Chapter 26
The week dragged on, but Thursday finally came. The black Cadillac SUV with tinted windows rolled up near where the tour buses sat parked outside the stadium. I started to sweat, but not from the heat. I brushed back my hair to keep it from sticking to my forehead. I felt a little sick, and it wasn”t about divorce or annulments.
”Thank you,” I said to Hans. He would”ve come along with me to Denver, but he had to stay and keep things moving here.
”You have one hour there, and then you”re back on a plane. Straight here for the next show.” Hans opened the door, holding his hand out to help me into the vehicle.
It took some work to figure out the logistics on this trip, and he wasn”t thrilled about it, but he understood that I needed this salt and pepper conversation with my husband.
He made it happen.
That”s how I found myself settled into the backseat of the SUV, pulling up to Dimefront”s private jet at the airport. Everything about the way the world looked seemed to be subtly muted right then. Like somebody had pushed the sofa too far to the left, and the flow was all jacked up.
I left the car and scooted across the tarmac while calling Finn.
”Finn?” I asked into my cell. ”I need a favor.”
”Shoot, whatcha got?” Finn asked without seeing what the favor might be.
”I need you to give Sloan a jar of pepper tonight.” I started up the stairs to the plane, though it wouldn”t be leaving until it was time. I still took them quickly. ”After the game.”
”Pepper?” he asked, surprised.
”Sloan will know what it means, and it”s important. Can you do it for me?”
Finn hesitated, and a low-grade panic crept up on me. I needed to hear his yes, not hesitation.
”Please. It”s how he”ll know it”s important that I”m there,” I said.
”You”re coming to see the game?” Finn asked, perking up.
Gah. ”No, I”ll be cutting it short and getting there right after.”
”Bummer,” Finn said. ”Would love to see you on the Jumbotron sometime.”
I shivered in agreement.
”Me, too,” I echoed.
”And this pepper thing is a kinky bit you two have going on?” Finn asked, like he was being nonchalant but nosey. ”Like he sprinkles you, or you sprinkle him?”
Finn”s questions weren”t helping my pre-flight, pre-important-talk stress levels.
”You”re not helping this situation,” I said, taking a seat in the middle of the plane and buckling up.
”There”s a situation? All I know is I answered my phone.”
”Finn.” I didn”t mean to be short, but I was. ”Please. I need your help.”
”Then consider it done. Jar of pepper after the game. Can I tell him it”s from you?” he asked.
”Yes. Please.” Nobody else should be giving him seasoning in the locker room, but might as well make it clear where it came from.
”Does it have to be full? Or can I just bring the one from home?” Finn asked, and it sounded like he was rummaging through a cupboard.
”It doesn”t have to be full,” I assured as the plane taxied for takeoff.
The flight was uneventful, though I spent most of it staring out the window, thinking about what came next.
We landed, and I stepped off the private jet, the brisk Colorado air welcoming me home. Hans was right, though—I had little time.
I hurried to the waiting black van that would take me to Stallion Stadium.
While I didn”t make it for the game, they won, and Sloan didn”t take any particularly hard hits today. I got ushered through a maze of hallways until we reached a small locker room office. It”s the only place I could meet Sloan on such short notice and on such a tight timeline. Small with dim lighting, the air in here was thick with the smell of sweat and leather.
That”s where I waited, staring into space and hoping my husband was on his way as the clock ticked on the wall.
”Maya?” Sloan said my name as he approached the door to his coach”s office, a mix of surprise and worry mingling in his expression. ”You”re here.”
”I”m here.” I took him in, checking him from top to bottom. I was worried about his injury from the last game. He looked good, though—healthy, even, and fresh from a post-game shower.
But I didn”t rush to him, like usual. When we touched each other, our bodies took over, and for this kind of conversation, we needed clear heads.
”You, uh, left me a message?” He held up a half-empty jar of pepper.
”Things feel off between us. I think we need to talk. Really talk and open the conversation back up.” My voice wobbled as I spoke.
He set the pepper down on the corner of the desk, poking it away from the edge with the tip of his finger.
”Let”s talk.” He tried to sound casual, but the concern for where I was going with this was obvious in the way he couldn”t quite meet my gaze.
”You said you loved me.” Why was my heart racing? This was only a conversation.
”I said that I”m in love with you,” he corrected me calmly.
”Is there a difference?” I asked.
”I think so. I love lots of things, but I”m not in love with them. Seriously love this team, love winning games, love when I”m having Lucky Charms and it”s all marshmallows at the end. But I”m not in love with any of those things,” he explained with a small smile.
”Sloan, I don”t know what you want me to say to this. I”ve done the love thing. I”ve spent most of my life being in love with love. But it never worked. What we have here, it works without the love part,” I said, earnestly. ”It works.”
”And I”ve fallen in love with you, so it”s changed. Doesn”t mean it won”t keep working,” he clarified.
He seemed so certain. Why couldn”t I be certain, too?
”Maya,” he said my name, and I knew whatever came next, it wouldn”t make me comfortable.
”Are you in love with me?” he asked directly, searching my face for an answer.
”It doesn”t even matter if I am, because that”s not what we agreed on.” I crossed my arms, then uncrossed them.
”Are you in this?” he pressed on. ”Or are we just going through the motions?”
”I”ve been in this,” I replied, hurt and ticked off that he”d imply I hadn”t been.
”Things have changed. I want more,” he said matter-of-factly.
”Sloan, this isn”t what we agreed to,” I reminded him, a sense of panic rising in my chest.
”That”s why we”re talking about it now, isn”t it?” he reasoned.
”Is this because we”re apart so much? Because there will be an off season, and the tour will end,” I assured. ”It”ll be just like before.”
”You”re right. I realized I fell in love with you because of the distance between us and the way it feels missing you. But it only amplified everything I already felt. It didn”t create the feelings.” He stopped to think about that. ”I don”t want to live apart like this all the time. But I”m also not stupid enough to ignore the fact that we both have jobs that take us away from each other. That”s just how it is. The reason you have to leave? It”s part of why I love you. And the reason I have to leave? Pretty sure you get that it”s not only a game to me. Football is part of who I am,” he explained, his voice tinged with feeling as he spoke.
”What are you asking me for?” I finally asked. ”What do you want from me?”
”I… I just want to know if you”re in this.” He seemed so vulnerable with the way he fidgeted with the pepper shaker on the desk. ”You aren”t in love with me? I can live with that. But know that it doesn”t change things for how I feel about you.”
”Yes, yes, Sloan. I”m in this.” I said the words, but even I didn”t quite believe them.
”If something matters to you, it matters to me,” Sloan reassured. ”Don”t doubt that. Don”t doubt the way you feel, either.”
”This was always supposed to be a marriage of convenience,” I said. ”But it”s not feeling very convenient anymore, is it?”
He scanned the room, his eyes meeting mine and then falling to the pepper shaker. ”I wanted no expectations. I meant it, and I expect nothing from you, either, other than we”re honest with each other.”
”I came because we need to decide if this—if us—still works,” I said.
”Is this a breakup?” he asked, point blank.
I moved to him, then, until we were right there in each other”s personal space.
”This is not a breakup,” I assured. ”I”m not leaving you. I”m not ending anything. This is like a… heads up for us both.”
”I am all in,” he said. ”But are you? Are you, really?”
I didn”t know how to answer that. I wanted to say that I loved him, too, but there was so much more to what we had than that.
”Sloan,” I said his name since I didn”t know what else to say.
He reached for me, and I let him pull me to his chest. My throat worked as he pressed a kiss to the top of my head.
The question lingered… Was I all in?
He tilted my chin and breathed a light kiss against my lips, testing things out. I opened for him and kissed him right back. Pressed against him in that little room, I questioned everything about what I”d found to be true.
I’d thought that maybe if I rearranged my life like furniture, it”d get better. And it did.
But now, Sloan wanted to move the furniture again, and I had to figure out if I was okay with it and if I”d help him. Or if I was stuck again.