19. Washed Away
CHAPTER NINETEEN
WASHED AWAY
TARYN
“Honey, I’m home.”
Tucker’s voice comes from the apartment entrance, and I smile, folding his practice jersey. “In here, Tucker.”
Baety, who’s been sleeping in her dog bed wrapped in one of Tucker’s oldest t-shirts, wakes up and calls out to her daddy. “Quack, quack.”
The duckling flaps her wings with obvious excitement when Tucker’s voice comes closer.
“Hey.” His big frame fills the doorway as he stops to look at us, a smile pulling at the corner of his lips.
“When you called out from the bedroom, I thought I was in for a hot surprise.” His blue eyes skim up and down the length of my body.
“But I have to say, this scene of domestic bliss is quite nice, too.” He points at the practice jersey I was folding.
There’s a question in the dark blue depths of his eyes, but he doesn’t look angry.
I rush to explain, relieved that he isn’t upset to see me handling his clothes.
“So, I gave Baety the little snack you left for her and she loved it. Then she took a nap, and I was watching a documentary on TV. I swear I got distracted for a minute at most. One second she was in her bed by my side sleeping, the next she was gone. I found her in your hockey bag.”
“She loves sleeping in my clothes, and her favorite is my hockey stuff. The sweatier, the better. That’s why I named her Baety Swalls.” Tucker chuckles.
“Yeah, well. I tried to take her out of your bag and she tried to bite.” I continue.
Tucker shakes his head. “Baety.” His tone is reproaching and soft at the same time.
“Quack!” the duckling responds.
“What did I tell you before I left?” Tucker speaks to her the same way one would speak to a small child. “We agreed that you’d be a good girl for Taryn. Daddy loves… I mean, Daddy cares about Taryn, and we don’t bite the people who are important to Daddy.”
Did he almost slip up and say that he loves me? My heart jumps in my chest at the thought, joining the rest of my body that’s in turmoil at the sight of how hot Tucker looks when he’s all paternal.
Call it a primal instinct, but seeing him so soft and patient with his little duck makes me think that one day he’ll be an amazing father.
“Did she bite?” He picks up the duck, but his attention turns back to me. “The good news is that it’s very unlikely that she would have rabies. But I feel terrible if you got bitten while doing me a favor.”
“No, I was faster than her.” I reassure him.
“But I don’t know if it was the peas going straight through her, or if she was upset that I took her away from your clothes, but she had an accident.
Most of the clothes in your bag were covered in duck poop, so Baety and I decided to make amends by washing everything that was in the bag.
Baety and I wanted you to come home to clean clothes. ”
Tucker’s smile fades, his blue eyes widening with every word that comes out of my mouth. He doesn’t look happy. He looks alarmed.
Shit. Maybe I overstepped. “Look, I hope you don’t think I’m one of those girlfriends who doesn’t respect boundaries.
In a normal situation, I would have never gone through your clothes without asking first. But I swear Baety made a mess.
I felt terrible that it happened on my watch. That’s why I did it.”
A few seconds pass before Tucker’s throat works as he swallows. That wide-eyed, stunned look still on his face. “You did my laundry?” He asks.
Fuck. I shouldn’t have done it. I didn’t think about how this could come across. “Tucker, I—”
“Did you wash everything in my bag?” he sounds almost scared.
“Yeah, I had to. There was poop everywhere.”
His gaze moves from me to the items I’ve been folding on the bed. It’s as if he’s looking for something. I know when he finds it because then is when his face drops. If I thought he wasn’t happy a second ago, now Tucker looks positively upset.
“You washed my lucky pants.”
The last sentence is barely above a whisper, but Tucker is holding a pair of athletic underwear with a bereft expression on his face; it’s one of those padded underwear that includes a jock cup.
“Tucker, Baety was all wrapped up in that particular pair. They took the brunt of the mess.”
He keeps staring at his boxers, his handsome face as pale as a sheet. It’s as if he had seen a ghost or something equally scary. “You washed my lucky pants.” He repeats, slightly louder this time.
Ok. It’s his favorite pair of athletic underwear.
I get it. I have my favorite pair of dancing shoes that are perfectly broken in and fit me like a glove.
I wore them for all the audition rounds with the Shooting Stars, and they used to be my performance shoes in college.
The shoes we were given as part of our uniforms are great, but I must admit that, given a choice, I’d rather wear my favorite pair.
“Tucker,” I close the distance between us.
My hand shakes a little when I touch his muscular forearm.
“I promise I wasn’t trying to be nosy or intrude in your business.
And if this can make you feel better, I washed them on a delicate setting and in cold water.
I checked the label of every item before putting them in the wash, but those are quite worn, so the label wasn’t readable.
They’re fine though, look. They didn’t get out of shape or anything.
” I take the garment from him, turning it in my hand to show him that it survived the wash unscathed.
Tucker’s broad shoulders sag as he sighs. “The point is that you washed them.”
He’s taking this really hard, and I’m confused. “Yeah. I mean, they had duck poop on them. It’s not like you could have worn them in that state.”
It’s my turn to look shell-shocked at the look that passes on Tucker’s face.
“You would have worn them like that?” I gasp.
Tucker lowers himself onto the bed and offers me his hand. He drags me down to sit on his lap when I take it.
I’m immediately surrounded by his fresh, citrus scent and I barely resist the urge to inhale his neck. If he’s holding me, I don’t think he’s going to break up with me. But I don’t want to push my luck, seeing how upset he looked a second ago.
“Yeah,” he sighs. “I would have probably worn them like that.”
I open my mouth to express my shock at his admission, but he laces his fingers through mine and explains.
“The lucky factor of my pants is that they were unwashed. They were forgotten in my locker after practice, and one day during freshman year, our starting goalie was injured, and I got my debut on NCAA ice.”
He explains how he had come late to the locker room with no idea that he was going to have to play and he had forgotten his gear in his room.
“The team has laundry facilities and they wash our uniforms, so most of my gear was taken care of. But I had started to wash my underwear separately at home. For some reason, the detergent they use is really harsh on my privates and makes me break out in hives. That night, since I wasn’t coming from my room, I had forgotten that I had taken all my protective underwear home to wash with my special detergent. ”
Tucker points at the bottle of detergent I found by his clean laundry hamper.
“At least I used the right kind.” I reassure him.
His tone is kind but sad. “Yeah. But the point is, I found that pair in my locker. It had fallen to the bottom, and I hadn’t taken it home to wash. It was a little sweaty, but beggars can’t be choosers and unwashed underwear beat risking a puck to my junk without any protective gear.”
He explains how he had an amazing first game and how he kept wearing that same underwear as long as their winning streak lasted.
“Every time I forgot my lucky pants, we lost.”
I feel terrible. Dancers can be as superstitious as hockey players.
I own a pair of stud earrings my grandmother gave me for my eighteenth birthday, and I wear them for every performance.
My granny is no longer with us, but she was my biggest fan, and those earrings make me feel closer to her. Like she’s watching over me.
“So the lucky part was that they were unwashed?” I ask.
Tucker nods. “Yeah. I had to make do with them, and my teammates gave me shit because they smelled. I know it sounds gross, but after we had an amazing game that ended in a shutout, they kept joking about how even sweaty pants couldn’t stop me. That’s how the whole thing started.”
“Tucker, I’m so sorry.”
His big hand comes up to cup my jaw. “I know, baby. I’m not mad at you, I promise. You had no idea. I’m sorry if I reacted like a weirdo.”
If he had been yelling at me about this or been horrible, I wouldn’t feel as bad as I do right now.
“Can you ever forgive me?”
He strokes the spot behind my ear with the pad of his thumb. “There is nothing to forgive. It was an honest mistake. I’ll have to find a new lucky charm or a new lucky routine. At least I have time to figure something out before the regular season begins.”
He’s trying to put on a brave face, but I know he’s still sad. “Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?”
Knowing Tucker, I expect a whole list of crazy requests. Especially bedroom stuff.
“Just hold me and kiss me?”
His lips are soft, and the kiss is deep, reverent, almost cautious. Whether Tucker Prescott is in a playful, flirty mood or tired and a little sad, his kisses make my heart melt and my body come alive.
When he breaks the kiss, my fists are holding the fabric of his t-shirt.
Tucker doesn’t back away from me; he keeps my face cupped in his hands as he looks at me.
I’ve never seen him so sad, and it breaks my heart. “I’m so sorry, Tucker.”
“Shh,” he murmurs, silencing me with another soft, slow kiss. “I’ll be ok, baby. And I swear I’m not mad at you or Baety. It’s just that…”
“What is it?”
He closes his eyes for a second, and I can’t help but notice how long his blond lashes are.
“This hasn’t been my summer, that’s all.
First, that mix up with my grades and missing graduation.
Then that stupid clause that has us sneaking around when I want to spend with you every minute we aren’t training.
Now, this thing with my parents. They’re losing our family home.
And there’s nothing I can do until I go pro. ”
I wish I could do something, anything, to help his family. “The last thing you needed was a girlfriend who washed your lucky underwear.”
There’s an amused glint in his dark blue eyes, but it’s fleeting. “There was no way for you to know. And to be honest, you’re the only good thing that’s happened to me this summer.”
“Are you sure? Remember that I shot you in the leg the night we met.”
This time my attempt at a joke earns me a small twitch at the corner of his lips.
“That was an accident. But I’m serious, Taryn.
Maybe the problems with my grades and my pro-team wanting to hold me off for one more season were necessary obstacles so that we could meet.
I’m falling for you, Taryn. I hope you know that. ”
“I’m falling for you too.” I whisper back.
Tucker sighs, his smile still a little sad. “My mom made us dinner, but with the news my parents had, my appetite had vanished. Now I’m hungry again. What do you say we order something? Anything you want, my treat.”
“I feel like I should pay for dinner.” I argue. “I’m the one who ruined your lucky charm.”
“That’s water under the bridge, I promise,” Tucker insists. “I’d love to take you out on a date, but we can’t really be seen driving off to town together.”
Tucker is right. “To be honest, even staying in right now is a bit of a risk. I should probably be back in my apartment by the time your teammates are back from that meeting. Just in case someone sees me coming out of your apartment.”
“Do you think my teammates would rat you out to Carole?”
“No, but I can’t say the same about my teammates.
Now that we have to use the dining hall in shifts so we don’t fraternize, our dinner hours end when yours begin.
So while the Cove Knights will be headed to dinner, the cheerleaders will be coming home.
I told Jodie that I had a headache to avoid an extra rehearsal during the free time we got this afternoon.
Since you weren’t back yet, when she texted me to ask if I wanted to meet her for dinner I told her I was still feeling rough.
She wasn’t rehearsing alone, so just in case she went to dinner with some of the other girls, I’d rather not be caught sneaking out from here. ”
There’s also the fact that Jodie is convinced that I need to stay away from the hockey players until we figure out who’s behind the threats that I’ve been getting. That’s why I lied to her. If she knew that I was here, she’d freak out even if it was just to do duck-sit for Tucker.
“Ok.” Tucker doesn’t look happy. “This clause totally blows.”
I agree with him, and between the no fraternization clause and my secret stalker, I’ve started to wonder if my dream to be a dancer is even worth it.
My phone pings a text message right as I leave the warmth of Tucker’s arms.
The way my heart stops and my hands tremble as I unlock the screen confirms that this is no way to live.
“Baby, you ok?” Tucker’s blond brows are knitted together. “You look worried.”
“I’m ok. It’s just Jo-Jo.” I exhale, relieved that it isn’t another threat. “I need to go just in case Gen trails her back to our apartment.”
Our goodnight kiss is rushed and leaves me longing for more.
Hiding from our coaches and from the rest of the team is one thing, but hiding from my best friend is ridiculous.
As I wait for the elevator in the lobby, I make a decision.
I need to be careful so I don’t get reported to Carole.
But Jo-Jo will have to accept that I can’t pretend the guys don’t exist. I know she’s just doing her best to keep me safe, but I can’t stop living my life to avoid the malicious scrutiny of my stalker.
After all, there’s no guarantee that whoever has been messing with me won’t make even more requests in exchange for their silence or even decide to go to the cops, anyway.
An idea makes its way into my mind. It isn’t perfect, but sometimes in life, we have to make hard choices to get to our happily ever after. I guess it all depends on what makes me truly happy.