Chapter 37
SHOT BLOCKING: INTENTIONALLY GETTING IN FRONT OF A SHOT
After the new year, I receive an invitation in my inbox that makes my nerves tingle like a live wire. I reread it for the third time even though I know exactly what it says.
Subject: You are invited…
To: Brennan McCallister
From: Simon Reynolds [Oklahoma Plains, Athletic Director]
Brennan—
I wanted to take a moment to personally invite you and a guest to a charity fundraiser we’re having at OPU.
The charity is Childress Institute for Pediatric Trauma. Their mission is dedicated to researching and improving the treatment of pediatric head injuries, including the Concussion Care Fund to support young athletes.
Considering your personal ties to the university and your own experience, we hope you will be able to make it.
Please find the formal invitation attached.
Regards,
Simon Reynolds
OPU Athletic Director
I open the attachment to find an invitation for a black tie event at a hotel in downtown OKC. I feel like it was meant to be. This is the exact issue Coach Collins and I have been discussing.
“First, I need to talk to Amy,” I murmur aloud. After all, the last time we were an us outside of Willow Creek didn’t end well for her. Still, it’s her choice. I don’t want to repeat my mistakes from our past and assume anything.
I sit back at my desk and look at a picture taken of the two of us as Velma and Shaggy on Halloween that Amy gave me for Christmas. When I opened it, it was all I could do not to kiss her then and there. Considering we were in her parent’s living room, I held back until later that night.
That’s when she let down the last of her barriers.
The house is quiet. While I place the leftovers in the refrigerator, Amy turned on the lights to the tree she insisted I put up.
Now, the tree lights are glowing but they don’t hold a candle to the woman curled up next to me. Amy’s head is resting against my shoulder. I lean over to nuzzle her hair, I realize maybe it was a good thing I got knocked in the head.
It didn’t just reset my priorities. It returned my heart.
Amy’s been quiet for a few minutes. Thoughtful, not distant. I’ve learned her all over again with the intensity I used to devote to learning plays on the ice. The way her thumb traces slow, absent patterns along my forearm. The way she breathes in before saying something that matters.
“Brennan?”
“Yeah.” I turn her toward me, shifting so she has my full attention.
“I’ve been thinking about us. About…where I am.”
“What about where you are, my queen?”
“I think you should know my feelings have changed.”
My gut clenches with fear. “They have?”
“They’ve grown,” she continues, eyes locked on me. “I’ve fallen for you again. Maybe I never really stopped. But I’m scared.”
“Why?” I want to yank her onto my lap to return her feelings, but I sense she has more to say.
“Because we feel permanent. If that’s not where you’re at, I understand.” She searches my face for any sign of discomfort.
I don’t hesitate, not even for a second. I yank her over my lap so she’s straddling my legs. She glares at me. “Some warning next time?”
“I’m in love with you, too,” I lift her chin gently so she can’t look away. “I’ve been feeling this for a while.”
Her brows knit. “You don’t have to say that just because—”
“I know.” I press my forehead to hers, breathing her in.
“Trust me, I’m not. I’m saying I love you because I wake up thinking about you.
Go to sleep thinking about you. Because during a day where I may make one or a dozen decisions, your reaction to each is what I imagine.
When something good or bad happens, you’re the first person I want to tell.
All I want, for the rest of my life, is to be here. With you.”
Her eyes shine, reflecting the Christmas lights. “You mean it.”
“I feel complete with you in a way I never have anywhere else—including the ice.”
She lets out a shaky laugh that turns into a sob. Her hands fist in my sweater as if she needs to ground her emotions. “So, we’re on the same page.”
“We are.” I kiss her temple, then her cheek, then hover just close enough that she can feel the truth of it on my lips. “I love you. I will choose you for the rest of our lives at whatever pace you’re ready for.”
She kisses me then—slow, sure, like there’s no question left unanswered.
And for the first time since I saw her at The Honeyed Hearth, I feel like I deserve the love she’s offering me because I know I’ll never let anything happen to it the way I did before.
I grab my keys and head out to my truck. It’s almost the end of the school day and I want to see what Amy’s thoughts are about going to OKC for the gala. Ten minutes later, I pull into the school parking lot.
I don’t text.
I don’t call.
I know I don’t need to now. Still, it gives me a thrill to bound up the steps—two at a time—to know I’m going to hold her in my arms soon. After checking in at the front desk, I stride down the corridor to her classroom. I come up short when I stare at her behind her desk grading papers.
She’s smiling. Really smiling. The smile I’m determined to earn every single fucking day until I die.
Without knocking, I rasp, “Am I interrupting?”
Amy looks up. “What are you—?”
“I need to talk with you.”
Her brows lower. “Is everything okay, Bren?”
Bren. Hearing the shortened version of my name from her lips shoots through me like energy drinks. It fuels the fire burning deep inside my soul to make certain she remains happy. I step fully into her class, closing the door behind me.
Her eyes sparkle with amusement. “Get whatever lascivious thoughts are in your mind out.”
I pout. “Not even a kiss?”
“That you can have. What we can’t do is christen my classroom.”
Now I feel challenged. “We can’t?”
“All it would take would be a student to walk in or the principal to walk by for my job to go poof.” She makes a fist and flips out her fingers.
I stalk forward slowly. “But I can kiss you.”
She gets up from behind her desk and meets me in front of it. “Hmm, yes. Only after you tell me what’s on your mind.”
I slip my arms around her waist and declare, “I love you.”
Her reply undoes me. “I love you, Bren. Now, spill it. Why did you drive down here? I was heading home in a few.”
I let her calling my house home settle deep inside before grazing my lips against her forehead. “It’s nothing bad. At least, I don’t think so.”
“Tell me.”
So I do. I explain the email I received, the intention of the charity.
Her breath stutters. “This is everything you’ve been working on here.”
“Pretty much,” I allow. “But there will be people in the room who can help us more than any strategy session with Coach Collins.”
“So you want to take him instead of me?” It comes out so matter-of-factly, I’m stunned.
“Of course not!” I explode. For just a moment I just stare down at her face before I really look.
She’s trying not to be hurt, but I can see the wariness in her eyes.
“I want you by my side for the whole night. If it were up to me, I’d take out a bloody ad in StellaNova to announce to the world who you are to me. ”
“And who is that?”
“Mine,” my voice is savage. “I refuse to let you go. Ever again. Is that what you wanted to hear?”
“Then what are you here for? Why didn’t you just accept?” Her confusion is evident.
I rub the back of my neck before dropping my hand. Sheepishly, I admit, “I didn’t want to take us outside of Willow Creek in the event you weren’t ready.”
Her lips curve into a smile. “That’s not something you need to concern yourself with.”
“I do,” I counter quietly. “Because you mean more to me than any fundraiser, any game. You are the game—my endgame.”
Even in her class riddled with mathematical equations that range from simple to exquisitely complex, our history has its place. Amy understands me immediately. Her posture changes instantly. Love lights her eyes. “You don’t want to go if I’m not with you.”
“Correct. If you can’t—or aren’t ready—to expose us to more than Willow Creek, then we’ll stay behind and let Coach Collins go.”
Amy’s breathing stills. “Bren, you’re…”
“What?”
“Incredible.” I get lost in the glow beaming up at me. “You’re constantly showing me how much you cherish who we are together.”
“Now. Before, I didn’t.” I nuzzle her nose. “That’s why I wanted to talk with you about it before I broached Collins. It’s your choice, my queen.”
She worries her lip. “When is it?”
I give her the date. “Saturday after SuperBowl.”
“Plenty of time to find a dress.”
My happiness turns to a scowl.
She frowns. “What’s that look for?”
“You’re going to look all sexy and other men are going to notice.”
She rests her hand on my chest. “You’ll live.”
“The rational part of me understands that.”
“And the irrational part?”
“Is still thinking about how other men are going to see you in a sexy dress.”
She tips her head back and a peal of laughter rips out. “You should be more afraid if I run into one of your exes.”
I swallow hard. I hadn’t thought of that. Cautiously, I address the issue, “That might happen.” I hate knowing if I hadn’t fucked up, this wouldn’t be a topic of discussion.
“But the past did happen.”
“I wish I could change it.”
“Do you?”
I gape at her. She murmurs, “You lived a full life, Bren. A life that was different than if you’d been with me.”
“Everything about my life would have been better with you by my side.”
The air shifts. Her face tips up. It’s close, so close that I can see the tiny scar near her eyebrow. One she got as a kid tripping in her cowboy boots. It was a story her father shared with me last weekend over dinner.
“When you first came in, it looked like you were ready for a face off,” she murmurs.
I tighten my arms around her and murmur, “Because I really wanted to kiss you.”
She hums. “Then stop talking and kiss me.”
Our lips brush against one another’s once before settling. I listen to her and pour everything into it. I kiss her because she’s my heart and soul. Because I’ll always put her feelings first. She’ll always be my choice.
Amy melts into my body. Her response isn’t tentative. It’s a declaration that we’re together.
My tongue gently runs against the seam of her lips, seeking entrance to her warmth. When she parts her lips, I know I’ll never be able to live without the woman in my arms ever again.
When we break apart, her forehead rests against my chest. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
I rest my chin against the top of her head and know loving Amy is everything. Today, we stand in her classroom. Tomorrow, we’ll step into the world together.