Several beats passed before he finally responded. “She is a shit cook,” he muttered. “That’s why we always order takeaway when we eat together.”
I allowed myself a tiny scoff as we lapsed into another brooding silence.
My pulse pounded from the force of my rant, but now that I’d gotten it off my chest, I could think more clearly. Our arguments were great for blowing off steam, but they weren’t getting us anywhere because they didn’t address the root of the issue.
“Look,” I said. “I know I’m not your first choice when it comes to boyfriends for Scarlett?-“
“You’re not my second, third, or fourth choice either.”
I ignored his petulant grumble and continued. “But I care about her more than anyone else in the world, and I don’t want you to blame her for any of this. She hated lying to you, but she was so worried about your career that she didn’t want to just drop the news on you.”
Vincent’s brows drew together. “What the hell does your relationship have to do with my career?”
“She was worried that if you found out, it would make things worse between us and affect our game. She knows what Coach said about benching us if we couldn’t work together. She didn’t want to add to the problem.”
He huffed out a long breath. “Right.”
The initial thoughtless, instinct-driven flames of our wrath had died down, leaving us drained. Brooklyn had basically sent us to time-out, but we’d needed it.
“I don’t doubt you care about her,” Vincent said. “The fact you skipped a match against
Holchester to be with her proves that. But this isn’t about your feelings toward her. It’s about honesty. You both lied to me.” His mouth pressed into a thin line. “When we were at the Angry Boar after the charity match, you let me go on and on about how I appreciate you not hitting on her, and you didn’t say a fucking thing.”
“I know.” Guilt seeped through me. “I’m sorry.”
It was my first time apologizing to Vincent. It was easier than I thought it would be because I meant it. If I were in his shoes, I’d be upset too.
“We were going to tell you the week you returned to London,” I said. “But you and I were starting to get along, and after your speech at the Angry Boar, I was even more worried that you wouldn’t…handle the news well. I was the one who convinced Scarlett to postpone our talk. I didn’t want to ruin our truce so close to the start of the season.”
Looking back, we could’ve handled the situation better.
Communicated better. But these things were clearer in hindsight, and it was hard to make the right decision in the moment.
“You should’ve just told me,” Vincent growled. “I’m the captain of our team. I care about the season and about winning as much as you do, if not more. I would’ve handled it better if you told me to my face like a man instead of letting me figure it out myself while my sister’s in the fucking hospital.”
“I should’ve,” I admitted. “But it’s too late for that now.”
He let out another snort. “You think?”
More silence.
The hum of the vending machines buzzed through the air, muffling the faint voices and footsteps from the main hall.
“Did we win?” I asked after several minutes of wordlessness. “The match.” I hadn’t checked the final score before he showed up.
Vincent shook his head. “Draw. Two-two.”
“Fuck.”
“Yeah.”
We exhaled our frustrations with twin sighs.
“Coach is absolutely furious with you, by the way.” Vincent sounded far too happy about that. “He’s going to flay you alive the next time he sees you.”
I grimaced. I foresaw a lot of punishing runs in my future, but I didn’t care. Much.
“That’s fine,” I said. “I’ll survive.”
“You always do.” A trace of bitterness ran beneath Vincent’s voice and reminded me of his reasons for not liking me. “You’re like Teflon.”
“Trust me.” I flashed back to the thousands of awful messages I received after I announced my transfer to Blackcastle. “I’m not as invincible as you think.”
“Maybe not, but let me think you are. It’s easier to hate you again that way.” He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “No matter what I did, I was always compared to you. We don’t even play the same position, yet there you were, always mentioned in the same breath as me when I know I couldn’t have gotten away with half the shit you did.”
“If it makes you feel better,” I said after a long pause. “You have a World Cup, and I don’t.”
Vincent barked out a short laugh. “It does, actually.”
As recently as yesterday, I wouldn’t have dreamed of joking about the World Cup. Seeing victory slip from my grasp during the last tournament would always be one of the defining moments of my life and career. I would never forget it.
But my earlier fight with Vincent allowed me to vent some of that pent-up anger, and our truce the past few weeks had softened the jagged edges of my resentment. He’d stood up for me against Bocci and Lyle, and like it or not, we were on the same team. Even if we weren’t, I’d have to interact with him regularly because of Scarlett.
All that made the World Cup incident easier to swallow. It really was time to put it behind us-but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to get my revenge the next time we played against each other.
“Don’t worry, though,” I said. “That’ll change in two years.”
The next World Cup was bearing down fast. Qualifiers for Europe started in the spring, and I could already taste the thrill. There was no way England wouldn’t make it into the tournament. Our national team was the best it’d been in over a decade.
“We’ll see about that,” Vincent scoffed, but his words lacked bite. This time, he was the one who paused before continuing. “I’m not proud of what I did. If I could go back, I would’ve done things different, but the past is the past. We can’t change it.”
I closed my eyes. Old memories resurfaced, as vivid as if they were happening right at that moment.
The shrill of the whistle. The cheers and boos of the crowd. The smell of grass and sweat, and my sheer, utter disbelief when the ref whipped out a red card.
It was the closest I’d come to punching someone on the pitch in my entire career.
Every time I trained, every time someone criticized me and I thought I couldn’t keep going, I relived that moment. I channeled my grievances and used them as fuel not only to be better, but to be the best. And it worked.
The red card had affected the trajectory of my career in many ways, and as much as I’d despised Vincent for it, not all of the consequences had been bad. It’d pushed me to where I was today.
“No, we can’t change the past,” I said. “The same way Scarlett and I can’t go back and tell you before today. But what’s done is done. There’s no use dwelling on it.”
Honestly, I was relieved our relationship was out in the open. The circumstances of the reveal weren’t great, and Vincent’s first response had been less than ideal. However, we’d needed that fight. We had too much bad blood for it to be smoothed over with words.
Vincent blew out a deep sigh. “No. I guess not.”
We didn’t say anything else. Instead, we took the moment to simply sit and acknowledge the closing of one long, rocky chapter in our shared history.
Coach, Holchester, the paps, the public’s inevitable discovery of my relationship with Scarlett and the ensuing fallout…that was the future.
The future would always be there, but today, we’d finally laid the past to rest.
SCARLETT
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.