Chapter Fourteen LIAM
Chapter Fourteen
L IAM
Let it be known that I had the patience of a fucking saint.
Either that or I was the worst kind of simpering fool for this woman. I could’ve ignored the questions. But I didn’t.
“Would you rather speak any language in the world or have the ability to communicate with animals?”
“Honestly, Valentine.”
“What? It’s a hard question.”
I took a moment to think. I sighed. “Animals. Because then I could bribe spiders to stay away from me for the rest of my fucking life, and I’d never have to see them again.”
She smiled, and it made my chest go all soft. “Hates spiders. Noted.”
That was a good one, and I barely stopped myself from asking her how she’d answer, but somehow I managed.
The next day, it was like she wasn’t even trying.
“Favorite place to shop?”
“The grocery store.”
She sighed dramatically. “That doesn’t count.”
“Does to me.”
Zoe set her chin in her hand and stared, finally rolling her eyes when I didn’t change my answer. “The bookstore,” she said. “The one in Lone Tree. They have the best romance section.”
I grunted as I flipped through the mail, but I found myself wanting to tuck each little nugget away for safekeeping. Things I hadn’t known about her before.
I liked it when she answered on her own.
She’d set aside the envelopes with my name on them, and I paused when I found a heavy one addressed to me but stamped with the logo from Chris’s alma mater. He’d gone to the University of Michigan, and I’d come from their bitter rival, Ohio State, so I took a moment to growl at the sight of the blocky M in the return address. Zoe angled her head when I ripped at the back. “What’s that?”
“An envelope.”
She sighed heavily, and it brought me an unholy amount of joy. “What’s in the envelope?” she clarified.
Skimming the invitation, I didn’t answer right away, and she tried to edge around me to look. I moved the letter so she couldn’t see it. She narrowed her eyes in a glare, and I fought the urge to smile.
“They’re doing something for Chris and Amie,” I said as I continued reading. “First home game of the season. They’d like us to come with Mira.”
She nodded. “Do you think we should go?”
“I hate that fucking stadium,” I told her. “But yeah. I might call Burke, see how the house is coming along. He was probably invited too.”
“Why do you hate it so much?”
“You want a list?” I laughed, short and dry and devoid of humor. “It’s ugly, and it’s too big, and there’s way too much blue and fucking yellow.”
“Ahh.” Her eyes were wide and serious. “It sounds ... awful.”
“Don’t you make fun of me; you have no idea what it’s like to play in that place.”
It was the first place where I’d played against Chris, and we’d split during our years in college. He won two, I won two—something we’d never let each other forget in all our years playing pro ball together in Denver.
Zoe chewed on her bottom lip as she studied me, her eyes gleaming.
“What?” I snapped.
Her grin blossomed slowly. “Nothing.”
“Yeah right, fucking nothing,” I muttered, brushing past her and out of the kitchen to the sound of her laughter. She’d somehow managed to get a few extra questions in, and I decided to blame that on Michigan too. Bloody Wolverines.
Thankfully, she’d dropped it by the next day.
“What movie have you watched more than any other?”
“Are you joking?” I asked her.
“No.”
“What’s yours?”
She stared past my shoulder for a moment as she thought. “ Back to the Future .”
“Really?” I asked. “That’s your favorite movie?”
“I didn’t say favorite,” she pointed out. “I said what movie have you seen the most. I always watch it when it’s on TV, and it’s on a lot.”
I conceded that one with a grunt. Then I pointed at Mira. “What do you think?”
Zoe’s face bent slightly in confusion.
I sighed. “Duck, what’s your favorite movie?”
Mira was pushing her food around her plate, and her head snapped up. “ Moana ! We watch it?”
Zoe laughed, and even though I rolled my eyes, the mood in the kitchen was light and happy while we finished our dinner.
“If you could have only one meal for the rest of your life, what would it be?”
I cocked my head to the side as I grilled chicken for dinner the following night. Mira was drawing with sidewalk chalk on the concrete, and Zoe was sitting in one of the lounge chairs with her Kindle in hand.
“Do I get sick of this meal?” I asked.
“No. And it never makes you gain weight either.”
“Not chicken and veggies, I can tell you that.”
She laughed, and I tucked the sound away in my brain. Something to think about later. Something to pull out when I wanted to make my heart feel warm and happy.
What was my big accomplishment for the day? I’d made Zoe Valentine laugh.
Simpering.
Fool.
Zoe set her Kindle down. “That’s not your answer, is it? Because that’s cheating.”
“Not my answer,” I told her. “Just thinking.”
“Mine is pizza,” she said. “And mint chocolate chip ice cream for dessert.”
Zoe would inevitably spend all day thinking about her one question and hit me with it sometime around dinner.
“You and that ice cream,” I mused.
She arched an eyebrow. “It’s the perfect flavor.”
Yeah, and every night when she opened the freezer to dig her spoon into the container, making those fucking noises after a few bites, I had the startling realization that I’d probably always get hard when I smelled mint and chocolate.
Not ideal.
“If it’s not chicken and veggies ...” Zoe prompted.
Right. My daily question. I closed my eyes and conjured up the first thing I’d ask my mum to make if I were back home. “My mum’s bacon butty.”
“What’s that?”
I glanced at Zoe. She’d turned in the chair, her legs tucked up to the side. Even though it was perfect out, sunny and in the midseventies, she had that fucking Wolves sweatshirt covering her to midthigh, her thumbs poked through holes in the sleeves.
I’d come to realize she did that to all her favorite shirts, and fuck if that didn’t delight me.
A few curls had escaped her ponytail, and they framed her face—open and attentive and curious.
When I didn’t answer, she widened her eyes meaningfully.
“You know, your one question somehow turns into quite a few. That’s cheating.”
Zoe grinned, a dimple popping up in her cheek.
I had to turn away because I was not liable for my actions when that dimple appeared. Bloody hell, it made my stomach tremble dangerously.
For a moment, I focused on the chicken, flipping a few of the pieces and then transferring some others to the top rack to finish.
“A butty is just a sandwich,” I told her. “My mum fries up bacon—ours is much larger than anything you use here. She puts salted butter on the bread. If tomatoes are in season, she’ll add a fresh slice from the ones in her garden. Sometimes it’s got brown sauce.” My voice went a little quieter the longer I talked, the longer I thought about sitting at her banged-up kitchen table, eating one of those fucking sandwiches. It had been years. “It’s nothing fancy, and you can find it in a thousand pubs across Britain. But hers are the best.”
Zoe was silent after I stopped talking, and when I risked another look in her direction, she’d lifted her Kindle again, but her smile was soft and happy.
Slowly and quietly, I exhaled all the air from my lungs.
Some days, the questions were easy.
My biggest pet peeve? People.
That one made her laugh. I liked it when that happened.
Favorite candy? M the clean lines of the pale-pink one-piece were cut high on her thighs and low on her chest. The ripe curves of her breasts were high and sweet. Maybe not much more than a handful, but fucking hell, my mouth watered at the sight.
Around her shoulders, all those golden curls tossed about in the breeze.
She smiled sweetly at Mira and adjusted the delicate straps of the suit. Everything she did was sweet to me, even in the moments when she’d spit fire over how mad I’d made her.
Wasn’t that the crux of my problems? I could hardly see any of this clearly because I was tied up in a million knots over this woman.
And as much as Mira scared the shit out of me, the things I felt for Zoe were just as terrifying.
Scary in an entirely different way. The kind of scary that shredded my insides because I couldn’t make sense of where to put that feeling anymore.
It couldn’t be ignored, not with her in my face every single day.
Mira already loved me, already looked to me for comfort and kindness and encouragement. I still wasn’t sure how well I could give her any of these things.
But she didn’t have the power over me that Zoe did. The power to inflict massive damage with a single word.
Zoe glanced into the house, doing a slight double take when she caught me staring.
I didn’t look away. Didn’t drop my gaze. But I didn’t soften the moment with a smile either.
That was something she did. A gift that she was willing to give.
And maybe it was easier for Zoe to offer it because she had a heart bigger than the ocean. She’d had it broken before, and she still stepped right up to the plate when people like Chris and Amie demanded a sacrifice of such magnitude that it was hard to comprehend sometimes.
We weren’t playing house. This wasn’t a game. And, still, she and I were just trying to get through each passing day without making a monumental fuckup of the task we’d been handed.
“Question of the day,” I said to myself. “What the bloody fuck are you gonna do with these two?”
I wished I knew the answer to that one. And I hoped she never asked.