Chapter 11 #2
Miraculously, he got off with a generous amount of community service, thanks to Annie’s family solicitor, but he was done with that life.
And Annie was done with him. Turned out that she had met some Eton boy at a party, and she’d rather ride around in his Bentley than take the bus with an unemployed scoundrel like Ciaran.
It was the wake-up call that he needed. So, once his community service was completed, Ciaran took out a portfolio of student loans, secretly cosigned by his mother with whom he had stayed in contact, and moved to America.
He graduated with degrees in Architectural Design and Engineering four years later.
He stayed away from anything that would remind him of his former life, and that included football.
It had been six years since he had last set foot in Scotland and, after only the occasional kick-around by himself, the past few weeks playing for some semblance of a team felt pretty good.
“Earth to Scotty.”
Cliff’s voice snapped him back to the present.
“Hmm?” He asked, realizing that he had been frozen bent over his foot with the laces of his half-tied boot—cleat, as the Americans said— in his hand.
His boss clapped him on the shoulder with enough force to nearly topple him off the folding chair. “You want to beam the rest of us up to whatever world you were just on or are you going to join us here?”
Ciaran groaned inwardly. “Not a good idea.” He tied a knot with more force than needed and stood. “What time is it?”
Cliff glanced at his Rolex. “Three-thirty.” He replied, and dramatically scanned the crowd ringing the chalked sideline. “Your girl here yet?”
Ciaran’s eyes scanned the crowd. “No, but if its only half-three, she still has time.” Fuck, he got me again. He snatched the captain’s armband from Cliff’s hand. “And she’s not ‘my girl.’”
Cliff snickered and gestured to where most of the other players were joking around the Gatorade cooler. All but Mike, who was on the sidelines hitting on his girlfriend, and Cameron, currently lying on his back on a bench, one arm draped over his eyes against the sun. “All yours, Cap.”
Ciaran walked over and gave the underside of the bench a swift kick.
Cameron bolted upright and rubbed his eyes.
Ciaran turned his attention to the ginger with his arm around the curvaceous hips of his girl. “Oi, Mike, get your ragged arse over here.”
Mike got a good luck kiss and reluctantly joined the group. He brushed his red hair from his eyes and glowered at Ciaran who had to remind himself that Mike had been voluntold to play anyway.
“Okay, lads, we need to do some warming up.” He told his team as he fit the armband in place.
He hadn’t worn one in a long time, and its grip around his bicep was oddly uplifting, even if it was just a beer-fest Corporate Challenge.
“I don’t want anyone getting a stitch in the middle of the first half. ”
The others grumbled, but Ciaran returned their glares with only icy authority, and they got to stretching.
As he jogged in place, Ciaran scanned the crowd for Jal without seeing her, and even after the match had started, there was no tell-tale flag of black curls on the sidelines or in the stands that had been wheeled over from the baseball fields for the event.
He forced himself to keep his mind on the game, Morrison’s guys were better than he had expected. The score stayed close at five goals to three in favor of Dougherty, Jamison & Russo at the halftime whistle.
Mike and Cameron were panting and sat down gratefully on the bench. Kurt passed around the water bottles, which they drained almost immediately. The day had turned sunny, and unseasonably warm.
“Good first half, lads,” he told them. The goals had been scored by four different players, with Ciaran himself netting two. Kurt was the odd one out, but there was still time. “Just another twenty minutes. Then you can hit the pub.”
Mike whooped, anxious to get back to his girlfriend and get a drink in his hand. Ciaran was supposed to join them, and a good dram of Glenfiddich wouldn’t go to waste if it was put in front of him, but that all depended on whether or not Jal showed her face.
Halftime ended and still she wasn’t there.
It started out in their favor as he buried the ball in the net five minutes in off a surprisingly nimble steal from Cliff, but then the ball was quickly taken back the other way and put past Jake, the goalkeeper.
Another goal a few moments later gave DJ&R only a slight 6-5 lead.
Steaming back the other way, Ciaran had just accepted Kurt’s pass to shoot it into the open side of the net when a slide tackle caught him at a bad angle and sent him tumbling to the ground.
He rolled a few times and clutched his lower leg, pain radiating from where the spikes from his opponent’s boot had connected.
The bastard who’d tripped him blocked out the sun as he loomed over him with a smug smile peeking through his long Viking beard. He’d been hounding Ciaran all afternoon and had four of Morrison’s goals. “Not so flashy now, are you?”
“Get tae fuck away from me, mate.” Ciaran snarled and grabbed the hand Cameron held down, leaning into his support as he hobbled to the bench.
As he sat to examine his leg, he glanced one more time at the crowd and caught sight of a familiar curtain of black hair flying out as she pivoted away from the field. In the barest glimpse he got of her face, he could have sworn that her pale skin had gone bone white.
So, she came after all.