Tyler
I was feeling good this afternoon.
My leg rehab was going perfectly thanks to a certain someone. It was getting stronger by the day. I’d spent the afternoon in conditioning sessions—speed work, lifting, footwork drills—and for once, I was nailing absolutely everything.
I should’ve felt on top of the world. And I did, mostly, but there was still this hollow ache I couldn’t shake.
My mind kept circling back to my session with Orla that morning.
The way she’d tried and failed to keep her guard up around me.
The way her laugh slipped out even though she’d done everything in her power to smother it.
After the way she’d shut the door in my face last night, I loved that I could pull that reaction out of her—I loved it more than I had any right to.
Even the way she wouldn’t look at me for longer than two seconds because she knew damn well what would happen if she did. She had no idea how far under my skin she was. Fucking stitched into me.
I stayed at the gym longer than I probably should’ve this evening.
Told myself I needed the distraction. Really, I just needed something to drown out the urge to knock on her door and kiss her again.
I even toyed with asking her to grab a drink with me, but I chickened out at the last second.
Mostly because I wasn’t sure I could handle another rejection from her so soon.
I’d been down there so long that I barely registered the woman hovering around the weight rack until she cornered me.
Blonde, leggy, exactly the type I used to lose entire weekends with.
She had on one of those matching pink gym sets that made women look like they were heading to a photo shoot rather than a gym.
Normally it would have had my pulse racing like wildfire.
She smiled, touched my arm, and said something about grabbing a drink later.
A few months ago I wouldn’t have thought twice. I’d have had her in my room before she even finished the sentence. Now, though? The thought actually made me wince. These days there was only one woman that existed in my world.
I stepped back, out of range of her expensive smelling perfume, muttering something about an early start.
She looked surprised—hell, so was I—but the idea of taking anyone back to my room when Orla was sleeping ten steps away felt disgusting.
Like betraying something that didn’t even exist yet, but already mattered.
That was my sign to head back upstairs.
When I reached our floor, I hesitated outside her door. I could hear the muffled sound of her TV through the wall. I leaned back against the wallpaper, heart knocking painfully against my ribs, not brave enough to knock, but not brave enough to walk away either.
Fuck, she had no idea.
No idea she was the whole reason I hadn’t fucked up in weeks. No idea she was the reason my life was on the rails for once.
Eventually, I tore myself away and stumbled into my room. My back hit the bed hard, and I stared up at the ceiling searching my thoughts for clarity.
What I needed was to give her space. Time. But it didn’t stop it from killing me.
And lying there, all I could hear were her words from earlier:
“You don’t give up, do you?”
Not on you, Doc.
Not a fucking chance.