Her breaths are nowhere near as steady as mine, but after a few more, she finally stops trembling.
“Are you OK?” I ask. There’s no shame in having an attack, but I can see embarrassment written all over her face.
“S-sorry. I don’t really do well in tight spaces,” she says. Her voice is shakier than I’ve ever heard it, and I don’t stop rubbing her arms, trying to ground her in the physical space.Everything is OK. You will be OK.
“I totally get it,” I reply with a grin. I doubt she can see my expression in the dark, but hopefully she can hear it in my voice.
“The only reason I’m not panicking with you is because I have years of practice keeping my nerves in check in front of a crowd.”
“Ha,” she laughs shakily. “We have that in common, though I rarely have to deal with my claustrophobia on the runway. A friend of mine used to work at a club where the dancers were in these plexiglass tubes before she got signed with Ford. I couldneverdo that.”
I ease my hands off her, trying to give her space to process without my support, but she leans further into me, tucking herself into the fold between my arm and my side. I try to ignore how perfectly we fit together.This is not a date. This is not a date.
I clear my throat.
“I think I’ve been to that club. Was it Mythos? Down on Mercer?”
She nods against my side, her nose grazing my nipple.Oh God, please. I’m trying to be a good guy, and you keep testing my resolve!Her perfume, some exotic blend of lemon verbena and vanilla, wafts up to my nose, and I stifle a groan.
“That’s the one. On one hand, I get it. They can’t just dance on top of columns six feet off the ground with no safety precautions. On the other hand, dancing six feet off the ground in a clear plastic tube is the stuff of nightmares for me.”
I chuckle.
“Did anything specific trigger your fear, like getting stuck in an elevator? Or maybe caught down a mineshaft?” She giggles at my ridiculous hypothetical.
“Nothing that dramatic,” she murmurs. Her tone sounds breezy, but there’s an edge to it. “Just got locked in a trailer for about an hour.”
“Locked in a trailer?” I turn to her. “That sounds pretty dramatic to me. How did that happen? Why didn’t anyone let you out?”
She shifts away from me for the first time since we got on the train, and my body misses hers immediately.
“Oh, it’s a long, boring story. Anyway, tell me more about you. What’s it like to play overseas? Did you ever have nerves so bad you couldn’t play?”
The abrupt shift in topics has alarm bells going off in my head. She was locked in a trailer for almost an hour. It was so bad, it gave her claustrophobia, and now she doesn’t want to talk about it? Something’s fishy, but I’m trying to calm herdown, and pushing her about something she obviously doesn’t want to talk about is the opposite of that.
“It’s hard to describe. Some days, it was like being a rock star. People held up signs, painted their faces with my number—the whole deal. We made it to the finals a couple times, and my brothers were even there to see me get my own chant.”
I can’t help but preen; after winning the championship for Barça, that chant was my crowning achievement.
“It was also a little lonely. My family was back home and usually only visited during the season when it was a really big game. I stayed in a lot of tiny efficiencies watching TV with subtitles, ate a lot of boiled chicken breast to maintain my strict nutritional regimen, ran five miles a day, and didn’t make friends with team members because you never knew who would be traded and when.
“I honestly think the glory makes up for all that, but it takes a toll after a while. I was already considering leaving when I got the call that they would be building the next phase of the team around a new, younger player.”
“Ouch. That must’ve sucked. How much younger?” she asks.
“The kid is twenty-one. Twenty-one!” I practically whimper. “He skipped his senior year of college to turn pro. Barça was his best offer, and he followed the money. I can’t blame him; I remember when Iwashim.”
Kendra sighs.
“Modeling isn’t exactly a long-term career path either. I’ve been more successful than most, but there are already some brands I can’t work with because they’re focused on the new, hot thing.
“And,” she continues, “it gets pretty lonely, too. I’ve been to shoots on six of the seven continents, but most of the time, I was alone. I flew in, got picked up by a P.A., slept off the jet lag until it was time to shoot, then flew to the next location. Meanwhile, my husband’s back home doing his own tour…and several groupies too,” she adds bitterly.
I read all about that dirtbag, Andre Gibbs. A pretty boy R&B singer who thought he could do better than KendraFuckingGray. Thank God he fumbled her, though, because now she’s coming home with me. Well, technically,I’mgoing home withher, but the point still stands.
“I was sorry to read about what happened,” I lie. She snorts in response.
“You were?”
