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I still love him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Ash
I’ve been walking around with my head up my ass.
And it took her to leave me for me to finally pull it out and realize what I’ve been ignoring. What’s been in front of me all along.
Too focused on my career, I lost sight of my priorities.
And while I am married to my job, Lily is my number one priority.
The only one I should have been concentrating on.
Becoming head coach has taken over my life, more so than when I was a player or an assistant coach. The long, untraditional hours, time away from home, working late; she had enough, and I don’t blame her. I can’t deny that so have I.
She woke me from my stupor. I just hope we still have time to save us because while she says she’s still mine, it kills me to see the doubt flickering in her eyes.
Clearing everything away from our meal together, I stack the dishes into the dishwasher and wipe down the last of the kitchen surfaces. Lily chats mindlessly away as she scrolls through the television menu, trying to decide what to watch. It gives me hope; she seems quite relaxed around me, open to me planting myself unexpectedly into her day.
It’s been years since we sat and watched a movie together, something we used to do regularly.
While my job is demanding, my life outside of work seems to consume me too. My friends were right, I am never off the clock. Between wrangling the team, ensuring they stay out of trouble, answering their endless emails, calls, and pulling Wade Collins out of police custody on the regular, as well as the constant stream of media interviews I seem to do now, it’s had a detrimental effect on my marriage.
As heartbreaking as it was, she was right to pack her bags.
But this isn’t the end of us.
It can’t be. I refuse to let her walk out of my life again.
Operation Get Lily Back is underway. I just hope I can execute it in the way it played out in my head and I talked it through with my buddies.
My plan has to work.
After tomorrow’s meeting with management to iron out a few gray areas, where I’m hoping they’ll meet me at least halfway, then and only then can I move the plan forward.
If I go too fast or too slow, I could fuck it up with her.
And if I fuck this up, I will have lost her forever.
I’m nothing without Lily. She’s my purpose. That’s why there is no other option but to fight and save us.
“I don’t know what to watch,” Lily sighs, endlessly scrolling the menu.
“Why don’t we start a series?” I suggest.
Turning around in her seat, she rests her arm on the back of the sofa. “That’s a serious commitment,” she replies, looking at me knowingly.
And what she really means, but doesn’t say out loud is, can I commit to it? And do I have the time and will we still be together to finish it?
“Select one that has at least five seasons,” I tell her. That should show her how dedicated I am.
Worry lines wrinkle her forehead before she says, “I left you last week, threatening to end our marriage forever. We shouted, but you didn’t go crazy, smash my car up, or call me names, although you may have drawn devil horns on my head on our wedding photos for all I know.”
“Yeah, I might have done that.”
“You didn’t?” She gasps.
