16. Ill Never Let Anything Bad Happen to You
I first knewKayden and I would be friends when I found out that he”s a morning person like me. He was just traded from Chicago to Salt Lake City, and we were on the first road trip since he joined the team. I stepped off the elevator and into the hotel lobby at seven in the morning for a coffee run when I saw him. First, I thought he was sneaking back into the hotel after a late night out, so I charged over to him, not caring how many people were about to see me rip into the irresponsible hotshot center. But before I had a chance, he smiled and waved a cup of coffee. ”Morning Morrison. Hotel coffee just doesn”t cut it. Plus, I needed to get out and move.” I decided then that the new kid was going to be okay.
But today? It”s five-thirty in the morning. Kayden is bopping his head and tapping his fingers on the steering wheel as we drive through the sleeping downtown for one of Coach”s insanely early practices. And all I want to do is crawl back into bed. Coach tells us this will help get us ready for those one o”clock games on the east coast, but it”s really just because half the team was lethargic at yesterday”s practice. This is his way of teaching us a lesson.
I just close my eyes and let my head roll back against the headrest when Kayden slaps me on the leg. ”Come on, man. You said you went to bed early last night. You can”t be tired.”
Ten is early, but that doesn”t mean I fell asleep then. There was a time when I never lay in bed worrying about my future. I was the undisputed starting goalie, and every night I went to bed with Serenity beside me. The woman I thought loved me. The woman I thought I loved. Her leaving me might be the only good thing that came from my injury. Sure, I was sad when she left, but I wasn”t heartbroken. It didn”t take long to realize I didn”t even miss her. I just missed what she represented. Someone to come home to. Someone who would always be there for me. Based on how quickly she left me when my career was in doubt, she was never going to be that person. I think of our new trainer way more often than I ever thought of Serenity when we were together. That tells me everything I need to know about my feelings for Serenity.
”I know what”ll get you going.” When we stop at a red light, Kayden swipes through his phone. A new song plays, and he looks at me. ”Right? Fucking best concert ever!”
I shake my head. I swear we were two of only a handful of guys in a mob of thousands of twenty-something girls who all sang in unison with every word at that concert. Every time I looked over at Kayden, he was bouncing and singing right along with them. Halfway through, he joined up with the group of women next to us, and together they belted out the lyrics even louder. But by the end of the night, I might have been swaying in rhythm just a bit. And maybe I did stream their newest album once or twice since then. So yeah, it was a good show. But I still don”t want to admit that. ”Eh, it was alright.”
Kayden laughs to let me know he sees right through my act, and then he turns up the music. We might both be signing along—him loudly and me under my breath—when we turn into the players’ parking lot.
”Oh, shit.” He slams on the brakes. There”s a car pulled up tight to Coach”s Cobra. No, not just pulled up to it. It”s against it.
In the dark of the parking lot, it takes me a second to recognize the other car, but then I throw my seatbelt off and race to the driver”s side of the old Subaru.
”Lily?” I tap on the glass. ”Are you okay? Can you hear me?”
She looks up and stares at me for a second. Then her mouth drops open and she covers her face. Like I won”t be able to see her if she can”t see me. I tap the window again, but she just shakes her head, her ponytail whipping from side to side.
”Is everyone okay?” Kayden is on my left now. He looks at the two cars and then at me and finally the driver.
”It”s Lily,” I say. The way she”s moving her head, I assume she doesn”t have a neck injury, or at least I hope not as I pull open her door. ”Lily, it”s okay. Are you hurt?”
”No.” I don”t know how one word can sound so broken. She looks up at me again. ”Brant?” I nod.
”See?” Kayden elbows my arm, and I just glare at him.
”What am I going to do?” Lily”s soft voice draws my attention back to her. ”This cannot be happening. It”s a dream. I”m still in bed. Or no. I fell asleep while I was driving here, and sure, I crashed into someone”s car but not this one. I”m just hallucinating now. I didn”t really crash into the probably very expensive classic car of my boss. Nope. This definitely did not happen. It”s maybe just a delivery truck. I need to close my eyes for a second, and when I open them, it won”t be Coach”s car in front of me because that would be too much to deal with right now. The universe might be an unfair place, but it can”t be this unfair, right?” She squeezes her eyes shut, and when she reopens them, she looks like she”s going to be sick.
I rest my hand on her shoulder, and something inside me draws tight at the look on her face. She looks sadder than the saddest dog on those sad dog commercials. I just want to put my arms around her and tell her that everything will be fine. But I can”t. Well, maybe I can. That last part, at least. ”It”ll be alright.” She shakes her head, but I hold my finger out in front of her. ”Lily, listen to me, it”s going to be alright. Coach might act mean, but he?—”
”He”s going to fire me.” The sadness in her eyes turns to desperation, and my heart drops so far it could be in one of my legs. ”He”ll fire me, and I”ll never be able to be a trainer for any team ever again. Oh god, not even a minor league roller derby team in Poland would take me now.”
I kneel so I”m level with her, and I get her to look at me. ”Breathe, Lily. Deep breaths. You”re not getting fired. Just focus on your breaths. In and out with me.” I inhale deeply, but she just stares. Tears well in her eyes. I don”t know what will happen if I see her cry, but I know I would do anything to make sure it never happens. ”We got this. Me and Kayden, right?” I turn to him. He”s standing at the hood of her car, staring down. He looks like he”s watching a coffin being lowered into the ground. ”Right, Kayden?”
”Dude, this is?—”
”Right, Kayden?” I interrupt him before he can say anything that will make Lily feel even worse than she already does.
”Right.” He follows my lead and nods his head. ”It just looks bad because it”s so dark. There”s not really much damage at all once you see it up close.” He looks at Coach”s door, which I now see has an enormous dent, and then back at me with a shrug. He mouths she”s fucked. I shake him off before he can say anything aloud.
”It looks bad because it is bad. What do I do?” Lily looks from me to him and back. That”s a damn good question that I need more than a few seconds to think about. ”Even if he doesn”t fire me, I can”t afford to fix his car. That”s probably… Oh no, that”s probably a fifty-thousand-dollar car, isn”t it?”
Kayden chokes, but I don”t say a word.
Lily”s eyes go wide. ”More? One-hundred-thousand? Seriously? I”m dead” Her body is quivering even more than her voice now, and I don”t have the heart to tell her that a classic Shelby Cobra costs way more than that, even when it”s a daily driver like Coach”s.
Her eyes glaze over, and she looks like she”s about to faint. ”Lily?” I take her hands in mine and squeeze to keep her focused. She”s freezing. ”I need you to trust me. I”ll never let anything bad happen to you, you got that? I swear.” Even as I say it, I know I”m overpromising. She”s just a girl I”m attracted to. A coworker. My neighbor. That”s it. How can I promise to always protect her? ”Remember your deep breaths,” I tell her. ”Do you think your car is drivable?”
She just shrugs, so I look at Kayden who gives me a thumbs up. Good. ”Are you able to drive?” Her breathing, which was slowing down, speeds up again, so I rub my thumbs on the backs of her hands. ”Not far. Just a...” Shit, where can she go? ”You know the hotel on the next block? The big one?” The one that undoubtedly has security cameras and will certainly report a crashed car sitting in its lot. This is a bad idea.
But when Lily nods, her eyes are so wide and expectant that I have to follow through, bad idea or not. It”s like facing a fast break when the shooter twitches to his right. Maybe he”s deking me, but once I commit, I have to stick with it. I just need to think of a way to turn this bad idea into a good one, or at least one that won”t come back to bite her in the ass.
”Drive there,” I tell her. ”Kayden will follow you to make sure you make it safely.” I don”t turn to make sure he”s hearing me. I know him well enough to know he is, and I have the feeling that if I break eye contact with Lily, she could shatter right now. ”You park the car in the back of the parking lot, and then you”re going to walk back here. You took TRAX to work today. Got it? While you”re doing that, I”ll call someone to take care of everything with your car.”
She blinks a few times, processing, then she nods. ”Does TRAX run this early?”
I try to remember if I”ve ever seen one of the passenger trains rolling around the city this early, but I can”t. ”It”s close enough. No one will ever know.” I hope. ”So you”re going to walk back here from the hotel, and then if anyone asks why you”re late, you”ll say it”s because you took TRAX. You”re new in town, so you aren”t familiar with the routes.”
”I”m not. New in town, that is. Not really.”
This takes me aback. I expected that since I”d never seen her, she must not have lived here until just a few weeks ago. It”s foolish. There are over a million people in and around the city. How can I expect to have spotted her in all of those? But I”m mad at myself that I didn”t. ”Doesn”t matter. Just stick to the basics. Kayden will drive behind you to make sure you make it back. Coach might be mad at him for being late, but he can handle it.”
”I feel like you”re throwing me under the bus, dude.”
I wave him off.
”But what about Coach”s car?” she asks.
I haven”t thought that far ahead yet. There’s still about two minutes before I need to worry about that. ”I”ll take care of it. And don”t ask. As far as you know, nothing unusual happened this morning. You”ll just go in and go to work like normal, got it?”
She nods but then stops. ”I can”t afford to pay you back. I”m barely living paycheck to paycheck as it is.”
I don”t mean to, but I laugh. ”Lily, I”m a professional athlete. I”m not bragging when I say I”m a millionaire. You don”t have to pay me back.”
She pulls her hands away, and for the first time today, the muscles in her face relax. But only a little. ”But I do! Maybe not money, but something. I won”t let you guys do this for free.”
”You might not have to pay Brant back,” Kayden says, ”but there is something you can do for me. Be my teammate at the Charity Bee. It”s the first weekend in October.”
A bolt goes through me when he asks her that, and although the last thing I want to do is make a scene, I stand and face him. His chest just inches from mine. ”What are you doing?” I snarl under my breath.
”I don”t know what that is, Kayden, but sure, I”ll literally do anything.”
Kayden raises an eyebrow at me, and I growl. I know him. Next to my sister, he”s the best friend I”ve ever had. He wouldn”t do something like this. He wouldn”t take advantage of a woman like this. Yet here he is. ”Absolutely not, Lily, you”re coming with me.” She”s staring up at us, unsure what she”s supposed to do. ”Come with me to the Charity Bee, please. Be my teammate. We pick the charities we compete for. You”ll have fun. I promise.” And here I am, making promises to this woman again. But this is one I”ll make sure I keep.
”We choose our own charity?” Lily bites her lip, and heat flashes through me. I want to be the one biting that lip.
I squeeze my hands to resist the temptation to do something I”ll regret. Like kiss her. Or more. ”We do.” I have to force the words to come out evenly. ”Do you have one in mind? I usually play for the no-kill animal shelter. And does this mean you”ll do it?” Just like that, I”m back in high school asking a girl to prom. In high school, though, I could get any girl I wanted, and I knew it. So my stomach didn”t do the things it”s doing now.
”I don”t know. About the charity. I might know one. And yes. I meant it when I said I”ll do anything.”
”Good.” I nod my head when what I really want to do is shout my excitement. ”Now go to the hotel before someone sees you. Kayden,” I spit out his name, ”will be right behind you. And I”ll take care of everything with Coach.”
She nods and slips her car into reverse. The engine ticks and rattles and makes some noises I don”t even recognize, but other than a bumper that is barely hanging on, there”s no sign of any damage to the outside. Coach”s car, though, is worse than I thought. The entire driver”s door is bashed in so far I”m not sure if it can be opened. As soon as Lily is out of earshot, I spin on Kayden. ”What the hell was that? You”re not the kind of person who manipulates someone in a situation like this.”
He laughs. ”No. But I am the type of person who manipulates his best friend into asking out the girl he has a crush on when he”s too chickenshit to do it himself.”
Oh.He set me up perfectly. Had me going left when the whole time he was planning to wrap around to my right. ”So that was?—”
He pats me on the shoulder as he walks around me to get to his car. ”You”re welcome, Branny. Don”t fuck it up.”