Chapter 18
“W oo-hoo, yeah! Go!” Landon’s perky, adorable blond thing yells, clapping her hands excitedly and bouncing up and down in her seat. “First down! Nice run!”
“Elle, you know I’m really starting to love you and all, but if you continue to root for the Dolphins over the Pats, we can’t be friends,” Amelia, Oliver’s fiancée, fake fiancée, girlfriend, I don’t know how to classify her, says.
Elle spins around, frowning at the petite redhead on my right. “But I cheered at the University of Miami and then I lived in Miami for years while I was married to David. I even know a few of those players down there.”
“Yes, but you do realize you live in New England now and we’re all big sports fans up here, right?
Everyone in this booth is ready to throw down.
You could start a riot.” Amelia’s hand pans around the room and sure enough, Rina, Brecken, Oliver, Kaplan, Carter, Luca, Dr. Fritz, my father, and even Landon and Layla are giving her the stink eye.
Elle doesn’t appear the least bit concerned. “Whatever. Grow up!” she snaps at everyone. “I’m not going to love your beloved Pats.” She gets a few snarls and sighs and then she shakes her head in dismay. “Y’all don’t scare me. I’m scrappy like a squirrel, and you do not want to mess with Texas.”
I laugh lightly, as does Octavia. We throw each other a side-eye and a grin. I think I like Elle. I think I like Elle a lot.
Elle tosses her hands up when Amelia gives her a “Uou wanna try it, sweetheart? I’m a redhead from the mean streets of Boston” expression.
“Fine.” Elle holds up a consolatory hand. “I’ll cool it, but only a little and only because I know y’all are such big sports fans and I respect that about you.”
“Deal.” Amelia gives her a satisfied nod. “It’d be worse if we were at the Red Sox. Layla teases me about my obsession with them, but she’s just as big into sports as I am, especially now that we live with Oliver.”
“I guess it’s lucky for me Stella hates sports and doesn’t care who I root for. She still loves me anyway. Don’t you, Stella?” Elle raises her voice at the end, catching Stella’s attention. Stella glances up from her book to give a thumbs-up before quickly returning to it.
I snicker. “I’m with Stella on this. I’m not a huge fan of sports either,” I admit. “I mean, I’ll watch a game if it’s on, but I don’t seek it out.”
Both Elle and Amelia stare at me like I just grew horns and a beak before their eyes.
“Then how come you’re here tonight?” Elle queries, truly perplexed.
She’s a sunshine of a little Texas girl and I have no idea how she and Landon—who is eternally a broody bastard and rightfully so after all he’s been through—work together so well, but clearly they do because the man stares at her like she’s the moon and the stars in his night sky.
“She got roped into being here, same as I did,” Grace states, placing her hand over Octavia’s, who sits between us.
Octavia gives a remorseless shrug. “If I’m forced to be here, all of you have to be as well.
I promised Dr. Fritz one football game a year and I wasn’t coming without a buffer.
Besides, nothing’s better than my whole family being together.
” She gives my hand a squeeze and I drop my head onto her shoulder, the end of her blond wig tickling my forehead.
It’s real hair, which is kinda cool and kinda creepy, but I know it makes her feel better having it on.
The woman is the essence of regal beauty with a heart and soul to match.
Octavia is the only mother-like figure I had growing up since mine died when I was so young and wasn’t around much before that.
Octavia’s recurrent breast cancer is the main reason I’m back in Boston.
I wanted to be with her. Near her. It’s similar for Grace, though her parents cast her aside because of her epilepsy, and with the way Octavia loves and embraces us as her own, we’d do just about anything for her.
Including coming to a Sunday night football game after I played a concert this afternoon and am getting set to move tomorrow.
Something I haven’t mentioned to anyone yet other than to my father this morning. He scowled at me. I’m not sure the man knows how to parent me now that I’m an adult and ends up keeping his mouth shut when keeping his mouth shut is certainly not what he wants to do.
I also haven’t said anything to Luca, though I’m positive he knows since I talked with the management company on Friday.
I haven’t seen him or heard from him since I lost it on him the other day in the apartment and honestly, I’m grateful for the reprieve.
Doesn’t mean my body isn’t acutely aware of him being in such close proximity.
He’s been good at keeping his distance, and I’ve been good at avoiding looking at him.
So I have no idea if he’s staring at me the way I think he is. If the hairs on the back of my neck that are standing up, the whole-body chills and shudders, or the perpetual flutter in my lower belly are from him or I have a fever and am coming down with a stomach bug instead.
Except I know it’s unfortunately not the flu causing these symptoms. I can feel him.
“How was your performance this morning?” Octavia questions as she picks at something on her plate with her fork. She isn’t eating much tonight and that frightens me.
“It was wonderful. The last charity concert before we start practicing for the Holiday Pops shows. I’m excited about that. I know they’re big here and holiday music is just fun to play.”
“Will you have another solo?”
My smile slips. “It’s hard to know until Antonio—he’s the conductor—makes the assignments, but I might.
I hope I do.” And I don’t because solos give me cold sweats and panic attacks, but hey, that’s my own thing to battle through.
The fact that my stage fright decided to pick now to rear its ugly head back up is yet another log on my fire of madness.
“I have no doubt Antonio will give you a solo,” Rina muses with an impish lilt to her voice. “In fact, I think he’d like you to give him a solo any chance he can get.”
My eyes fly out of my head, and I glare at Rina with a zip-it look. She knows about Antonio’s flirting and quasi-pursuit of me. But dammit, not in front of Octavia.
She grins like the cat who ate the canary at my expression. “What? You know it’s true. And don’t give me that stunned, deer in headlights thing because every man who blinks at you is hot for you. This should not come as a shock.”
Grace laughs, rocking into Rina while staring at me. “She has a point. Seriously. Do you remember when you flew home for your birthday a couple of years ago and the three of us went out? Every guy in every bar and club we went to was all over you.”
“Was not.”
“Was too,” they both say in unison, making everyone, including Octavia, crack up.
I sigh, sagging back in my seat, my face feeling like a fireball. “I was twenty then.”
“And being twenty-two now somehow changes the ‘men being all over you’ thing? Because, as far as I can tell, it doesn’t.”
“Are we going there, Rina?” I challenge, a sly smirk quirking up my lips. “Your mom is right next to me. I can start in on some stories.”
“Oh, sweetness, I’ve already heard most of them.
A mother’s ears unfortunately pick up everything.
Especially with children like mine who end up as front-page news.
Besides, I like hearing you’ve lived a little after…
well, after things not always being so happy for you in that department.
” She glances over her shoulder in the direction of who I can only presume is her son and I won’t do it.
I won’t look. I don’t know if he’s across the room or listening or what and I do not care.
“I want to hear more about Antonio. More about his penchant for solo time with the female musicians in his orchestra.”
“Oh my God,” I cry out, snapping up in my chair and narrowing my eyes at Grace this time. “The two of you are so grounded from my gossip. I should have never told you what Catarina told me.” I point at her and Rina, who are finding far too much enjoyment in my discomfort. They even high-five.
“No, we’re not,” Grace remarks with assurance. “You love us too much to deny us.”
Ugh.
“Antonio is pretty sexy if you’re into that older, eccentric thing,” Rina states airily.
“And clearly he has a thing for his newest star. But honestly, I’m not sure I’d go there.
I’d hate for his body to be found dead in the Charles River.
” Rina bounces her head, again in what is likely Luca’s direction and all I can do is shake my head.
Ambushed. I’m freaking ambushed.
There is no winning this and I don’t think I’ve ever been so embarrassed in my life. I realize Octavia isn’t my mother, but… she’s still freaking Octavia Abbot-Fritz. Sitting here at a football game and talking boys and flings and… yup, flaming face. All over me.
“I work for him and he’s about twenty years older than me.”
“That’s quite the age difference,” Octavia notes, giving me a wink as if to say she doesn’t mind the girl talk one bit. Her green eyes are flatter, most of their typical sparkle dulled a bit and I wonder if she’s not feeling well and is trying to hide it from us.
“My ex-husband was eleven years older than me,” Elle offers. “Sometimes age is just a number.”
And just like that, everyone falls into a slightly awkward silence because though Elle might not be aware of this because she’s new to the Fritz crew, Luca is almost exactly eleven years older than me. I can feel a few sets of eyes boring into the side of my face as I struggle not to react.
“Oh my gosh, look.” Amelia points out the large panel of glass in front of us, straight at the huge screen over the end zone. “He’s proposing to her. I can never decide if that’s cool or cliché.” She smirks at me, and I throw her a grateful smile in return for taking me out of the hot seat.