Before my brain can even take in all the words, my eyes land on the pictures.

  Holy fuck.

  Cam and me in the VIP section at Cavo, my hand to his lips. Him kissing the corner of my mouth, my body flush against his. Locked together on the dance floor, his body curled over mine and his hand high on my thigh. Picture after picture of us on the sidelines of games. Standing just a little too close. Bodies always turned towards each other. One from after his touchdown, exactly like the picture Sophie took of the jumbotron. One from just yesterday, my hand grazing the outside of his leg as we stood on the sidelines with Drew and Tyler.

  They’re all a little blurry, like they were taken on a phone or grabbed off someone’s social media, but it doesn’t matter. No one who sees these pictures all together would doubt that Cam and I are exactly what we are to each other. And no one who reads the article will think anything else but that I am the whorey female doctor with a sort-of-famous family who bagged a player my first month on the job.

  Congratu-fucking-lations to me.

  My family.

  Thoughts of them reading this article have my heart slamming against my ribs, and my palms growing sweaty, my hands shaking as my brain races with the implications of this. This is the worst-case scenario.

  When Cam gently takes the phone out of my hands and sets it on the bed, laying a big hand over both of mine, I jolt, my head snapping up to look at him. “Baby, I am so, so sorry this happened.”

  I’m devastated. Furious. Incandescent with rage. Irritated as shit. All. Everything. I can’t grab onto a single emotion as I spiral into the abyss. Cam’s eyes are steady, calm and determined as he radiates a kind of we can fix this energy that for some unknown reason makes my anger burn hotter. My devastation dig deeper.

  “My career,” I say as quietly as I can manage, my voice shaking with the force of my emotions. “Everything I worked for. They made it sound so…trivial. Like the entire reason I came to work for an NFL team was so I could find a player to fuck. My fa—” My voice catches and I swallow hard, trying again. “My family is going to read that. Be asked about it.”

  Cam shakes his head, his hands squeezing mine. “It’s unfair. It’s so fucking unfair. You’re brilliant, Maddy. You’re amazing at your job, and you were born to do this. You have done an incredible thing with the team this year. We’re playing in the AFC Championship next week for the first time in almost a decade, and so much of that is because of you. Everyone who matters knows it. People who think otherwise don’t matter.”

  “Don’t they?” I say slowly. “Sports fans and half the men who work for this league already think women don’t belong anywhere near the NFL. They’ll read this article and it’ll be one big bro-fest of I told you so. If we had been able to tell people on our own terms, during the offseason, maybe we would have been able to avoid the fallout, but we live in this world now.”

  I pick up my phone and click back into the browser to refresh the screen. Just as I suspected, ten more articles from different local news outlets and sports blogs pop up, all breathlessly reporting on the initial blog post. “And in this world, I’m the slutty team medical professional who seduced the squeaky-clean single dad, obliterating professional ethics rules and probably team rules and definitely the rules of all the asshole men who think they get to tell women where we belong.”

  “You belong right here,” he says, laying a hand on my cheek, holding my face steady when I try to look away from his kind, understanding eyes. “In this league. With this team. With me.”

  I let out a laugh that sounds brittle even to my own ears. “That might be true, but it won’t matter. Because it doesn’t matter what’s true. It matters what people believe. And since some wanna-be sports reporter cheerfully tossed a bomb straight into the middle of my career and my personal life, people are going to believe that.”

  Cam shakes his head. “You did everything right, Maddy. Absolutely everything. We tried to stay away from each other. We couldn’t. And when it was clear we couldn’t, you didn’t treat me. I’ve never sat on that couch in your office as a player or a patient or anything other than the man who lo—” Cam cuts himself off, and my heart gives one painful throb because I know exactly what he was about to say.

  The man who loves me.

  Five hours ago, I would have been overjoyed to hear those words from him. But right now is absolutely the wrong time, and I think he knows it because he shakes his head and tries again. “You did everything right,” he says again. “You didn’t break any rules. We didn’t break any rules. Everyone who matters will understand that.”

  He’s right. I know he’s right. He’s saying all the right things. Somewhere inside my brain is the voice telling me to put my smart-girl hat on. To talk to Cam and figure out a way forward. That this really isn’t as bad as it seems. That everything is going to be okay. But that voice is buried too deep because my brain also pummels me with a thousand worst case scenarios in rapid succession.

  The commissioner of the league deciding that, actually, he doesn’t want the psychologist sleeping with a player to be the example for other team mental health professionals to follow in terms of how to do this job well.

  My own players losing confidence in my ability to help them.

  Brian being stuck in between the fallout from my choices and the fact that he’s my family.

  My brother being asked about my relationship instead of his own game performance.

  My mom’s clients reading about it, and her having to answer for me.

  Riley and Ethan reading the articles. Hearing about it at school.

  Shit.

  I should have told Brian about Cam and me that day in my office when I got interrupted by Riley’s call so he wouldn’t be blindsided like this. I’m such an idiot. The thought of all the people I love most in the world having to answer for this, defend me for this, when I did the wrong thing, is what breaks me. My hands clench into fists, my nails biting into my palms, and a cold sweat drips down my back. Everything is on the line because I fell for the football player with the kindest eyes and the softest heart who makes me feel everything.

  I realize it’s been a long time since I’ve said anything when Cam cups my face in his hands and presses a kiss to my forehead that has me swallowing back a sob. When he pulls back and starts to speak, for reasons I don’t understand and don’t have the headspace to work out, his earnest eyes and soft words make me want to jump out of this bed and run.

  I don’t deserve to be looked at like that. Talked to like that. I’ve fucked up my life and so many other people’s too. The magnitude of it is more than my spinning brain can handle right now.

  “It’s unfair, Maddy. It’s so fucking unfair that people are going to spout bullshit and other people are going to believe it. But there are so many other people who won’t. People who know you and believe in you and are going to have your back no matter what. Your family. My family. And me. I believe in us, and I believe in you. So fucking much, baby. You are my heart and soul and my whole fucking universe. I’ve been walking around in the dark for years, and I didn’t realize it until you stepped into my life and brought the light with you. You brightened up my world with your smiles and your laughs and your Celine Dion power ballads. With your bags of M&M’s and your orange soda obsession and the way you care for my kids. I’ll never not be on your side. I’ll go to fucking war to tell the entire goddamn world how amazing you are. There is nothing on earth that I wouldn’t do for you. You’re mine, Maddy, and I protect what’s mine.”

  We stare at each other for a beat, my heart thrashing wildly, anxiety gripping me in a vise and his words hanging in the air between us. And then, without warning, to my absolute horror, my eyes fill with tears. They spill over and slide down my cheeks, my breathing coming in shuddering gasps. Cam reaches out to pull me to him, but I shake my head, swiping at my cheeks, an irritated sound falling from my lips.

  My body vibrates with tension, and the love pouring from Cam is so strong it’s like I can reach out and touch it. And that’s what does me in. The knowledge that he loves me, the way I know it without him even saying the words, activates me in a way I don’t anticipate and can’t explain. All I know is I need to get out. Now.

  I shove back the covers and jump out of bed, stalking around the room and picking up my discarded clothes. My movements are jerky and abrupt, my heart stuttering as I shove my legs into my jeans, then replace Cam’s shirt I’m still wearing with my own.

  When my phone rings, my head whips around at the sound, my eyes landing on the screen. Brian.

  My stomach lurches, my heart twisting painfully as my ringtone reverberates around the room. My throat clogs with tears that want to keep falling, but I can’t come apart here. I won’t. Because if I do, Cam will wrap me in those comforting arms and keep telling me that everything is going to be okay, but he doesn’t understand that I fucked everything up and I don’t know if it can be fixed.

  “Fuck,” I mutter, stalking back to the bed and jabbing the Ignore button, swiping the phone off the bed and shoving it in my pocket. I cross my arms over my chest and avoid looking at Cam, my posture so ramrod straight that my spine hurts. Aches with the effort of keeping myself together. Because I can’t fall apart. Not yet. Not here. “I have to go. I need to think.”

  Cam pushes back the covers and gets out of bed, coming to stand in front of me, rubbing his hands up and down my arms. “Think here,” he says, his voice pleading. “Think with me. This isn’t just on you, Maddy. We’re both in this. We can figure it out together.”

  My phone rings in my pocket again, and I flinch at the sound. I want to reach out and grab the word together. Tuck it into my heart and put my arms around this perfect, amazing man and never let him go. But the alarm that blares in my head doesn’t care what I want. It overwhelms common sense and yells at me to go. Now. To get somewhere where my actions can’t hurt the people I love and no one has to answer for the choices I made. Where I can absorb the fallout and make sure it doesn’t touch anyone else.

  “I can’t,” I manage, shaking my head, my gaze bouncing wildly around the room. My chest is tight, head throbbing, brain a messy tangle. “Not right now. Caitlin booked me a flight home in an hour, and I’m going to take it. I need to go home, Cam. I can’t think here, and the idea of getting on the team plane is…” I shake my head, swallowing hard at the thought of facing everyone. I should be stronger than this. Fuck, I am stronger than this. But right now, I just can’t find my brave. I need to get out of here. “I can’t do it. I just can’t. Please let me go.”

  “I’ll come with you,” he says immediately, running the back of his hand down my cheek. “I’ll get permission to fly home separately from the team and come with you so you don’t have to be alone.”

  I shake my head even as everything inside me wants to say Yes, please. “You can’t. Both of us not being on that plane is a giant red arrow pointing straight at this entire clusterfuck. Besides, this is a crap time to piss off your coach. I think…” I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “I think I need to be alone for a while, and you need to go home and focus on Riley and Ethan. Teenagers are the worst, and this is going to hurt them. They need you, Cam. I can’t stand the thought of them being hurt because of me.”

  My voice cracks on the last word of my plea, and Cam’s eyes fill with a mixture of pain and resignation that stops my heart. “Okay,” he says, his voice raspy and raw. “Take the time you need, but then I’m coming for you, and we’re going to figure this out together.” He grips my chin and forces my eyes back to his. The blue is dark, a little wild, and the blazing emotion on his face is so intense that I try and look away, but his firm grip on my chin says more than words ever could.

  Look at me.

  “I love you, Maddy. Fuck, I love you so much. I have for a long time. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think I would get lucky enough to have a second chance at a love like this, and now that I’ve found you, I am never, ever letting you go.” He shakes his head, laughing a little. “This isn’t how I expected to tell you, but somehow it seems exactly right. You do what you need to do, but take those words with you and know that I’m yours. I’ll always be yours, and there isn’t a force on earth strong enough to keep me from you.”

  Cam pulls me into a fierce hug, and I’m helpless to stop the tears that fall as I soak his chest, breathe in his familiar scent, memorize the way his strong arms feel around me, tuck those words away like a talisman. He pulls back, cupping my face in his hands and wiping my tears away with his thumbs. He kisses my forehead, both of my cheeks, whispering words of love before finally taking my mouth in a long, slow kiss that tastes like my tears, full of promises I don’t deserve but I want anyway.

  “Will you text me when you get home?” he asks, easing back.

  I nod. “I will.”

  Seemingly satisfied with that, he lets me go. Walking away is the most counter-intuitive thing I’ve ever done in my life, but the voice in my head telling me to go is loud, and it forces my feet to keep moving. So, with a deep breath, I step back, shoving my feet into shoes and walking to the door. Grasping the handle, I look back at Cam. He’s watching me with love in his eyes, his face set in determined lines. He gives me a small smile and a nod as if to say, Do your thing. I’m right here. And the fact that he can have this much faith in me—in us—even as I head to the door, makes me want to run back to him and jump into his arms. Fling myself at him and never let go.

  But I don’t.

  Not now.

  Instead, I pull open the door and lean out, checking the hall to make sure it’s clear before I realize I don’t need to do that anymore. Everyone knows, and if they don’t, they will soon. So with one last look at Cam, I walk out of his hotel room, carrying only myself and the aching thought that I’m leaving my entire heart behind.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CAM

  “Stop touching my stuff!” Riley’s loud screech is followed by the thud of what sounds like a shoe hitting the living room wall.

  “They’re not yours!” Ethan yells back. “Lola bought those highlighters for me for my English project, and now the green one is all dried out because you left the cap off when you used it to highlight your stupid script.”

  “It’s not stupid,” Riley screams. “You’re stupid!”

  I rub my hands over my temples to staunch the throbbing in my head, wondering if my ten- and thirteen-year-olds being unable to find a more creative insult than stupid means I’ve failed as a parent. They should be able to do better than that.

  “No, you are and I hate you!”

  “I hate you more.”

  “Cut it out,” I bellow, stalking into the living room, the I hate you/I hate you more exchange the absolute last and final straw. Both my kids lapse into silence, gawking up at me with open-mouthed expressions, probably from the yelling. I’m not much of a raise your voice kind of parent. I learned long ago that I get a lot more leverage out of quiet disapproval than I do out of yelling, but my patience is a very frayed rope right now. “Shit,” I mutter, dropping down on the couch. “Sorry, guys.”

  “Why are you yelling?” Ethan asks incredulously, as if I haven’t asked him and Riley to just get along for the love of god no fewer than ten times since they got home from school. He throws himself onto the couch next to me, giving me an epic side-eye that would make me laugh if there wasn’t currently an aching pit in my gut from not laying eyes on the woman I love for four fucking days.

  “Jeez, Dad, I know you’re, like, missing Maddy or whatever, but it’s really bad parenting to take it out on us.” Riley crosses her arms over her chest and gives me a mini-glare. It’s so similar to an expression Lainey used to give me that I laugh, even as my chest aches.

  “You know I’m missing Maddy?”

  She gives me her signature are you stupid look. “Duh. She hasn’t been here, and Zoe told me she overheard Brian tell Liv that Maddy hasn’t been at work since before the game last week. Since you’ve either been at practice or here, that means you haven’t seen her since Denver.”

  That little reminder has my heart giving one painful throb in my chest, my brain once again filling with the ever-present images of Maddy’s shattered eyes, the broken expression on her face when she walked out of my hotel room in Denver.

  The way I couldn’t fix it, even though fixing it is all I wanted to do.

  “Did you break up?” Ethan asks.

  Riley flops back into the chair opposite the couch. “Of course they didn’t. But Maddy and Dad were keeping their relationship kind of a secret because it’s bad optics for a team doctor to be dating a player except then someone found out and wrote an article about it, so they’re lying low.”

  I snort out a laugh at Riley’s very astute assessment. “How do you know the word optics?”

  She shrugs. “I’m thirteen. I know stuff. I also texted Maddy when I read the article to tell her I think it’s total bullshit. Also to tell her not to read the comments because people are horrible and really need to get a hobby.”

  “Did she text you back?” I wince internally at the eagerness in my tone. The clawing need to know if Maddy is communicating with Riley in a way she isn’t really with me. She texted me when she got home from Denver and sent thank you texts for the coffee, breakfasts, and snacks I’ve been sending incessantly to her house over the last four days, but other than that, we haven’t talked much since Monday.

  My stomach twists when I think of that morning. Of her walking away from me. I replay it over and over in my head a thousand times a day. While I make breakfast for my kids. At practice. When I lie in bed at night not sleeping because all I can think about is her.

  I know there was something else going on in her head. Then and now. Something more than just being upset that our relationship was outed the way it was. I saw the second her expression changed from angry and resigned to I need to get the fuck out of here. Something caught her off guard. I don’t know what it is, but I love her enough to give her the time she needs to work through it. As long as the time she needs isn’t more than a week because if she doesn’t come talk to me before the AFC Championship on Sunday, the second the game is over, I’m going to get my girl.