Change of Hart (32 page)

I spent the rest of the day with a goofy grin on my face. No one said anything about it except Deuce, of course, who would never miss an opportunity to razz me. I shut him up real quick when I asked if he had poked his baby in the head yet when he had sex. I couldn’t help myself. I knew he was gonna be running home to scour through that damn baby book to make sure he wasn’t going to inflict any brain damage on the kid.

As I hit the road to head back north to Addison’s house, I couldn’t help but realize how full circle it had all come for me. I had grown up in that town. One of my best friends lived there. And now, the woman I loved lived there with her son, whom I also loved. Never in my life did I expect to fall in love with something or someone more than I was in love with football. But here I was, goofy grin still hanging on. And for the first time ever, I could honestly say I had never been happier.

9 months later

I
t was the first game of the season and we were pumped. The rookies were finally starting to gel with the veterans on the team and I knew we had a fighting chance at making the Super Bowl this year.

Of course, I said that every year and it hadn’t happened yet. So what did I know?

“I know you’re tired, baby,” Deuce said gently into the phone. “I won’t screw around after the game is over. I’ll come straight home, I promise.”

Deuce had calmed down a lot since little Michael Johnson the Third had been born a few months ago. The baby was cute, but apparently he was colicky so neither Deuce nor Vanessa were getting much sleep. I had no idea what all that entailed, but I knew it wasn’t good so I tried not to poke fun at him too much about his sad lack of a sex life.

As I suited up, my phone beeped. I picked it up and checked the text.

Addison: We’re here and wearing your jersey. Have a great game. We love you!

She ended the text with a selfie of her and Jax in their seats wearing my number. Damn, I loved that woman.

“Well, look who’s still hanging out in Dallas, being his big bad self.” I turned around to find my favorite reporter, Catherine Hernandez, standing across the room with her hands on her hips.

“Hey!” I said, walking over to give her a hug. “What are you doing in a nasty-ass football locker room? Aren’t you supposed to be hobnobbing with all those pussies you call football players in San Diego?”

She smiled. “Yeah, but I was sent here to cover a story about a drug ring that has a connection in both our cities. So the bosses had me stop by and get some footage while I’m here. Anyway, how the hell are you?”

“I’m great,” I said with a smile, lacing up my cleats and grabbing my gloves. “I really can’t complain.”

“Not even about Gill?” she chided.

I groaned. “Don’t remind me. She’s like a boil on my ass and she just won’t go away.”

Catherine laughed. “Yeah, I’m not sad about leaving that one behind.” She looked over at Deuce who was still on the phone. “What’s the matter with him? He’s not as . . . hyper as he used to be.”

“He became a daddy to a baby with colic,” I said, patting him on the shoulder. He flipped me the bird, not even bothering to turn around in the process. I just laughed.

“That explains it. How about you, Hart?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest. “I hear you’ve gotten pretty serious about some woman since I’ve been gone.”

I broke out into a wide grin. “Addison, yeah. She’s amazing.”

“I’m glad,” she said, patting me on the arm. “I always wondered when the right woman would come along and snatch you up. You’re too good of a catch to be single the rest of your life.”

“Well, speaking of that,” I said with a devious grin on my face. “Can I ask for your help with something?”

“Sure,” she said. “Am I gonna get a scoop to go along with it?”

“Oh, you’ll get a scoop alright.” She sat down next to me on the bench and I filled her in on my plan.

Just as I had said, the team was gelling well and the game went off exactly as planned. Well, exactly as our team planned. I had four sacks and several pretty significant blocks. You could say I was burning off nervous energy. It worked. We won 24 - 14.

As the team started heading toward the tunnel to make their way to the locker room, I headed to the fifty-yard line and the seats reserved for family members. As I passed our head trainer, he intercepted me and completed his one and only hand-off on the field. Then I glanced over at Catherine Hernandez who was in position and ready to roll.

When I got to Addison and Jaxon, I noticed she was in the middle of a lively discussion with someone I didn’t recognize. Probably one of the new girlfriends. They were always rotating in and out. Jaxon noticed me, however, and was doing a bang up job of trying to contain his excitement. I stepped up on a leftover water cooler and hauled myself over the railing, wrapping my arms around her waist from behind.

“Oh!” she said in surprise before realizing it was me. “Jason, you scared me. What are you doing up here?”

Just then, Catherine and her cameraman came walking up to us, making sure to capture every moment.

“Well,” I started, “when we first started dating we had the worst trouble with publicity. So I’m here to make sure it doesn’t happen again by making my own public statement right here, right now.”

I pulled the black velvet box out of the waistband of my pants and dropped to one knee. The stands weren’t even close to being empty yet and Catherine had worked it out for this moment to not only be broadcast on all the monitors in the building, but on TV as well. So it came as no surprise when I heard a collective gasp coming from around the stadium. But the loudest gasp I heard was from the woman right in front of me.

“Jason, what are you doing?” she whispered, her eyes wide with disbelief.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” I said with a smile. “I’m proposing. Now hush so I can get it right.”

I cleared my throat before continuing. “Addison Bryant, I will never forget the day you dropped into my life. I was perfectly content living for my career. But then you showed up with your bright eyes and your big, joyful smile and I was a goner. I’ve heard people talk about how love just bowls you over when it shows up, but I never expected it to feel like this. You’re all I ever think about. You’re all I dream about. You are the single most important thing to me. I love your humor. I love the way you stumble over your words when you get nervous. I love your strength. I love the way you love Jaxon. I love you so much, I feel like our souls were just waiting to find each other. And now I feel like a total wuss for saying all this mushy stuff in front of all these people. But here’s the gist of it,” I opened the box to reveal a nearly flawless three-carat round diamond solitaire set in platinum with gleaming pave-set diamonds along the band. I only knew all that because I picked it out myself. I was pretty proud of that fact.

“I love you. I want you to be my wife. I want to be your husband. And I want us to be a family. Will you please do me the honor of marrying me?”

Her hands were covering her mouth and tears were streaming down her face. When the shock finally wore off a few seconds later, she wiped her face and turned to Jaxon. “Well, what do you think, buddy? Do you think I should say yes?”

Jaxon just rolled his eyes and threw his hands in the air in exasperation. “Just say yes already, Mom! I already told him it was ok for him to marry you!”

She turned back to me quickly with an amused look on her face. “What is he talking about?”

“What?” I shrugged. “I had to get permission from the man of the house before popping the question. It’s practically a requirement before proposing.”

She threw her head back and laughed. “Well in that case,” she said with a smile on her face, “since you already have Jaxon’s permission . . . yes,” she said softly. “Yes, I will marry you.”

Jaxon started jumping up and down and the stadium erupted in cheers while I stood up, slid the ring onto her finger and kissed her like I meant it.

The rest of the night was a blur of congratulations, camera flashes and phone calls from family members. By the time we got back to Addison’s place, we were exhausted and fell into a deep sleep.

The next morning, I was the first one up. As much as I wanted to stay in bed snuggled next to my fiancée, yes, I said it . . . fiancée. Wow. Anyway, as much as I wanted to stay in bed snuggled next to her, the season had just started so I couldn’t start slacking off quite yet.

I cracked open my laptop as I sipped on my first cup of coffee, anxious to see what was being said. All of the articles talked about how we met and the unlikely relationship that all started with Jaxon. But one article in particular caught my attention. The article itself was pretty standard, but the title and picture are what caught my eye.

Below it was a picture someone had taken after I had proposed. Addison and I were standing next to each other, arms wrapped around each other and somehow Jaxon was standing behind us, maybe on top of a chair or something, I wasn’t sure. He had one of his arms around each of our shoulders, with the widest grin I’d ever seen on his face. It was a fantastic picture of all of us.

The caption below it said it all . . .

Yes, ye
s
they did.

And I never wanted it back.