Chapter 25 #3
He said his goodbyes to Suzette and Marie, giving them gentle hugs, and he left a package under the tree for them.
But that would not be the end of it, he swore to himself.
If anyone was concerned that he and Charlie hadn’t exchanged Christmas gifts, no one gave a hint of it.
Maybe they assumed they’d had a personal exchange, or maybe they thought the engagement ring was more than enough to cover Christmas.
Either way, Trent felt funny, as he walked through the kitchen with Charlie, that he had no gift for her.
He hadn’t called his jeweler to tell him to send something tasteful because it didn’t seem right.
But he hadn’t had time to pick out something himself either.
He wanted to ask her again to go home with him for Christmas, but he knew it was going too far—she’d already said no.
Besides, taking her to Alabama to meet his entire clan, whether they expected it or not, would be too much to pull off.
To lie to all those people, to expect Charlie to put on the charade for dozens of his relatives, would be far too much.
It was one thing for him to meet her small family and spend a quiet evening and another to put her through the fiasco at his home where he was the center of attention, treated like a demigod—whether he deserved it or not.
They reached the back door and stood there. He’d driven himself in his overpowered Audi RX in spite of the snow on the road, finding he’d wanted to let loose after being in what felt like football prison for weeks now.
“I have a confession to make. I wish you were coming home with me tomorrow,” he whispered, playing with the wispy curl at her temple. He didn’t know why he’d said it, what good would come of it. It didn’t change anything between them.
“I confess that I wish I could come. I’m very curious about your family, to see where you came from.”
He snorted, dispelling his wistful feelings. “They’re a messy, noisy, self-important lot. But they’re mine and I love them.”
“I’m sure they love you,” she said, looking up at him with an almost girlish expression.
“Oh you have no idea. I’m like Zeus. They idolize me. Except when they decide I need to be brought to earth with a crash of reality. Then there’s no limit to the amount of ribbing, poking and practical joking I have to take.”
“Sounds perfect.” Her eyes went melancholy again and he stiffened. It was time he dragged himself from her womanly sphere of influence, or who knew what trouble he might get himself into.
“Not quite, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He paused a beat, caressing her face with the back of his hand. “Merry Christmas, Charlie.” Then he turned and left, not allowing himself a kiss. Not even a hug.
It was as if he were punishing himself for being a very bad boy this year. Because he had been. And she deserved far better.
While he drove home, going too fast, he contemplated why the hell he wanted to bring her home.
It would have been a stupid thing to do, subjecting them to a hellish level of deceit.
He didn’t want to pretend about their engagement to his family.
Ironically, he thought that if they weren’t faking an engagement, he might have invited her home and felt good about introducing her to his family as his special lady, someone important to him.
But the lie, the circumstances, made it impossible for them to have a real relationship, even if he wanted to, even if he was developing real meaningful feelings for her.
But in the end, he couldn’t imagine her falling for him, not really.
She might care about him, but she was a doctor.
She cared about all her patients. He’d seen that with the children.
She was attracted to him, they had great chemistry in bed, but he knew she didn’t respect him.
She’d made it clear that she didn’t respect his decision to go balls to the wall with football.
He knew she thought it was too trivial a pursuit to warrant the kind of risk he was taking.
Deep down, he knew she was right.
As soon as he walked inside his penthouse door, he slipped his phone from his pocket and called Nunley.
“What’s wrong?” Ralph sounded harried.
“Did I catch you playing around with a Christmas Elf?”
“Don’t mess with me—what’s going on?”
Trent walked to the window overlooking the city and stood next to his professionally decorated tree.
“Relax. Sorry to call so late. Everything’s fine.
I called to find out how much money Charlie makes or how much someone in her position as a university medical researcher might make.
” He suspected it would be a decent salary but not enough under her circumstances as sole breadwinner for this needy family.
“What the f—ck?”
“I was just at her house, Ralph. It’s old and needs a lot of work. It occurred to me that maybe she doesn’t have enough money to keep it up.”
Ralph grunted and he sounded less aggravated when he spoke again.
“You would be right. She probably makes less than I do. Their home was in the family for several generations. I remember her talking about it back in undergrad. I bet the family’s money was drained while she was in med school—she once said that they were investing the last of the family’s fortune in her by sending her to med school, that they were all counting on her, not only to find a treatment or cure for the family’s disease, dermatomyositis, but financially as well, so that they could live normally. ”
“She admitted that to you?”
“Yeah. We were friends.”
Trent let the silence go on while he got control of the mix of his emotions, especially the stab of jealousy that Charlie had confided so much in Ralph.
He wondered if she’d shared with him everything that was going on now, how much she’d shared about what had gone on between Trent and Charlie.
He quickly realized that wasn’t Charlie’s style.
But Ralph might know about her theft of the EM HGH-1 serum, maybe he even knew about Hogarth’s blackmail.
He already knew the John Doe secret. It wasn’t a thing only between him and Charlie.
Ralph had been the third wheel, involved up to his filthy balls all along.
“Hey—don’t get the wrong idea. It was strictly platonic between us.”
“Not because you didn’t try.” Trent accused his friend with an angry edge to his words. He fought to tamp down the unreasonable resentment, gripping his phone tight.
“Ancient history. She barely tolerates me. When you’re in the room I’m invisible to her. And I got to tell you, Trent. It’s damn disconcerting. To see how you swept her up without effort, so fast, so completely, after I spent years and got nowhere.”
Ralph’s words calmed him and he chastised himself for the irrational anger. His feelings were out of control. He needed to get back to where he needed to be. He turned away from the window and walked to his bedroom.
“Sorry I bothered you so late.”
“You thinking of giving her a pile of money for Christmas?”
He had been more than thinking about that and in spite of his doubts about the wisdom of it, whether it might be leading her on, he couldn’t let her family go on that way without intervening. He needed to play Santa.
“Something like that. Go back to doing whatever you were doing.”
“Like sleeping?”
“Merry Christmas, Ralph.” He hung up.
Trent had one day to bring himself around. Back to concentrating on football. Only football.
He went home to Alabama on Christmas Day to have dinner with his family, leaving Charlie behind with her family.
An early call to his private banker from Logan Airport and another call to Diggins allowed him to arrange for Santa Claus to leave a special gift under the Morneau Christmas tree.
That appeased his unease somewhat. Fake engagement or not, he felt Charlie’s absence at Christmas dinner like a missing front tooth.
Gaping and pervasive enough to sap a good part of his joy in the holiday.
It was almost as if she’d become necessary to him.
Damn it.
On the flight back late that night, he swore that when he took the field the next day, all thoughts about anything but winning the next game would vanish from his mind.
Tomorrow, he’d need to forget about Charlie. Forget about the serum, the John Doe secret, the TIA, the headaches, forget about everything except football and playing like there was no tomorrow.