Chapter 5
Dawson hadn’t even realized he was feeling alone—not lonely, per se, because it was basically impossible to feel lonely in a place like Toronto, and around a football team like the Thunder, who all clung a shade too close, but on an island of sorts—until he and Cam started carpooling.
“I don’t know why you weren’t doing that before,” Nate said to him in the weight room when Dawson expressed how nice it was to have company on the long and often infuriating drive to the practice facility every day. “You guys live in the same damn building.”
“I didn’t even think about it,” Dawson admitted. God, he’d been so preoccupied with his own shit.
“Pretty self-absorbed of you,” Lane joked.
Dawson rolled his eyes. “Don’t need to tell me that.”
“I kinda think we do,” Aidan added, and next to him, Mo nodded.
“I don’t need a lecture,” Dawson retorted without much heat. Maybe he had needed one, but he’d figured it out, hadn’t he? He’d fixed it. Well, not entirely, but he was on his way to fixing it.
He looked over at where Cam was stretching on one of the big mats.
“I kind of thought I was gonna have to give you one,” Aidan said in a low voice, flicking his hand towards Cam’s figure on the mat. He was moving into some yoga poses now, shorts pulling across his ass.
Dawson glanced away. It was a really nice ass. He was divorced. Not dead. And while he might be long since inoculated to Aidan’s hotness, it wasn’t the same with Cam.
Maybe he could get him to puke in a bush.
“What are you talking about?” Dawson asked suspiciously, afraid he did know what Aidan was referring to.
“Please, you think he’s adorable,” Aidan said. “And he’s well . . .”
“Pretty fucking green?” Lane answered for him.
Dawson rolled his eyes. “This convo is not good for anyone. Not for me, not for you, and definitely not for you, Lane.”
Lane’s eyes gleamed with mischief. “Afraid I’m gonna move in on your rookie, Hall?”
“He’s not my rookie, and no, because the guy’s got good taste. Better taste than you.”
“Ouch,” Lane said, lifting his hand for a high five with Mo.
Aidan gave them both a brief but hard look.
“The rookie has a name, and he’s—” But Aidan didn’t get any more of his speech out before Lane interrupted him.
“Naive? Innocent? Way too sweet for any of us?”
Dawson ground his teeth together. “All of those things, sure.” If Aidan couldn’t finish his lecture, then Dawson would do it. “But he’s a good kid. Deserves better than to be harassed by you guys.”
Lane rolled his eyes, but Dawson wasn’t really worried about him. There was only one rookie Lane had been looking at, and he might talk a big game about hooking up and might talk an even bigger game about disliking the guy, but the rookie wasn’t Cam.
He finished up his reps and glanced over at the mat. Cam was there still, laughing with Duke.
Maybe Lane wasn’t who Dawson should be worried about.
“Your face is gonna freeze like that and good luck ever getting anyone else to marry you.”
Dawson looked over and of course it was Aidan, looking smug and annoying.
“God, I hate you,” he said, punching Aidan in the arm. “Go be superior someplace else.”
Aidan only shot him a knowing glance.
“Maybe where your hot boyfriend is,” Dawson muttered under his breath. He polished off his water bottle and headed over to the dispenser to fill it. Not surprisingly, Aidan followed him.
“You know I wasn’t giving that warning for Lane,” Aidan said, leaning against the wall, knowing look gleaming in his blue eyes.
“He’s the best person for you to give it to. The guy’s living out his Grindr-hookup fantasies.”
“Don’t think so. Not anymore, anyway. But don’t change the subject.”
Dawson was afraid he knew what Aidan was trying to get at, and he really didn’t want him to say it out loud.
“Don’t,” Dawson warned.
“So you admit you need the warning?”
“No. No. The guy’s like a baby. A rookie.
Why would I be interested in him?” Dawson’s mind was not cooperating and was currently ticking off reasons why he might be: 1) most definitely cute, with an even cuter ass, 2) talented, 3) funny when you got him out of his own head, 4) and saw a version of Dawson that wasn’t a total fucking failure.
“I want to remind you that you kicked my ass about Levi, and you were right to do it.”
“That’s different. You were like a robot with a failing battery, and when he showed up, it was as if you’d finally gotten plugged in again.”
“I’m going to ignore that sort of fucked-up metaphor and focus on the point. My point. You look at him. I know you do. And he sure looks back, Daws. And that’s not a bad thing. I know you’ve had a hard go of it recently—”
“And that’s it, the extent of this conversation,” Dawson interrupted casually.
“Why do you never want to talk about it?” Aidan complained. “You make me feel like a bad friend.”
Dawson took a long drink of water and shot Aidan a look. “’Cause you’re a fucking terrible friend, Aidan.”
Aidan had the nerve to look wounded, and now, it was even worse because Dawson felt guilty about it.
“Not that you actually are terrible. You’re ride or die for your guys, you’ve always been. I knew when I signed here that you’d watch out for me. Be a good teammate. But you’re always fucking pushing.”
Aidan frowned, confusion creasing his forehead. “Daws, that’s what good friends do.”
Was the worst part that Aidan was probably right? Or that after all of Aidan’s insistent patience and pleas to talk about his goddamn feelings, he’d ended up confiding in Cameron instead the other night?
Aidan would surely pick the latter, but Dawson would always, always pick the former.
“Okay, I’m only gonna say this once.” Dawson fixed his gaze on a point just over Aidan’s shoulder so he didn’t have to see his eyes as he said it.
“I’ve been feeling pretty fucking sorry for myself.
Some of it justified, some of it not. And it sucks to realize that.
That while I’ve been pouting about how things shook out, it’s like the world moved on without me.
I’m still trying to catch up. I don’t need to talk about it.
I don’t want to talk about it. It sucked. It sucks. End of story.”
“Daws—” Aidan started to say, hand coming up to cup Dawson’s shoulder.
“No,” Dawson said flatly. “Don’t say you’re sorry.”
Aidan looked almost relieved. And that was better than anything else. Maybe Levi had actually, finally turned him into a real boy.
“Okay,” Aidan said. “But my original point stands. Cam gazes at you like you’re a god, and that’s gonna feel good.”
“He does not,” Dawson scoffed. He nearly told Aidan that Cam actually thought he was the hot one, but Aidan didn’t need any more boosts to his ego. It was already healthy enough, especially with Levi in his bed now.
“He does,” Aidan argued mildly. “And you might pretend that you don’t, but you’re looking back.”
Dawson wanted to argue. But then he’d checked out Cam’s ass earlier, hadn’t he? He’d have to be a lot stronger man than he was to be faced with that slender, muscled curve and not look at it. It was just aesthetic appreciation, that was all.
“I’m not saying don’t, because you’re not Lane, thank God. We have our hands full enough with the demon twins. But like . . .step carefully, alright?”
“He’s not a child,” Dawson argued and then regretted saying anything at all.
“Right. Of course he’s not. But like . . .everything’s new to him. Remember how that was?”
Dawson did. How underwater he’d felt his whole first season in the NFL. “I’m watching out for him, that’s all.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re doing at least that now,” Aidan said.
Dawson smacked him on the arm. “You’re the fucking worst.”
Aidan grinned. “Yeah, yeah. But you love me, secretly.”
“Enough people love you, secretly,” Dawson said.
A complicated look passed over Aidan’s face. “Yeah,” he agreed.
Dawson raised an eyebrow. “You wanna talk about that?” he asked, gesturing across the room to where Mo had joined Cam and Duke.
“I really, really don’t,” Aidan said, glancing briefly at Mo and then looking away.
“Remember that the next time you whine at me about sharing my feelings,” Dawson told him.
Laughing, Aidan chucked a fist under his chin. “I missed you, you know? When you were in Baltimore.”
“I’m not surprised,” Dawson said.
“Okay, how about this: if you’re gonna fuck the rookie, at least don’t fuck up the rookie?”
Dawson rolled his eyes. “I’m not gonna fuck the rookie.”
Aidan didn’t look like he believed him, which was fine. Aidan wasn’t the end-all, be-all of everyone’s sexual desires. Frankly Dawson hadn’t been convinced that Aidan even had sexual desires, not until Levi had shown up in Toronto and Aidan couldn’t stop looking at him.
But as much as he didn’t like it, Aidan’s words followed Dawson through the day. Through practice, watching from his spot on the field as Joey and Cam practiced hitting punts that landed within the five-yard line.
He could kick pretty damn far for a punter, no question, with a leg strength that belied his slender stature.
But he had the accuracy too, which not every punter had.
Most of them were just damn good at booming kicks, but not pulling back when the occasion demanded it.
Dawson hadn’t met a punter yet with such a fine-tuned ability to judge exactly how much force was needed on a kick to pin an opposing team on the other side of the field.
It was just admiration of skill, that was all.
His high school English teacher would have insisted he was protesting way too much.
Brynn would probably tell him competence porn was a thing. After all, it had won her over. Carlos had been her personal trainer, and there was a part of Dawson still very much pissed that his normally intelligent ex-wife had fallen into that trap.
His words hung around at lunch, with Cam on one side of him and Duke and Jack across from him as he ate his chicken salad.