“… No.”
“Right. And you got psychic powers when? ’Cos if you can read minds and you haven’t told me, I’m gonna be proper upset.” He shot me a teasing smile, but there was a fierceness burning in his eyes that suggested he wasn’t as relaxed as he was trying to pretend.
“I’m sorry, I can’t read minds,” I said with a tiny huff of laughter as I ran my fingers through his mullet. It was longer than I’d expected and weirdly suited him. For a hairstyle that hadneverbeen fashionable, Danny had somehow made it work. I hadn’t been sure about it the first time I’d seen him with it, but now I couldn’t imagine him with anything else.
“Right, so,” Danny said as he held up his hands, starting to count things off on his fingers. “He never told you he was upset or that he wanted you to spend more time together and you didn’t know because you can’t read minds, he cheated on you multiple times and then expected you to get over it and forgive him, and then got mad when you didn’t and has now spent months harassing you because you didn’t do what he wanted? I mean, from where I’m sitting, that makes him a first-class wanker. You shouldn’t have to put up with that bollocks.”
I sighed, my lip twitching. “You know, you’re not the first person to say that to me.”
“Well, clearly more people need to tell you if you still believe you’re the bad guy. Or maybe you need to start listening.”
“Or maybe things aren’t that black and white. Maybe there isn’t a good and bad here.”
“Maybe,” Danny said. “But there are definitely shades of grey. Like yeah, maybe if you were working too much or too focused on other stuff, then you needed to be more self-aware ofthat shit and adjust. But, I dunno, when we’re caught up in that, sometimes it’s difficult to notice that you’re doing too much. You need someone to say, ‘Hey, I’m here too.’ And yeah, maybe he was justified in feeling upset and neglected, but, like, you don’t cheat multiple times like that if you respect the person you’re with. I don’t know if he thought he could get away with it, or if he was trying to punish you, or what. But if he really loved you, he’d have tried to fix things first before going fucking nuclear.”
I thought for a second. Everything Danny said made sense, and he was the first one to acknowledge that maybe I was a little at fault. Or had been at the start. “You don’t think I went nuclear?”
“Nah, I’d have left too. At that point, I don’t think it’s fixable.”
I hummed. “No, I don’t know if it was.”
“Did you want to fix it?” he asked. “When you found out. Did you want to fix it with him?”
“No… I was angry and upset, but I think part of me was a little relieved maybe? I still loved him, but looking back, I think he’d already stopped loving me. And I think that was what hurt the most. Because, if he didn’t love me, why didn’t he tell me? Why did he have to shatter my heart instead of just breaking it?”
My chest burned painfully, the open wound inside ripping apart as if it had never started to heal. Danny sat up and in a flash was crawling into my lap, putting his arms around me and pulling me against his chest. “’Cos he’s a prick,” Danny said softly. “A vindictive, malicious little prick. And he wanted you to suffer. Well, fuck him, he doesn’t deserve you.”
“Thanks,” I said, resting my head against his chest, feeling more vulnerable than I had in months. Maybe even years. It wasn’t a sensation I enjoyed, and I didn’t really want to dwell on it.
Danny kissed me softly. “Want me to distract you?”
“You really are insatiable, aren’t you, puppy?”
“I’m twenty-four. I’m horny like ninety percent of the time and you’ve now given me something to direct all that horny energy at.” He grinned and I laughed. I knew he was doing this deliberately, but I was grateful for his efforts.
I couldn’t remember the last time someone who wasn’t Shane had cared about me this much.
It was another realisation that I didn’t really want to dwell on.
“You can keep watching, just maybe let me suck your cock while you do?”
“Mmm, I’m never going to say no to that,” I said, tilting my head up to kiss him and then letting out a deep sigh as Danny slid onto the floor between my feet and reached for the button on my jeans.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Danny
“All right,nice and steady today, boys,” Matty said as we huddled in the dressing room, arms around each other’s shoulders despite the surge of hot weather making us sweaty before we’d even stepped foot outside. “It’s an early preseason friendly, nothing to get worked up over, and they’re only in the Championship, so let’s not slaughter them.”
There were a few nods and chuckles. We’d played Nottingham in a preseason friendly last year and while they’d started off strong, it’d ended up with us handing them their arses on a plate. Clearly, Matty was trying to avoid totally decimating their morale before their season started, which I guessed was nice of him, if a little ridiculous.
“Aww, but it was kinda fun last year,” Bailey said with a grin.
“Yeah, but you like it when people suffer,” Hunter said fondly with a roll of his eyes. “Fucking sadist.”
“Kinky. But don’t go spilling all my secrets.”
Hunter snorted and a couple of us laughed. I was absolutely convinced there was something going on between them—therehad to be—and it was killing me not to ask about it. But I’d decided to keep my tongue in my head because I wasn’t prepared to have them fire back or go digging around.
