Chapter 28
Chapter twenty-eight
Colton
Colton took a hit, grunting as he landed underneath one of his defensive linemen. He helped Colton up, apologizing profusely, but Colton shook it off.
“No worries, I’m all good. My fault.” He’d barely been paying attention to practice and hadn’t realized how much time had passed since Chris had snapped the ball to him.
Focusing on football was a nearly impossible task.
Colton’s thoughts hadn’t left Lucia for a moment, not even when he was on the field.
He was so far gone. He’d known spending that last night with her would only hurt him more in the long run, but he hadn’t realized the depth of his feelings until he’d spent a week away from her.
She had called out sick for their sessions the week following their night, and the distance hadn’t done him any good.
If anything, it’d just proven to him how in love with her he was.
Still, he hadn’t contacted her, trying to respect her wishes.
Colton’s performance had been subpar at best in the last game of the regular season. The Sabers only barely managed to beat Tampa Bay, a team they’d been projected to beat by miles. Lucia had steered clear of him both on the plane and once the team was back in Charleston.
Now, during a Wednesday practice of bye week, he couldn’t even throw one solid pass.
It’d been nine days since he’d seen her, spoken to her, held her, and all he could think about was the feeling of her wrapped in his arms. He was sure Coach Turner was one bad throw away from pulling him and putting in their second string, but he couldn’t help that his thoughts were elsewhere, no matter how hard he tried to concentrate.
As if Coach could read Colton’s mind, he yelled, “Beaumont, get the hell off my field!”
Colton’s head snapped to Coach Turner. He jogged over, pulling his helmet from his head. “Coach—”
“I don’t want to hear it. If you can’t make basic passes to your receivers, you’re out for divisionals.” The divisional round of playoffs was only eleven days away. Worse, it was against Max Clark and the Richmond Vipers. He needed to play in that game.
“Coach, I promise I can do this. I’m just in my head. I’ll stay late. I’ll do whatever you need me to do. I promise I can do this. I need to do this.”
Coach Turner’s eyes were already sweeping the field before he said, “Go shower and cool down. I need to think.”
Colton’s heart jumped into his throat as he nodded.
He ran off the field, ignoring the looks of his closest friends.
Cooper had asked him a few times what’d been going on with him, as had Rudy, but he’d been too embarrassed to explain that his relationship with Lucia had never been real, and yet he’d fallen for her harder than he knew possible.
He breathed in and out quickly, trying to relax even as his mind ran a hundred miles a minute. He needed to find a way to prove to Coach that he could do what needed to be done for the Vipers game.
He took a quick shower, hardly noticing the way the water scalded his skin, and threw on a pair of sweatpants. He couldn’t find the sweatshirt he’d left in his locker, and then remembered it was one of the ones he’d let Lucia have. His chest grew heavy at the reminder.
She’d been the last person he expected to see as he walked out into the facility, and yet there she stood, a white, long-sleeved button-down tucked into a pencil skirt that grazed the tops of her knees.
Her eyes drank in the upper body he’d worked so hard for, and then her eyes met his and he stopped breathing.
She opened her mouth to speak, then closed it.
I think I might be in love with you, he thought. And I think that even though that scares the shit out of me, even though I’ve been convinced my whole life that I can’t have a girlfriend and this career, I can’t bear to be without you.
He opened his mouth, but the stricken look on her face and subtle shake of her head made him close it.
He didn’t voice his thoughts, and she appeared relieved as she hurried past him to the elevator, his arms aching to reach out to hold her again long after the doors closed.
At least her being at the facility meant their sessions would continue.
He walked to his car, trying to understand the look on her face when he’d been about to speak. He located a shirt and threw it on, then went up to her office. He stepped inside, ready to ask how she was feeling, when he noticed Tim standing beside her.
Lucia wouldn’t even meet Colton’s eyes as Tim looked between the two of them. Finally, Tim spoke.
“Today will be a joint session. I’ll be supervising Lucia, but you can continue as if this were a normal session.”
“Why?”
“Lucia wants to make sure you’re getting all the help you need as we go into playoffs.” Colton had been asking Lucia but Tim responded.
Colton’s eyes hadn’t left Lucia. She still refused to look at him.
Why was she making this so hard? Why had she called backup, especially when it was at the expense of her independence?
She hated people believing she couldn’t do her job, so why would she invite someone into their session as if she wasn’t capable?
And then it all came crashing down on him as he realized why.
She’d sobbed as she’d told him she wanted to end things.
She’d let him take her in his arms, let him comfort her, even as she told him she didn’t want to continue their relationship.
She hadn’t wanted him to talk when they were alone together.
She’d asked someone to come and sit with them through sessions so they would have to keep things professional.
She’d agreed to go with him to Devin’s, and then when he’d confessed his feelings to her, she hadn’t said she didn’t feel the same way.
When he’d asked if it’d changed anything, she hadn’t said “no” but “it can’t.” It can’t change anything.
All of this had arisen from her seeing her father for the holidays, a man Colton knew had spent a lifetime getting his heart broken. The man whose experiences had convinced Lucia that she wasn’t built for love.
And it all came together. Maybe she didn’t feel about him exactly how he felt about her, but she was struggling too.
She didn’t want this, maybe as badly as he didn’t want this.
She was pushing him away because she was scared about her feelings for him.
Because she’d felt that thing between them go from a tentative friendship to something entirely different.
He hadn’t been faking it for a while, and now he knew she felt the same way.
He wasn’t going to let her push him away.
He wasn’t Max Clark, and he wasn’t any of the women who broke her father’s heart.
He wasn’t going to give up on them just because she was scared.
Things were different for them, and he was going to show her that.
Because even if it took him a lifetime to prove it to her, he loved her.
He sat through the session, providing responses only when asked, his head in an entirely other space.
And when the session was over, he watched her shoot up and leave with Tim like she knew being alone with him had the potential to change her mind.
For the first time in a week and a half, Colton had hope.
January 11th
Colton
If you can honestly say you don’t have feelings for me, then I’ll leave you be. But you have to swear on your fantasy football team or it doesn’t count.
January 12th
Colton
I know what you’re doing. You’re pushing me away because you care about me too. So here’s me refusing to let you.
January 13th
Colton
You can keep having Tim in our sessions, but it won’t change how I feel about you. And how you feel about me. Eventually, we’re probably gonna end up alone in your office or the hall, and then you’re gonna have to face what this is.
January 13th
Colton
Don’t give up on us, Luc. We both know this is different.
January 14th
Colton
I can do this forever. You not responding won’t stop me from texting you. We both know how stubborn I am.
January 15th
Colton
Stop running, Luc. I won’t stop texting you, finding ways to see you at the facility, telling you how I feel. I won’t give up on this, no matter how long you ignore me.
Once he’d learned what was really going on with Lucia, he’d gotten his shit together on the field. Now, only three days from the game, he felt certain in his abilities. He would do everything it took to bury Clark and the Vipers. Not for himself, not for a ring, not even for the team. For Lucia.
His father had invited him over after practice, and it’d been a few weeks since he’d been at the house, so he’d agreed.
He stood outside, taking in the perfectly manicured shrubs and greenery that lined the stairs of the house, something he was sure his father had nothing to do with, other than perhaps handing someone cash.
That itchy and tense feeling that always accompanied meetings with his father was there beneath his Sabers sweatsuit. He saw a flash in his periphery but paid it no mind. He climbed the steps up to the front door and rang the doorbell, half-hoping the man wouldn’t come to the door.
He was not so lucky. His father opened the door, a suit on that told Colton he’d been working from home. Rather than speak, his father turned on his heel and walked inside the house, leaving the front door open.
Colton stepped inside, respecting his mother’s wishes by removing his shoes, and closed the door. He followed his father toward his study, taking in the bare walls for the first time. No pictures of the family, or of his deceased wife, or even photos of nature. The walls were just bare.
“Hey, Dad.”
“I’m glad you and that girl broke up. She was ruining your chances at another championship.”
Colton’s legs almost gave out at the words.