CHAPTER 43 Maverick Jennings
Sending Minions
I’m watching the games from home on the day after my thirty-third birthday.
This isn’t the way to start a brand-new year.
It feels like my life has done a complete one-eighty over the last week.
It took ten years to make the first turn and one week to turn all the way back.
Except it feels somehow worse this time. Losing Christina sucked. It changed my very DNA. Losing my mom was harder. And losing Everleigh…
I don’t know.
It feels like something I can never recover from. Like I can’t go on. There’s no motivation to push forward.
I know there is. Obviously. But right now, everything just feels so…pointless.
It feels almost painful enough to just let go of the reasons why I had to end it in the first place, but if she’s not choosing me now for the big things, what kind of future could there possibly be for us?
I blow out a breath as I stare at the screen. Brandon Fletcher was just sacked. Could’ve been me laid out on my back as the commentators make their stupid comments about what the offensive line should’ve done to protect him.
But it wasn’t me in that position because I’m fucking sitting here, suspended because of my own stupid decision.
And who knows where it’ll lead? The DA could call me up tonight with questions, and if I don’t give them the answers they’re looking for, I could be in an even worse situation.
That is why I feel alone. That’s why I’m staring listlessly at a television with a bottle of Lagavulin by my side as I work on numbing out these stupid fucking emotions just so I can get through the day.
I’m allowed back into the Complex on Monday, and I’m there burying myself in my workouts for the entire day.
One day turns into another, and another, and yet another, until a week has gone by without her.
I work my ass off in the weight room, on the treadmill, in the pool.
I spend time finger breathing up on the roof, contemplating what I can do to get her back, wondering what would happen if I just went against her wishes and named her father anyway.
It would save me a hell of a lot of trouble, and it’s clear she’s done with me anyway.
I won’t do it despite the temptation. She might not be protecting me, but I’ll still protect her. It’s what you do when you love somebody.
I put in more volunteer hours at the animal shelter than my usual one a week. In fact, I go every morning before practice. When our bye week hits, I stay longer.
Bruno is still there. I think about taking her home.
I don’t, but I spend a lot of time with her.
Since it’s our bye week, I don’t even get to play in a game. If we did, though, I’d have already turned back into the cold quarterback who doesn’t celebrate well-executed plays but instead returns to the sidelines with a vicious comment about how we could have done it better.
Even if we win by a good margin, it’s still not a reason to celebrate. We always make mistakes, and you know what I’m really fucking tired of?
Mistakes.
Stupid or otherwise.
Jack hasn’t been my shadow the way Everleigh was, but he is making sure someone is checking on me every day.
Apparently because we live in the same building, today is Dex Bradley’s turn.
Just the person I don’t want to see.
I’ve been avoiding him this week, a fairly easy thing to do on our bye week, but today, I can’t avoid him. He knocks on my door, and the last time I opened it to him, he blabbered on about how relationships are two-way streets and I should do something to get Ev back.
“Jack sent you today?” I guess when I open the door.
Yesterday it was a defensive lineman who lives in my building. The day before, it was Lily. Must be nice running your own empire and sending your minions to do your dirty work.
“Yeah,” he admits. He stands in my doorway and shuffles on his feet a little. “You okay?” he asks.
I turn away from the door and walk into my condo without inviting him in nor declining his entry. “I’m not going to any underground casinos, if that’s what you’re asking. Are you supposed to check to make sure I’m home, or is this more of a welfare check?”
He pulls out his phone and pretends to snap a photo of me. “Proof of life.”
I roll my eyes as I plop back onto my couch. I stretch my legs out and cross them at the ankles, and Dex sinks down into the recliner.
“It almost felt like you were starting to warm up to being here, and now it seems like you hate everyone again. What happened? Is it Ev? Because I can call her and fix this.”
I hold up a hand. “Stop. It’s not Ev,” I lie.
He shoots me a yeah, okay look that’s absolutely brimming with sarcasm.
I blow out a breath. “Fine. It’s Ev.”
“Knew it,” he says, pumping a fist into the air.
“She took off, man. She’s done with Vegas, done with me, done with all of it.”
“Yeah, because Jack fired her because she couldn’t get you under control,” he says.
My jaw slackens before I clench it tight again, my teeth grinding at his words. “That’s not what happened,” I hiss.
“You don’t think so?” he bites out. “Everybody knows it, Maverick. Everybody. So don’t sit here whining like a little bitch when we both know why she’s gone.”
“Ah, so you’re going the route of tough love. Let’s see, we’ve had sympathy, humor, and logic.” I tick each one off on my fingers as I name the approaches that have been taken with me thus far. “Seems like the right time for tough love, and it’s on brand for you.”
He huffs out a sigh. “Yeah, maybe. I’ve got more skin in the game than the others, though. She’s my sister, and I know that’s why you’re acting out.”
“I’m not acting out,” I say with a bit more defensiveness than I should. “I’m sitting right fucking here in front of you. I’m not even drinking tonight since we have a game in two days. I’m not at a club. In fact, I’m being so good that I’m not even watching porn. You can report that back to Jack.”
Dex stands and wanders over to my windows. “I spend a lot of time in my own place looking out over the view as I contemplate my decisions. My life. But honestly, since my kid came into my life and I got married, I haven’t done it as much. Less to contemplate when you’re happy, I guess.”
“Rub it in a little more.”
“Why is that rubbing it in? Not everything is a personal attack, you know,” he says. “I can be happy, and you can not be, and we can still coexist.”
I don’t have anything to say to that, and he turns around to face me.
“What happened with my sister?”
I stare at him carefully for a few beats, and ultimately I decide…why the fuck not just go for honesty here? “We fell for each other. She got me to open up about things I never told anyone. She came to my mom’s funeral with me.” I shrug. “And then, well, you know the rest. We’ve been over it.”
“Spell it out for me,” he says.
“I was at the Legacy underground casino the night it was busted. I was told the DA would go easier on me if I named the operator, that they might even drop the citation before I took flak for it from the team. I asked Everleigh for her permission to name your father, and she declined. End of story. Why are you making me relive this shit again?”
“I’m looking for a loophole.” He shakes his head. “I’m not finding one. Ains ended it with me, you know. She felt I was putting her and my son in danger because of the lounge. I had to make a choice, too.”
“But you chose her,” I point out.
He shakes his head. “I didn’t at first.”
“So you’re saying there’s hope that your sister will change her mind?”
“I don’t know what I’m saying. Our family history…
it’s complicated. And now with Mom sick, surely you could understand the situation Ev was in.
She’s a protector, Mav. Always has been.
Hell, she tried to protect you, too, with her brand shit.
But you asked her to choose between the family she’s known her entire life and a man she’s known all of a couple months. What would you have picked?”
“Anyone over my own father, that’s for damn sure,” I mutter.
“Okay, but she didn’t. She couldn’t. There are seven of us Bradley kids that she’s looking out for. There’s one of you. Can’t you understand that?”
“Why are you talking to me about this?” I ask, my voice gaining in volume. “She walked away. She chose your goddamn family over what we had built. All this bullshit…it’s a big part of why I never wanted to get involved with someone again.”
“Again?” he asks.
I nod. “Again,” I murmur. “I was married once. It’s complicated, but I found out too late that she’d been cheating on me.”
“Jesus, Mav. I had no idea.”
“Nobody does. I’m notoriously private because I don’t show weakness to anybody.”
“Getting cheated on isn’t a weakness,” he points out.
“Sure as fuck felt like it weakened me. I found out at her funeral after I found out she’d been pregnant when she died in a car accident. Imagine trying to move on from that ordeal.”
His brows are raised, and there’s sympathy in his eyes. “Fuck, dude.”
I nod toward him. “That look. That right there. The sympathy.” I make a face of disgust as I shake my head.
“That’s the shit I don’t want.” My voice is venomous as I say the words.
“That’s why I don’t tell anyone. It’s why I shut everyone out.
It’s why I let everyone think they’re my enemy.
It’s easier to go through life like that than to feel what I’ve felt the last week we ended things.
” I press my lips together and shrug like it doesn’t affect me even more than the accident that ended my first marriage.
“My sister cares deeply, and you forced her into an impossible position. I’m sorry you didn’t like it when you got your answer, but sometimes loving someone means understanding what they’re faced with and fighting with them rather than against them.”
I blow out a heavy breath as I get up and walk toward the door to indicate that it’s time for him to go. He did his welfare check, and we’re done here.
“You’re right,” I finally say. “And sometimes it means letting them go when they walk away.”