CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Cole
The whistle blows and I don’t wait for anyone to tell me to get off the field. I’m already moving, helmet in hand, jaw tight, breathing not quite as calm as it should be.
Third quarter is done. One quarter left. We may be up, but that last play was too damn close for comfort.
It replays in my mind as I cross onto the sidelines. My read was right, but my throw was a fraction too late. A bit off. A case of too much thinking and not enough doing.
Or maybe I’m mindfucking this whole thing knowing that the fourth quarter has been where my weakness shows since all this shit happened . . . and knowing it has the pressure wearing on me.
But how can I not overthink this all? Now that I know what might be triggering the betting, I’m thinking too much about it.
“Hey,” Lucas says as I pass him, stepping in my path to slow me down. “The hitch? Thought we worked through that?”
“I’m good,” I say automatically.
He lifts his brows. “Didn’t say you weren’t. I just asked why it happened.”
I don’t answer because I don’t have one for him that I’ll put a voice to. I know exactly what it was but I’m not about to admit it.
He studies me a half a second longer and then nods once. “Then fix it,” he says. “We need this win to stay in playoff contention.”
With a nod, I push past him, barely hearing the rest of the sideline noise as I head toward the bench. I regulate my breathing like Dr. Hawley suggested. I call shit on it, and yet here I am still doing it, desperate for any way to staunch the usual bleeding that follows.
I glance up and catch sight of a guy in the crowd right in front of me. His head is down, his Rebels hat hides his face, but for a split second I think it’s my dad.
Can’t be.
And yet when the fan lifts his head, I still see my dad’s face on him. Still cringe from that sneer of disgust and disdain and disappointment I’ve had directed my way so many times in my life.
The man isn’t him, but it’s prompting thoughts of his pre-game phone call. That’s on me for unblocking his number. I close my eyes for half a second.
Not now. Please, not now.
You think that’s good enough, Cole-y boy?
I can’t shut off the call I shouldn’t have taken this morning from him.
You keep playing like that and they’ll replace your worthless ass before the season’s over.
Out of habit, I flex my fingers once. Twice. There. That subtle, almost unnoticeable tremor.
I switch my helmet to that tremor hand. If my fingers are gripping on to it, then no one will catch the tremble.
But I’ll still feel it.
I’ll still know it’s there.
My jaw tightens until it aches. Breathe, Cole. Reset. Forget about him.
But it lingers. He lingers. Always does. I take a long drink of water I don’t need.
You don’t get to hesitate. Only losers hesitate. Oh, don’t look now, you’re hesitating.
“I’m fucking not,” I mutter under my breath as my hand trembles again and I hide it by tightening my grip on my helmet cage.
Don’t do this. Not today. Not this game.
I know what comes next. Dublin showed me in clip after clip what comes next.
“Valor!”
I glance up at the sound of Lucas’s voice.
“Fourth quarter.” His voice is steady, and the look in his eyes says he believes in me. “You’ve got this. I have faith in you.”
Good thing he and Coach do.
“I do.” My answer is automatic because anything else isn’t an option.
He studies me for a beat and then nods. “Then go finish it.”
I roll my shoulders, grab my helmet with my throwing hand and put my other hand inside of it, hiding it. I flex it out of everyone’s sight. The tremor is still there. My hand still doesn’t feel right.
C’mon, Cole. Come the fuck on.
I lift my helmet to put it on and for some reason, I look up. It’s not intentional. I don’t search or count the number of boxes over from the fifty-yard line, I just look up and find her.
There in my suite.
There, wearing my jersey.
There . . . for me.
Despite the distance, her eyes meet mine and fuck, man. The noise dulls—not gone, just quieter. The pressure in my chest eases, and I can think better. I can breathe better.
There you are.
The words settle in my head without effort or resistance. Like she’s supposed to have been there all along.
We stare at each other for a beat. My dad’s voice fades. It’s shoved back so that it’s not the only thing I hear.
“Hey,” Wolfe says as he pats my shoulder. “Let’s go kick some ass.”
We’re on the field, lined up in seconds. Fifteen minutes on the clock is a lifetime in football. Everybody knows that.
“Blue eighty. Blue eighty. Set—hike.”
Snap. The ball hits my hands and everything narrows to the world in front of me as I drop back into the pocket.
Formation.
Coverage.
Movement.
This is what I know. This is what I trust.
Read one—covered.
Read two—there. An opening.
I plant and it hits me out of nowhere. The hesitation. The flicker. The what if. A split second where everything wants to stall. Where my mind wants to second-guess and overthink.
I clench my fingers on the leather and force through it.
My man is still open, so I pull the trigger and release the ball. It’s not the best spiral but it does the job. The receiver catches it for the first down.
The crowd erupts as I shake my hand at my side and draw in a frustrated breath.
No interception. It’s a start, right?
“Let’s keep it moving down the field,” someone shouts as they pat me on the ass.
The next couple of downs play out the same way. The hesitation hits and I find a way to push through it. To execute the game plan. To compensate. My throws aren’t sharp or clean, but they’re effective. We move downfield—yard by yard, play by play.
Every time the flicker hits, I shove it aside faster. Quicker. Like I’m learning the timing of it. Like I can beat it. I can’t control it, not yet, but this gives me hope that I’ll survive it.
The crowd is on their feet as we take our first snap in the red zone.
“Trips right, sixty-two slant,” I call, stepping into the huddle. “We score, we’ve got this.”
They nod and we break.
The blitz come hard once we snap but I adjust on the fly, stepping up just as the receiver cuts inside. There’s no hesitation this time before I release and I’m rewarded. Touchdown.
The stadium explodes.
Hands are patting me left and right as I jog off the field. I just nod. I just say thanks, because while it was good, this still isn’t me at my best.
The clock winds down. We win.
Thank fuck.
I’m still running over the plays in my head, critiquing my mistakes—but it was enough.
It was a glimmer of hope that I’ll find my way back to the cocky fucker I used to be when the season started.
And right now? Enough is what I’ve got.
· · ·
“You sure got out of that locker room in a rush,” says Barry, the stadium attendant who supervises access to the suites, as I get off the elevator.
I fist-bump him and nod. “Too much damn testosterone down there.”
“Especially after a win,” he says.
“That’s for sure.”
“That means there’s less in your suite. She with you?”
I flash a grin and shrug. “I’m a lucky man, Barry.”
“Don’t hate the player, brother,” he says and laughs as I move down the hallway.
It’s definitely quieter up here than the locker room—decibels quieter—but that doesn’t mean my pulse hasn’t caught up yet.
Game’s over. We won. That should make me happy.
But my feet are already moving toward the one thing that will make this day even better. Dublin.
I push the door open to the suite and stop. She’s in the middle of the space, in my jersey, surrounded by my best friends. They’re all laughing so hard that Jaxon’s clutching his stomach and Tristan’s wiping the corners of his eyes.
For a second, I just take it all in. Because my best friends—my family—and my woman are . . . together.
And they’re not circling her. Not sizing her up. Not holding back.
They’re laughing with her like she’s always belonged.
I don’t have time to unpack how settled that makes me feel.
“Uh-oh. The man of the hour has made his entrance,” Tristan yells, hands up to double high-five me and then pull me in for a quick bro-hug.
I catch a glimpse of Dublin stepping back for what I assume is a chance for me to be with my buddies.
But it’s fleeting as Malachi steps in our line of site, holding his hands up. “It’s not my fault.”
Jaxon straightens up, hands matching Mal’s. “It was all in fun.” Then he barks out a laugh. “We may have had a few shots.”
Ah. That explains it.
But he moves and I finally lay my sights on the one person I wanted to see more than any of them.
Dublin’s cheeks are flushed, her eyes are a little brighter, and her movements looser than usual.
She points at me with a dramatic flair.
“Cole Valor,” she says, like she’s announcing it to the room, but then throws her head back and laughs.
I shake my head, a grin tugging at the corners of my mouth before I can stop it. “You’re drunk.”
She shrugs unapologetically. “So? I walked through fire. That means I earned the right to be a little tipsy, right?”
I don’t even think about it. I step through my friends and reach for her hand, loving when her fingers slide into mine without hesitation.
She doesn’t pause or overthink like normal and that alone throws me more than anything. I tug her toward me, expecting her to hesitate or let that careful, controlled version of herself to step in.
But she doesn’t. She comes willingly, easily, and stumbles just the slightest into my chest before tilting her head up at me like this—us, her being here for me after a game—is the most natural thing in the world. Like there was never a question.
“Your hair’s kind of wet,” she says, studying me.
I huff out a quiet laugh, wishing desperately that it was just the two of us in here alone. “That’s what a shower does.”
Her lips twitch. “Is this the part where you kiss me?”
Jesus. Buzzed Dublin is adorable. And dangerous.
I lean down and brush my lips against hers. She melts into it for a split second, like she always does, but this time it feels so much more defining than any other.
Because it’s the first time we’ve kissed in public.
And when I pull back and glance up, the guys are all staring.
Malachi’s smirking. Jaxon’s grinning like he just won whatever these three assholes no doubt bet on regarding us. And Tristan’s observing.
“What?” I bark out through a grin.
“Barbecue?” Tristan asks, referring to our typical post-game hangout in my backyard.
But it’s not a real question. It’s more of a test.
“Not tonight, guys,” I say as I look down at her.
“Ooooh,” Jaxon draws out.
“While I’m selfishly bummed we don’t get to use your kick-ass grill, it’s about damn time you pick someone over us, Valor.”
“No shit,” Tristan says. “So that’s a no, then?”
I flip them all off with the hand not currently settled on Dublin’s ass.
“Yeah. Yeah,” Malachi says, already heading toward the door. “We’ll leave you to it.”
“Try not to get kicked out of your own suite,” Jaxon adds with a wink before following Tristan through and shutting the door behind them.
Silence settles as she looks up at me, eyes glassy. “Thank you for the jersey.” She steps back and does a fake model twirl in it wobbling at the end.
But when she stops and her eyes take in my grin and then meet my eyes, she says, “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”
I’m speechless. I’ve had girls I like wear my jersey before. Women I dated. Women who wanted more. Women who were fine with being exactly what I needed them to be, but never—never like this.
A woman with grit and determination and that hint of vulnerability that steals a piece of me every time I see it. Never a woman who I gave my own jersey to.
“That’s one of the jerseys from my first game. First one I have framed on the wall in my office at home. It got ripped halfway through the game so in the second half, I wore that one.”
She gasps and runs her hands down it. I love how animated the tequila makes her. “Then I’m definitely washing it and putting it in your pile in the laundry room,” she says. “Thank you for letting me wear it today.”
“It’s yours, Dublin.”
In more ways than just a jersey.
She swallows. “I couldn’t possibly—”
“It’s yours.” I take a step forward. “Red suits you.”
“Perfect. I’ll wear it all the time.”
“Only if it’s just the jersey,” I say as her eyebrows quirk up.
“Is that so?”
“Hmm, I love you in that jersey—more than you can imagine. But I like you even better out of it.”
She blushes and this time when she steps up to me and kisses me, there’s more heat to it. Her hands slide up my chest and thread through the hair at the back of my neck as her tongue twines with mine.
She tastes like tequila and desire and that’s a mixture I could get drunk on easily. Maybe I already have.
She pulls back, her pupils wide and smile soft. “Name the time and place, Valor, and I’ll take it off just for you.”
My dick hardens instantly. Does she have any fucking clue what she does to me?
I look around the suite and then look back at her, quirking my eyebrows. She follows my gaze and the gives me a dubious look.
“You’ve got to be joking,” she says.
I brush my lips against hers again. The feel of her body against mine’s an even greater temptation. “It is my suite,” I say.
The playful edge to her expression transitions to suggestion, her smile coy. “Mmm,” she hums. “It is, is it?”
I lean into her ear, love the hitch of her breath as I lace an open-mouthed kiss in the spot just beneath her ear. “And I know where the blind spot is.”
When I lean back, her eyes spark. “Do you take all your women here and seduce them, Valor?”
“That’s not a very nice thing to say to the current one.” My tongue darts out to lick my bottom lip. “And, no. No woman has ever been in here with me.”
Something flickers across her face. Surprise. Satisfaction. Maybe both.
“But,” I add as I run my thumb over her bottom lip, “you can’t fault a guy for knowing where they are.”
Her smile turns wicked. “So where’s the blind spot exactly?”
I nod and turn toward the far corner. There’s no way, straight-and-narrow Dublin Locke would ever agree to this. And yet, here she is.
The minute the thought clears my mind, she wraps her fists in my shirt and yanks me down toward her, toward the blind corner. She stands on her tiptoes and brushes her lips against mine.
“To the victor,” she murmurs, “goes the spoils.”
And then her body collides with mine just like her lips do, and she kisses me like she plans to collect.