by Violet Paige
“Whoa, what’s gotten into you, honey?” Heather asked.
“Nothing. I just wanted you to know how much I love being a Goddess. Being a part of the team.”
Presley eyed Heather. “Is she drunk? Did I just hear her say that?”
“I’m not drunk.” My eyebrows rose.
“Ahh, there it is. That admonishing tone we love so much. Okay, it’s her.” Presley winked.
“I don’t admonish,” I argued.
They folded their arms and stared at me.
“Maybe a little bit. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t do that. It’s a very bad ballet habit.”
“You blame the ballet?” Heather wasn’t convinced. I actually felt a little hurt. I didn’t realize they thought of me that way.
“Yes. No. I don’t know. Madame Collette was very opinionated. And she practically raised me, so maybe a little of the dance snobbery rubbed off on me. Okay?”
They both smiled. “We’re just giving you a hard time, Natalia. We know it’s different being a Goddess. But we still love you.”
I sighed. “Thank God. I was starting to think you weren’t going to let me travel this weekend.”
“And mess up the halftime show? You’re crazy. Maybe she is drunk.” Presley still wasn’t convinced.
We climbed onto the bus together. It was a quick ride to the airport and from there, we would fly to DC.
For the first time I felt as if I had this all figured out.
I sent Sam a quick text.
Headed to the airport for DC. I’ll miss you.
I waited until my phone buzzed.
Don’t stay gone long.
I started to giggle and covered my mouth.
“Who are you texting over there?” Presley leaned over the seat.
I turned my phone facedown. “Something funny I read.”
Heather grinned. “I think you have a boyfriend and you aren’t telling us.”
“No. No way.” I shook my head.
“Something has you all giddy and mysterious. It’s been going on for weeks. I can tell.”
“Nothing is going on.” My voice must have returned to ballerina status, because their eyes widened. “Sorry, I did it again, didn’t I?”
They nodded.
I had that nervous feeling in my stomach. The same one from the conversation when Heather admitted she knew about Sam and me. Although, this time, it wasn’t only about the money. I didn’t want to lose this. I was finally happy. Everything in my life was bliss. Sam. Dancing. I could wear my pointe shoes. It was perfect.
“Tell him you’ll be home Sunday night and we’ll take care of you,” Heather instructed.
I smiled. “Not necessary, but thank you.”
I settled into my seat as the bus driver closed the doors. In a few minutes, we’d be on the tarmac and in the air.
29
Sam
We won our game Sunday, but after the first few snaps, I realized Wes wasn’t throwing to me. He was still pissed about last week. I tried to talk to him on the sideline, but he walked the other direction. I was going to have to prove myself again. Fuck.
This was one time I wished I had the power to get Coach to call the plays. He wanted Wes to throw to me, but the quarterback called the shots once we stepped on the field. He didn’t trust me, and it showed.
I sat in the locker room after the game and waited for the room to clear. Wes was dressed in his dark suit. He had to move over to the press room in a few minutes.
“Hey, man. Can we talk?” I cornered him by the mirrors.
“Yeah. I have a minute. I’m waiting on the golf cart.”
“Look, I know I fucked up last week. But what happened out there today? I can catch the damn ball.”
His hand landed on my shoulder. “You blocked today. That was your job. And you did a damn good job keeping the defenders off our asses. So thank you.” He paused, and his eyes hardened. “But if you ever drop another pass in the end zone again, I swear…”
“Blakefield, they’re ready for you.”
He looked at me. “Catch what I’m saying?”
I glared at him. “Throw me the fucking ball next week.” I walked away from him.
I had it today. I could feel it. Everything was together. I had closed on the new apartment. The construction started tomorrow. It was only a matter of a couple weeks before I could move Natalia in. If he had thrown the ball to me at all, I could have given him twenty yards. But no, the bastard passed it off to Persons or threw it to Stubbs. He used me as a wall.
I picked up my bag. I remembered what Natalia had told me at the cabin. She didn’t let one mistake define her life. She was back in her shoes, preparing for auditions. I couldn’t let one dropped pass be the end of my relationship with the quarterback. I needed him and he needed me.
I lugged my Wranglers bag over my shoulder and stepped into the tunnel outside the locker room. The Fillies were grouped together, talking about going out.
“Hey, Sam.” One of them turned around and waved.
“Hey, Vanessa.” They reminded me of Natalia. I wondered how her halftime show went today. I wondered if she was in the air flying home.
“Want to go get a drink with us?” she asked.
“I think I’ll pass. I’m pretty worn out, girls.”
She pouted. “You never come out with us anymore. Last year you were so much fun.”
Last year I took advantage of every new opportunity. I had rookie fever—no doubt. But I had someone in my life and I wasn’t going to fuck it up.
“Sorry.” I shrugged my shoulders and walked past them. “Maybe next time.” But there wouldn’t be a next time. I was done with the Fillies. I was done with other women. There was only one person meant for me.
I walked into my apartment and grabbed a beer from the fridge. We had the early game today, so there was still plenty of football to watch. I stretched out on the couch and turned on the TV.
I looked down and saw Natalia’s name light up my screen.
“Hey, baby.” I smiled.
“Hey, we’re stuck.”
I sat forward. “What do you mean stuck?”
“Our jet is down for maintenance or something. That said it’s going to be tomorrow before we can fly out.”
“The Warriors aren’t getting you out of there?”
“No,” she answered. “We have to wait until a part comes in. I don’t know. They aren’t handing out many details.”
“I’ll get a ticket for you. I can fly you in here and then drive you back to Austin in the morning. I’m off tomorrow.”
“I can’t let you do that. I just wanted to let you know what was going on.”
“You can let me do that. It’ll take five minutes for me to get you on a flight out of there. You can be here in three hours.”
“Sam.” Her voice was firm. “What will everyone think if I fly out of here like that?”
“They’ll think you have somewhere important to be. They don’t have to know that place happens to be my bed.”
It made her laugh. “As much as I want to be in your bed tonight, I’m going to have to wait until all the Goddesses can fly out of here together.”
“I don’t like it. I don’t want you on a jet with maintenance problems. This is ridiculous, Natalia. Let me get you out of there.”
She was being stubborn and hard-headed. It was the French side coming out. Although, she said my stubbornness came from being Texan.
“No. We’re going back to the hotel and I’ll call you when I find out more. Okay?”
I took a swig of beer. It wasn’t okay. But she wasn’t playing along.
“All right. But call me as soon as you find out. And if there’s something unsafe about that jet, you’re not getting on it. The Warriors are a bunch of cheap bastards. I don’t want them fixing the plane with duct tape.”
“If I see any duct tape I promise to call immediately,” she answered sweetly, but I knew she was mocking me.
“Should I fly up
there?”
“No. God, no,” she whispered. “And get me fired?”
“All right, then take your safety more seriously.”
She huffed. “I’ll call you later.”
“Hey, wait.”
“What is it?”
“I miss you.”
She whispered, “I miss you too.”
Then there was silence.
30
Natalia
It took two days for us to make it back to Austin. The maintenance staff had to order a part that wasn’t easy to find and the Warriors refused to buy commercial tickets for us when they had to pay for the jet to be fixed. I sat in a hotel room two extra nights with Heather, missing my chance to meet Sam at Canyon Lake.
I sat on one bed while Heather sat on the other, flipping through channels.
“Do you think the Warriors would pay for us to watch Game of Love?” she asked.
“They need to after leaving us to die in DC.”
She hit the purchase button. “Done.”
I laughed. “I’ve always wanted to watch this movie. It’s the one about the baseball player who falls for the reporter, right?”
Heather eyed me. “You haven’t seen it?”
“Umm, no, but I really want to.”
The opening credits started. I had a new interest in sports romances, only I couldn’t tell my roommate about it.
“Oh, we should order big desserts while we’re watching,” I suggested. I pulled out the room service menus.
“I like how you think.”
I picked up the phone to call the restaurant downstairs. I covered the receiver. “I’m getting a double brownie with ice cream. What do you want?”
“Oh, I want that.” She smiled. “But we have to do double cardio tomorrow for the double brownie.”
I glared at her. “You just took the fun out of it.”
“Sorry.” She shrugged and threw herself on the pillows while I ordered our sinful dessert.
I signed for the silver trays when the waiter brought our snack to the door. “Voila.”
I presented one platter to Heather and placed mine on the end of my bed. Things were just starting to heat up in the movie. I couldn’t take my eyes off the pitcher. There was definitely something hot about athletes. Why hadn’t I noticed it before?
“So,” Heather turned to me. “Who’s the guy?”
“There is no guy. I told you and Pres that.”
She scooped some ice cream on her fork with a bite of brownie. “Really? No guy? All the secret texts and phone calls? There’s no one?”
I didn’t want to be interrogated and I didn’t want to miss the scene where the couple went on their first date. He was taking her to the ballpark for a candlelit picnic.
“It’s my mom. That’s all. She’s in Dallas and she worries when I travel. She’s one of those hover mothers, you know? A dance mom.”
Heather laughed. “I think we all have dance moms. I guess that makes sense. Sorry. We thought it was a guy.”
“No, but what about you?” I wasn’t paying attention and dropped a dollop of ice cream on my leg.
She rolled her eyes. “I wish. I tried online dating, but that was full of creepy weirdos who found out I was a Warrior and then lied about what they did for a living. Presley set me up with one of her brother’s friends, but that was a disaster. I’m not going to date a player.” She sighed. “I don’t know. It seems impossible right now to find someone. Do you feel like that?”
I chewed on my bottom lip. What I should tell her was that it was completely possible. When she least expected it, some guy would show up out of nowhere and turn her world upside down and make everything else seem less important. He would be there for her. He would surprise her and romance her. Yes, it was worth waiting for. It was worth all the lonely nights that came before his existence.
“Oh, I know what you mean. Dating is the worst.” I felt my stomach turn. I hated lying to her. She had done so much for me.
“Oh, here’s the best part.” She turned up the movie with the remote.
We both sighed as the pitcher kissed the reporter on third base. It was sweet and sappy. But he was clearly an amazing kisser. The girl was swooning.
“See, that’s what I want.” Heather whispered. “All of that.”
I watched and realized that was exactly what I had.
By the time we flew back to Austin, Sam and I figured out there was no way to see each other any time soon. Our schedules were off the rest of the week and we both had away games the next weekend.
I called him as soon as I walked through my apartment door. His voicemail picked up.
“Hey, we made it back. I know you’re at practice, but I wanted to hear your voice, and maybe you want to hear mine. Call me.”
I walked into my room, feeling the drudge of traveling clinging to my skin. I stripped down and stepped into the shower. The last three days were down the drain in seconds.
Heather and I finally had our romcom marathon and I discovered that Presley was a lot more fun than I realized. She was an excellent shoe shopper and there were some great boutiques in DC she scouted for us. I came home with three new pairs of heels.
Other than missing Sam like crazy, I had a great time. But I couldn’t believe that in a few days, I had to do it again. This time we were flying to San Francisco. I couldn’t think about that now. I stepped out of the shower and dried off.
I didn’t have the energy for anything but crawling under my covers and going to sleep. I put the phone next to the bed in case Sam called.
31
Sam
“Hold on.” I called to whoever was knocking on the door. It was probably one of the guys from the construction crew. They had been tearing the place down and rebuilding it almost from the studs up. It was going to be incredible.
I whipped open the door to find out what had gone wrong this time, when I stared into a pair of brown eyes I never thought I’d see again.
“Maddie?”
“Hey, Sam.”
I looked behind her. This wasn’t right. “What are you doing here? How’d you find me? Who in the hell let you in here?”
“I’m here to see you. Pretty much everyone in San Antonio knows this is your building, and I walked in with a really lovely older couple and told them I was your girlfriend.”
I was ready to slam the door in her face. “There is no reason for you to be here.”
“I told you on the phone Todd and I broke up.”
“So?”
“So, I thought it might mean something to you.”
She brushed past me and walked into the living room. She was wearing a short black skirt and a dark pink shirt that was tight enough I could see her nipples through the front. Damn, she wasn’t wearing a bra.
I shrugged. “Sorry you wasted a trip here. But it doesn’t. I don’t give a shit what you and Todd do.” I held the door for her. “Go talk to him about your relationship problems. I haven’t talked to that fucker in three years.”
“Come on, Sam. Isn’t there some little part of you that’s glad?”
“Not really.” Why was she sitting on my couch?
She tucked her hair behind her ears. I remembered how she used to do that in college when we were studying for a test or she was nervous about something.
“What’s going on, Maddie?” I closed the door. She obviously wasn’t going to leave until she got what she came for. “I already told you I’m not giving you any money. Todd can fund your shopping habit. I’ve been out for a long time.”
“I’m not here for money. I heard what you said on the phone. I’m embarrassed I even asked. I called you because I was desperate and scared. I shouldn’t have done that. It was a weak moment. I’m sorry.”
I scratched the back of my head. “Okay, so we’ve got that figured out. Why are you here?”
She wrung her manicured hands together. “I think I made a mistake.”
“Other than a drunken phone call?”
“Now you think you made a mistake?” I couldn’t fucking believe this.
She nodded. “Will you listen? Just listen to me. Please.”
“No. You’re talking about something that happened years ago. I’m over it. I’m over you. I don’t care about Todd or your damn breakup. Go get a job. Make some money like normal people do and leave me the hell alone.” My voice boomed across the apartment.
She started to tear up. “Oh, hell. Don’t cry about it. We haven’t been a thing in a long time. I can’t make you cry. You didn’t cry when you cheated on me.” I glared at her.
She took a deep breath. “I’m not going to cry. It’s just that when I see you, I remember all the fun we had, and how much you made me laugh. And I know I shouldn’t have cheated on you. It was wrong. I was wrong.”
I nodded. “Now you’ve got something right. So you can clear your little conscience and get the hell out of my apartment.”
I didn’t like her being here. I didn’t like her acting as if this was even a possibility.
“Nothing? You feel nothing?” she prodded.
I pulled out my phone. “No. See?” I scrolled through to the picture of Natalia and me at the lake. “I have someone. Someone who doesn’t cheat. A woman who I’m fucking insane about.” I shoved the picture closer so she could see how serious I was. “This woman is my life. You are a bad memory.”
She closed her eyes and the tears started to slide down her cheeks this time.
“Shit. Hold on.” I dropped my phone on the table and walked to the bathroom to grab a tissue. I looked through a few drawers before I found one. Part of me wanted to throw her crying ass in the hall, but I didn’t.
“Here.” I handed the tissue to her when I returned to the couch.
“Thanks,” she sniffed, pressing it to the corners of her eyes. “You sound like you’ve found someone special then.”
