Linebacker's Second Chance (Bad Boy Ballers) (36 page)

“I’m not—we’re not—are we dating?” I think back to the day before, when we road Rowan’s horses through the fields behind his house and up into the mountains. That—and all that came before it—might suggest that we were on a dating fast track. But we haven’t seen anyone else. This hasn’t been the real world.

“As far as I can tell, I think we’re dating, Cadence. And I want to give you this to show you that I’m serious about keeping on with you, no matter if you’re in New York or not. Hell, I’ll set you up in the guest house after all if you need some space right now.” He picks up the velvet box again, and there’s something so sad about it. In my little girl dreams, I’d always wanted a prince to take me away from the world and want me more than anyone. Eli had shown me that none of that was real, that I couldn’t have everything I wanted. In the world I lived in, this didn’t seem like it could be
real
. And it isn’t, because of the broken things deep inside of me. I put my hand on top of the box and push Rowan’s hand away. Confusion hits his deep blue eyes, and he knits his dark eyebrows together.

“Cadence, you care about me. I can see it.” He puts his strong hands on my arms, and warmth sears through me at his touch, even in my state of mind.
 

I smile. “It’s really that obvious?” He nods. My heart beats fast, and I’m afraid of the words I’m about to say. “Rowan—”

“I don’t like your tone, woman.” His words are joking, but there’s worry hidden in his voice. “This is the ‘It’s not you, it’s me’ speech. I’ve gotten this one before—”

“Stop for a second. Rowan, I know you’ve got baggage. I do too. But it’s different. What I’ve got is
different
.”

“Whatever it is, it’s okay. I promise.” I purse my lips together, and I think of is body when it collides with mine. The last time we were together, we hadn’t used a condom, and there was something in his body language, the hopeful look on his face. It was idiotic of both of us, but God, that hope... It’s the worst thing of all. He puts the jewelry box down again and grips my hand. I wonder how many more times he can nervously pick it up and put it down. “You don’t even have to tell me. Hell, I’ll put the necklace away. It’s a necklace. It’s not a ring—”

“Rowan...” I start, and my voice trails off. I think of a way to explain it. But there’s nothing easy about this, and it’s never something anyone wants to hear. But with his big, earnest blue eyes, I owe him an explanation. “You know I read romance novels, right?”
 

He nods and smiles. “This has taken a turn. A good turn—right?” He smiles, and his dimples form. It would make me melt if I weren’t about to describe the most painful shit in my life.
 

“Usually, in the damn novels, the woman or the man keeps a secret hidden from the person they care about. And it’s always annoying as shit. So I’m not going to do that to you. You’re right—I care about you.” I gulp and take a long breath, closing my eyes for an instant. “But I came here to escape my life in New York.”

“What is it? An ex-boyfriend? Did he hurt you?” Rowan’s voice is serious, and I wave a hand to brush his words away.
 

I open my eyes and look into his. “I came here after I had a miscarriage.” My voice breaks on the last word, like it always does. Even in the time I’ve been here, the pain feels raw and angry when I speak the word. I feel the pain again, physical and emotional, the pain I’ve been ignoring, pushing away.

“Cadence, I’m so sorry.” Rowan isn’t a sobbing, voice-cracking mess like I am, but his eyes are shiny, and he squeezes my hand hard. “That doesn’t—”

“Before you say that doesn’t matter, please let me finish.” I take a deep breath and try to pull my hand away, but he won’t let me go. “I can’t have a child. The man I was with before, Eli, we tried for five years.”

He knits his brows together again, and he pulls me closer. It’s the sweetest reaction, the one I never got from Eli through any of this shit. “You’re so young—”

I let out a sharp laugh. “Yes. I’m only thirty-two. I kind of feel like that’s old. I wanted a big house full of kids. Eli didn’t believe in marriage, but he wanted children too. He wanted the same things, and we tried for two years before any doctor would take us seriously. Then it was tests after tests after tests, and then injections. And then IVF. I had the last embryo transfer in early November, and it worked at first. Until it didn’t. You know how people say, ‘You can’t be a little bit pregnant?’ Well, you can. That was only the second time I actually got pregnant, but it didn’t stay. I was a little bit pregnant, but only for the smallest amount of time.”

Rowan runs his hands over my arms and holds me, and I feel like I might start crying and never stop, like I might break completely. I could have waited to tell him—I know that. He could easily tell me that we aren’t on that track, that wouldn’t be bound for that sort of thing if I stayed, that he doesn’t care. But to me, and I know to him too, there’s no denying that we would get there if I were to stay.

“Thank you,” he says. “You didn’t have to tell me that.” He pulls away, and his eyes are serious, with none of that spark that’s usually there.
 

“Rowan, I’m pretty sure I’m falling in love with you. And I can’t—” My breath stops for a moment, and my throat goes tight. The words came from somewhere deep inside, somewhere I hadn’t even opened up since I met Rowan. Tears start to run down my face, and I hang my head and let them fall. I know I’m not a pretty crier, but unfortunately I’m not going to scare Rowan away with puffy eyes and runny mascara.
 

“You’re pretty sure, are you?” He pauses, and I realize he’s still holding me, even though I feel far away. He takes my hands in his. Next to him, my long artist’s fingers feel small and delicate. Hell, next to all of him, I feel small and delicate, and there’s no man who’s ever made me feel that way. At five foot seven and a size twelve, no one has ever made me feel quite so sweet, just like he says I am. “I’m exceptionally, totally, and undeniably sure that I am in love with you, Cadence.”

I start sobbing openly and lean my head against his shoulder. “I’m broken, baby. I’m broken.” I choke the words out. “I lost everything I wanted, and I have no control over it, and I’m not ready for something like this. I’m not ready for a love like this when I feel like I don’t deserve it.”

“I know, baby girl. I know you feel that way. I won’t—I can’t—push you. But my God woman, you’ve been the brightest light I’ve ever seen—”

“Oh Jesus, just stop.”

“Stop what?”
 

“Being perfect,” I say, wiping tears away from my eyes.
 

He smiles, maybe a little sadly. “I am not that at all.”

“Just take me upstairs.”

“That I can do, sweetheart. That I can do.” Rowan sweeps me up into his arms and carries me to the stairs. The unopened jewelry box sits unopened on the grand old coffee table next to Rowan’s glass of expensive whiskey.
 

It should be that way. It’s the promise of a brighter future. And that happy ending just doesn’t exist, not for me.
 

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

When we wake the next morning, the snow has fallen again, thick and deep like a blanket over the plains behind my house. With everything that’s happened between me and Cadence, I hadn’t checked to see if the flurry would change to anything else again. But we’re here again, stuck inside, and after a whole lot of talking that leaves both of us in a strange place.
 

Cadence is still asleep, and I catch myself looking at her again. Her chest rises and falls, and the look on her face is calm. Her eyelids flutter as if she’s dreaming, but her brows aren’t knit tight like they were last night when she told me about the thing I’d been wondering about for the last few weeks, that thing that weighed her down unnaturally.

If I could take it all away, I would.
 

But I can’t. There’s no cure to this pain, no way to make it end for her. So much time, so much loss. No wonder she came here, no wonder she took this job.
 

I brush the smooth skin on the side of her neck and trace my fingers down her shoulder, down to the tank top she wore to bed. I just held her. For the first time, we just slept together, nothing else. I held her until her body fell calm, until her breathing became heavy and deep, until her mind slipped into sleep. It was better without making love, just sleeping, just holding her and letting her know that I’d be there for her when she woke in the morning. That man—the man who left her—well, he was never there, it seems, not really.
 

There’s a world of distance between him and me. But hell, I don’t blame her for needing more time, for wanting to trust me but not knowing how, for wanting to take things slower. And we’ve been anything but slow.
 

I don’t often meditate on my own weaknesses. I was done with that when Joanna left—she pointed them out far faster than I could even think of them myself. But lying in this bed next to this woman, this strong, powerful, talented woman that I’m falling in love with, I know the weakness that’s reared its ugly head in the time that I’ve known Cadence. It wasn’t falling for her too hard, too fast—that was unavoidable. The universe brought us to the same place at the same time, and all of it happened just as it should. No, my fault lies in pushing her too hard, never stopping to listen to all the times she tried to convince me to put on the brakes, when she told me she wasn’t ready.
 

Her body was ready for me, ready to move on from the past and feel something else, something good. But her mind and her soul were screaming that it was too soon. And now she’s all the way past her breaking point, no turning back.

“I’m so sorry, Cadence,” I murmur, moving my fingers down the soft, rich skin of her arm. I could get lost in this woman’s curves forever, and I could lie here in this bed and die a happy man. But the pain I caused her by pushing too hard too fast, I wish I could take every bit of that away.
 

After a moment, Cadence’s eyes open, and she yawns. For a moment, her face remains still, just as it was in sleep. Then the worry sets in, and I see last night’s conversation written all over her face. I wish I could erase those lines from her face, do away with that expression she’s wearing.

She thinks she’s told me too much.
 

“I’m the one who should be sorry,” she mumbles. “If this is too much for you to handle—”

“What? What’s too much to handle?” I grin, and my voice comes out gravely from waking up too late in the morning.

“Me. All of the past.” She pauses and bites her lip, turning to look out the window. “Everything. I can go—”

“Go where, exactly? It’s Christmas Eve, sugar. And we’re buried under a solid foot and a half of snow. We thought it was bad two days ago, but that was just the beginning, apparently. This isn’t supposed to melt until sometime next week.”

She shivers against me, but her skin is still hot. “Oh God,” she moans, like she’s realizing she’s stuck here with the worst person in the damn world. There’s panic in her voice, and her body feels like a live wire against mine. I pull her in and put my arm over hers.
 

“Cadence, trust me. This isn’t too much. I’m too much.” I clear my throat and stop for a second to think. I might be able to talk up a storm when it comes to investors, but it’s hard to know what to say to a woman who’s trapped against her will in a snowstorm, a woman you’d like to hold onto forever. “I put names and titles on everything when you kept telling me to slow down.”

“You didn’t—”

“Hush. I did. I’ve undressed you whenever you tried to talk to me, and I made you breakfast the past two weeks, took you to dinner, got you to ride my horses. It was all too much, too soon, just like you said. If I’d have known...” My voice trails off because I have no idea what the hell else to say. The guilt sits like a heavy weight in my chest.
 

“You didn’t know. I should have told you I needed to stay in the guest house.” She turns over and her eyes meet mine, her lips millimeters from mine. I want to kiss her, make her body melt into mine, take that pain and replace it with pleasure. “But I didn’t.” Her voice is firmer now, more confident. And there’s a trace of something sultry in those words. “When I saw you, I wanted you, right then and there.”
 

She kisses me, simple and warm, like we’ve been lovers for years. And that’s what it feels like, with the fire raging through my own body, my cock growing stiff as she throws her leg over mine.
 

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The snow melts over the next two days, and Rowan and I continue on in the pattern we’ve made for ourselves. He takes me into town when the snow has melted enough, and I paint the remaining stars and lettering for the mural. It’s nearly done now, and almost a week early. I don’t have much excuse to stay now, but still, I do. And we pretend like last week’s conversation didn’t happen. But there’s not much more talk about me staying. And he put the necklace away.

In the mornings, we go out and walk the horses. Symphony has taken something of a shine to me, and I feel better about her too than I did the first time. Rowan keeps telling me I have a country girl hidden inside, and if it were any other time in my life, I might think he was right.
 

But he knows, and I know. I’m leaving on December 31st.