We moved closer to the entrance. “Ready for your first football match tomorrow?”
“Oh, my Lord,” she teased, “he’s even got you calling it football, not soccer. He must have a magic penis.”
I shoved her. “Ugh, who invited you here?”
Isabel laughed. “Yes, I’m very ready for my first match. I probably shouldn’t tell him I was rooting for Liverpool last week when they played, huh?”
“Probably not.” I eyed her. “Why?”
“Amy is a huge fan. She always has the TVs at the gym turned to the matches when Liverpool plays.”
I grinned, thinking of Isabel’s boss. “Is she still going to sell the gym?”
Isabel’s shoulders slumped. “Yes. I’m so sad. She’s like my Yoda, you know? And who knows who she’ll sell it to. They could be an asshole or a misogynist or a terrible gym owner. They could fire me because maybe they don’t want a manager, and then I’ll be destitute and angry because I love my job and don’t want to work anywhere else.”
I grinned, looping an arm over her shoulders as we turned into the grand, soaring entryway of Kensington Palace to have our bags checked. “Maybe none of those things will happen, and she’ll sell it to some hot, mysterious man who’ll sweep you off your feet.”
Isabel rolled her eyes. “I’d quit before that happened.”
“Cheer up, Iz. You don’t need to worry about any of that right now.” I hooked my purse back over my shoulder when the security guard handed it back with a smile. “Today, we see palaces, and tomorrow, we watch the Shorthorns beat Tottenham.”
The security guard snorted.
“What?”
He held his hands up. “You’re dreaming, dear. Shepperton is going to get bloody wrecked tomorrow.”
“Geez,” Isabel muttered. “I thought the British were supposed to be nice.”
He winked, tipping his hat at us. “Cheers.”
We entered the palace smiling, and I kept my fingers crossed that the mood would carry us over into the next day.
JUDE
What’s the saying about hindsight? Well, mine was twenty-bleedin’-twenty, because I should’ve known that everything would go to shit when we got kicked from pillar to post by Tottenham. Yeah, we scored two goals, but that only did so much when they scored five.
Their bloody captain, who I had no problem with when he wasn’t running my team into the ground, got in my face more than once, calling me old man and slow. He might have been teasing because the fucker grinned like a clown when he said it, but all I could do for ninety minutes plus stoppage was imagine punching him right in the bloody mouth.
Losing was always hard in our league. Especially when your team hovered only a few spots above relegation. Each loss, each time you failed to add points added a sense of urgency to the time spent on the pitch.
We were fine. For now.
But in a few weeks or another month or two, it could be an entirely different story.
Losing was even harder, though, when your manager pulls you into his office and says, “I’m probably going to bench you next week, Jude, and I want you to know it now before anyone else does.”
It took everything in me not to explode. “I can play better,” I promised.
“You’ve been telling me that for weeks, McAllister. I’ve got guys younger and faster and hungrier, and that makes them better options for me when I’m trying to win more games.”
I clenched my jaw, practically heard the crack of my molars from the effort it took me to keep the words crowding my throat from coming out. It hurt to breathe through them, breathe through the bruise to my pride, if I was honest.
There wasn’t much worse for a footballer than to feel useless or like a hindrance to their team. And after a wet, sloppy loss on a muddy rain-soaked field, useless was an apt word for how I felt.
Ineffective.
And if I was honest, I couldn’t stop the word worthless when it whispered through my subconscious. If I wasn’t this … if I couldn’t do this, what was I? What good was I to anyone without this part of my identity?
All the things I used to define myself came straight from the game I played. My drive. My passion. My work ethic. None of those things were in question, which was what made it even worse. Those things were in my control, but the reason Coach wanted to bench me, that was nothing I could grasp onto.
I nodded stiffly and left his office without another word.
I showered. Changed. Packed my bag. No one said anything to me in the locker room, and I was glad for it.
I was supposed to get my head on well enough to go meet Lia and her sister visiting from the States. Lia and I hadn’t even seen each other since I dropped her off in front of her flat after the disaster at the farm and all for good reason.
She was finishing her paper and didn’t want to stop while the work was good.
I was training my arse off to prepare for a brutal stretch of Liverpool and then Tottenham, both games serving us brutal losses.
Fucking red birds and fucking roosters.
All of that to set up the fact that when I walked out of the locker room, I was in a foul fucking mood when my brother sent me a text.
Lewis: Sorry about the match. Can you swing round after you’re done? I’m assuming Lia is with you. I’ve got something for both of you.
Me: I’ll ask her. Her sister is visiting from the States, and I don’t know if they’ve got plans for us after this.
Lewis: It would mean a lot.
I dropped my head back and let out a slow breath. That moment right there was when I should’ve canceled all of it.
Should’ve called Lia to reschedule meeting her sister until the next day.
Should’ve told Lewis to sod off because I was in a horrid mood.
But that useless feeling would’ve only intensified, and I knew it. The only thing worthwhile I’d done in the past few months was Lia. Just that one thing.
I took a deep breath, smoothed a hand down my weary, old, slow face, and turned the corner where I knew the two women would be waiting for me.
They were leaning up against the wall taking selfies of the Tottenham logo in the background, and I took a moment to study them. Lia’s sister was taller than her with sharper cheekbones and a sharper jawline. Her hair was darker, and when she smiled, it didn’t spread as widely as Lia’s. But the similarities were stunning, and I could only imagine what the four sisters must look like all together.
Isabel saw me first, and the look she gave me reminded me of a flock guard dog that my parents used to have. In one split second, she assessed me with unguarded caginess.
Are you a friend or a foe?
That was what I saw in her eyes, with her arm around her younger sister.
Lia looked over, and the brilliant smile on her face swept away just a bit of my awful day.
“Hi,” she said. “Rough game. I’m sorry.”
If Isabel hadn’t been there, I would’ve wrapped my arms around her to take whatever comfort she may have given me, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that like the guard dog on my parents farm, she’d rip my arm off if I made the wrong move.
I attempted a smile. “Can’t win them all, right?” Lia gave me a curious look, then slipped her arm around my waist. I sighed, kissing the top of her head. I’d missed her smell, missed the feel of her next to me over the past couple of weeks. My hand found her belly. “My how you’ve grown.”
She pinched my side. “Thanks for pointing it out.” She turned, gesturing behind her. “This is my sister, Isabel. Isabel, this is Jude McAllister.”
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.