Focused: A hate to love sports romance(44)

This was Noah. The version of him I'd never met before.

I wanted to tie him to my bed and mount him like a cowboy on a bucking bronco.

"For picking me," he said. "If nothing else, I'm glad I did this documentary thing because it's getting me out to visit her again. It's been too long." Noah shrugged. "I miss her, you know?"

If this was my first glimpse of a carefree Noah, and we were on our way to his happy place, free of the distractions of work, I was completely and utterly screwed, and we hadn't even taken off yet.





Chapter Nineteen





Noah





As we left the small airstrip about forty minutes away from my grandma's, it was hard for me to make polite conversation with the three people riding with me in the car. Molly had taken care of all the logistics of getting us from Seattle to Custer, South Dakota, and the stoic driver of the large black Escalade was about as talkative as I was.

Our reasons were different, no doubt, but nobody riding in the vehicle questioned either of us.

As he maneuvered the car along the winding roads toward my grandma's, I stared out the window and felt a foreign pang of melancholy. And guilt.

For the second time in the past week, I couldn't shake the feeling that I'd made a sharp turn in the wrong direction of my life. It was unsettling, and I didn't like to feel unsettled in this place that I loved so much.

I wanted to plant my feet and know that where I was heading was right, was correct, because that was how I did things.

If you weren't sure about what you were doing, then you probably made the wrong decision. And in my eyes, making the wrong decision was the same as failing.

But the problem with that was too much had caused me to second-guess things lately, stemming back to offering my teammate’s drunk wife a ride home because it was the right thing to do. That was minor even though it had major consequences.

What wasn't so minor was kissing Molly. Even worse was that I was struggling to feel any sort of guilt or regret over it, except for the fact that I didn't know how she felt about it.

That was what made its impact so much bigger than the impetus to my presence in Washington. One kiss with her wasn't just one kiss. It was more than knowing how she tasted or how soft her lips were. It was a simple motion that had not so simple consequences because it could undermine everything I'd cultivated.

I woke up earlier that day in Seattle, and the first thought that crossed my mind wasn't about workouts or practice or preseason. I found myself wondering if Molly drank coffee. If she was a morning person or a night owl. If she slept sprawled across her bed like I did mine. And how tonight, I'd go to bed under the same roof as her.

That was why that kiss mattered.

But as difficult as it might be, I had to put it out of my head. At least for the day.

The green hills and black tree-covered mountains rose everywhere, a totally different kind of landscape from Seattle, but to me, it was just as beautiful. And I hadn't been here in years.

Large log cabins set back from the road on generous plots of land gave me something to focus on as the view blurred from the speed of our car. The driver's GPS told him when to turn, which was good, because enough had changed in the three years since I'd visited that I would have missed the turn had I been driving.

I tilted my head when I saw the green metal roof come into view. She was at the base of the foothills, so the gentle curls of smoke coming out of the chimney had a lush green backdrop as the mountains pushed their edges into the skyline.

Molly said something under her breath to Marty, and he laughed, cutting into the thoughtful silence I'd immersed myself in.

"How long has your grandma lived out here?" Rick asked.

My eyes closed briefly because I knew I'd need to shift my headspace. This wasn't just a grandson paying a long overdue visit to his grandma. This was intentional, to show a side of me that no one believed existed. Thinking about the public intruding on this moment, when I already felt guilty enough about not coming to see her more, I had to keep reminding myself why this was a good idea. Why I'd agreed.

"Her whole life," I answered. "But this house specifically, for the last four years."

"When you started in the league." His statement left no room for subtlety.

I glanced back at him. "If you're going to ask something, Rick, just ask it."

He grinned.

Molly's eyes were covered in blue-mirrored sunglasses, and I wanted to rip them off her face because I couldn't tell what she was thinking or if she was even listening in the first place. Instantly, I flipped my attention back to Rick as we approached my grandma's because I shouldn't even be worried about whether she was paying attention.

"It's a beautiful place," he mused when the driveway appeared, as did the sprawling cabin with a massive wraparound porch. Two black and white horses grazed in the fenced-in area north of the house. Who knew where the goats were, probably in the barn that was partially obscured by the house. "Big, just for one woman."

"She didn't want to feel cramped," I said, the edges of a smile starting on my mouth as the car pulled over the gravel driveway. The porch was covered with all shapes and sizes of potted flowers and plants. Along the east edge of the roof, a line of wind chimes swayed in the breeze.