Chapter 35
ANNIE – EARLY NOVEMBER
Pinky Promise
I’m packing up my things in the players’ lounge when Tanner heads back in.
He, my brother and Omar left with Coach Roy a while ago and Omar returned alone.
Since then, there’ve been hushed questions about why Coach wanted to speak to his starting receivers and I can’t tell whether Omar is giving up the secret.
The vibe in the space is different now, though, and I’m getting curious looks from players who’ve otherwise been great fun to be around today. All in all, it’s making me wonder if I already know the topic of conversation. A certain trade that’s increasingly being speculated about in the media.
I feel that sense of relief I did earlier when Tanner arrived. He’s safety and comfort, as well as looking mighty fine in his tight-fitting training gear, cap turned backward.
I’ve been conducting interviews back-to-back with the guys all day, whenever they could naturally take a training break – that was the deal Tanner struck with Coach Roy to get me in here. So I haven’t had a chance to speak to him, despite all the glances his way I’ve snatched.
It’s served the sole purpose of reminding me that I miss him. I miss him and hot-darn, I want him.
He looks over as I’m packing my things for home and I feel like a deer in headlights, caught in the act of gawking. So sure I’ve been snagged that I stop dead and stare back, my blood thumping when his lips lazily curve up. Hi, I mouth.
He inclines his head, beckoning me over to the kitchen area, where the four pecan pies I baked for the squad and staff have been demolished.
Despite the strong smell of coffee around us, and the fact he’s been training for hours, Tanner smells like he always does. Masculine, woody intoxication.
But he’s not his usual bold-as-brass self as he rests back on the countertop, hands clasped around the edge, as if he’s pinning himself as far away from me as possible in this relatively confined space.
“How’re you doin’, Annie Quinn?”
I fight a smile. He’s still Tanner Pace. My Tanner.
“Why I’m just peachy, Tanner Pace. Listen, I—”
“Annie, I—” We speak over each other.
“Can I go?” I ask.
He nods.
“I’m sorry I got weird, Tanner. I panicked and didn’t know what to do. I still don’t, honestly. Auston has always been great at messing with my head. But it wasn’t, isn’t only that. Saturday night was—”
“Incredible.” His tone is so low and gravelly that my next words don’t come. “I’ve spent the last few days replying what happened and I need you to know that I wanted it, too. Just because you instigated it, doesn’t mean I didn’t want it. I meant what I said, Annie, I like—”
“Annie, are you all set?” Colton appears as if from nowhere.
“Ah, yeah,” I say. “Hey, could you give us a minute?”
Colton looks back and forth between Tanner and me, as if he can see right through my promises to stay away from his friends. Those promises weren’t empty but I crossed a line on Saturday and now, I feel deservedly guilty.
“I’ll be outside,” he says, frowning but leaving.
I step closer to Tanner. “I don’t want to ruin our friendship.” I shrug. “No one makes me laugh like you do and I’ve missed it this week.”
His eyes meet mine, then my lips, then somewhere in the distance. I want his gaze, his mouth, his hands on me. Is this like I’m feeling?
“Me neither,” he says, after an eternity. I’m simultaneously inflated and deflated by his words.
He covers the distance between us and I hold my breath. Would he kiss me? Will he kiss me? Here.
I’d let him if he tried. Despite all the reasons I shouldn’t, I’d let him. Because on Saturday, he set my entire body ablaze and I want to know how it would feel if he did more. To have him inside me.
My eyelids are heavy as I look up to him. He reaches out to me and… with a clenched fist, sticks up his pinky.
“You can always come to me when you need a laugh, Annie. Friends forever, no matter what?”
Laughter bursts from me – giddy relief after the intensity of the way I’m feeling in his proximity. “You’re making me pinky promise?”
Sighing, I wrap my finger around his. “BFFs.”
Colton is waiting in his car and ends a call with Sas when I slip into the passenger seat, dropping my bag into the footwell.
“All set?”
“Yeah,” I tell him, genuinely happier than I’ve felt in days for seeing Tanner, trying not to listen to my inner voice yelling, I don’t want to be friends.
Colton’s quiet in a way that feels loaded. Call it sibling intuition. So I’m not surprised when he tells me, “Annie, we need to talk about Auston.”
My Tanner-zen is zapped in an instant.
Colton scratches his head, procrastinating.
“Say what you’ve got to say, Colton.”
His face contorts but he must decide against griping at me. “The rumors about the trade are true. Auston requested a trade and our GM thinks it’s a good deal. Coach wanted to give Pace, Omar and me a heads up and ask our views, but ultimately, if the GM thinks it’s a good deal—”
“What did you say?” I ask calmly.
“That I don’t want him.”
“How about Omar and Tanner?”
“Omar told it how it is. And Pace. He said he’d work with Lamar to make him the best quarterback we can.”
“He doesn’t want Auston here?”
He rolls his jaw. “He doesn’t want Auston near you and our family. But everyone knows how well Auston and I used to play together.”
“You used to be magic.”
He nods. “We’re all looking out for you, Annie, but it might be out of our hands.”
I have so many thoughts and things to say but I still haven’t made sense of them all and honestly, if I’m wavering, my brother isn’t the person to help me work through this rationally. That’s why I haven’t told him before now…
“I already know.”
“Already know what?”
I exhale heavily, bracing myself. “Auston told me it was true on Sunday.”
“S— Sunday?”
“Eyes on the road, Colton. And yes, Sunday. Before I left Dallas.”
“You spoke to him?”
“No. I asked by message and he told me it was true. Then he went out to play a game and every time I’ve tried to call him since, he hasn’t picked up.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you hate him and I already knew how you’d react. Auston is doing what he’s good at – dropping a bombshell, then disappearing. Leaving me with absolutely no idea what he wants from me or Nelson.”
It’s his superpower. Confusion. And I’m coming to appreciate that it’s part of his hold over me. It’s how he traps me.
Tanner was right. No one should feel trapped into a relationship.
I didn’t trap Auston. He trapped me.