I nod. “Perfect. Great work.”
As the team filters out, I head back to my office, ready to call it a night, when I notice a sticky note plastered to the middle of my computer screen. It’s bright pink and written in Sienna’s bold handwriting:
CALL HANDSOME MMA FIGHTER BACK OR I’M GOING TO PRETEND TO BE YOU, THROW ON A BLONDE WIG, AND BANG HIM FOR ALL WOMANKIND.
I laugh, shaking my head. She’s ridiculous.
Flipping the note over, I find his number scrawled on the back. I toy with the sticky note in one hand and tap a pen against my desk with the other, letting my mind wander. It’s not that Ihaven’t been dating in the years since my divorce was finalized—because I have—but I’ve never let anything get serious. Elsie always seemed too young, and I wasn’t interested in bringing any man around her unless I was certain he’d stick.
But now that she’s older, the questions have started.
Why don’t I have a dad like Sarah?
Why did you and Daddy split up?
Where is Daddy now?
Why don’t I remember him?
I try to give her answers that make sense for a nine-year-old. “Daddy and I didn’t work out once he started playing in the NFL,”I tell her. What I don’t say is the rest—the cheating, the gambling. The way he’d gambled away my peace and safety right alongside his paycheck.
The physical and financial abuse.
The realization I came to in therapy that his coercive control mirrored the life I grew up in under my parents’ thumb. Their wealth and status allowed them to control every decision I made—where I went, what I wore, who I spoke to, and whether I worked. It wasn’t until I broke free, built my business from scratch, and made a name for myself—my ownname—that I finally tasted real freedom and realized I was drawn to people who controlled me.
But those are all things that I’ll save for a conversation with Elsie in ten years so that she won’t make the same mistakes that I did.
I press the sticky note against the edge of my desk and stare at it for a moment. Sienna has a knack for lightening the mood, even on the days when the weight of it all starts to feel too heavy. But tonight, it’s not the sticky note or the fighter’s number that lingers in my mind.
It’s the idea that maybe, just maybe, I’ve been standing in my own way for far too long. Clinging to my fear around how itcould hurt to let someone else into my orbit again. I wonder how it’d feel to have someone else help carry the load that I’ve been carrying around for so long.
What the hell.If anything, it’ll be a fun date and maybe some good sex. Professional athletes all have one thing in common. They’re full of themselves and think they are God’s gift to womenkind, but they are also usually very,very,generous in the bedroom.
I dial the number on the pad, it rings only once beforeAxel 'Storm’ Delcoanswers.
“Hello?” he says, his voice sounds like he’s been punched in the throat one too many times, exactly as Sienna described it.
“Hi, Axel. This is Mae Sterling from Sterling Sports Public Relations, giving you a call back.”
“Mae. Hi. I’m so glad you called.”
The next ten minutes consists of Axel and me chatting about our mutual friend Dexter and getting to know each other before we decide on meeting up for a date at an upscale restaurant in the heart of Nashville that I’ve never been to before this Friday evening. I’ll have to rearrange a few things, but I figure I can make it work. Thankfully, Elsie will be going away with my parents for the next two weeks on their vacation, so I won’t have to worry about setting up a sitter for her.
“Can’t wait to see you,” he says, his voice breathy as we end the call. I sit back in my chair, fingers drumming idly on the desk before I reach for my purse to head home. But then I pause, the weight of the day pressing into my chest. Slowly, as if I might get caught, I reopen my laptop and pull up my music app.
The words“Cody Cameron Music”linger in the search bar for a second before I press enter. His most popular track sits at the top—Smalltown Sadness.With a cautious breath, I click play.
The first notes drift from the speakers, soft and aching, a melody wrapped in familiar, southern warmth. Then, his voice hits—arich, deep tone that curls around me like smoke. It’s the kind of voice that makes you feel something even when you don’t want to.
A pang of nostalgia blossoms in my chest, bittersweet and unwelcome. It’s the sound of long-forgotten summer days—the kind where the sun kissed your skin, and the future still felt like something to look forward to. I can see Georgia and me by the pool, her laugh bouncing off the water while the radio plays some old-school country song, maybe Shania Twain or Garth Brooks. And Cody…
Cody’s there too. Watching me from under the brim of his baseball hat, lips quirking into that lazy, boyish grin that used to make me feel like I was the only girl in the world.
Back then I was.
So much has happened since those simpler days—since Elsie, Vance, since I buried the girl that I used to be. I’m not sure if Cody showing up now is a coincidence or the universe trying to tell me something important, but I can’t ignore the way his music feels like a bridge to a version of myself I thought I’d lost forever.
As the song fades into the next—something slower, rawer—I stand and walk to the door, locking it quietly. I tug the blinds down one by one until the office is wrapped in shadows. The world outside fades, leaving just the sound of Cody’s voice and the ache inside me.
