Five years later
I stood on the sidelines watching as the girls ran the ball up and down the field tossing it back and forth between the cones. It was blazing hot out here. I didn’t think that I would ever get used to this humidity in the south. Whose brilliant idea was it to host a summer football camp for girls in the July heat? Oh yeah, mine.
“My daddy used to play football,” our daughter, Peyton called out rocking back and forth on her pink cleats.
“Really?” asked Josie.
“Yeah, now he’s the coach at Elliston. You’ve probably seen him on TV.”
Josie was Peyton’s new friend, and it took all of five minutes for her to introduce me to the girl with the blonde ponytail and matching cleats like Peyton’s. That was my girl though, making friends wherever she went. This girl had superior social skills like her father.
“Girls, I need you to pay attention to the drills, you’re up next, Josie,” Peyton’s coach asserted.
Her coach scowled at me, he was grumpy and frustrated with me because Peyton was late and disruptive when she bounced onto the field.
“Coach,” Peyton said, calmly. “We should be playing the game not running through orange cones. I want to work on my passing skills.”
Her coach leaned down so that he was eye level with her. “Oh, do you now?”
“Yes, I do.” She nodded vigorously her hazel eyes twinkling. “I need to work on my dexterity.”
“Where’d you learn that word?” his deep voice asked.
“Coach, this isn’t the time,” she said, waving him off.
“All right,” he said, patting her head. “We’ll try it your way.”
“After practice, we can get ice cream, right, Daddy?”
“If you don’t drop the ball, out there then, yeah, we can get ice cream,” Wyatt teased, tugging at her mass of braided brown hair.
“Daddy, you know that I won’t drop the ball,” she informed, jumping up on the bench.
In addition to being athletic, Peyton was smart, especially in math. We decided to send her to a private pre-school since she was solving math problems in her sleep.
“Mommy, Daddy said we could get ice cream after practice.”
I smiled. “He did, huh?”
She nodded and clapped for her teammates as they rounded the cones. “Go, Josie, go.”
Wyatt had proposed to me a few weeks after Luke graduated from high school. We were married a month later. Why wait? We loved one another and there was no reason to have a long engagement.
It was a small ceremony just a few friends and family. Wyatt surprised me with a honeymoon to Costa Rica. I spent the end of the trip in our room sick as a dog. The on-site physician thought that it was heat exhaustion and dehydration.
When I felt well enough to fly we left, and Wyatt took me straight to the hospital. As it turned out, I was seven weeks pregnant. Color me shocked. Well, not that shocked since I’d stopped taking the pill a few months before Wyatt proposed. I had no idea it would take that quickly. Wyatt wanted to have a baby, and at first, I wasn’t completely sure that I could have a baby. I was worried about my age and other health factors.
The assistant coach blew the whistle and called time. “Water break and then we play a game.”
Peyton’s small hands landed on Wyatt’s shoulders. “Put me in, Coach, I’m ready.”
I pressed a fist to my mouth to suppress a smile. God, she was cute. She jumped into his arms and he kissed her cheek. “Love you, superstar.”
“Love you too, Coach. I think I want strawberry banana smoothie instead.”
“Oh do you, now?”
Wyatt set her feet to the ground and then strode towards me. “We’re apparently getting smoothies instead of ice cream.”
I bumped his shoulder. “She’ll change her mind at least five times before we leave the field.”
My phone rang and I swiped the screen. “Hey, Luke,” I answered. “How are you?”
“Hey, Mom, I’m good. I’m grabbing a late lunch and thought I’d check in. How’s Peyton doing with practice?”
Luke moved to Chicago after college where he took a job working in the marketing department for a company that places students in study abroad programs. It was a great job that gave him the opportunity to travel. I was glad that he wasn’t that far from us here in Kentucky.
“She’s being mouthy and telling the coach what to do.” I watched as the assistant coaches picked up the orange cones and got the field ready for the scrimmage game.
He laughed. “Sounds familiar—like mother, like daughter.”
“Yeah,” I answered, adjusting my sunglasses. “You coming our way anytime soon?”
“Thought I’d visit Labor Day weekend and go to the game against Kentucky. Think you can get me some tickets?”
My gaze swung to Wyatt who was making notes on his clipboard. “I might have a hookup.”
“Great,” he said. “That’s my other line. I gotta take this, Mom. Love you all.”
“Love you,” I said.
“Everything all right with Luke,” Wyatt asked.
“Yeah, he’s coming for Labor Day weekend and wants to go to the Kentucky game.”
Wyatt rubbed his hands together. “Perfect.”
Perfect. I never thought that I’d get a second chance at falling in love with someone for the first time. There were days when I believed my heart was so broken it would never heal. All the cracks in my shattered heart, that’s where Wyatt sneaked in making me whole again.
Peyton passed out cold after her bath. Stepping onto the patio, the warm night air offered a tolerable breeze. Loki was curled up inches from Hannah’s feet. I handed her a glass of white wine.
“Thanks, I needed this.” She curled into my side as soon as I sat next to her.
I laughed and cracked open my beer. “Yeah, tell me about it.”
I stared out at our pool concentrating on the ripples lapping against the blue tile. We purchased a four-bedroom modern farmhouse a few miles off campus. The view was breathtaking. We could see a ranch a few miles away and the horses would roam the pasture endlessly each day. The horses were Peyton’s favorite part. In the far distance was a partial view of the football stadium.
“You ready for tomorrow?” she asked.
“First day of practice, yep.” I nodded, before taking a drink. “Thomas thinks this is the year Elliston goes all the way.”
She laughed. “He wants that ring so bad. But you know who wants it more?”
A smile broke out across my face. “Our daughter.”
I never thought I’d be a husband and father again, but Hannah had given my broken heart the gift of both. My daughter, she was a little superstar with a sassy attitude like her mother and a competitive streak that matched my own.
“I think she’s going to be a scout someday,” Hannah mused.
“She’s going to be a shark for sure—probably an agent.”
She leaned back to look up at me. “I’m proud of you. So proud. Have I told you that?”
“Not today anyway.” I kissed her.
She laughed, and her hands moved beneath my t-shirt. “Well, I am very proud of you, my husband.”
My lips brushed over hers. “Stand up and take off your shorts.”
Her dark brows arched up. “Excuse me?”
My sexy wife, smart as hell, all mine and she still challenges me.
“Listen, we have a few hours before that lil’ spitfire of ours is up and begging me to watch Sports Center so that she can get an early first day of practice report,” I pleaded my case, moving my hands up her thighs.
Hannah complied with my request, her blue eyes twinkling and a smirk tugging at her lips.
“Does this make you happy, Coach?” she asked.
“Very much.”
“Your turn,” she whispered.
I nodded, beckoning her back onto my now naked lap. “Come here.”
My arms banded around her waist and my lips pressed to her neck, we moved together and I felt my universe slipping together perfectly.
The world had a way of shaking your faith. There was a point in my life where I thought that I buried all my love with Kate and Sydney. Loving them and finding love again with Hannah taught me that I was meant for more than walking around the rest of my days a shell of a man.
Pleasure trembled through every part of her body as my hips rolled against her. We got lost in the sensations everything went black, there was only us.
She came, her teeth gnashed into my shoulder and I was right there with her with my arms locked tight around her waist. If it were possible I loved Hannah a little bit more every day.
She gave me a lazy smile, brushing her lips to mine. “You will forever be mine.”
“Always.”
THE END