The drive to the airport was a quick one, and the flight to Boston was only an hour. No one bothered him or talked to him or even acknowledged him from the time he left the locker room in New York until the door of his hotel room closed behind him in Boston.
Charlotte was having a bad day. Again.
It was three days after Jordan's fight at the game in New York and he was still giving her the cold shoulder. She couldn't blame him. She knew she deserved the silent treatment he was giving her after she kept her relationship with Declan a secret. She had even avoided his questions when he asked her about it directly. At the same time, Jordan could at least call her back and give her a chance to explain herself, couldn't he?
But it seemed Jordan was the only one who didn't want to talk to her. She never realized how many members of the sports media even cared about her until they started calling and calling and calling. She finally just recorded a new outgoing message on her voicemail directing all of them to her family's spokesperson. Of course, that still didn't stop them from trying.
She shoved the key into the lock on her apartment door, slamming it shut behind her and angrily throwing her suitcase in the corner. Her coat got tossed over the sofa, her carry-on bag dropped in the middle of the floor. She was focused on one thing right now and that was her liquor cabinet. As a writer, she would joke with her friends that of course it was well stocked. But right now, she was thankful that she fit the "drinking writer" stereotype because it meant she had plenty of bottles to choose from. Wine. Tequila. Vodka. Rum.
Charlotte grabbed the bottle of Captain Morgan's and started pouring it into a glass with one hand as she flicked off her shoes with the other. She would pick them up later. Right now, she needed to sit on the sofa in the quiet of her penthouse and wish this would all go away.
The liquor burned as it went down, but the events from the past few days still lingered.
There were some bad things about it all — many bad things — but the worst part for Charlotte was just after the fight. She didn't really know what happened on the ice before the first punches were thrown, although she was pretty damn sure it started with Declan.
In the third period, it looked like more words were exchanged between Jordan and Declan right before they lined up on opposite sides for a face off, something that seemed to have been happening all night. But this time, as soon as the ref dropped the puck, Jordan dropped his gloves and went after Declan. It was a tough fight before Declan finally got Jordan off balance and brought him down, but the damage had already been done.
As the ref escorted Jordan to his bench with a gash above his eye, Declan continued to yell at him while the crowd at the arena cheered on their new player. But Jordan blocked all of it out. Instead, he found Charlotte in the crowd, staring at her with a look of anger and resentment that she had never seen on his face before. It went straight to the core of her with a guilt she had never felt before. If she hadn't been so afraid to talk to him about her past, he would never have needed to look at her like that.
ESPN had played Declan's post-game soundbite over and over again on Sportscenter the next day.
"What was the fight with Jordan King about?" asked a reporter in the locker room scrum.
"He's dating my cold leftovers."
"Who's that?"
The pest sneered at the camera. "Charlotte Stone."
That's what Declan had told the media and that's the quote theNew York Postused for its headline. "Cold leftovers" was plastered in large capital letters on the front page of the tabloid paper. Not the front page of their sports section. No. The front page of the entire damn paper. And right there on the cover next to Declan's smug grin was a picture of Jordan, blood streaming down his face from the gash that had been opened up above his eye.
One of the reasons Jordan had been chosen to be the captain of the Pirates was because he led by example, and the example he set was of someone who was measured, fair and didn't let some trash talking from other players get under his skin. She didn't even know when he last fought someone. But she doubted he was used to getting chirped at by her ex-boyfriend. Declan probably said something vulgar, something that could never be repeated off the ice, something that was likely a variation of his stupid "cold leftovers" comment. Whatever it was, it was enough to make Jordan take a rare swing at another player.
The media kept leaving Charlotte texts and voicemails, but all she wanted was one call from Jordan.
She put her drink down on the coffee table and began to dig through her purse before finding her phone. Seven more messages were waiting for her, and that was after she deleted the fifteen that were left for her while she was on her flight home. She dialed Jordan's number and her call immediately went to voicemail. Again. She was pretty sure he was blocking her.
"Jordan, it's me. I'm home in Detroit now. I think you were supposed to get back today after your Boston game and I wanted to invite you over so I could explain all of this." She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down so he couldn't hear the emotion in her voice. "I don't know what else to say except please call me."
Charlotte mashed her finger on the "End call" button and threw the phone down on her sofa in disgust. She should've told him the truth. There were so many times she had the chance to tell him about Declan and her past, so many times she could've explained herself. Instead, she decided to not open herself up to him, afraid of what he would think of the real her. In that sense, Declan had still been with her, whispering in her ear that she wasn't good enough. She just didn't expect it to come to this.
Charlotte finished her drink and dropped it off in the kitchen sink before heading to bed. She grabbed her phone, making sure the ringer was off so the calls from reporters wouldn't wake her up. She needed sleep if she hoped to put the past few days behind her. And more than that, she needed Jordan.
The harsh buzzing from her penthouse intercom woke her up. She grabbed her phone off the nightstand and checked the screen — 10:13 a.m. and another five missed phone calls. None of them were from Jordan.
The buzzer sounded again and she dragged herself out of bed to answer the call from the front desk.
"Yeah?"
"Um, Miss Stone? A Mr. Jordan King is here to see you."
Her doorman knew damn well who Jordan was and knew he had been there before to see her so she was a little weirded out by the formality. Then she remembered that even her doorman had probably heard about Jordan's fight in New York.
"You can send him up."
Charlotte cracked the door open slightly so Jordan could walk in when he got up there. Then she realized that she had slept in her clothes and her things from the trip to New York were strewn everywhere. She quickly ran into her bathroom to try and pull herself together, grabbing a brush for her hair and some lip gloss from her drawer. She would just have to hope her clothes didn't look too wrinkled since she didn't have any time to change.
"Charlotte?"
