Chapter Fourteen
Braden
“Great game, Lock.”
The voice came behind the pounding of a hand on my chest, and I almost didn’t register the smiling face the voice belonged to. It was Victor Clemens, our wide receiver coach, a broad-shouldered man in his late fifties who beamed at me as he passed.
It was a fleeting comment, one said with goodwill, and yet it left my stomach sour.
Had it been a great game?
We’d won. It had been a close game. I supposed those two facts alone meant it was a great game.
But had I played a great game?
I wasn’t sure I knew the answer. I was tallying it all up in my head, the good versus the bad, and just when the scale would tip one way, I’d recall something that slid it back the other.
Five catches.
Seventy-two yards.
One touchdown.
On paper, that looked good. Hell, most receivers in this league would take a stat line like that and call it a solid day.
But paper didn’t show everything.
Paper didn’t show the slant in the second quarter where I’d had a full step on the corner and hesitated just long enough for him to close the window.
Our quarterback, Geno Alberson, had still squeezed the ball in there, but it could’ve been twenty yards instead of eight if I’d trusted the route and exploded out of the break.
Paper didn’t show the third down late in the third quarter when the safety rolled over the top and I’d cut my route half a yard shallow. Geno had looked for me exactly where I should’ve been.
Half a yard.
That was the difference between a conversion and a punt.
And I’d had a drop. It wasn’t a brutal one that made the worst of the week highlight reels by any means, but the ball had touched both of my hands, and somehow I’d let it fall.
The touchdown held the scale down the most for the good side of things. It had been a clean route — a double move that left the corner biting hard enough that I almost felt bad for the guy as I broke toward the pylon. Geno dropped it right over my shoulder and I’d pulled it in effortlessly.
But one touchdown didn’t mean shit if the rest of your tape looked sloppy.
I adjusted the strap of my duffle on my shoulder as I walked, jaw tight.
Great game, Lock.
Maybe.
But was it great enough to earn me a second contract?
Great didn’t guarantee I’d still have a locker in this building two years from now. Great didn’t mean my family never had to worry again — that I’d never have to worry again.
I needed excellent. I needed astounding. I needed perfect.
Something inside me squirmed under that pressure, not because it wasn’t used to the weight, but because it was trying to gently remind me that I put too much on myself. That’s what my therapist had said — you don’t have to be responsible for all of it.
But that therapist didn’t have to watch my dad pull at his hair under the low light of our kitchen as he tried to figure out how to make ends meet.
That therapist didn’t know the sound of my mother’s cries.
And he sure as shit didn’t know what it was like to love my sister the way I did, to want to give her the best of everything and be willing to stop at nothing to do just that or die trying.
I still hadn’t decided if I believed Coach about that whole great game statement as I shuffled out of the locker room.
I had my headphones around my neck, volleying between leaving them there or putting them on my ears so I could just plow right through the area where fans would be waiting for autographs.
In the end, I left them be. Those fans were the reason I got to do what I loved. They were what kept us going when the odds were stacked against us. A signature and photo were the least I could do to repay them.
The area leading to the barricade was a strange kind of energy.
I could hear the cheers from the fans waiting outside, could hear them calling out the name of my teammates as soon as they passed by me with a jut of their chin and descended into the madness.
I took a deep breath in the reprieve of that shelter, ready to put on a smile and channel the energy of that great game Coach said I’d had.
Before I could take a step, a flash of neon green and navy popped up in front of me, rhinestones catching the light from above.
“Great game, Boss.”
There were those words again, except this time they didn’t vault me straight into a thought spiral like they had when Coach said them. Maybe it was because they were softer, more of a tease than an actual assessment.
Maybe it was because they came from the sweet, glossy lips of Emily Huxley.
“Thank you,” I said.
I should have walked away. I should have nodded a goodnight and bolted for the door.
As it was, I was rooted in place, my eyes greedily taking advantage of the excuse I had to finally look at the woman I’d been working so hard to ignore.
I kept it brief, at least — the track of my gaze from her wide, dark eyes to the ink stretched across her skin.
I clocked the way her uniform accentuated her subtle curves, how the cut between the skirt and the top was perfectly made to show off her tight abdomen.
When I met her eyes again, she was smiling wider.
It was as unnerving as it was enticing. She loved when I looked at her. She didn’t shy away from my gaze one bit.
She blossomed beneath it.
“Did you see the little dance I did for you when you scored that touchdown?” she asked.
I smirked, adjusting my bag on my shoulder. “Afraid I missed it.”
On purpose were the words I didn’t add. I knew better than to risk a look in her direction after I scored. I would have been so distracted I probably would have ran right into the field goal post.
“Aw, that’s too bad.” She pretended to pout, her bottom lip jutting out before she inched closer and waggled her brows. “Want me to do it again? Maybe in a different setting… with less clothes?”
My heart leapt into my throat, which I cleared as I looked around to make sure no one had overheard her.
Emily chuckled, the sound warm and addicting. “Relax, Boss. Our contract says not to make out — it doesn’t say we can’t talk to each other. Look around you.”
She gestured to the other players and staff members who were passing by.
Some walked alone, but others chatted with one another, players and dancers laughing before they split ways.
The players walked through the tunnel of fans to the player parking lot while the dancers went straight, heading for the staff exit on the far side of the stadium.
I let myself look at her again, and just like before, I felt the air punch out of my lungs at the sight of her teasing smile.
“How was it?” I asked, unable to help myself. “Your first game.”
“Incredible,” she breathed, shaking her head. “I don’t know how you guys hear yourself think with those fans screaming their heads off like that.”
“It fuels us. It’s our opponents it creates problems for.”
“Then I guess that’s why they call them the twelves, huh?”
She smiled, hands clasped behind her back as she did a little shake of her shoulders.
“Hey, man, gotta keep it moving,” the security guard to the side of us said. He shrugged like it was out of his hands, gesturing for me to walk out toward the parking lot and not clog the tunnel.
I nodded to him and then to Emily, wishing I didn’t have to leave her, wishing I could have what I wanted without it jeopardizing everything I cared about most.
“See you around, Trouble,” I said, and because I’m a glutton for punishment, I reached out and thumbed her chin, my eyes falling to her lips for the briefest second before I tore my hand and my gaze away and started for the barricades.
I made it all of five steps before Emily was at my side again.
I frowned, looking down at her with eyes I hoped communicated what the fuck are you doing? But I couldn’t say anything out loud — not now that we were in the throngs of dozens of screaming fans.
“Braden! I’m your biggest fan! Please, sign my ball!”
“Lock! Lock! Over here!”
“You’re the best, Lock!”
“Braden! I love you!”
There were phones everywhere, capturing pictures and video, and camera flashes from actual cameras, too.
I smiled as I reached for a marker and ball from a kid who looked to be no older than ten, scribbling my signature across the ball before I handed it back to him.
He celebrated as I moved down the line and posed for a selfie with a group of fans.
Emily watched it all, her lips quirked to the side.
She made no hurry to leave me behind, either.
She acted like she was supposed to be there, even taking peoples’ phones so she could get a better picture of us.
Soon, people were asking her for pictures, too, and she obliged with that gorgeous, heart-stopping smile of hers.
Even when she didn’t mean to, she stole the show. It was impossible to avoid. She just… sparkled, like a whole universe of stars existed inside her and she was the only one who couldn’t see it.
When we made it through the noise, I threw up a hand in a final parting wave to the fans and shoved my hands in the pocket of my hoodie, feet on track for my car.
“You know that exit is for players only, right?” I asked, arching a brow as I angled my chin down toward Emily.
“Apparently not, since security didn’t stop me.”
“They probably thought you were lost and didn’t want to embarrass you.”
“Can’t embarrass someone who doesn’t give a fuck what other people think.”
I huffed a laugh, both loving and hating that little fact about her.
“Must be why you don’t care that you’re breaking our contract in plain sight,” I said.
“Again, that contract is meant to keep us out of each other’s beds,” she shot back with a roll of her eyes. “Not to prevent us from talking or to make us act like the other doesn’t exist.”
She followed me when I veered right for my Bronco, and I tapped the unlock button on my keys, the lights flashing. A few of my teammates clocked Emily at my side, their brows cresting as we passed.
I did my best to act like it wasn’t a big deal, my gaze forward and focused on my car.
“Speaking of which,” Emily said, jogging to catch up to my stride before she slid in front of me. We were just a few feet from the Bronco, but I had no choice but to stop or plow her over. “You’ve been avoiding me like the plague.”
“I’m beginning to think you’re my own personal one.”
“Ouch.” She covered her chest and stumbled back a bit like I’d hit her with an arrow.
I shook my head, adjusting my duffle bag on my shoulder before I forced my gaze over her head and across the lot.
“Can’t even look at me?” she asked, snapping her fingers in front of my face. “Is it because the last time you acknowledged my existence, I had my hand—”
“I can’t stop fucking thinking about you.”
The words rushed out of me, sounding every bit as angry and annoyed as I felt. My chest heaved, jaw tight as I watched the sass fade from Emily’s face.
Something akin to surprise and glee slid in to take its place.
I looked around, making sure no one had heard before I lowered my voice.
“I can’t,” I repeated. “No matter how I try to ignore you. And it’s a real fucking problem.”
Emily’s lips curled into a soft smile before she covered it with her fingertips, looking to her left where a player was passing us. She waited until he was out of earshot before her gaze found me again.
“Maybe if you’d hang out with me, that would solve your little problem.”
“Or make it worse.”
“Only one way to find out.”
Her voice was low and sultry, a dare in her eyes as she stepped just an inch closer.
It was enough to make fire bloom in my chest, to make my hands shake with restraint where I had them stuffed in the pocket of my hoodie.
I swallowed past the lump in my throat, eyes casting up to the sky like God could save me.
“Goodnight, Trouble,” I said with finality, giving her one last pointed look before I side-stepped and used every ounce of willpower I had to reach for my car door instead of her.
She sighed as I passed. “Goodnight.”
The sound of the world was muffled once I sat in the driver’s seat, and when I chanced a glance out my window, Emily stood there unmoving.
She wiggled her fingers with a teasing smile, but she still didn’t move.
And her eyes said it all.
You can keep trying to ignore me, Braden Lock.
But don’t count on me to help you.