by Stella
“Where are you?”
“You worried I’m jeepin’ behind your back?”
I didn’t even know what that meant. “I need to talk to you, and you don’t need an audience.” My eyes watered with emotion.
“Katie, really. Every guy on the team has either had a wife go through this or multiple girlfriends—and some have had multiple wives, although not at the same time.”
“Gage, oh my God. Please focus.”
“Okay, okay. I’m opening the door to my hotel room now.”
When he finally got comfortable and leaned back against the pillows, I took a deep breath and then held up the front page of the sports section from the paper I’d bought at the store. His brow furrowed and he squinted his eyes while he tried to read the print.
“Aww. That’s sweet. They called you my princess. Most girls I’ve been photographed with didn’t get nearly as nice of an introduction to the sports community.”
“Do you recognize where this picture was taken?” This would be so much easier if I were sitting on the bed with him and not hundreds of miles and hours apart.
“Yep.” The two of us were currently on separate pages—hell, we weren’t even in the same book.
I flipped the page and folded it over so he could see the other photos.
“That top one on the left is a great picture of you. Your boobs—”
“Gage! Do you see where those were taken?”
And the lightbulb finally turned on. He took a deep breath through his nose and flared his nostrils. “I’ll get the team’s PR firm on it. Coming to the house is crossing the line.”
“Well, if you’re going to involve them in that, you might as well go ahead and give them my name as well so they can do damage control there, too.”
“Ex-squeeze me? Baking powder? Did you just give me permission to release your name to the press?” He beamed with excitement. The poor guy was going to have whiplash before this call ended—maybe then he’d know what it was like to have a conversation with himself.
“No, your PR team.”
“But not the press?” The lightbulb had gone back off.
“I’m sure they will have it soon enough. And I just hope your PR can spin this tale in a direction that doesn’t hurt you.”
“Gotta tell you, Chicken Crisper. I’m having a hard time following you, here. Why are you so hell-bent and determined on keeping your name from being associated with me? You act like I have the plague.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and rubbed my eyes with my fingers. “It’s not you, Gage. I’ve told you that over and over.”
“Yeah, but you haven’t told me what it is.”
“I have a criminal record, Gage.” I spit it out as fast as I could. “I’m not worried about my name; I’m worried about your career and what people will think of you.”
“Wow. You’ve done time in the big house? That’s cool. What was it like in the yard? Did you ever get thrown in the shoe?”
“This is serious. And also, exactly why I haven’t told you. Everything’s a joke. This isn’t funny. No one’s laughing. You’re thirty-one freaking years old—grow up!”
All emotion washed from his expression. “Okay. I’m sorry, Katie. I’m listening.” And then he closed his mouth, moved his fingers across his lips like he was pulling a zipper, turned them, and threw away the imaginary key.
I knew what I had to say; I had just hoped after confessing to Granny, I would never have to share these words again. “I was convicted of prostitution several years ago.”
His lips parted, the corners turning up in a dopey grin, and his eyes glittered. “That’s so freaking cool.”
My squinted gaze and cocked head reminded him of his self-imposed silence, and he zipped up again. I wasn’t sure why he bothered with flicking his fingers as if tossing away the key if he’d just open his mouth again anyhow—although, there was a good chance if I brought that up, he’d make a show of retrieving it before speaking next time. I couldn’t win with him, even when confessing a part of my painful past.
“It’s not cool, Gage. It’s embarrassing.”
“Crisper Crisptopherson, it’s legal in Nevada. So you got paid to have sex, big deal.”
“I didn’t, though.”
“If you didn’t get paid, then doesn’t that just make you a slut? Why would you go to a state pen for that? Trust me, it’s not against the law…I should know.”
I clenched my teeth and groaned, which he must not have heard—or he ignored it. “I didn’t go to a state penitentiary.”
“Hey, no need to burst my bubble, ’kay?”
“Whatever, Gage. That’s not the point. I didn’t get paid because I didn’t do any of it. I took the charge to keep my mom from going to jail.”
“I thought your mom died?” Mr. Sensitivity and Mr. Personality all wrapped into one—and to think, I was incubating his offspring. “Wait, I didn’t think felons could have a medical license?”
“I’m not a felon. It was a misdemeanor. And I repeat…I didn’t do it.”
“Did your mom?” The sour expression on his face was a dead giveaway for his thoughts on my mother prostituting, yet somehow, it was okay when he assumed I’d been the one turning tricks.
“This would be a lot easier if you’d just let me tell you the story.”
There was no doubt in my mind he could see the shame written not just on my face, but my whole body, as well. It wasn’t an emotion; this was a condition that ate at my soul. I forced myself to make eye contact as I told him about her drug addiction, her inability to hold down a job which resulted in her homelessness, and in turn, her working the street corner to feed her heroin habit. Intravenous drug use was a nasty game. She’d spun the roulette wheel and landed on black when she’d needed red.
“She was really sick. Without any way to reach her—she pawned every cell phone I gave her, and spent every dollar she got—I had to find her. Her corner was the quickest way to do it.”
“I’ve heard homeless people get really bad cases of the flu that can kill them.” His comment came from the heart and not out of the typical Gage Nix repertoire.
I puffed out my cheeks, filling them with air, and then let them pop. “She had AIDS. And she couldn’t afford the medication. Hell, maybe she sold it when she got it. I don’t know. I had graduated by that time and started working at the hospital in Culver City. She hated me—said I’d abandoned her when I went to college and thought I was too good for her.”
It had been the drugs that spit out those hateful words; I knew that then, and I still know it today. However, knowing it didn’t change the way it cut me at eighteen years old. I wanted to become a nurse to help her. I was naïve enough to still believe I could change the world.
“Anyway, I went down there to talk to her. I’d gotten her into rehab, and she had to be there the following morning. We got into an argument with some random guy she knew, and then she yelled at me for being ungrateful and not giving her money. I’d pulled cash out of my pocket to give her a few dollars for dinner after she promised to check into the facility when the cops pulled up behind me. My mom and the guy—I later found out he helped her scam money off people all the time—tried to run.”
“So how did you end up taking the fall for that?”
“Gage, honestly, I was young and stupid. It was a known part of town for sex services, I was caught with money in my hand and a guy who ran. One of us was going to be charged that night—me or her. And I wanted to believe she’d go to rehab and get clean if she saw what she was doing to my life. I don’t know. I’ve asked myself that same question a million times since then. Protecting her was what I’d tried to do since I was fifteen, and my dad beat the shit out of her and left.”
“Did she ever apologize?”
I exhaled through my nose and licked my lips. And regardless of how hard I fought, the tears fell anyway. “She overdosed that night. I never spoke to her again. Ironic, huh?”
“Babe, why haven
’t you told me any of this before?”
I didn’t try to stifle the laugh that erupted. “When would I have worked that into the conversation? Between my regular updates about Granny? Maybe her funeral? Oh, I know—when we were having wild-monkey sex and you knocked me up with your cargo. Come on. Get real. My mom was a heroin addict with AIDS, and I have a prostitution charge on my criminal record—hardly the stuff you talk about around the dinner table.”
“Wait a minute here…” His brow knitted ever so slightly, and his lips quirked a bit to the side. “You didn’t have a criminal record when I hired you—I would know, I checked. I was very particular when choosing a nurse to stay with Granny. Considering I was a hot commodity back then, almost as hot as I am now, I wasn’t about to take any hillbilly off the street corner.” He paused to add an exaggerated wink, as if his pun could’ve possibly been missed. “So does this mean you were moonlighting as Julia Roberts after Granny went to bed?”
It’d been posed as a joke, but Gage’s genuine concern was obvious beneath the layers of immaturity. No matter what my answer was, I believed it wouldn’t affect our relationship or where we stood, but I didn’t doubt that it would give him cause to question my role in Granny’s life. Luckily, I didn’t have to find out. “I hadn’t started working for you yet. The charges came down days after you had just hired me, and considering I took a plea, there was no trial. I did my community service and tried to put it all behind me.”
“Fair enough. It doesn’t bother me that you didn’t tell me; it bothers me that you thought you couldn’t. That somehow I’d judge you or possibly think less of you—clearly, you’ve missed the continuous field day the press has had with my mistakes over the years.”
“I thought I was protecting you by not telling you; surely you see that.”
“Protecting me from what?”
“Seriously? You’re having a baby with a woman who’s been convicted of prostitution. And as you just pointed out, the media hasn’t exactly been kind to you where women are concerned.”
“You saw that, huh?”
“Just because you were traveling didn’t mean you were on the other side of the world.”
“So you were stalking me way back then, huh?” He grinned. And the conversation was over.
“Yeah. With your grandmother.” I rolled my eyes.
“She was a rather progressive lady. I mean, she did like eighties hair bands, had a tattoo of a rose with a thorn on her shoulder, and could recite every line in Pretty Woman. Oh, and she loved you.” At least that explained his Julia Roberts reference earlier.
Laughter came roaring out of me. I’d never thought about that. I’d listened to music with her for years: Bon Jovi, Poison, Phil Collins, Madonna—she didn’t discriminate. She loved them all.
His expression softened, and my giggles died down. “Look, I’m the last person to judge anyone. I’ve made more mistakes than any one human should, and every one of them was put on display for the public to throw around. I don’t know if you made the right decision that night—I wasn’t there. You can’t change it, so dwelling on it is a waste of time.
“I’m not interested in what the press or the public thinks of me. I’ll do everything I can to protect you—that shit with the pictures will stop—but in the long run, the only opinions that matter are ours.” That might have been the sweetest and most sincere thing that had ever crossed Gage Nix’s lips.
“And Corinne. Hers is pretty important, too.”
That, I could deal with. “I still think you should warn whoever handles PR for the Titans.”
His face scrunched to the side, and he waved his hand in front of his phone. “Nah, it’s way more entertaining to watch them sweat.” A yawn filled his words, and it was clear how tired he was.
His eyes were glazed over, and his hair mussed from running his hands through it when I’d first called. He hadn’t shaved since early this morning, and the scruff on his face reminded me of things I didn’t need to think about when he was on the road. The easy smile hanging on his lips made my stomach flutter.
And it fluttered again.
I pressed my hand to my abdomen, pushing in just slightly, and the flutter turned into a tingle extending down between my legs. It wasn’t sexual, and it wasn’t Gage—it was his baby moving.
“Oh my God, I wish you were here—”
“You’re missing that bawn-chica-wow-wow.” He nodded as he said it.
“No! The baby’s moving. I can feel it. Well, not with my hand, just inside my stomach—right below my belly button.”
I expected him to be as excited as I was. It wasn’t a kick or anything, but it was still a big deal, yet he sat stoically on the other end. My smile died as I witnessed the disappointment marking his expression.
“Gage, are you okay?”
“Yeah. I’m just tired.”
He was a crap liar, too. I didn’t know what I’d said to upset him. He didn’t care about the prostitution, yet telling him I’d felt the baby move sent him into the underworld. “Oh, all right. I’ll let you get some sleep.”
“Hey, Jimmeny Crispness?”
“Yeah?”
“Tell my Hot Pocket in your oven how much I love him.”
“Her.”
He grinned and shook his head before he said goodbye. I let out a heavy sigh and quickly calculated just how long it would be before I saw him again. Nine days seemed like an eternity, and I regretted not going with him when he’d offered.
Chapter Six
Katie
“I have to get going. Promise you’ll call me after the ultrasound this afternoon?”
I’d made this promise no less than five times since he woke me up. “Promise. Good luck.”
“With this kind of skill, I don’t need luck. The other team does.”
“Your modesty overwhelms me.”
He winked and said goodbye. I’d created a monster. Gage had become obsessed with FaceTime, and he thought nothing of using it at six in the morning or eleven at night. There was never any warning, and more often than not, he caught me still in bed—his bed. I quit trying to hide it and just gave in to his incessant bragging. I had no idea how much he’d paid for this mattress; I just knew it was worth every cent—it was like sleeping on a cloud. A king-sized cloud. He was proud of himself for winning the zombie apocalypse, and while he believed I was camping out in his room for the superior mattress and enormous television—which was partially true—I also spent my nights in here because I felt closer to him. The sheets smelled like Gage, his pictures were on the dresser, and his clothes were more comfortable than my own.
Virtually nothing I owned fit, and without a job, I couldn’t buy maternity clothes. After the grocery store incident, I quit putting in applications. Right now, I was still able to use a rubber band to hold my jeans together—except, that wouldn’t work much longer. It didn’t really matter since I no longer left the house out of fear someone would recognize me. My name would come out eventually, and I dreaded the shitstorm it would cause. Gage acted like it wasn’t a big deal; however, he hadn’t really thought it through. He might not care what the media thought, but that didn’t mean his teammates or Coby and his wife would be as forgiving. And like it or not, Gage would be tied to me for life with this child.
Still lying in bed, I stared down the length of my body and smoothed the shirt around my ever-growing belly. A couple weeks ago, the lemon was barely noticeable—now my lemon was the size of an avocado, and she took up far more space. I glanced at the clock, realizing I needed to get moving. I had to get something to eat, shower, and get dressed. At the speed I moved these days, that could take hours. I dreaded the time when I’d actually have an enormous belly and wouldn’t be able to get up from a chair on my own. Gage hadn’t found it the least bit funny when I joked about him coming home from a road trip and finding I’d gotten stuck and couldn’t get up.
He’d been careful about what he said and how he said it, yet there was no denying how much
he struggled with everything he thought he missed. It was the reason I didn’t complain about the FaceTime calls—whenever they came—because it gave him the sense of actually being with me when he was on the road. And in truth, it did the same for me. No girl could deny that getting phone calls from Gage Nix was flattering, regardless of the time of day or the lack of makeup. He didn’t care what I looked like, and I was grateful he couldn’t smell my morning breath through the screen.
It had gotten rather comical. He’d call me when he ate breakfast or lunch with guys from the team. Initially, it was uncomfortable and awkward, though ten minutes into the first call, they just started talking to me like I was sitting there with them. He walked me around stadiums to see where he played, showed me locker rooms, and took me out to dinner. It brought a whole new meaning to online dating—not that we were dating. We weren’t. He’d just found a way to ease my loneliness and his guilt.
By the time I finally got around to putting on pants, I was running late. There was no one else on the planet who could take as long as I had to do nothing. Lord help Gage once the baby came and I was responsible for getting two people ready—I’d have to start the day before.
My phone vibrated when I got in the car, and since no one else sent me texts, I knew exactly who it was. I wondered how Gage managed to sneak a phone into the game considering his get-away-with-murder charm didn’t work too well on other men—aside from Coby.
Sperm Donor: Don’t forget pictures.
I tried to type out a message while I put the keys in the ignition and buckled my seatbelt. Multitasking was a skill I’d lost when I gained pregnancy brain.
Me: I’m not sending you nudes. We’ve talked about this.
Sperm Donor: You can save that for FaceTime. I was talking about the baby.
Me: There will definitely be no naked FaceTime.
Sperm Donor: You’ve never said no to naked face time before.
