Twenty minutes later she shifts, rolling onto her side, her back to me. She’s been asleep for a while now. I wait, pressed into her back, for another forty minutes, the whole time watching her eyelashes flutter and running through a billion reasons in my head why this is okay. Zoey isn’t going to hurt me. I won’t hurt her. It’s fine. This is good. We’re good and we’re going to continue being good. This is what I thought I wanted with Tessa—I have it. It’s real this time. It’s right.
Still, I can’t fucking calm down. Adrenaline won’t stop racing through my body. Two hours later, when I know sleep is not coming maybe ever again, I slip out of bed. I move through the house in the dark, gathering all my discarded clothing as I go. She’s got a small chalkboard on the wall next to the fridge. I grab some chalk and, next to the grocery items she’s jotted down, I scrawl a note. Then I head to the front door, twist the smaller lock on the back of the handle so it locks behind me, and close the door.
I just need time to think.
29
Zoey
Waking up this morning to an empty bed instantly made my blood run cold. He freaked out last night. I get it. We did something stupid. I mean, I’m not on the pill. I also can’t get pregnant without a shit ton of tries—more than six months of trying had resulted in nothing, so I know one time with Jude was likely to bring the same results. But he’s never done this before. He freaked. Understandable, but he seemed to be calming down. He calmed me down enough that I fell asleep.
When I get downstairs, I see the note on the chalkboard.
Z, Couldn’t sleep. Call me when you wake up. Yours, J. OX
Okay. That makes me feel a little better. I make my way back upstairs and dig my phone out of my purse. I have less than half the battery charge left, so I walk over to the nightstand to plug it in, and that’s when I see Jude’s phone on the floor. It’s half under the bed, with one side touching the leg of the nightstand. It must have fallen from his pants pocket when we were pulling off each other’s clothes. And he was in such a rush to get the hell away from me, he left it behind.
I push the thought from my head. I have to give him the benefit of the doubt. It was late and dark and he just forgot it. Simple mistake, and not a sign of abandonment. I put his phone on the table next to mine and head into the bathroom to get ready for work. Twenty-five minutes later his phone is beside mine on the kitchen table as I steep my tea when it chimes and the screen lights up. I glance down and automatically read the text message filling the screen by accident or habit or whatever. I just do. And I instantly regret it.
The message says:Great seeing you last night. You are full of surprises! Can’t wait to see you again.
The name on the message is Kina. I don’t know a Kina. He does, obviously. And he saw her last night. After he left my bed? I shake my head. I don’t know that. Maybe it’s someone from the party. A fan or someone who works for the team or a teammate’s wife or sister or something. It could be meaningless. It could be innocent. But it could also break my heart.
I can’t sit here with my thoughts anymore so I get up, dump my tea in the sink and head to work. All I want to do is call him, but I can’t because he doesn’t have a home phone, only the cell phone currently in my purse with a message from Kina. Argh.
He’ll figure it out. He’ll come to my work for the phone or to my house for it tonight, and we’ll talk it out, and everything will be fine. Because I need everything to be fine. I want it to be fine. I deserve fine.
Marti is already sitting at her desk when I walk in. Well, hunched over her desk is a better description. She’s got both hands wrapped around a venti cup. She looks presentable to the common person, but I know her too well by now. Her hair is up in a topknot, and she’s wearing the jeans and black silk shirt she keeps in the desk drawer in case of emergency.
“You haven’t been home,” I announce as I walk around my desk. “I’d ask where you were, but I think I know.”
She looks up, and I expect a sheepish smile, but instead I get a tight one. I drop my bag on my chair. “Everything okay?”
She nods. “Yeah. The sex was satisfactory. Both times,” Marti explains, and I try not to cringe. I just don’t find anything about Eddie Rollins attractive, so I really hope she’s not about to give me details. “But he is a chatty drunk. And he’s not a good teammate.”
I lift an eyebrow. Okay, this I kind of want to hear. “How so?”
“Well, he doesn’t seem to like Jude much. I think they had a falling-out, because he was bitching like he was scorned or something,” Marti mutters. “Man, you’d think Jude stood him up for prom.”
“What did Jude actually do?” I can’t help but ask as I sit my butt on the corner of my desk so I can face Marti. I probably shouldn’t be asking. I mean, gossiping is a bullshit thing to do. But…he has me feeling all needy and insecure after disappearing.
Marti sighs and fidgets, playing with the edge of the plastic lid on her coffee cup. “He says Jude gave him shit about locker room talk. Chewed him out in front of the guys.”
That’s not bad. I mean, maybe to a dirtbag like Eddie, but to me it’s a good thing. I shrug and feel my shoulders loosen, because I was tense and didn’t realize it. “I have a feeling Eddie is probably pretty hard-core. I mean…not that he’ll talk about you.”
Marti laughs, unperturbed. “Oh hell yes, he will. But I don’t care. Maybe it will help the guys remember my name when they need to buy or sell a house.”
“Marti!” I laugh, and she smiles, but it falls off her face pretty quickly. Too quickly. “What?”
She goes back to fiddling with her cup. “After round one, before round two, he took me on a walk down memory lane about how much fun Jude used to be…and how his adventures with women were legendary both in numberand antics.”
I nod. “Yeah. I know.”
Marti glances around the office to make sure none of our co-workers are too close. “His hockey stick is on the internet,” she whispers and points at her crotch just so I know “hockey stick” is a euphemism.
It makes me laugh. “I know that too. It’s fine. Believe it or not, I was a very liberal wild child when I first met Jude. We’re not judging each other on the past. Besides, he was single.”
She looks even more uncomfortable. “Not always, according to Eddie.”
