And for the first time all match, I saw Jude look up in the direction of our seats. His hair was a mess, and his jersey was filthy, but his smile was blinding.
I waved frantically, and he lifted a fist in the air.
“Want to go with me to meet him when he’s done? Maybe we could grab a bite to eat at your pub?”
Lewis smiled, face flushed red from the celebrations. “If you two want to popover later, I’d love to say hi, but I have to get back. Tell him congrats for me, will you?”
He gave me a brief hug and followed the crowds out of the stadium.
When I looked back down at the players on the field, Jude was staring back up at us, but his smile wasn’t quite as wide as before.
Maybe he and I were kidding ourselves in our constant search for distractions, but I slid my hand over my stomach and vowed that I’d do what I could to move us forward. No more focusing on the past.
JUDE
It was the moment when she screamed at the telly that I had my first real moment of pause when it came to Lia Ward.
“Oh, you fucking moron,” she bellowed, hand speared in her hair as she paced my living room. “Of course, they were going to blitz. Block! Come on, get him, get him, get him!”
With a wince, I watched the Washington Wolves quarterback get viciously sacked. Lia groaned, sinking back on the couch with a deep breath.
“All right?” I asked cautiously. Normally, I might have slid a hand up her back to rub in soothing circles, something I’d learned that she liked. Any physical affection made Lia purr like a bloody cat, actually. But as this was my first experience seeing her watch American football, I felt a bit skittish. Mainly because she swatted my hand away the last time I tried to calm her down.
“No, I’m not all right.” She tossed her hands in the air at the next play. “What is he doing? Why would you do another pass play? They’re killing us on the line.” She pulled her phone out, frantically tapping out a text. “Idiot. What an idiot.”
“Texting the coach your suggestions?” I teased.
“Yes.”
My eyebrows popped up. “I was joking, love.”
She glanced over at me. “So was I. It’s my sister Isabel.
“Ahh. Does she concur with your game analysis?”
“Yeah, the head coach is an idiot. He should’ve been fired last year. I don’t know why Allie hasn’t stepped in.”
My head tilted. “Who’s Allie?”
“Paige—Logan’s wife—it’s her best friend. Allie owns the Wolves.”
“Goodness,” I murmured, “I had no idea I’d impregnated sports royalty.”
Lia smacked me in the stomach, and I grinned.
“And Isabel is the one visiting in a couple of weeks.”
Before she answered, she watched with a frown as the Wolves offense failed to get a first down. “Yeah. You’ll love Isabel, mainly because you won’t be intimidated by her.”
“Are most people?”
“Oh, yeah.” Lia laughed. “She manages a boxing studio back in Seattle, and I swear, you take one look at her, and you just know … this chick could kick my ass without breaking a sweat. She’s tough, and smart, and funny. She’s the best big sister because I always knew no one would mess with us when Isabel was around.”
Her family was so different than mine. Listening to her talk about them, I felt a bit like I was a voyeur trying to understand what normal family dynamics were through the very extraordinary group she’d been born into.
“And she’s also watching at home, screaming at the screen like a maniac?”
“Yes,” she answered immediately. “Paige and Claire are at the game, but they’re also probably screaming like maniacs. It’s a family trait.”
“Sounds like it.”
“But”—she held up a finger—“I actually have messaged Logan during the game with ideas.”
“You have not.”
“He ignores me.” She narrowed her eyes as she thought. “Usually. There was one time he said he saw my message during a commercial break and ran the defensive scheme I suggested.”
“You are joking.”
Her eyes got big. “I would never joke about that. The running back was kicking their ass. Logan needed the inside linebacker to blitz the gap.”
I threw my head back with a good belly laugh. I couldn’t help myself.
It was enough to have Lia’s tense shoulders relaxing for the first time since the game started. Shepperton had the day off, we’d played midweek, and she begged for control of the telly on Sunday night so we could watch her beloved Wolves—–the team her brother played for and now coached. The camera panned to him as the defense took the field for a new series.
“Defensive coordinator Logan Ward has made quite an impact on this team’s defense since he took over the clipboard,” the announcer said.
His counterpart hummed. “Indeed. They’ve consistently ranked in the top three for sacks and takeaways, and this season so far, they’re the top scoring defense in the league. That’s largely in part to the addition of Noah Griffin to the roster last year, and how he’s stepped up under Ward’s coaching.”
Lia smiled.
“That’s your sister Molly’s boyfriend, right?” I asked.
She nodded. “He used to be our next-door neighbor when we were younger. Molly had the most obnoxious crush on him, so it was total kismet that they ended up working together at Washington.”
It was interesting, sitting with her while she watched her loved ones play the sport they loved. My parents had never come to a single one of my matches since I became a professional player. My brother came a couple of times a year, but I’d never see him afterward. No one had ever waited to tell me how excited they were for our win or console me after a loss. Never had anyone tell me they’d screamed like a maniac in the stands. Not until Lia.
“What’s it like?” I found myself asking.
When she turned to me with a question in her lovely eyes, I wanted to retract the words immediately.
“What?”
It felt as though I’d rolled over, exposing a soft underbelly that I’d never inspected before. My throat felt dry, and I couldn’t quite conjure a flippant response with her looking at me like she was.
“To watch your family do what they love like this.” I gestured weakly at the screen. “Across the ocean, they still hold enough weight in the world that you can sit here on my couch and watch them do this incredible job.”
Suddenly, I found myself holding my breath that she wouldn’t brush off my question. I hoped she’d give it proper thought because I wanted to know, quite desperately, what most families must’ve felt.
“It’s …” She paused, clearly searching for the right words. “It’s weird sometimes. Mainly because it’s so normal for me to have my brother on camera. I’ll admit that I don’t think too existentially about it, but other times, like right now … I’m sitting with you while they talk about my brother and my future-brother-in-law, and honestly, I could cry from how proud I am to call them my family.” She smiled. “I was like, twelve when Logan won the Super Bowl, and oh, man, I was so obnoxious when I went back to school. I didn’t appreciate the magnitude of it then like I do now, but knowing that people I love have had such an effect on a game on this scale is pretty fucking cool.”
If I’d been anyone else, less emotionally stunted, less … British, I probably would’ve teared up at her words. I tried not to think about when Lia needed to go back to Seattle when her semester was done, but moments like that made it difficult to ignore because I’d miss her. I’d miss having her around and hated the thought of it, almost as much as I hated the idea of how completely inept I was at trying to have any sort of healthy relationship. Maybe if that was all she’d said, I could’ve turned back to the game and marveled at how nice it must be to have a family like that. But then she spoke again.
And when she did, she sealed her fate.
She smiled at me, completely unaware of what was happening behind my rib cage, what vulnerable emotions were daring to escape from between the skin and bones. “I guess it’ll be that way with me and the little nectarine, huh? We’ll be wearing our Sheppertons kits and screaming like maniacs for you next season. We’ll be the loudest cheering section you’ve ever heard.”
“Will you?” I said roughly.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.