Chapter 9
CHAPTER
NINE
Alie
I pull my red pantsuit over my hips, the fabric sliding into place as softly as the knot forming in my chest. If I didn’t already have plans today—and Liam didn’t have to get back to New Orleans—I would’ve stayed tangled up with him in that bed until the very last possible second.
Being wrapped around him felt dangerously easy.
Through the open crack of the bathroom door, I watch him step into the shower. Steam billows around the shape of his broad shoulders, the water carving paths along his skin until he disappears behind the fog.
A smile tugs at my lips. Never in my life did I imagine I’d spend the night with him—Liam Pitz, one of the hottest new quarterbacks in the league.
Of course I knew who he was. I always know the players; it’s impossible not to when you work in the business and your father owns the New York Titans.
But I hadn’t gone to the wedding last night, searching for him. I went because Aaron needed a plus one and also insisted I get out of my slump.
It’s been a rough few months. My ex blindsided me in the fall, breaking up with me after pretending to care for nearly a year.
It turned out he wasn’t interested in me at all—just in getting close to my father.
Another baller looking for a good time, as Dad put it.
I learned the hard way that Grant girls need to tread carefully.
Dad made me promise, no more athletes. Not for a while. Not until my judgment wasn’t clouded by heartbreak or loneliness.
So, no, I didn’t walk into the wedding, plotting to fall headfirst into the arms of a rookie quarterback.
In fact, Dad’s warning played on repeat my whole life: rookie athletes have terrible reputations—money, women, partying, football as their entire world.
And when Liam told me he wasn’t ready for a family, none of it surprised me.
It fit exactly what Dad had drilled into us: Do not get mixed up with a man whose entire future depends on keeping his life uncomplicated.
But then Liam smiled at me. Really smiled.
And once we started talking about ridiculous things, like being in a Christmas snow globe, something in me cracked open.
He wasn’t trying to charm me because of my last name.
He didn’t even know my last name. For the first time in a long time, someone saw me, not the Grant legacy or the Titans heiress.
He looked at me like I was just a woman in red, making him laugh.
And once we were talking, I didn’t want it to end.
Maybe that’s why I let myself fall into his bed.
Against my better judgment. Against every warning I’d ever gotten.
I don’t know what I expected when I woke up here this morning, wrapped in his arms, listening to the low, sleepy rumble of his voice.
But for a second—just a second—I wondered if this could be something more.
“What have I gotten myself into?” I whisper.
As if on cue, Liam’s phone buzzes on the nightstand.
“Hey, Liam!" I call. “Your phone is ringing.”
“It’s fine, just ignore it,” he says over the rush of water.
I try. I swear I do. But it keeps buzzing, persistently enough to draw my attention to the screen.
When the name flashes across it—Sabine—my breath hitches.
A woman’s name. Elegant. Familiar in a way that sends a quick, sharp sting up my spine.
Jealousy flares, then fizzles, leaving humiliation simmering beneath it.
I shouldn’t care. I have no claim on him.
But the truth is, a tiny piece of me already does.
The buzzing stops. I exhale and shrug into my coat. Then the phone lights up again.
Scott Jackson.
I know him. Everyone in football knows him—one of the top agents in the business. Liam’s agent.
Scott Jackson: No can do. You’re in New Orleans for at least two more years, per your contract. Put in the work and keep them happy with their decision to make you one of the highest-paid rookies in your class.
Two years in New Orleans.
Two years far away from New York.
Far away from me.
The small, reckless hope I didn’t want to name flickers and dims.
Another buzz.
Sabine: I didn’t sleep at all last night. I need you.
My throat tightens. Another buzz.
Sabine: I took a test this morning. I think I might be pregnant. The doctor said Tuesday is the earliest they can confirm. I want you with me … I shouldn’t have to do this alone.
A wave of nausea rolls through me. Another buzz.
Sabine: We can tell my family when you come home with me for the holidays.
The air in the room shifts—thick and heavy, pressing down on my ribs. This isn’t a pleading ex. This is someone who speaks like she has a right to him.
Someone he made promises to.
My hands tremble as I stare at the screen. Every warning my father has ever thrown at me roars to the surface at once. Rookie athletes. Unreliable. Immature. Too many women. Too many blurred lines. Too many complications.
The room tilts.
This is not a fling he forgot to mention.
This is a man with someone waiting for him in New Orleans … someone who expects him at a doctor’s appointment.
Someone who talks like he belongs to her.
And I … I’m the girl he met at a wedding. The girl in red, who he flirted with for one magical night. The girl who let herself believe he saw her and not her last name.
Because I have to add insult to injury, I see a notification from Archie Griffith. Of course, I scroll up to see it.
Archie: Since I didn’t hear back from you last night, I assume you got that pussy.
I am such an idiot. Everything inside me recoils at once. The memories of my ex. The warnings from my father. The constant fear of being used. The reality is that Liam lives in another state and now may have a child with someone who sounds very much like his girlfriend.
A painful, familiar thought slices through me:
I was stupid to believe, for even a second, that he could want me for me.
I look toward the bathroom door, steam drifting out beneath it, and every instinct inside me fractures. I should wait. I should ask. I should let him explain. But humiliation grips me tight. Fear grips me tighter.
My phone buzzes from somewhere in the room. I grab it instinctively and shove it into my pocket, only for something small and hard to clink against it.
I pull it out. The ornament. The tiny Christmas tree we bought last night after wandering through Manhattan like two idiots high on winter air and each other.
It feels unbearably heavy now.
I set it beside his phone—both symbols of two worlds I can’t be a part of. The world where he lives in another state and has other … complications, and the fantasy we created last night. None of it can be my reality.
My feet carry me to the door, even as my heart tries to root me in place. I pause with my hand on the handle, staring back at the bathroom. I almost call his name. Almost ask him what all this means. Almost choose to trust him.
But believing in people is how I got hurt last time. And I can’t—will not—go through that again. Not with someone I could fall for. Not with someone whose life, career, and complications exist so far outside my reach.
I swallow hard, open the door, and whisper, “Goodbye, Blitzen.”
Because if I say it any louder, I’ll stay.
And staying might break me.