I kiss a trail down, taste his collarbone, graze his navel. He hisses as my lips press against his stomach and he knows where I’m headed, what I want to do in these black early-morning hours. How can we survive this? Exhaustion, worry, pain.

  I want to make it all go away, so I focus on his boxer briefs as I slide them just low enough that I can take his length in my hand and then in my mouth. What a mess I make, tasting him, licking him, trying to take him all the way down into my throat and failing miserably. I keep expecting him to laugh and tug me up, tell me “Nice try” and then get on with the next step, but he keeps me in place, bucking his hips, tangling his fingers in my hair, thrusting up into my mouth, faster, harder, taking back that control just enough that I feel emboldened by it. More, he shows me, like this, wrap your hand around my base and fuck, just like that…

  He comes and I swallow it down, trying to catch all the breaths I’ve held in for the last few minutes. I feel weak when he turns me and lays me down flat on the bed, throwing the blanket off onto the floor with a whirl of impatience.

  My alarm goes off and he silences it.

  “Five minutes,” he tells me, weighing me down as he settles on top of me.

  “I have to—”

  “Five minutes, Birdie.”

  And then he’s not asking me for permission, he’s sliding down my body, returning the favor, spreading my legs and kissing me awake.

  Chapter Twenty

  Ben

  “You gonna sleep over there again tonight?”

  I drag my towel across my face, mopping up sweat. “I’d planned on it.”

  “Aren’t you tired?”

  I shoot Anthony a look, and he laughs.

  No I’m not tired. I should be. For the last week and a half, I’ve been living life in fast forward. I’m running on fumes, but there’s no sense in dwelling on it. I have three days left in Texas before we fly out to Tokyo. Three days left with Raelynn. Since the night I woke her up in her trailer, I’ve been with her every single day. I usually beat her to Dale’s in the morning, or I drive over to her trailer at night. If I could sneak away at lunch to visit her too, I would. I want to be with her whenever I can.

  “Hate to break it to you, man, but you’ve got circles under your eyes. You need some cucumbers or some shit. Maybe one of those masks ladies put on that make them look like a serial killer.”

  I whip him on the arm with my sweaty towel. He dodges out of the way, but the tail end still gets him and he howls playfully.

  He makes a big show about rubbing his arm as he continues nagging me. “So what are you gonna do when we have to leave in a few days? You haven’t made her any promises or nothin’, have you?”

  “Promises?”

  “Yeah, like you and her really having a future.”

  My hackles immediately go up. “Why are you saying it like that? You’re the one who was pushing me to get to know her in the first place.”

  “Yeah, get to know her, get out of your funk. Not fall in…”

  His voice trails off once he gets a look at my face.

  He rears back. “I mean, c’mon, you barely know the girl—”

  “I know her enough.”

  He snorts. “Right. There’s also the fact that you two live in completely different states? That she hasn’t even seen your real life? Does she even know about fucking Shelby? Jesus. Should I keep coming up with more reasons for why you’re being dumb?”

  Out of everything he’s said, I get hung up on the most innocuous. “This is my real life.”

  “No, this is the middle of fucking nowhere, Texas. Wait until you get back to Los Angeles. You’ll remember who you are.”

  Who I am.

  The man I’ve been for the last few months? Depressed? Aimless?

  I’m in no hurry to get back to that.

  We walk over to get our bags from where we stashed them on the side of the court. Now that practice is done for the day, I want to shower fast and get to Raelynn’s trailer.

  “You taking her back to LA then?” Anthony asks.

  It’s not an option. Raelynn won’t leave her grandmother. She’s here in Texas to be with her, and I know if I ask her to join me in Los Angeles after the Summer Games, she’ll say no. So I haven’t asked.

  It’s been eating away at me though. I’ve been trying to build up the courage to sit her down and get into the big stuff. Everything Anthony’s pointed out. We have so little time together though, stolen hours in the morning and at night. The last thing I want to do is pile more crap on her shoulders. She has enough going on without me making life worse for her. That’s been my explanation all along, but now I wonder if I’ve just been deluding myself into thinking I’ve been acting in Raelynn’s best interest instead of my own. When I see her in those fleeting hours, I want her sweetness, her honest blue eyes staring up at me, the sounds she makes when I touch her, and for that, I’m a selfish bastard.

  I reach down to grab my bag, annoyed by the guilt clawing away at me from the inside.

  I knew this day would come. I knew I’d have to reckon with my decision to keep Raelynn in the dark about parts of my life.

  Anthony nudges me. “Dude…”

  “What?” I ask with a hard tone.

  I’m annoyed with him. Sure, it’s misplaced anger, but still, it feels good to be mad at someone other than myself. If he’d kept his mouth shut, I wouldn’t be feeling this way right now.

  “Ben,” he says again, sounding like he’s seen a ghost.

  I finally glance up and notice he’s stopped packing his bag. He’s staring across the court, mouth agape, eyes wide.

  “Is that Shelby over there?”

  Anthony’s question comes from so far out of left field it takes me an obnoxiously long time to catch on to what he’s just said. Shelby?

  Here?

  I turn abruptly to see where he’s looking. Sure enough, there she is, standing in the doorway of our training complex, holding one arm across her stomach as a deep frown mars her features.

  My heart immediately stops.

  What the fuck is Shelby doing here?

  I can barely process the sight of her in a loose white button-down shirt, rolled up to her elbows, cropped jeans, and simple flats. Her hair is much shorter than the last time I saw her, and the cut suits her. She looks well, and the petty part of me resents that. She shouldn’t get to look so happy and healthy.

  Seeing her here feels like a punch to the gut.

  I want to be unbothered, but there’s still a lot of anger simmering deep down.

  I hate it. Hate that I haven’t overcome those feelings of betrayal and lost love.

  I also fucking hate that she’s pulling a stunt like this, showing up in Texas, at training camp. She has some nerve.

  My teammates glance from her to me, and I swear I could hear a pin drop inside the complex now that everyone’s aware of the situation. With a sigh of impatience, I grab my bag and head straight for her, trying and failing to rein in my anger by the time I reach her.

  I don’t even stop walking, don’t deign to meet her gaze as I speak. “I don’t know what you’re doing here, but we’re only supposed to communicate through our lawyers.”

  “Yeah, I’m aware. Ben—”

  She has to turn and race after me.

  “I’ll call my assistant and get you on the first flight back to Los Angeles. Whatever you thought you were doing by coming here…it’s not happening.”

  “Would you stop for just a second, please?”

  I don’t listen to her. I keep walking, out of the complex, past the cars, and toward my cabin. She follows behind me, trying hard to keep up with my long strides.

  “Listen, I’m sorry for just showing up like this. I knew if I called first, you wouldn’t give me the time of day.”

  I don’t deny her claim.

  “Ben, please.”

  I barely contain the urge to shout. Who does she think she is? Pulling this after everything? Everything.

  We reach the line of trees where the forest starts and I keep going, anxious to put distance between us and the rest of my team. We don’t need an audience for this. I have enough eyes on my life as it is, and I don’t trust every guy to keep his mouth shut. Some of them like the limelight. Some of them would love feeding this story to the press for a nice lump sum.

  “Ben, you’re being—”

  “Don’t.”

  My tone is biting, and she immediately goes silent as she follows behind me, hurrying as much as she can. I’m relieved when my cabin is in sight. I don’t know what will happen when we get there, but it feels like the only option is to continue forward, away from Shelby.

  I stomp up the stairs and bang open the door. I don’t invite her in, so she comes to an abrupt halt in the doorway.

  I toss my bag and mean for it to land on a chair, but it hits the wall instead. I see her jump in shock and I tense, aware of how nervous she is. Fuck. I’m being an asshole. I take a calming breath, tell myself to get it together. Then I turn, and when I speak, it’s finally with a cool, measured tone.

  “This couldn’t have waited until I got back to Los Angeles? Did you really need to drag this shit across state lines?”

  Up close, she’s as beautiful as ever. Smooth black skin, curious hazel eyes. She looks resigned and downright sad, and I’m shocked to realize I still have the capacity to feel pity for her after everything.

  “No. It couldn’t wait.”

  Her hand goes up to cradle her stomach, and I see for the first time what’s been so obvious since I first spotted her. Underneath her loose shirt, she’s concealing a very pregnant belly.

  I have tunnel vision as I stare straight at it, trying to process what this means.

  Shelby is pregnant.

  Shelby is pregnant with Mike’s baby.

  I feel like I’m sinking down into quicksand, like I need to hold on to something or I’ll go under. I reach out and grab ahold of the table beside me, hunching forward.

  Shelby takes a hesitant step toward me, obviously worried about my reaction.

  “Why?” I ask, and it sounds like my soul is being crushed. Why did she need to come here and show me this? Rub salt in a wound that was damn near healed?

  “It’s not Mike’s baby.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Raelynn

  Three more nights with Ben isn’t enough. Three nights is…god. What am I going to do? I wish I had cash to blow on seductive lingerie. I wish I could whisk us away to some fancy hotel. I want to make these nights memorable. Why? Because after Ben leaves for Tokyo, I’ll go right back to living a mediocre no-lingerie-necessary existence. There’s a sharp reminder of that this morning when Patrick arrives at Dale’s. He hasn’t been around the last few weeks, and I’d fantasized that maybe he fell off the face of the planet. Wouldn’t that be lovely?

  At least this morning, he’s not drunk.

  “Heard you been sleeping with that basketball boy.”

  Okay, maybe a little drunk.

  He doesn’t seem to mind that there are people eating at the counter, well within earshot of him as he throws barbs at me.

  I choose to ignore him and continue working. I refill Doyle’s coffee and reach over to grab Dr. Tully’s empty plate. Before I can, Patrick yanks my ponytail, throwing me off balance. I stumble back and try to catch myself.

  “You hear me, Raelynn, or you gone deaf?”

  He lets me go, but my equilibrium is off. I tip forward and clutch the edge of the counter, and there’s a long awkward beat where my cheeks flame red and I straighten my dress as if I’m the one who acted out of line. I can’t meet anyone’s eyes as they all stay conspicuously silent. Maybe they aren’t sure they saw what they think they saw. Heard what they think they heard. Whatever the reason, their silence hurts worse than Patrick’s words.

  He comes up behind me again and crowds my space.

  “Is that another one of your jobs now? Fuckin—”

  There’s a flurry of motion and I yelp in shock as Dr. Tully leans over the counter, grabs Patrick by the scruff, and squashes his face to the counter. Patrick struggles but Dr. Tully doesn’t let up.

  “You keep harassing her and I’ll call the sheriff. You understand, boy? That goes for when I’m not around either. I’m sick of your shit. Your daddy lets you run around town acting like a fool, but I won’t.”

  Patrick resists at first, and Dr. Tully leans in closer.

  “Do you understand?” he asks again, enunciating every syllable.

  Patrick lets loose a sound like a distressed animal as he nods over and over again.

  Dr. Tully lets go of him and shakes out his hands. “Good. Now get outta my sight. You smell like a damn liquor store and it ain’t even nine in the mornin’.”

  I hold perfectly still, tense from my head to my toes as Patrick grabs the baseball cap that got knocked off his head and stomps out through the kitchen without looking back at me. I watch the swinging door after it closes behind him longer than necessary, wondering if maybe he’ll come back through it, hotter than ever. Eventually, when I’m sure he’s well and truly gone, I look over at Dr. Tully to see he’s right back where he was a moment ago, sipping his coffee and reading the newspaper, unbothered. He’s not looking at me or anything. It almost feels like I imagined the whole thing, except for when he turns the page of the newspaper and casually says, “I’m calling the sheriff. Enough is enough.”

  “Thank you.”

  He shakes his head, still not looking at me. “Don’t thank me. I should have said something a long time ago.”

  Even with Dr. Tully stepping in, my encounter with Patrick throws me into a funk the rest of the day. My scalp still stings from where he yanked my hair. His disgusting words circulate in my mind even when I try desperately to think of something better. At the trailer that night, I make a simple turkey sandwich and eat it on the steps outside, willing Ben’s SUV to appear down the gravel drive. He could distract me. He always does.

  “Heard you been sleeping with that basketball boy.”

  “Is that another one of your jobs now?”

  A part of me is surprised we’ve been found out considering we haven’t been gallivanting around town or anything. I guess I’ve been with him in public a few times. He insisted on putting gas in Nan’s car for me last week, and two days ago, we drove up to the Piggly Wiggly to get some late-night cartons of Blue Bell when we were both craving something sweet. I hadn’t thought much of it, but now I wonder if everyone in town is thinking exactly what Patrick is and they’re just too polite to say it.

  I set aside the last half of my sandwich, sick to my stomach all of a sudden. I want Ben to get here already. He told me this morning that he’d be coming back tonight. I kissed him good and long before he walked outside to his car.

  “Sure you have to go?” I teased, knowing full well I had to get going soon too.

  “Think they’ll notice if I don’t?”

  I laughed. “Yeah…I guess you’re sorta hard to miss.”

  He looked back at me for a long beat, smiling wide, and my heart caught in my chest. I wish I could have heard his thoughts in that moment, but he turned and kept walking and now I sit, waiting.

  Usually, he’s here by now. It’s later than usual. I had a big house to clean in the afternoon and I really dragged. The sun’s good and set. The stars are starting to shine and the bugs swirl above my head, circling the light near the trailer door. I strain my ears and listen for the telltale sounds of tires on gravel or the whirr of an engine. I know what I’m doing. This eagerness inside me, nervous energy brimming over so I can’t keep still. My feet bounce on the stairs, my finger drags across my thumbnail, back and forth over and over. A critter moves to my left and I whip my gaze in that direction, trying to discern what it is. A rabbit locks eyes with me for a fleeting second before scurrying away.

  I told Ben we couldn’t exchange phone numbers in a feeble attempt to keep restraints on a relationship that was never going to be contained in the first place. It was futile and naive and now I’m paying the price. I’m sitting here waiting on a man, desperate and hopeful, and it’s making me feel like an open wound.

  He leaves in three days, I tell myself. Three days.

  The warning falls on deaf ears though.

  I keep sitting, waiting until my back starts to ache and my butt has gone numb. Something is keeping him. He isn’t coming tonight.

  I fight the sudden, ridiculous urge to cry.

  It’s not a big deal.

  I’ll just go inside and change into my pajamas, grab something to read, and focus on that for a few minutes before bed. I’ll brush my teeth and wash my face and ignore the tear tracks on my cheeks. I’ll pretend this is any other night and I’ll keep on playing the denial game with myself until it actually works.

  I have no other choice.

  I’m still not myself the next morning at the diner. At some point last night as I lay in bed, I started to pin my hopes on Ben showing up at Dale’s first thing in the morning with a good excuse for why he wasn’t able to make it out to see me. When I arrived at work to find an empty parking lot, that hope vanished too.

  I’m quiet as I get my work done, rolling silverware, taking orders. A few people ask me how I’m doing, and I suspect they’re worried Nan has taken a turn for the worse. I try to pin on a smile, but it’s not real big or genuine, and I know they can tell. I wish I could shake off my foul mood, but it seems to be impenetrable.

  The bell rings over the door as another patron walks in. I look up to see a woman heading for the counter. I don’t recognize her, but if I had to guess, I’d say she’s with one of the basketball players. She’s gorgeous and polished, and I highly doubt she’d end up in this town if the guys weren’t here training. I suppose she could be press, but she’s dressed casually in a light blue sundress and only has a tiny clutch with her.

  “Can I just sit anywhere?” she asks me with a small smile.

  “Sure, yeah. Grab a seat and I’ll bring you something to drink. Water? Coffee?”