He set his water down and met my gaze. His eyes had turned cold. “I’m glad I was able to be here for you. I know your heat can be longer, and I’m sure it’s a relief that you won’t miss a game.”
I didn’t care about the game. I only cared that I didn’t spend the heat alone. There was no other alpha I’d share this with. My eyes grew heavy. I blinked away the tears that gathered there.
This was over.
I was being dismissed. Given the out that I knew I would take.
“Well, guess I won’t see you for the rest of this season. But hey, if you want tickets to the playoffs, I can—”
He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You know I can get my own tickets. And you know you can’t give me tickets to the playoffs.”
Right. Because he was a ref in the league in which I played. We couldn’t even be friends. We could only be casual acquaintances. And even then, it wasn’t like we’d socialize.
“I’ll see you around.” I took one last sip of my coffee, grabbed my gear bag from where I’d dropped it the night prior, and walked out the door.
Chapter 16
Silas
The world moved on.
Teams advanced, games were won and lost. The regular season was nearing its end, which meant that my season was nearing its end. The official roster for who would be working the playoff games and the final game hadn’t been figured out, but I knew that I wasn’t on it. Not as a first-year official. A veteran crew with many years in the league would be chosen for that honor. I only had this game and another one before I was finished and would go back to not traveling every moment of every day. I would finally be able to relax in my own apartment for more than five minutes.
It sounded miserable.
I had no idea what I would do with my time when I wasn’t running around so much.
In fact, I hadn’t even put together my plans for the offseason. Usually, I spent it with Elliot, but now I would not. Theoretically, there was nothing keeping me in Port City, nothing keeping me in that apartment. It would have made more sense for him to keep the apartment than for me, but it had been mine before it was his. But now it was just empty, especially since I had shared his heat with him there.
I had a hard time going back home now, especially the bedroom, without remembering him and me together. It had been bad enough before sharing his heat, now it was damn near impossible to be in that apartment knowing that Elliot no longer lived there. I was not going back to that. I had no way of knowing how I was going to go forward and get over Elliot after that, not when I saw him everywhere.
So right now, I was in a game. Not a Port City Badger game, and yet I could still hear the announcer talking about Elliot. More than one person in the stands was wearing his jersey, even though his team wasn’t even playing. It had been one hell of a year for him, which was amazing. Of course, I was happy for him. But more than anything, I just wanted to be there when he won. Or at least, I wanted to be the person he called to tell about the game. I just wanted to be something to him—something other than just a person to make his heat go quicker.
The final whistle blew, and I went over to the scorekeeper’s box. I conferred with my crew and put in our final paperwork and signed off on everything. Then I was off to the locker rooms.
The officials had different rooms than what the team had. It was where we could go to grab our showers and get away from the crowds. Our rooms were calmer than the team room. Fewer people, less chaos. Less equipment. The press wasn’t allowed to talk to officials, except for rare occurrences.
“Hard to believe the season’s coming to an end. How did you like your new gig?” Xavier asked.
“Great,” I said.
Apparently I didn’t put the sufficient amount of enthusiasm into my words because Colin and Xavier exchanged a glance. Even Geoff shot me a look.
Colin shook his head. “And you know how many people would kill to be in your spot right now?”
“I know,” I said. “And I’m grateful. This is a dream come true.”
It was. It truly was.
But the bigger dream, the one that I really had aspired to, slipped through my fingers. The dream where I could be actual partners with Elliot, maybe even husbands. Hell, maybe even fathers. That dream—the one I didn’t even allow myself to voice out loud to anyone or think too hard about—was gone.
“You want to grab a beer?” Colin asked.
“Nah, I’m actually taking the red eye back to Port City.”
“Not even going to party down in the city with us for a bit? We’re in Vegas, man! Let’s go out.”
“No, I’m ready for a break.” Also, I had forgotten that we were even in Vegas. Once I was in the arena, the rest of the world faded away. I didn’t pay attention to the colors of the jerseys.
