Page 60 of Take Her On

“How are you doing, Mum? Really?” Jamie asked.

The question hung in the air while her mum chewed her lip. “Let’s not focus on that.”

She sighed. “But I’m worried about you. It’s not healthy being stuck here on your own.”

“You could visit more.”

“No.” Jamie shook her head. “I can’t do that. I’m sorry, but I can’t.” She didn’t want to look at her mum and see the hurt on her face, but she forced herself to. “Why won’t you leave him?”

Her mum’s watery eyes flicked to her, and her chin wobbled. “I wish—”

The slotting of a key in the lock made them turn their heads. Dad’s timing was always impeccable.

Jamie’s stomach tightened as the door opened, and her father’s deep voice called out, “Jaim. You here?”

Momentarily, she wished she’d parked her car out of sight, so she could make a run out the back door. But she steeled herself. She wasn’t going to keep brushing it under the carpet.

She wasn’t down to play happily families either.

He entered the kitchen, dressed in a black work suit with a purple tie loose around his neck. She still couldn’t look at his face without feeling rage.

“Did you see the Manchester United game at the weekend? Three—”

“Actually, I was just leaving.” She stood, then leaned in to give her mum a kiss on the cheek. “I’m meeting Leah.”

Her mum’s demeanour radiated sadness, but she tried to mask it. “Okay, love. I’ll speak to you later.”

Jamie nodded, hating the emotions reflecting in her mother’s eyes. She wondered if her mum had always shrunk in her dad’s presence, or if she’d only noticed it after everything had happened. She couldn’t remember. Everything was tainted now. A before and an after that couldn’t be undone.

She sidestepped her dad in the doorway and walked out the front door without so much as a glance back.

* * *

“I’m just saying. It’s fairly obvious,” Leah said.

Jamie chuckled, lining up a shot in the middle pocket. “You had no idea until I told you about us.” She focused, pulled back the cue, then fired in the red to take a five-ball lead. Leah groaned, and Jamie flashed her a smile before moving around the pool table.

“I suspected. No one claims to hate someone that much if they don’t wanna fuck ’em.”

Jamie’s mind jumped to her ex-teammates at the Harriers. After what had happened, she wouldn’t touch any of them with a bargepole. “I don’t think that’s true.”

“Worked for me and my ex.” Leah shrugged. “Anyway, I saw it coming a mile away.”

Jamie picked her new shot and fired, missing the pocket by a few centimetres. Leah punched the air, then moved around the table to take her turn.

“You can’t expect me to believe that,” Jamie said. “Your gaydar is atrocious.”

“Hey!”

Jamie had played wingman to Leah after witnessing her repeatedly strike out at the bar. Her new friend seemed to have a superpower for singling out all the taken straight women.

Leah huffed. “Whatever. Even if Harriet and Noodle hadn’t mentioned it, I would still have known.”

So most of the team were talking about them. Hardly surprising. Jamie wondered what Maya would think about that if she knew. There were still so many things that were uncertain about their captain, but there was nothing Jamie enjoyed more than peeling back those layers and learning more about her. Knowing they were the team’s current hot gossip might make Maya freak out. She took her role as team captain very seriously, something Jamie admired about her, but would it make her close off and push Jamie away? Or would it force them closer together, make it impossible to deny that what was going on between them was real?

Jamie wasn’t even supposed to want that, but she couldn’t help it. The pure happiness she felt around her was addictive. Maya made her giddy, and it was infinitely better focusing on that rather than the sour happenings with her dad.

Thankfully, Leah was too busy concentrating to see the stupid smile on her face.