Chapter Eight
Braden
“You’ve never ridden the train before, have you?” Emily asked as we took a seat near the back of the car. It was relatively quiet, just a few other passengers spread throughout.
“Not here. I took it all the time in Boston.”
“Boston, huh? Where’s your accent?”
“I grew up in Oklahoma.”
“Again — where’s your accent?”
“Howdy, partner.”
Part of me expected her to keep poking, to dig in the way she always did — and part of me almost welcomed it. It was easier to keep things light than sit in the quiet weight of everything else pressing on my chest.
But at my tone, Emily softened — a rare sighting, I imagined — and reached over to cover my wrist with her hand.
“Hey, I’m sorry. Humor is my default setting. I can’t help it.” She squeezed my wrist, and I looked down at the point of contact, at the micro tattoos lining her hand and fingers. Her nails were long and sharp and painted black.
And for a brief, weak moment, I wondered what they’d feel like raking over my back.
I wondered what it would be like to say fuck it, to take this train straight to her place and bury myself and all my worries inside her.
I wondered if she’d have the power to make me forget for a while, if I could lose myself in the easy way she carried herself through life and pretend I could do the same.
I swallowed, sniffing the thought away as I looked out the window again. “It’s fine. You’re not the first to laugh at my expense when it came to that car.”
That seemed to wound her. “Hey now, I may not have a serious bone in my body, but I’m not an asshole. I wasn’t laughing at you. And I’ll beat up anyone who has.”
A small smile tugged at my mouth despite myself. There it was — that pull she had, dragging me out of my own head whether I wanted her to or not.
I assessed her with an arched brow. “You will, huh?”
“Look at me.” She waved a hand over her lean, athletic frame. “Who would wanna mess with this?”
“No one who values their life.”
“Exactly. I’m small but scrappy, okay?” She smirked, but then her eyes softened again, those dark brown irises flicking between mine. “That car meant a lot to you, I’m guessing.”
I scratched my neck. “It wasn’t sentimental or anything. I just…”
I trailed off, my stomach curdling. The only way to be honest about why this was a problem was to share my whole fucking life story with her, and I didn’t like sharing it with anyone — least of all a woman I barely knew who was hell bent on being a thorn in my side.
A very hot, very welcome thorn, but a thorn, nonetheless.
“I just don’t really have time to be car shopping,” I finished with a heavy sigh.
Emily flattened her lips. “Because it’s so hard to walk onto a car lot, point at a brand-new car, and say, ‘I’ll take that one, please.’”
“It won’t be a new car. I’ll have to do some research, figure out what’s reliable nowadays.
I imagine Toyota is still the way to go; although, I’ve heard good things about Hyundai.
” My thoughts trailed off, spiraling as they loved to do as I thought through how to make it all work.
“I’ll get maybe five hundred for the Camry.
Is CARFAX still a thing?” I tried to think if I’d seen any CARFAX ads lately, but couldn’t recall. “I think it is.”
I must have kept mumbling my thoughts out loud because I turned and found Emily blinking at me.
“You’re going to buy a used car?” she asked, deadpan, like she was suspicious.
“Yes.”
“When you’re a professional football player who makes a bajillion dollars a year?” Again, deadpan and suspicious.
And I could see through the needling — she wasn’t being facetious. She really didn’t understand why someone in the NFL wouldn’t buy a new car instead of a used one. It was a natural thing to wonder, honestly. My friends had questioned me for years about why I had yet to upgrade.
“I’m on a three-year rookie contract and a little shy of a bajillion,” I said.
She blinked, shaking her head. “I’m all for spending modestly, but I have to admit, I don’t think I’d be thinking about CARFAX if I knew I had a million dollars in the bank.”
My throat tightened.
I didn’t have a million dollars in the bank.
Not even close.
After taxes, my agent’s cut, my modest home, and the house I’d bought for my parents so they’d never have to worry about a mortgage again, the number sitting in my account hovered somewhere around three-hundred grand.
Maybe a little more if the bonus check from training camp cleared when it was supposed to.
Three-hundred thousand sounded like a lot of money for a year until you factored in a full-time nurse who cost me eighty grand a year, and that football careers didn’t come with guarantees.
One blown knee, one bad season, one phone call from the front office, and I could get to the end of this contract without any other offers waiting for me.
I needed that money to last.
I needed to make sure my family was provided for.
The train pulled to a stop, people shuffling on and off. When the doors shut again, I took the break in conversation to turn it to Emily.
“You didn’t have to do this with me today, you know,” I said.
“Weird way of saying thank you.”
I smiled. “Thank you.” I fumbled a bit when she smiled back. She was so goddamn beautiful it was like looking straight at the sun. “You were great with the girls today, by the way.”
“So were you.”
“Why do you always do that?”
“Do what?”
“Turn the attention away from yourself when someone says something nice.”
“Says the one dancing around every question I ask.”
“Fair,” I concede. “All right. How about we make a deal.”
“You show me yours I show you mine?” Emily whistled, looking around the train. “I mean, I’ve been waiting for this moment, but I have to say I kind of hoped it’d be in a more private location.”
She joked like she was about to take her top off; although, I wasn’t quite sure if she was joking because I had to physically wrap my hand around her wrist and stop her before she revealed her bra.
If she was even wearing one.
“You are a menace,” I breathed, looking around to make sure we hadn’t traumatized an old lady or something.
“Admit it. It turns you on.”
“Fucking hell,” I murmured. “The deal I was about to mention is you get to ask me one real thing that I have to answer, and I get to do the same to you.”
The humor left her at that. “This sounds far less fun than the deal I had in mind.”
“Scared?”
“No,” she shot back, narrowing her eyes. But she shifted in her seat, looking around like someone might overhear us. “Just… whatever, fine. I get to go first.”
We hit another stop, people exiting and filing onto the train. When we started moving again, I waved a hand for her to continue.
“Why did you drive an old beat-up car, and now you’re stressing about going car shopping like you’re broke?”
I balked before a laugh choked out of me. “Wow, straight to the point, I see.”
“Hey, you’re the one who had the idea to be real. So come on, spill. Are you addicted to gambling or something?” She perked up, a mischievous smile on her face. “Oh! Or is it sex? Are you a sex addict? This might work out well for me, actually.”
I scrubbed a hand over my face, slightly regretting my choice. But my curiosity about this girl apparently outweighed my self-preservation. Besides, I could tell the truth without sharing everything.
“I’m not an addict and I’m not broke,” I said. “Not exactly, anyway. I have money. I just… need to hold onto it. I don’t want to blow my wad on a new car when I have other, more important things to care for.”
“Like what?”
“My family.”
Emily was quiet then. Her brows pinched a little, mouth opening like she wanted to ask more but then thought better of it. It was like she knew that I’d shared what I was comfortable with, that we were at the end of my part of the deal.
“That’s really sweet.”
I nodded, my lips in a tight smile. “My turn.”
“No, I’m not wearing panties.”
I rolled my eyes so hard my eyelids fluttered, and Emily laughed, the sound light and sweet and airy. I wanted to bottle it up and play it on repeat.
And somewhere between the way she’d softened just now and the way she always snapped right back to teasing, it clicked — the sarcasm, the wit, the constant deflection. It wasn’t just who she was. It was how she protected herself.
I wondered why that defense mechanism was there.
I wondered what it would take to get past it.
“What you said to Zara earlier…” I started. “It seemed personal.”
“That’s not a question.”
“Do you really feel like you don’t fit in?”
She swallowed, but to her credit, her eyes never left mine.
“I know I don’t,” she said. “But I’ve also learned that’s not a bad thing.
It may land me in some trouble sometimes but…
I don’t mind it. I want to stand out. I’m loud.
I say what I mean. I like living on the edge.
” She shrugged. “Safe is boring. And if there’s one thing I know, it’s that I don’t want to live a boring life. ”
I couldn’t help it, though I tried. I bit back a smile but it broke through anyway, and a laugh barreled out of me.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s just… we could not be more opposite if we tried.”
“You are pretty boring.”
“I prefer it that way. You said safe is boring, but I say boring is safe.”
Emily watched me for a long moment, her eyes flitting up to the screen above the door that had her stop coming up next.
“I’ll go car shopping with you.”
I shook my head. “That’s not—”
“A suggestion, I know. It’s fact. I’m going. Give me your phone.”
She stuck her hand out, wiggling her fingers when I sat there dumbfounded. For reasons unbeknownst to me, I dug out my cell and handed it to her, watching as she typed her number in, texted herself, and then tossed the device back to me.
She stood then, grabbing her bag and heaving it over her shoulder. I resisted the urge to get off at her stop just to carry the ridiculously heavy thing so she didn’t have to. “Let me know the day and time.”
“We’re not supposed to be fraternizing.”
“Then I guess we better keep it to ourselves, Boss.”
She winked, and then bent down to plant a kiss on my cheek before she bounded off the train, leaving me no chance to argue.