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His eyes locked on mine, and it was almost like he was begging me to read between the lines. I could tell he was the quarterback, lost in the thick of it with no idea where to go from here. The problem was I knew he wouldn't like my answer. Still, I shrugged and responded. “The way I see it is he has two options. One, find a way to trust a new running back, or two, realize he was always supposed to be a concert pianist.”
Nate’s eyes widened, and I could tell I’d caught him off guard—if only for a moment. His brow furrowed. “What the hell does that even mean?”
“It means there is always another road, another option. He might not see it yet because it’s covered in vines like the secret garden, but it’s there. He’s more than just a quarterback.” Just like I was more than the little girl who grew up at her father’s feet, only to be left with an evil stepmother who didn’t believe in dreams and had no problem abandoning me the moment I turned eighteen. This was my other option.
“Hmm,” he grunted, mulling over my words
“Listen, Mr. Fox. We both know your sudden fascination with this player has nothing to do with a love of football or hypothetical theories.” I let out a deep sigh and tentatively took a step forward until only inches separated us so as not to scare him away. I reached out and placed a hand on his broad shoulder. Drunk bees took flight in my stomach the moment I touched him, and I resisted the urge to rake my hand down his taut muscles. “You look like you need to unload whatever bullshit is weighing you down. You’re never going to see me again. Get out of your head and talk to me. Let me carry some of that load for a bit.”
His full lips parted and he opened his mouth a few times to start speaking, but no words came out. He dropped his gaze to the floor, and for a split second, I was sure he was going to tell me to shove off. I took a calculated risk pushing him, but when he finally raised his blue eyes to meet mine, I knew I had him.
“She was my wife.”
CHAPTER FIVE
NATE
Let someone else carry my burdens.
I’d never done that before, except for in silent prayer. I was the man who people came to for help, not the other way around. Maggie had been my only confidante for so long, and aside from only two other times during my diaconate study where I was required to be honest about my past, I didn’t let anyone except for God see me vulnerable.
So why did I feel a sense of relief when Eden offered to carry my bullshit?
Maybe it was because I wasn’t sure I wanted to be this guy anymore.
Her eyes widened before dropping to my left hand where I wore the faint tan line of my wedding ring. I’d torn it from my finger and chucked it out the window on the way to the pub. It was a decision I’d probably regret after the rage and alcohol left my system, but right then, I didn’t miss the suffocating metal.
“She died just over a year ago. Today I found out she’d been having an affair for the last seven years of our marriage.”
That was the first time I’d said it out loud. It was the first time it became a real, tangible thing outside the confines of my mind, and I wanted to scrape my tongue clean of the foul taste it left.
“You didn’t know?”
Moments of life with Maggie flashed before my eyes, late night walks through our neighborhood, anniversaries celebrated, trips to her favorite ice cream shop because they were the only ones who carried bubble gum flavored ice cream. Only now, the rose-tinted glasses I’d once seen her through were gone, and the glaring red flags had woven their way through my picture perfect life. I could see the excuses she’d make to stay home and let me go minister to the poor on my own, or how she would find a reason to leave early. In recent years she never initiated sex; it was always me who had to find a way to woo her into our bed. I thought she was just tired, but it was just me she didn’t want.
My lips pressed together and I shook my head. “I was clueless. Two days before she died, I bought tickets to Italy for our fifteenth wedding anniversary so we could renew our vows at the Vatican.”
Eden's nose crinkled as she winced. “Yikes.”
“I thought her death ruined me,” I admitted, “but this, finding out it was all a lie… I don’t know what was real anymore.”
The last part was barely a whisper, and I don’t know why I said it, but it wasn’t a lie I’d have to confess later with the litany of sins I’d committed since walking into the pub.
Eden doesn’t need to be taking on my baggage. She doesn’t need to know I’m spiraling as I try to figure out where I went wrong, or what comes next.
“Did you know the guy?”
“He was a…” I almost said parishioner, but stopped myself just in time. I didn’t want her to know who or what I was. She didn’t need to know I was a deacon, or just how fucked up I was. I didn’t want her to look at me like every other woman who found out I was a deacon after Maggie died. To them, I was the man who lost his wife and would be forced to live his days celibate and alone. A waste of a good body.
As a permanent deacon I couldn’t remarry according to the church doctrine, so it was either celibacy or the priesthood, neither of which appealed to me, but what could I do? I didn’t enter the diaconate with the intention of losing my wife a year and a half after taking my vows. Still, it hadn’t seemed so bad before today. Being alone was a way I could honor the memory of my wife. Now, it was nothing but a slap in the face.
Maybe it was inevitable. If I was honest, from the moment Maggie died I feared there would come a day that I couldn’t resist. Despite what my father would say, I was all man. I needed the feeling of a woman beside me, under me. But before today, I honored my vows for Maggie. She’d wanted me to give myself to God in every way possible.
The alcohol in my stomach soured, and I swallowed past the bile that threatened to rise.
Everything I was was because of Maggie, but becoming something new was sounding more and more appealing.
I looked over at Eden and frowned when I saw her eyes still focused on me as I continued to spiral. “He was a what?” she asked.
