“I swear on my career I didn’t blow you off,” I explain. “I stupidly left the paper you wrote your email address on in Maine. As soon as we went back for Memorial Day weekend, I emailed you. But you never responded.”
“I ditched the Hotmail account for a school one,” she explains.
“After the NHL draft, I didn’t go back to Maine that summer because things got crazy fast with training, moving and finding an agent and everything,” I tell her. “Not that it would have mattered, because your dad had already taken a job somewhere else.”
“Sacramento,” she elaborates, playing with the end of her ponytail for a second. “I did try to find you on Facebook. More than once. Couldn’t find you or your sisters.”
I nod. “Yeah, Facebook is a bitch for professional athletes and their families. So is Instagram and all social media, really.”
“All athletes? Or just ridiculously good-looking, incredibly talented, single ones?”
“I’m sorry, did you say something after you called me ridiculously good-looking?” I ask with feigned innocence. “Because you didn’t have to.”
“Jude, you are way more cocky than I remember,” she announces as I pull to a stop about half a block from Duncan’s new address. I turn off the car, and we look at each other.
I lean on the console between us, my face close enough that I can smell the hints of jasmine in her perfume. “I’m a big boy now.”
“You were a big boy before,” she returns with a grin. “At least I think it felt that way, if I recall.”
She opens the door and slips out before I can reach across and grab her, which is exactly what I was intending to do. Grab her, pull her into my lap and get that second kiss under our belt, and then let her get under my belt and see what she missed out on that first time.
But I have no choice but to get out of the car and join her on the sidewalk. I instinctively reach for her hand. And when our fingers lace together, it feels like the most natural thing in the world. We walk up the hilly street to the address Duncan texted me. I squeeze her hand a little as I confess, “I emailed you at your old Hotmail account a couple years ago on the off chance you still checked it.”
“A couple years ago?” she repeats, her voice filled with disbelief.
“Yeah, you were on my mind.” I look up at the address on the house we’re passing and then back at her. God, I love her eyes. I’ve never seen another pair quite that color. They’re mostly a dark amber but rimmed in a stormy gray with flecks of blue and green in them. “I never forgot about you.”
She smiles at me. I useour joined hands to tug her a little closer as I turn and climb the steps to Darby’s new house. “I wish I could remember the password to that account. I would love to know what you said.”
I ring Darby’s bell and stare down at her. “I’m kind of glad you don’t. I was drunk when I wrote it. I think I asked if you were still prettier than a sunset and if I could have a do-over. Imighthave gone so far as to say it would be the best sex of your life.”
She lets out a big, beautiful laugh, and I can’t help but laugh with her. The front door swings open, and Duncan is standing there in a pair of shorts and a well-worn Captain America T-shirt. He gives me his usual gregarious grin, and then his eyes land on Zoey. “A fellow ginger!”
He grabs Zoey and pulls her over the threshold and into a hug. She lets him, probably because he did it so quickly she didn’t have a chance to dodge him. I step into the house and untangle her from my goofball teammate. “Back off of her, you orange yeti.”
He laughs and takes a step back, extending his hand like a normal human being. “Hi. I’m Duncan. It’s my party. Well, mine and my girlfriend, Carla’s. She’s out back working the grill. She makes bitchin’ barbeque chicken with this secret marinade.”
“Hi. Zoey.” I watch her shake his giant freckled hand,andI put an arm around her shoulders to keep him from spontaneously molesting her again.
“Welcome to my newmaison,” he says with a bad French accent and a grand sweeping gesture with his hand.
“It’s lovely,” Zoey tells him, and she’s right. It is. Duncan’s last place, a loft condo, was spectacular too, but his furniture and decorating choices left a lot to be desired, at least to anyone over the age of twenty-one. His living room featured a bunch of beanbag chairs and pillows on the floor. The dining room held a Ping-Pong table instead of a dining table. One wall was nothing but a series of old-school arcade games.
This place has none of that. There is a real sectional couch in the living room and throw pillows on the couch, not the floor. I spot a table, an actual table, not a Ping-Pong table, through the archway into the dining room.
“Did you hire a designer or something?”
“Carla,” he says proudly. “It’s all grown-up and shit, huh?”
I laugh. “Yeah. Impressive.”
“Come on.” Duncan motions us with his hand as he starts down the hall and through the massive marble-tiled kitchen. “Party’s back here.”
I take Zoey’s hand again and follow him. His backyard is impressive for San Fran, where that kind of thing is a hard-to-find luxury. It’s grassy, with a nice-looking oak tree in the corner for shade and a redbrick patio with a grill Carla is currently overseeing. There’s also a hot tub at the other end.
“Hey!” Noah, another teammate of mine, calls out, lifting his beer toward us as we step onto the redbrick pavers. “I didn’t know you were coming, Braddock.”
I give him a wave and let my eyes scan the rest of the group. My teammate Brian is sitting on a lawn chair under the tree. A foot away Noah is shirtless, sprawled out on anotherlawn chair trying to catch the last few rays of afternoon sun. His girlfriend, Stella, and Brian’s wife, Abby, are in the hot tub laughing about something and sipping margaritas. Sitting at the picnic table in the middle of the yard is Levi. Tessa is in his lap, her arm wrapped lazily around his neck.
