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That was what I really wanted: to go to sleep and wake up when the story was over. But I couldn’t deny how full my heart was. My teammates and friends cared about me. It amazed me how far they were willing to go for someone I considered a loner, a lost cause.
Me.
When Erin started to leave, she hugged me and pinched my cheeks, reminding me of my late grandma and how she would tell me how cute I was while smoke puffed out of her mouth. She would watch me when Mom had to work but would take me to the diner so everyone could see how red my cheeks were.
That was a good memory in the middle of my hard life in California before I found soccer. Losing my dad when I was young and being raised by a woman who worked her ass off and barely made enough to pay the bills always weighed on me. It was enough motivation to know that I still had to fight for my job, my career, my life.
There wasn’t anything else I was qualified to do.
“See ya,” Erin waved once more as she walked out the door, only to stop and pick something up. “This was on the floor in the hallway. Yours?”
“I think it's trash.” I walked toward her and grabbed the paper that had been wadded in the corner of the landing from when I got home. When I saw Hunter and saw that ball of paper, I assumed it was something he had brought with him and then accidentally left behind.
Shutting the door and taking a deep breath, I started toward the trash can but stopped when I looked at the ball of paper again. If it was Hunter’s, I was nosy enough to want to know what it said, so I opened it, expecting it to be a parking ticket or some other bullshit.
It wasn’t that at all, though.
It was another picture. A better one.
Clearer than the first two.
No surprise, it was Hunter and me, him down on his knees in front of me in the corner of the dark club. Whoever took the picture had to get closer for that shot, and by making sure it was clear enough to see, I felt like it was telling me more than the four letters typed across the top.
MINE.
ChapterForty-Two
Tatum
After I ate my spaghetti, Colton did the dishes while I worked on my computer for a little bit. My mother had been calling both of us, but after I told Colton my suspicions about her, he and I both decided not to answer.
Eventually, the phone stopped ringing, though, and we were left in peace and quiet.
“You staying over tonight?” I asked him, bringing a glass of wine to my lips.
“If you don’t mind,” he sighed as he sat back with me on the couch. “Kinda feeling a little big brother-ish.”
“I’m older than you,” I pointed out.
“I said big brother-ish. Because despite our age difference, I’m bigger.”
“Touché,” I smiled. “But I’ll be okay. Head back to the dorms if you have early classes.”
“I’m staying tonight.” He spoke matter-of-factly and sliced his hand through the air.
Once again, my phone chimed, but I didn’t look down. It was most likely my mother again, and until I knew how to approach her, I had to keep myself distant.
“You really think she sent those three pictures?” Colton asked as he got up, heading for a shower. “Seems weird, but I guess she is crazy.”
I never answered; I just closed my eyes and tried to envision her figuring out a printer. When I heard the bathroom door click, my eyes shot open, and a light bulb went off inside my head.
“Three pictures?” I whispered to myself.
Picking up my phone to clear my mother’s message, I paused when I saw it was from Tripp. It took him until almost nine in the evening, but he was finally reaching out, so I opened the message quickly.
Just got a third picture. It was wadded up outside my door.
Third?
