truth?

Someone touched her arm and she looked up from where she’d been studying a squished patch of grass for the last…? She didn’t know how long she’d been fascinated with the ground. Owen stood beside her, his brow set in deep furrows.

“Hey,” she said.

She should probably say something else, something like “exciting game, huh?” to keep up the charade that everything was A-OK and she was coping just fine while her world crumbled. While she would never win that Oscar, she’d years of experience putting on her game face when necessary. It was a skill she’d learned quickly at her very first foster home. Kids who smiled even when life continued to dump trailer loads of lemons on their heads managed to fly beneath the radar. Those who blended in, the way she’d forced herself to accept her lot in life, survived the system. And Nat was nothing if not a survivor.

“Nat, what’s going on?” he asked. “Are you sick?”

Yeah, sick to her stomach and not above using the oldest excuse in the book to get a guy to back off.

“Period cramps. Really bad ones.” She scrunched up her face and pressed a hand to her lower stomach.

“Uh-huh.”

Owen didn’t sound convinced. Probably because, as a doctor, womanly problems were dealt with on a daily basis and no more likely to scare him off than a head cold.

“Morgan told me she wants to ride home on the bus with the other girls after all,” he said gently. “You’re welcome to catch a ride back with me if you like.”

“I should stay with the girls, make sure they’re okay.” Although nothing sounded as good as getting away from Isaac.

“They’re fine. Disappointed, of course, but fine. Look.”

Nat glanced up to see Morgan and Olivia walking toward them, talking animatedly. Olivia’s face scrunched up once she reached Nat and Owen.

“Well, that sucked,” Morgan said.

Olivia draped an arm over Nat’s shoulders. “They only beat us by three points, though. Right, Mum?”

“Right.” Though Nat had no clue about the final score, she managed a smile. “Pretty damn good for your first big match.”

“Failure is the birthplace of character, and pain is necessary for growth,” Morgan said. “That’s what Coach says.”

Someone would have to winch Nat’s sealed mouth open to get her to comment on anything ‘Coach’ said. She slipped her arm around Olivia’s waist and gave her a quick one-armed hug. “If it’s okay with you, I’m going to ride back with Owen. It’s that time of the month and I don’t want to be stuck on the bus for hours.”

“Muuuum!” Livvy clapped a palm over her eyes. “TMI. Whatever. I’ll see you at home.” She and Morgan rolled their eyes at each other, then jogged back to join the other girls.

Owen handed his car keys to Nat. “Why don’t you go sit in my car? I’ll grab your suitcase and let Isaac know about the change of plans.” He raised an eyebrow at her, as if waiting for a reaction.

“Thanks.”

“We gonna talk about it on the way back to Bounty Bay?”

She knew exactly what ‘it’ he was referring to, but she angled her chin. “Really, Owen? You want the rundown on my preferred brand of tampons?”

He shot her a sympathetic grin. “Carpool Karaoke it is.”

Nat hurried across the parking lot to Owen’s car and climbed inside. Anything was preferable to weeping over what might’ve been and what now could never be.