AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Oh sure. Rest. But… umm… okay, I don’t want to keep you when I know you’re tired, but about Jeremy and what you texted when you left?”
Again there’s that barest hesitation and I jump into silence before he has a chance to answer. “It doesn’t matter how he feels. He’s not the one I want.”
“Cammy, you know… it would be okay if he was.”
I blink, staring down at the phone like it just lied to me. Like there is no way the man on the other end actually said what I just heard. I know this thing between us isn’t forever, but…It would be okay?
After a few more seconds of my stunned silence, he adds, “Sorry to do this, but I’m about to fall asleep. Talk to you later, Sunshine.”
“Oh, okay, right. Um… good night, Rux.”
Chapter 22
Rux
The meetings with the coaches go about as you’d expect with the game we had. The season’s winding down and while it doesn’t look good for playoffs this year, no one is ready to give up. Morning skate is brutal, but it’s what I need to keep from doing what I spent the entire damn night talking myself out of—driving over to Cammy’s place and begging her to let me hold her. Telling her I didn’t mean what I said. That there would be nothing okay about it if she decided Jeremy was the man for her.
But I can’t do that. And it’s not because I wouldn’t put a ring on Cammy’s finger and make Matty my own in a hot second if I thought it was the right thing. It’s that I know she deserves better and so I won’t.
We run double drills, and then I stay even longer. I push harder. Dig deeper. I’m not going to let Cammy down. And I’m not going to let this team down either.
By the time I’m done, I can barely drag myself off the ice. As I start taking off my skates, O’Brian comes in with Vassar and Popov from weights.
Just the man I’m waiting for. “O’Brian, what have you got going on this afternoon?”
“Inner city arts program. You?”
“Nada. My day got canceled. Flooding at the convention center or something.” I hate myself for what I’m about to do, but I do it anyway. “Want me to take yours? Give you a night off?”
O’Brian’s brows shoot up, a smile spreading across his face. We all feel good about the charity work we do with the team, but nobody turns down the chance for a night off. Hell, except me, apparently.
But if I’m booked, then I won’t be showing up at Cammy’s place, building Legos with Matty and stealing kisses from his mom when he goes to bed. I won’t be holding her in my arms while we watchOak Island, when I need to be letting her go so she has a chance to find the kind of forever she deserves.
* * *
Cammy
“I’m telling you,these guys are at the mercy of the team,” Julia assures me through the line. She’s in LA tonight but had a few free minutes before whatever dinner or event she’s got lined up. “PR asks them to do something, they need to do it.”
“Okay, I get that, but Julia, this is the third time in a week and a half. And maybe that doesn’t seem like a lot when these guys are traveling and as busy as they are, but this is Rux. I’m telling you, something’s off.”
There’s some shuffling from the other end of the line, and I’m pretty sure it’s Greg in the background, but I can’t make out what he’s saying. Julia tells him to give her another minute, and then she’s back, a new concern behind her words. “You haven’t seen Rux in a week and a half?”
I blow a curl from my eyes and throw up my hand in frustration even though she’s not here to see it. “No. I mean,yes, I’ve seen him. But it’s only been a couple times, and just when Matty is around. Like maybe, he’s not dodgingus. He’s just dodgingme.”
“No. No way.”
I like that flat-out refusal in accepting something so obviously impossible. I want to wrap myself up in it, but… I know better. I know Rux. And something’s going on with him.
I want to blame it on whatever happened that night when Jeremy followed him out, but there was something before that. More than the fact that he wasn’t dirty-talking my ear off every night, were the moments when he was too quiet. When I’d see him watching Matty with a pained look in his eyes. I asked if he was okay, and he’d snap back to the same old Rux—throwing out some crazy suggestion that no one could say no to.
What’s going on with him?
“Do you think it’s possible this doesn’t have anything to do with you at all? I mean, with the way the season has been going, he’s dealing with some pressure, right?”
Walking back to the kitchen, I open cabinets, close them with a sigh. “He is. I know.”
And if that’s what it is, I completely understand. I just wish I could do something to make it better, the way he makes everything better for me.
