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The press on the field were normally big-time sports reporters, not from the social pages.
“Adelaide!” the woman called. “Excuse—”
Arriving at the door, Adelaide hauled it open and risked a glance back to see what had happened to her follower.
Henri Reynaud, the Hurricanes’ quarterback and Dempsey’s younger brother, had planted himself between Adelaide and the woman. Addy’s heart fluttered a bit. Not that she thought Henri was Mr. Dreamy the way the rest of the female fans did. But because Dempsey’s brothers had made her feel as though she mattered this week. Gervais by inviting her to dinner. Henri by running interference.
Seeing how she might have been accepted into their world made her chest ache for the things she wasn’t going to have with Dempsey. She would be walking away from so much more than a job in three weeks. So why was she spending this window of time second-guessing herself—and Dempsey—every time she turned around? Why couldn’t she just enjoy the moment?
Maybe she needed to stop worrying about the future. Starting tonight, she wasn’t going to look beyond three weeks from now.
She would save up her memories of being the woman who got to be on his arm and in his bed. The memories of being part of a family. They wouldn’t be enough, but if they were all she would ever have of him, she would make each moment count.
* * *
Dempsey drove the fastest street-legal BMW produced to date, but it didn’t get him out of downtown any quicker after the game.
Had he ever felt so uneasy after a win?
He switched lanes to pass a slow-moving car, his G-Power M5 Beemer more than ready to launch into overdrive at the earliest opportunity. Too bad the ribbon of brake lights ahead meant he only succeeded in hurtling headlong from one stop-and-go lane to the next.
He’d asked the public relations coordinator if she’d seen Adelaide, but Carole didn’t know where his fiancée had gone after the game. Now he gave in and phoned Evan. Hitting the speed-dial icon on the dashboard, he listened to Evan’s line ring via Bluetooth.
“Hey, Coach. What’s up?” Evan had lost his roster spot due to injury, but unlike most guys who’d been in the league for any length of time, he hadn’t been in a hurry to rehab and look for a new team in the spring. He understood well the hazards of being a player and had been content to simply stick around the team.
Dempsey had asked him about returning to school for sports medicine and coming aboard as a trainer, but Evan called himself a “simple guy with simple needs,” insisting he liked driving the Land Rover.
“Just checking to see if you’re taking good care of my future wife.” The comment didn’t roll off his tongue the way he thought it would.
His wife.
The idea made his chest go tight and he wasn’t quite sure why.
“She’s teaching me about the garment business at the moment. Just a sec.” Clearly holding his hand over the phone, Evan spoke to someone else—Adelaide, presumably. But a man’s voice came through in the background, too. Then Evan came back on the line. “We’re just finishing up a tour of a manufacturing facility. She’s hoping that with some customization it might work out for producing her apparel line.”
Her apparel line. Dempsey ground his teeth together, biting back a retort.
Apparently he hadn’t made any headway yet convincing her to stay with the Hurricanes—with him—for the rest of the season. But then, he’d spent all his time romancing her after being surprised by an attraction he hadn’t accounted for.
He needed to get their relationship back on track.
“I’d like to surprise her with dinner,” he improvised, although maybe that wasn’t a bad idea. “Are you bringing her home soon?”
Dinner aside, he just wanted to know when he would see Adelaide. She hadn’t picked up her phone or answered his text after the game.
But then, she obviously took her start-up business more seriously than him.
“Definitely,” Evan returned. “I think she’s finishing up her meeting with the Realtor now. We’re about half an hour away.”
“Good deal. Thanks.” Disconnecting the call, Dempsey pulled into the driveway of his house.
The outdoor lights were on, along with a few indoor ones. He had everything on timers, and he’d increased the periods when the grounds were lit, wanting to make the place as hospitable as he could for Adelaide.
Had her decision to tour a manufacturing facility been made this morning, spurred by her frustration regarding Valentina? Or had Addy been quietly taking care of her own business concerns all week, in spite of their agreement that she’d devote her time to the Hurricanes?
