I can feel Colleen rolling her eyes at me as I walk into her kitchen, heading straight for the fridge.
“I should have called, I know.” I sigh, grabbing a beer, twisting off the cap and taking a long pull.
“We could have been naked,” Hayes says from the couch, throwing up a hand in greeting.
That makes me cringe. “Jesus, I do not need that mental image.”
Colleen shoots her boyfriend a stare that says, that was inappropriate. “You know you’re always welcome. Hell, you had the garage code before that guy did.” She throws a thumb over her shoulder. “But it’s kind of late. What happened?”
Since we were kids, Colleen and I have always been each other’s confidants. Even more than my brother, Sinclair, she’s the blood relative I am closest to. I’ve had keys to her place and her garage code forever, as she does mine, and we use them more often than not, bypassing the knock or the doorbell. I know I should probably cool it with walking in unannounced now that she is in a full-fledged relationship, but I am all out of sorts tonight.
Grabbing another beer, because I know I’ll need one shortly, I toe out of my shoes as I walk into the living room and join them. My cousin and teammate are curled up on one end of the overstuffed beige sectional Colleen bought three years ago. I know because I went to help her test them out. Right now, she and Hayes look like the picture of perfection in comfortable sweats, both nursing glasses of wine, with Colleen’s fireplace roaring on the far wall. There is some irrelevant hockey game playing on TV, and I know for a fact both of these people would pick sports over shows or movies any day.
Taking another gulp, I dive headfirst. “I went to see Hannah just now.”
Colleen sits straight up, Hayes’ arms falling abruptly to his sides and an annoyed huff coming out of him. My cousin just looks pissed.
“You what! How did you find her?”
“I may or may not have snuck into your office. You need to keep things locked up tighter, Col,” I admonish her.
“Walker, I can’t believe you! That’s a complete invasion of privacy, hers and mine. And that’s saying a lot for a woman who is trying her best to stay hidden for her own safety.” An angry blush starts to make its way up Colleen’s neck.
Hayes rubs her back, choosing to say silent, but his eyes are shooting daggers at me. Not only have I gone back on my word not to search for Hannah, but now I’ve ruined his relaxing night in.
“I know, I know. Believe me, I feel guilty as fuck if it makes a difference. But I had to, Col. I needed to see her.” My voice almost breaks as I say this.
She must sense the desperation in my tone, because she lowers back down to lie in the crook of Hayes’ arm. “I’m seriously pissed at you. But if it made you feel better, then I’m glad you saw her.”
“That’s the thing, it didn’t make me feel better. Not remotely better.” I shake my head, my gaze wandering out the big bay window of Colleen’s living room.
Hayes turns the volume down on the TV and takes a sip of wine before addressing me. “I told you it might backfire. She’s in a fragile way, man. What did she say?”
They both look at me expectantly as I polish off my first beer and pop open the second. “At first, it seemed like she was relieved to see me. Or maybe relieved that I wasn’t someone else. But the conversation just went downhill from there. She’s confused, skittish, doesn’t really seem to have a plan or any way to put it in motion. Shane has cut her off, the bastard, and I have a feeling she’s struggling. But she wants no help. And … she hasn’t filed for divorce. The way she said it, well, it sounds like she might not even file. What the fuck is that about?”
My mind drifts back to the inches of space between us, the way she looked at me as she stepped out of the condo complex she’s staying in.
Couldn’t she feel the way the ground shook, or the bolts of energy we stole from the power lines above our heads? When I’m near her, the entire axis on my world shifts, even more so now. Over the years, this crush I harbor, the feelings trapped inside my chest that I was never allowed to let out, they’ve grown to enormous heights. I’ve memorized the curve of her smile, the way her eyes twinkle when that fairy laugh would pop out of her mouth. Now, couple that with the fierce, lion-like need to protect her, and I am almost weak in the knees with the way I feel about Hannah.
The two waves of need, both for her heart and to protect her, crash within me in tidal-like motions. How did she not see it? I guess I understand that she has no room for it, not with everything she has going on. And before … well, she was a married woman. One whose moral compass would never stray, I know that much.
But standing on those front steps with her, just inches from being able to touch her hand, I have no clue how she couldn’t read every emotion in me.
I was going to tell her, I was going to let it all slip out tonight. My speech, rehearsed several times on the drive over, was going to include how I didn’t want anything from her, not even words. If she couldn’t entertain the thought of something more with me, then I would understand. But I needed her to know. I needed to, just one time, give voice to the feelings that have lived inside me for so long.
But then she said there was no divorce filing. And my dreams, along with everything else I was trying to offer her, were crushed.
“Wait a minute, she didn’t try to leave that asshole the minute she got out of the hospital?” Hayes looks thoroughly confused.
I shake my head. “Nope. She told me that it’s complicated. What is complicated about the man you’re supposed to trust most injuring you so badly that he puts you in the hospital?”
The whole thing blows my mind.
“That’s fucking insane.” Hayes rubs his jaw.
Colleen is quiet for a moment, and then I see sympathy swamp her eyes.
“If I put myself in her shoes, and even though we’re not married and don’t have children, if Hayes did something like that to me—”
My teammate, or former now I guess since he retired after the Series, sits up so abruptly, fury flaming in his eyes. “I would never lay a finger on you. Not like that. Thinking about it makes me sick.”
She pets his arm, trying to calm him, a peaceful look in her eyes. He seems to relax as an unspoken look of love passes between them and scoops her back against him on the couch.
Colleen turns back to me. “I’m just speaking hypothetically. But even without a marriage and all of those things that come with it … I could see how someone stays. I love Hayes very much, and the first time would be just that. The first time. I could see falling into that trap, that he was sorry, that he loves me so dearly he just became enraged in a heated moment. Add a wedding to that, add children, a house, all of these things that tie your lives together … it’s not an easy disentanglement. I hate that women like Hannah feel they have no other option but to stay, but I can’t say I don’t understand it. That’s the man she chose to spend her life with. It’s not an easy thing to cut such a huge part of yourself out. I imagine it’s like going into a surgery, knowing your odds are fifty-fifty or worse. You don’t know how any of it is going to work out.”
The logic seeps into my brain, but doesn’t penetrate it. It can’t because I will never accept that. He hurt Hannah in the most gruesome way a wife, or maybe even a person, could be hurt. And I was here, offering to be her soft landing. All she had to do was take it.