Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Paige
“Thank you, Paige, sweetheart. I know you had to miss class this morning to come with me.”
I smile over at my grandpa, but it’s a little stiff. “It’s okay. I planned in advance. Chase stayed late while I finished my essay and he’s going to turn it in with his own, so I shouldn’t lose points for late work or anything.”
“Did he now? That was awful kind of him to offer.”
I frown slightly. “Well, I asked him and it’s our class together so, it’s—Grandpa, are you sick?” I say suddenly, surprised by how much the thought scares me. I may not know him all that well yet, but at some point, he went from Grant to Grandpa in my mind.
His features soften, as if he knows exactly where my thoughts have gone, and reaches over, taking my hand in his. “No, sweetheart. I’m not sick. Not like your father was, anyway. I’m just doing that thing we all dread,” he says, smiling when I blink in question. “Getting old.”
A low chuckle leaves me and his follows.
“Okay, well. I guess we can’t do much about that. So, why did you need me to bring you today?”
“Well, I had to have a couple tests run, and it seems the doctors were right. My heart is getting older a little faster than the rest of me, but it’s not something a cocktail of medication can’t handle.”
“Do you take anything now?” I ask, realizing I don’t know much about his health. Or anything, for that matter.
Has he ever had issues before? Did he get ear infections a lot as a kid, like I did?
The man isn’t built like a grandpa. He looks like he stepped right off the set of The Sopranos, in his pin-striped suit and with silvery-white hair.
“Not so much as an aspirin. I, well, sweetheart…” He looks out the window a moment and then turns back to me.
“This old man used to train often, when I was younger. Boxing and just good old gym-junkie stuff, all in the name of fun and in the need to feed my vanity, of course.” He grins, and my lips curve up.
“Truth be told, not that it’s much of a secret, but I never had much of a life outside of work.
My job being a mind game of sorts, I needed something physical, so I always made sure my buildings had a gym for blowing off steam, and let me tell you, when you lose a nine-million-dollar deal to some young buck fresh out of college with concepts he has no idea how to put in motion, punching a bag is the perfect therapy. ”
My lips twitch. “I bet it is.”
He nods, but slowly his smile fades. “Yeah, but…being in the gym and marrying the job like I did left little time for family. Little time for your child, who you didn’t realize needed you until it was too late, and help was the last thing they wanted.”
Sadness washes over me, creating a heaviness in my shoulders. We both know who he’s talking about.
“Your mother was quite brilliant, Paige,” he shares.
“A gifted little girl in any area she put her mind to. It was the freedom I unintentionally gave her that led her down the wrong path. Foolishly, I assumed she would be fine, ready when the time came to take my place, like I’d always intended for her to.
I didn’t know how deeply the addiction had claimed her, but the moment I realized, I stopped training.
I couldn’t stomach putting a pill in my mouth and swallowing, even though they were just your average pre-workout stuff. ”
He turns to face me better, his eyes downcast. “I like to think there was nothing I could do to mend our relationship, but the old man in me isn’t so sure that’s true anymore.
She was my daughter, and I shouldn’t have ever let her go.
If I had just found a way to be there, found a way for her to allow me in, maybe I could have fixed what I broke.
I could have met your father and seen the way she turned her life around, and I wouldn’t have had to wait twenty-three years to meet you. ”
I squeeze his hand, shaking my head slightly.
“My dad tried and did all of those things. She would get clean and make all these plans, ‘believing it in her own heart’ is what he had said, but then something would happen. A stressful moment or a run-in with an old friend. A song or a short walk to the store where no one was watching. A reason or no real reason at all, and she’d be gone again.
Until one day, she was gone gone.” I lift a shoulder, telling him what it took me some time to realize myself.
“There was nothing anyone could have done and it’s no one’s fault. ”
“You’re a very smart young woman, Paige. Smarter than I was at your age.”
“I doubt that but I appreciate it all the same.”
He chuckles, letting out a small sigh. “Do you remember much of her?” he asks, almost hopefully, but I shake my head. “I’ll have to share some stories with you sometime.”
“I’d like that.”
He nods, and I think I see a glossy sheen fall over his eyes, but he blinks and then it’s gone. “Well, your class is over now, so how about we get some lunch?”
“I can’t today. I told Chase I would be back in time to have lunch with him and I really don’t want to cancel.”
My grandpa watches me closely, and I will my cheeks not to heat under his stare. I’m not sure we’re the kind of close where I’d talk about my dating life quite yet, even if he has a direct interest in the subject. But I did tell him Chase was over late, didn’t I?
He smiles then. “Not a worry, sweetheart. Prescott is always free for a lunch date with me. I swear, the man is as lonely as I am.”
Guilt washes over me, and I consider asking him to join us but decide on something else instead. “I’ll be heading down to Oceanside to check on the studio and a few things Friday morning. If you’ll be in that area, I’m free that evening.”
“Then that is where I’ll make sure to be.”
We pull up in front of the campus and with a quick goodbye hug, I climb out, spotting Chase sitting on a bench just a little ways away.
He stands the moment he sees me, a smile on his face, and I can’t help but mirror it with mine.
We meet in the middle, his knuckle instantly going under my chin and tilting my head back so our gazes are locked. “Angel.”
My pulse seems to pound a little harder from nothing more than the look in his hazel eyes, and maybe the reminder of the things he does to my body. Repeatedly.
Eagerly.
“Hi.” I don’t mean to whisper.
His mouth curves into that handsome smile of his, and the knuckle beneath my chin runs along my cheek. “Hungry?”
This time, I only nod, and his smile turns into a bit more of a smirk. He totally knows what I’m thinking, and he likes it.
Chase takes my hand, and together we head to the cafeteria, where our friends will be waiting. A group lunch date he has done his best to be a part of since the two of us became an us.
I can’t help but feel like my life is coming together in ways I never expected.
I have a family member again, and a friend who means the world to me.
A boyfriend that I am borderline obsessed with and, well, hope that everything will work out in the end.
Maybe there is a happy medium I can reach with my grandpa now that Chase and I are together and my studio can still be saved.
That is the mantra I carry with me in the week that follows, and I find that my mornings aren’t plagued by stress and uncertainty anymore.
I spend my days in class, my afternoons at the field watching Chase and the boys practice, getting my schoolwork done, and every other evening, I teach a quick class at the after-school program for the local elementary schools around town.
There is no payment involved, but it allows me to learn a little about how different programs work and leaves me with several ideas I might like to incorporate into my own.
If I ever get to that point, of course. If I can save my building.
I close my eyes, smiling as I think of my dad.
He never lost hope. Even when he was sick, he was full of it. Not in regard to recovery—we both knew that wasn’t an option for him—but when it came to everything else, when it came to me, hope was all he had.
Or maybe faith is a better word.
He never said if. He always said when. When you open your rec center. When you teach classes. When you fall in love…
My eyes open, landing on the photo on my dresser. It was the last one I ever took with my dad, and beside it, propped up and frameless, is the one I printed last week. The first I ever took with Chase.
A first photo and a last photo sitting there together, that has to be some sort of sign, right?
I had no idea the picture was being taken. It was the night of the show in San Jose. Noah sent it to me a few days later, having taken it in secret just in case I wanted it, he had said.
I’m so glad he did.
I haven’t shown it to Chase yet. I just want to keep it for myself for a while because I’m pretty sure my face tells a deeper story of my feelings than my voice has. Maybe even my own mind.
I think I’m falling in love, Dad, and I wish you were here to tell me if I was doing it right.
There’s a soft knock on my dorm door, and I blink away the tears, pulling in a deep breath as I move for the handle and pull it open.
Chase stands smiling on the other side. “Ready?”
I nod, grabbing my carry-on suitcase, but he quickly peels it from my fingers. I close and lock my room, following him into the hall and onto the elevator.
“Are the others outside, or are we meeting them at Mason’s?”
“Mase decided to leave earlier, hoping D would sleep for most of the drive.”
“Earlier?” I smile. “It’s five thirty.”
“Yeah, they left at four.”
My mouth drops open, and he chuckles, kissing my temple as he takes my hand, leading me out the door.
I’m greeted by a lively Brady and a glaring, grumpy Cam.
“Don’t mind her. She’s got her coffee already so just give her, I don’t know, three or four hours.” He laughs, dodging her when she thrusts her torso out of the passenger window and tries to punch him.
“Come on,” Chase says after setting my suitcase in the back and opening the door to Mason’s Tahoe. “You’re with me.” He grins, his eyes staying on mine as I slide in, and then he’s seated beside me.
“Ari went with the others?”
“She stayed the night over there last night, so it was just easier, I guess.”
She’s been over there a lot more lately, hanging out with the baby every spare minute she has, and I can’t help but wonder if there is a reason for that.
“We could have taken my car if we needed to.”
“Nah, Mase’s buddy is gonna change his brakes on this bad boy while we’re in town, so he wanted to bring it.”
I nod, settling into the comfy seats, and Chase reaches between the front ones, coming back with a small paper cup, a familiar green tag hanging out of the side of the lid.
“A little honey and a lot of sugar.” He offers it to me.
“You brought me tea?”
“I hope a small is okay.” His cheeks actually pinken a little, and it’s so endearing.
I nod, holding it between my hands to warm them up, my eyes on his as I take a small sip.
He watches, and when I smile around the lid, his shoulders relax and he sits back, his palm resting on my thigh.
And I really, really like the feel of it. Strong and warm. Protective. Possessive.
Oh my, I think I already do love this man.
For the first part of the drive, we’re all pretty quiet, speaking a little but mostly enjoying the morning and comfortable silence, the music on low in the background.
When we’re about an hour from Oceanside, we stop at the gas station so Brady can run in and use the restrooms, and Cam climbs out with him, following him inside.
The moment they’re out of the car, Chase squeezes between the seats again and turns the music down completely before facing me.
“I wanted to ask something, but I didn’t want to put you on the spot. I mean I did ask, but I don’t know if you really know what you said yes to, so I want to make sure we’re on the same page, and if we’re not, it’s fine. I just—”
“Chase, breathe,” I tease.
He freezes, then a low laugh leaves him. He glances out the window a moment before facing me. “We all planned this weekend together, right? Like every year since the rest of us started here—spend our bye week at the beach house, no matter what.”
I nod, having been part of their weekend getaway on the one or two Saturdays a season that they don’t have a game for the last couple years now.
“I asked if you’d be coming, pretty much already knowing the answer beforehand, and you said, ‘Of course.’”
My lips curve up, and I nod again, waiting for him to get to the part that’s making him act adorably nervous.
“You said yes, and I didn’t think about the context until, well, the guys started talking about it.
” Another pause, those hazel eyes on mine.
“Paige, you always stay in Lolli and Nate’s guest room when we go to Oceanside.
” Mason and Ari’s cousin, Nate, and his fiancée, Lolli, are part of the group but they have their own place, and I think I finally understand where he’s going with this.
“But I want you to stay in the beach house this trip. With me. In my room. My bed.”
I bite at my inner lip so my smile doesn’t break free. Shifting in my seat, I lift my legs and fold them over his, so they’re across his lap. His hands fall to my outer thighs instantly, fingers twitching a bit as he waits for my response.
“Well…” I trail off, looking down, because I know what will happen when I do, and Chase doesn’t disappoint.
His strong knuckle comes under my chin, and when he lifts my face, drawing my eyes to his, he sees it, the coy grin in place.
“Are you being a brat, Angel?”
A low giggle fights up my throat. “Maybe it was presumptuous of me, but I kind of thought that was already the plan,” I admit. “Of course, if I got it wrong, I can always sleep at—”
He cuts off my playfulness with a swift press of his lips to mine.
I laugh against his mouth, my hand sliding into his hair and tugging him closer as I fall back in the seat, my head hitting the door on my way down, and that only makes me laugh harder, and he’s right there with me—smiling like I’ve never seen him smile, a lively freeness to him I can’t get enough of.
There’s something lighter about him these days, and I like to think I’m a part of that.
No, scratch that.
I know that I am; he makes sure that I do.
“Hey, you two!” Cameron shouts through the open window before sliding in. “If you’re fucking, hop in the back. I don’t want to get a peek of Chase’s perky ass if I look in the mirror.”
I drop my chin to my chest to hide the blush, but Chase doesn’t hide from his friends.
He smirks, tugging me up with him, and as we get back on the road with his right arm around me, his other takes my hand.
And not once for the rest of the drive does he let me go.