Chapter 39
~Deacon~
My phone buzzes with Daley’s message in the middle of one of the other rookies telling a story, and even though I know it’s rude, I sneak a peek at the screen anyway. It doesn’t take long to scan the two sentences she sent but they leave me with a lot of questions.
What does ‘mission accomplished’ mean? Did she leave? I can understand why she wouldn’t want to walk in here with so much of the team around, but I would have gone out to see her privately.
My thumbs are poised to type out a quick response when River walks into the cafe and heads to our table.
Taking the empty chair at the end of the table, he sits down right as the other guy’s story ends.
Everyone erupts in laughter at the punchline of the anecdote, so I smile along with them even though I have no clue what he said.
“Is everything okay, Adams?” Scott asks from beside me. “Why was your mom here?”
A completely irrational stab of jealousy pierces my chest for half a second until I remember that Daley came to the locker room and everyone saw her there. That’s where Scott knows her from, not for any other reason, and I’m not surprised he remembers her.
She makes quite an impression.
“Everything’s fine,” River says, his usual smile looking a little strained unless I’m imagining things. His eyes meet mine, catching me staring. “Heard you need a ride back to the city, Deke. I’ve got room in my truck.”
Disappointment immediately flashes across the faces of several of the other guys, all of whom would have been happy to take me too, but I can’t turn River’s offer down. If he’s got something to say to me, better that we get it out in the open. “That’d be great. Thanks.”
The conversation quickly moves on, and over lunch we talk about everything from the sessions they had this weekend to our upcoming schedule, to some borderline-inappropriate talk about a group of women who come in still dressed in their tight, stretchy workout gear after finishing their yoga session.
River never addresses me directly, never even looks my way unless I’m the only one talking.
I don’t have a fucking clue what he’s thinking.
When the meal ends, the guys all head out to grab their things from their rooms and check out. At last, River looks my way again, but only to deliver four words before he walks off. “I won’t be long.”
I wander back to the lobby where the receptionist asks for an autograph for her son.
Nobody has said a word to me about Daley, no one asking about the woman I’m dating, so I have to assume the news hasn’t spread very wide yet.
Once Channel 11 reports on it, that’ll be a different story, so I try to enjoy the calm before the storm while I can.
As for Daley herself, there haven’t been any more messages, but I wasn’t really expecting any.
She’ll still be on the road for a while longer and her car isn’t set up for hands-free texting.
It’s got to be about as old as River is.
I’m still staring down at the screen anyway when he brushes past me. “This way.”
Alright, then.
Keeping my eyes on his back, I follow him out of the lobby and to his new truck. He told me he bought a new one with his first paycheck, but I haven’t seen it before, so I let out an approving whistle. “Nice ride.”
He shrugs as he tosses his suitcase over the bench into the back seat, not saying anything else, so with a shrug of my own, I head over to the passenger side and hop in.
It’s a lot roomier than Daley’s car but I can’t exactly call it more comfortable, not with the way the temperature seems to drop when River gets in next to me.
He silences the radio when he starts the engine and, without a word, throws the truck into gear and heads out onto the highway.
Soon, the prairie’s flying by at 70 miles an hour and he still hasn’t said a damn thing.
Unable to take the silence any longer, I ask the most innocuous question I can think of. “Feeling ready for our first game this week?”
His eyes leave the road for just a second, darting over to me before flicking back, as if he thinks something about me has changed in the last ten minutes.
When he answers, it’s with a question. “Are you ready?”
My brow wrinkles as I try to figure out what he’s getting at.
Since I’m not certain if there’s any hidden meaning, I take the question at face value.
“Yeah, I’m ready. Can’t wait, actually. Ten years in and it’s still just as exciting to step onto the ice for that first game. Don’t think that ever really fades.”
Looking at him from the side, I don’t miss the way his jaw clenches. “What about the post-game interviews? You ready for that too?”
Ah. That gives me a better idea where this conversation is heading, and I shift in my seat, angling my body towards him a little more to make it clear that I’m open to whatever he wants to say to me.
“I’d rather that people stick to asking me about the game, but that probably won’t happen.
For reasons I’ve never fully understood, being good at a sport means that people are interested in every part of your life. It’s fucking weird.”
A couple of days ago, he would have laughed at that, but today, his lips don’t even twitch. His eyes remain focused on the road ahead. “You know what else is weird? Hooking up with your teammate’s mom behind his back.”
Straight to the point, at least. I have to give him credit for that. Maybe he gets it from his mom?
Since he’s being direct, I answer him the same way. “What part are you upset about? That we’re together or that you didn’t know?”
His nostrils flare as he thinks it over. “Both. Neither. I don’t know. It’s just weird.”
He catches up to a semi ahead of us and I stay quiet while he passes, letting him give his full attention to the road before I respond.
His hands grip the steering wheel tightly, and tension strains his neck with each swallow, but he’s not shutting down like Daley feared he would.
He doesn’t even really seem angry, just kind of conflicted, which I can completely understand.
Since he seems willing to talk, I try to make it a real conversation.
“Let’s take it one step at a time then. What’s weird about me and Daley dating? Is it me? Or just the fact that she’s dating at all?”
“Of course she’s allowed to date.” Those words slip off his tongue so quickly, I get the feeling he’s been practicing them for a while. “I don’t want her to be lonely, especially since I’m not around all that much during the season.”
“So, it’s me, then?” I add a teasing lilt to the question to let him know I don’t take it personally, and it seems to work. He almost smiles before his worry sets back in.
“I always imagined she’d end up with someone older. A guy who wears sweater vests and likes science stuff like she does. Someone academic and really smart.”
I’m pretty sure he’s calling me dumb in a roundabout way, but I don’t take it to heart. There’s something else that sticks out about his description of his imaginary stepfather. “Someone like your dad?”
The truck drifts to the right as he looks over at me in surprise, but before I need to tell him to keep his eyes on the road, he corrects our bearing and swallows hard to regain his composure. “She told you about him?”
“Yeah. The basics, at least.”
He mulls that over for another moment or two in silence. “I don’t want her to be with someone like my dad when it comes to how he treated her. But I thought that was the kind of guy she found attractive.”
“Because you’ve never seen her with anyone else,” I guess.
“I suppose, yeah.” He falls silent again and I let him take a moment to think about it. Honestly, he’s handling it pretty well, all things considered. No sooner than the thought crosses my mind than his gaze darts to me again, piercing in its sharpness. “What do you like about her?”
The image of Daley beneath me in bed immediately springs to mind, and I shove it back down just as fast. Definitely not the time.
Besides, I have plenty of other answers.
“She’s smart, caring, independent, easy to talk to, not interested in all the celebrity noise.
She lives for herself, and for you, but not for anyone else.
It’s refreshing, especially after all the drama I went through this year. ”
River comes even closer to smiling this time. “I don’t disagree with any of that, but it’s exactly because of the drama that I’m most worried.”
“I get that. Trust me, I do.” I blow out a long breath, remembering the reporters outside the arena, and my house, and even the hotel in Vegas.
The feeling of not being able to go anywhere without having every move I make scrutinized.
“The last thing I want to do is invite any of that into my life again, but I can’t ignore the way I feel about her either.
She’s the real deal and that doesn’t come around every day. ”
We lapse into silence once more, but it feels more comfortable now. Or maybe it’s just me that’s feeling more at ease.
In that spirit, I take a chance with a joke. “You know, when you offered me a ride, I thought you might be looking for an excuse to get me alone so you wouldn’t have any witnesses to whatever you planned to do to me.”
River flashes me a grin that he definitely inherited from his mom. “I wanted you to sweat it out for a little while. That’s why I told my mom not to tell you what we talked about.”
That explains Daley’s cryptic text. “You little shit.”
He laughs, and even more tension leaves my body. “It’s still weird,” he admits after another few minutes. “I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do or how I’m supposed to feel. All I really know for sure is that I want her to be happy.”
“That makes two of us. We’re on the same team, River.”
When he glances over at me this time, the warmth is back in his eyes. “So, when do I start calling you Dad?”
“Fuck off.”
I give his shoulder a shove and he laughs again, reaching over to flick the radio back on to keep us company for the rest of the drive home.