Focused: A hate to love sports romance(43)

Isabel started picking up around the bags, and her cheeks were bright pink.

"What's her deal?" I whispered.

Lia shrugged again. "Who knows. I'd ask but ..." Her voice trailed off, and we all knew why.

We could ask, but unless Isabel wanted to share, she wouldn't tell us shit.

"Maybe she was a fan of his," Claire said, pointing at Mr. Tall, Dark and Scary-looking.

"Maybe." I sighed. "Okay. Tell me that I'll be fine this weekend."

“You will,” Claire said. “No matter what happens, you’ll be fine.”

Lia grabbed my shoulders, serious face in place. "You can do this. He's just a big dumb football player who won't remember you when he's gone from Washington, which will probably be soon since players are traded all the time."

Claire's mouth fell open. "You are terrible at this,” she told her twin.

My mouth screwed up like I had sucked on a lemon. "Thanks."

I gave all three of them hugs and made my way home to shower and pack.

As I did those things, Lia's poorly delivered words banged around my head like it was an empty crate.

She was wrong. He wasn't dumb, and he wouldn't forget me.

But she was also right. He could leave at any time, given his abrupt exit from Miami.

That still wasn’t justification enough to put my job on the line. But it did add a certain edge to my thoughts, an urgency that I couldn’t deny as I packed my suitcase.

My history with Noah had started off with a poorly thought out decision, one that was made without heeding any possible consequences, and ended—for me, at least—in humiliation and tears.

We were both older and wiser, but I couldn’t say we were any less stubborn, not in the ways that counted.

Noah was decisive and self-controlled. His journey to making a choice, no matter how big or small, was quick and instinctual. It was why he was a great player. All the great players had that in common. If you took the time to pause and second-guess, someone else would move past you.

In his new house, he’d decided that kissing me was his next course of action, and he never wavered. Kissing him back had felt amazing, but there’d still been a niggling sensation in the back of my head, a voice that I hadn’t quite been able to mute.

I zipped up the side of my suitcase slowly.

Could I walk into this weekend and not allow that voice to hold me back?

What I wouldn’t do was be a typical football groupie, begging for whatever scraps he’d allow me.

And I wouldn’t ask him to sacrifice something he wasn’t ready to sacrifice. I respected his drive more than that. Just as he respected me enough to stop when I’d asked.

The choice was mine.

I could take this weekend and own the opportunity for what it was. A chance, even if it was my only one, to finally bring this tangled history with Noah full circle. I could clearly, and deliberately, take a step into action and understand the weight of what I was doing, if he got on that plane and wasn’t shutting me out completely.

Noah's career, my career, was so much bigger than anything we were working on that weekend. I wasn't even sure that this Amazon documentary would make a highlight reel by the time he retired. Which also meant my time with him was short within the context of his career.

A window to finish something we’d started a very, very long time ago.

The comparison had me smiling because a window is what got us into this mess in the first place. His behavior back then had guided my own, and as I finished up, I knew I’d treat this weekend no differently.

I arrived at the airfield in jeans, a black zip-up hoodie, and my black Chucks in place on my feet. He smiled at them when I approached.

"I'll take your suitcase," he said and lifted it up for me so I could ascend the narrow steps uninhibited.

"Thanks," I told him. He let me go up into the plushy decorated plane first. A smiling flight attendant stopped and asked if I wanted a glass of champagne. "Oh, just water, please."

No more wine for me, not in the presence of cameras and Noah Griffin. Marty and Rick had their heads bent toward a laptop screen, and I waved at them before taking a seat in the wide captain’s chair covered in soft, buttery leather.

"You ready for this?" Noah asked as he sat opposite of me. His eyes were warmer today than I'd ever seen them, and I liked the way he studied my face, like he could absorb the details on my skin without so much as a single touch.

"I'm excited to meet your grandma," I told him.

The way he smiled melted something inside me. If his behavior was going to be my guide, then I was slowly, slowly sinking into an ooey gooey puddle of I want him.

"My grandma is the best woman I've ever known." He shook his head. "Just to warn you, she'll probably call me embarrassing nicknames and fuss over me."

I smiled. "There's nothing wrong with that."

"No," he admitted. "There's not."

He glanced over at Rick and Marty and shook his head again. "I should probably interrupt them to say thank you."

"For what?"

When he glanced back at me, his eyes glowed. This was Noah happy. That was why he looked so unfamiliar. It wasn't that driven, hyper-focused man who kept blinders on to everything outside of the game. It wasn't the man who frowned at the screen when he watched film. Because no matter what he said to Marty, he did do that. Or who worked out simply because he was bored at night.