If there were any doubt left, the fact that another song pours out of me the next morning proves it. I’m pining over Spencer even though he’s only been gone a couple of hours, and the pure need fuels a horny, fast song.
Yeah. Definitely falling in love with him.
I try to consider how to deal with this, but it makes me anxious, and I have to walk around the honeymoon suite while I’m strumming my guitar to shake the energy.
I don’t know what I’m considering in the first place. There’s nothing to deal with. We’re getting divorced in the fall, case closed. And even if the situation were different, something deep in my gut insists that Spencer is not going to love me back. He will abandon me because that’s what happens when I fall in love. People leave. They betray me.
I drag my fingers across the guitar strings, drawing out a noisy chord.
It’s terrifying to believe it could ever be different.
I shake off the clouds and get dressed for the match. He’s up against Everett, which means I’ll have some company in the crowd. They’ve faced each other plenty of times, but it’s different now, of course.
Spencer wants to stay focused on Everett as an athlete, as his competition instead of a new friend and fellow out athlete, which I understand. Spencer’s laser intensity on his game is a good reminder that I can’t tell him how I feel on this trip even if I wanted to. At least not during the tournament, which I fully expect him to win.
It’s extremely important that I don’t rock the boat right now. My reputation is recovering, the songs are starting to flow, and Spencer is happy. The last thing I need to do is to mess up his tennis career somehow.
At the court, I end up seated by Reggie, Everett’s husband. He owns a gym known for running a lot of LGBT programming, and he’s a regular at his husband’s matches. All muscle and smiles, the man embodies sports fandom.
Reggie grabs my shoulder. “Welcome to the tennis husband club, man. I’m going to tell you right now, I might get worked up. Might say some things about my man being the best today. But I want you to know I believe in good sportsmanship, Gabriel. I won’t ever say anything about your man out of disrespect. And whoever wins, we’re the two lucky guys who married the best tennis players in the world. Am I right?”
I can’t help but grin. “Damn right, Reggie.”
He pumps his fist into his palm. “Hell yeah. This is going to be a good match.”
“I wasn’t much of a sports fan before Spencer,” I confess. “But tennis is growing on me.”
“That’s right,” he says with a nod. His eyes are trained on the court, and I see that Everett and Spencer are out. “Tennis is pure athleticism. One on one. Precision, strength, endurance. It’s high drama, man.”
My eyes end up stuck on my husband, too, while we talk.
“And Spencer looks damn good playing it,” I add.
Reggie barks out a laugh. “It looks good on Everett. No lie there.”
I lean closer to him. “I’m still learning how to shit talk like a jock,” I tell Reggie. “But I’ll get it on the record now that I also think my guy is the best.”
Reggie chuckles and lowers his voice, too. “Noted. And Spencer has that drive. I can tell. It’s not always easy to marry a man with such a big part of his life consumed by something else. But I guess, being a rock star and all, you might get that, huh?”
“Yeah,” I agree. “Spencer and I understand each other.”
“I can tell,” he says. “I don’t know either of you well, but I know what happiness looks like. And you two are clearly a happy couple.”
I chuckle, not sure what else to say, but luckily, the match quickly starts up.
Reggie tenses beside me. I can feel him fighting to hold in his excitement, and when Spencer launches the first explosive serve, Everett blasts it back across the court with a deep grunt, resulting in a fierce exchange that Spencer ends with a slam from the net.
My heart is pounding. I’ve seen Spencer play on video, but live and paired with such an incredible opponent, he’s doing things I didn’t know were humanly possible. The two men fly across the court, grunting as they slam lightning bolts back and forth, the crowd totally silent until each play ends. Spencer and Gabriel have to fight like hell for every point of every game, and the entire stadium holds its breath as they battle for the lead.
Spencer is amazing. He’s a legend. He keeps squeezing ahead, pushing the edge of his record serve speed, holding the net against Everett’s forceful offensive waves. He’s so incredible I think I’m going to explode.
And then, somehow, he loses.
Everett seems to get stronger the deeper into the game they go. Point after point, he manages to hold off just enough to crack through. And even though it’s a toss-up until the end, Everett closes it out with a jaw-dropping winning shot.
My eyes are locked on Spencer, who stands there as though unfazed. The reality that he just lost crushes me. It’s ridiculous to be so completely shocked. Of course he could lose. But he was so confident that he would win this tournament.
I play it cool for the cameras and manage to compliment Reggie before he bolts down to the court to congratulate his man, but I’m stunned. I want to run to Spencer, too, and make sure he’s okay, but if he loses, I’m supposed to meet him back at his room, so I grab my bag and go.
