Pacing the room now, I dial up Blakely and listen to it ring and ring until voicemail picks up.
Fuck.
I try to call Penny again when my phone buzzes with a text message.
Blakely:I’m at the movies with Penny. What the hell do you want?
My fingers fly over the keyboard as I text back.
Eli:It’s her goddamn birthday? I didn’t fucking know. Can you ask her to call me?
Blakely:Uh . . . no. She’ll call you if she wants to call you. And yes, it’s her birthday. Way to make her cry on it, you piece of human garbage.
Eli:Blakely, I swear, I didn’t know. Fuck, I need to talk to her.
Blakely:Honestly, just leave her alone. We finally got her to have some fun. You texting her will only ruin it. Just focus on your game, like you told her you were doing last night.
Eli:I was doing that.
Blakely:Bullshit. And I’ll say this right now, if you’re out there living your single life, I’ll actually murder you.
Eli:I’m NOT! Jesus, I care about Penny. I’d never do that to her.
Blakely:But you will ghost her on her birthday. Even better. I hope you break a rib tonight. Peace.
“Fuck,” I yell just as the door opens and Pacey peeks his head through. “Man, listen—”
He walks into the room and shuts the door, only to lean against it. He folds his arms over his chest and says, “No, you listen. We have a game in less than an hour. We need you to be present. You can worry about Penny later.”
Feeling like I was just hit by a goddamn truck, I say, “Dude, I really fucked up.”
“Good, you recognize that. You’re just going to have to beg for forgiveness later.”
“You’re not mad at me?”
“As Winnie pointed out to me, I can’t insert myself in the relationship you have with Penny. You two have to figure that shit out. And like I said, hurt her, and you’re dead to me. I know hurting her today wasn’t intentional. After we’re done with all of this, I expect you to make it right.”
“I will.” I swallow hard. “I fucking will.”
“Good. Now, a fuck-ton of people are relying on us to play our best hockey. Get your fucking head on straight so we can go win this, Hornsby.”
“Got it.” I have a job to do, so I’ll get my shit together.
And then, hopefully, I can fix things with Penny.
ChapterTwenty-Nine
PENNY
The door opens, and I hear it quietly click shut.
I glance at the clock and read that it’s just past one in the morning.
The boys lost tonight, eliminating them from the playoffs. I didn’t watch the game. I couldn’t even stomach it. I know they lost because I receive alerts on my phone about the Agitators, and I saw the headline. I sent a quick text to Pacey, letting him know how sorry I was that they lost, and he apologized for losing on my birthday and that he plans on celebrating me when he gets back.
Winnie and Blakely came over to spend the day with me. I moped around for the first half, crying a few times because I honestly didn’t know what I did wrong. Did he get weird because I gave him gummy bears? I was just trying to be nice. All morning, I tried to think of the moment I messed up, when I should have done something different, and all I came up with was the gummy bears.
I want to say that not hearing from Eli didn’t really affect me at all, but it did. I’ve come to the realization that no matter how hard I try, I like the man. And those feelings probably won’t ever go away, which is sad—because I picked the wrong person to fall for.
