Glad to hear it.
Again, he takes his sweet time answering me. I swallow, hating the way I immediately worry that I’m annoying him, that he’s finally grown sick of me, that he’s going to turn me down because I got boring after a few weeks of getting to know the real me.
Boston
If I hadn’t been drinking, I’d swing by to pick you up. This bed isn’t the same without you in it and I’d like that body pressed against mine after a night like tonight.
I smile, leaning into myself. Maybe I’mnotannoying.
Me
You saying you miss me, Boston Black?
Boston
Every fucking second that you’re not around, sweetheart.
And if I remembered what falling in love felt like, maybe I would have recognized it at that moment. Maybe I would have put a stop to it. Maybe I wouldn’t have. If I remembered—that low, swoop in the stomach would have been a warning. The warmth that spreads throughout your body when you hear his name in a casual conversation. The way your heart races a bit faster when his heart is in the same room. The way time seems to slow in all the moments where it’s him and me, but everything else races on by.
Maybe I would have been able to tell what was happening if I could recall the good parts of love. Maybe I would have realized. How I wasn’t only about to fall, but I’d already stepped on the cliff. Maybe I would have prepared myself for a softer landing, knowing that it wasn’t just a freefall, but a freefall without a parachute.
It was always going to end painfully, but if I had known then, if I had realized, maybe I would have braced myself for the impact.
october
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
boston
The shitwith Danford has been kept rather quiet. I’m surprised. I thought somebody would have witnessed the scene we made in that hallway and ran with it. Luka has said nothing to anyone. He just continues to ignore Danford like the rest of us. If Danford keeps his end of the bargain and permanently keeps his wife away, I think the team will survive this.
He didn’t know.
He says nothing to any of us, not during practices and not during any of the preseason games that we’ve had so far. He avoids Saltzy like the plague, which means Morgan must have fessed up what she actually did to him. I haven’t seen that woman since the night Penny tore a strip off her, and Danford is only ever around when we’re working. They took our threats seriously.
Good.
I want to ask Saltzy if Danford reached out to him directly. To talk or to apologize. Maybe I’d be a little warmer with him if he had made a genuine attempt to have a conversation, to grovel. I don’t ask because Saltzy is dealing with the worst of it in this situation, and he’s had to cope with the weight of it for weeks. Heknows where I stand. If he wants to talk about something, I’m here. If he hasn’t mentioned it, I assume it’s because he doesn’t want to.
I respect that.
I pull up to the curb outside the library and a pretty little blonde hops into my truck. She smiles, big and wide, and winds her hand around my neck, hauling herself across the console to my mouth.
I have missed these lips. Especially when they’re smiling at me.
“Mmm,” I say, my eyes scanning her face as she pulls away. “Hi.”
“Hi,” she says, falling back into her seat.
We haven’t seen each other in nearly two weeks. The longest we’ve gone since we started doing this. It’s been…hell without her, to be quite frank. My bed is empty, my house lacking in laughter and mess, and even doing mundane, routine things has become lackluster without her constant talking.
“I got the highest mark in my class for my proposal,” she announces, sitting up a bit straighter in her seat.
I glance at her, brows lifting. “Yeah?”
She smiles shyly, but I can tell she’s proud of herself. Good. She should be.
“I’m killing it.”
