“If I am, it’s ’cause I deserve to fucking be.”
“Maybe, yeah. You’ve been through it, Daws. Here’s the thing. I know Cam’s been trying, but you’re being difficult. I don’t know why.”
“You don’t know why?” Dawson huffed out a breath.
Marty winced. “Okay, I know why.”
The captain announced over the PA system that they’d reached their cruising altitude and they’d be in Toronto in a little under three hours. Three hours for Marty to badger him to death about the rookie.
Dawson didn’t say anything, with the hope that maybe Marty, not the biggest talker in the world, would give up.
But he seemed intent on making his point because he kept going. “Sure, you’re a little pissed off. A lot pissed off, maybe. At Brynn, sure. At her daddy, no question. At Baltimore, for not having more faith in you as a player. But I’m telling you, none of that’s Cam’s fault. He’s just trying to do his job, best as he can, and you’re making it hard on him. Hard on yourself, too, to be honest.”
“Did you practice that?” Dawson asked flatly.
Marty grinned at him. “How was it?”
“Eh,” Dawson said. “Middling. Could use some work on the delivery.”
“Come on, man. You know what you need to do. You just need to do it.”
It wasn’t that easy, and Marty probably knew it, but this was as much of a pep talk as Marty was apt to make. Frankly it was more than Dawson had even expected.
“I’ll think about it,” he said.
Marty’s expression was full of frustrated resignation. “Do more than think about it.”
Dawson could’ve offered more excuses, but they all sounded painfully transparent even to him, and it was more than a little embarrassing how much he’d already exposed all his wounds—some of them still bleeding sluggishly, refusing to close.
“Alright,” Dawson said and hoped that he wouldn’t make himself a liar.
Chapter 2
Cameroncouldseeatiny sliver of Lake Ontario out of the corner of the biggest window in his living room if he craned his head just right while he was on the far end of his couch.
It wasn’t the nicest apartment tower in downtown Toronto, but Cam had still nearly choked when he’d heard the monthly rent. His dad had needed to remind him again how much money he was making now—and how much money he’d probably end up making if he stayed the Thunder’s new punter through an entire season and they signed him to an extended contract.
Still, Cam was pretty sure he was paying a shit ton of unnecessary money for that sliver of a view. Even though it was barely visible, Cam had found himself not bothering to occupy the middle of his couch, but instead sitting in that one spot on the very end, figuring that if he was paying for it, he might as well get as much enjoyment out of it that he could.
It was a one-bedroom place, tiny honestly, but even though it felt like it was barely bigger than the closet he’d had at his dad’s house in Montana, the walls didn’t feel confining. Instead, theyfelt cozy, like they were keeping him in, keeping him safe and whole andtogether.
“When’s the last time you left your apartment?” His dad’s voice echoed against the bare-ish walls. Cam shifted uncomfortably, jostling the phone balancing on his knee.
“I leave every day. I have practice,” Cam reminded him. “Remember, Dad? I’m a football player. Kind of hard to do that in a five-hundred-square-foot apartment.”
His dad made a disgruntled noise. “Not today you weren’t. It’s your day off. Did you go do something fun? See any more of the city? Hang out with anyone? Even go to the grocery store?”
“Dad,” Cam chided. “This is civilization. We get our shit delivered.”
Maybe the only thing he reallylikedabout Toronto, besides the team: the ability to get just about anything he could think of delivered right to his door.
It meant he never really had to leave his apartment if he didn’t want to, and the truth was, hedidn’twant to.
A fact he had scrupulously tried to keep from his dad and from his teammates, but obviously he hadn’t done a very good job, because his dad was pressing now, like heknew. Or had, at the very least, guessed.
“Cameron,” Shane Greene warned.
“Just saying,” Cam retorted, but without much heat.
