IMPACT: A Secret Baby Sports Romance (13 page)

Chapter 23

Olivia

"Liv?" Brad's voice cut through the warm blanket of sleep. "Are you alive in here?"

"No," I pouted, throwing the pillow back over my head to shut out the light that was pouring in through my windows. Why the hell had I thought an entire bank of windows would be a good feature to have in my apartment? Fuck the west-facing view, I needed blackness.

"I know you don't want to accept that it's morning," Brad chuckled, his voice muffled by the pillow. The bed dipped down as he plopped himself next to me. "But I brought you coffee. Does that help?"

I pulled the pillow away from my face. "Wait, you made me coffee?" Brad rarely drank caffeine, and when he did, he only drank green tea. Somehow he managed to look manly while doing so, a talent exactly no other guy possessed, I was certain of it. 

He chewed the inside of his cheek. "Well, I tried to, anyway. Let me know how it turned out."

I sat up and reached for the cup. I inhaled and then took a deep sip.

It was way, way too weak. This wasn't coffee, it was coffee-flavored water and was an affront to everything I stood for.

But he was looking at me so eagerly that I took another gulp and smiled. "Perfect," I told him, reaching out and patting his arm...then copping a cheap feel while I was there. "Thank you. Why are you up already?"

He turned and nodded in the direction of the living room. "Mr. Flatulent over there wouldn't stop whining."

"Wait, really?" I hadn't heard a thing. Romeo's whining was usually my wake-up call on weekends, but judging by the angle of the light across the floorboards, I had slept right through it.

Brad smiled. "You were out like a light, so I took him for a walk. He peed for, like, twelve minutes straight, then ran around like a maniac at the dog park."

I blinked. "You took him to the dog park? You walked my dog for me?" I couldn't wrap my head around this. "Why?"

He cocked his head. "So you could sleep."

"Oh," I said, in a soft, small voice.

Then I took another sip of the coffee he'd made me and somehow it tasted better this time. "Is this what boyfriends do?" I wondered.

"Dunno. But it's what
I
do." Brad stood up and casually let his gym shorts fall to the ground. "I'm going to take a shower now. Do you have anything I can use that doesn't smell like a fruit basket?"

I grinned. "Nope. But who cares? I think you'd be even sexier if you smelled like a peach."

He rolled his eyes and headed to the shower and I leaned back and sipped the coffee he'd made me, listening to the contented snores of the dog he'd already walked for me.

I'd lived alone my entire adult life. There had never been someone else...here. There had never been another pair of hands to lighten the load. If I wanted something done, I had always just done it myself and never even wondered how it would be just to let someone take care of me.

Let someone...
love
me.

That's what this was.

I was in love.

Huh.

I always expected that falling in love would be like getting hit on the head with a mallet. Like tripping over my own two feet and landing face first into something hard and unyielding. Like Brad's chest or something.

I never expected that falling in love would be like yanking your bra off and slipping into an old sweatshirt. Just a comfortable release, like, "Ahhh. I can finally be me."

I sat in my bed, listening to the sound of my man in the shower, and the longer I sat there, the more clear it became.

This is what
love
felt like.

I was
in love
.

The shower stopped and my boyfriend opened the door, letting out a cloud of peach scented steam before he emerged with his towel around his waist.

"Not going to lie. I smell pretty fucking delicious right now," he announced, sniffing his forearms.

"Come over here, I'll be the judge of that," I teased, patting the bed beside me.

He flopped onto the bed. "Wait, put a towel down, you're getting my pillow all wet!" I protested.

"It'll dry," he said, rolling his wet hair all over the pillowcase, "and then it'll smell awesomely like peaches too."

"You're maddening."

"So are you," he said affectionately, reaching out and resting his hand on my leg.

We fell silent, just listening to the sounds of the traffic below, punctuated with Romeo's snuffling and the sound of his nails on the hardwood as he trotted into the kitchen and started chomping into his food bowl. There was no need to fill the silence with words.

After a spell, I glanced back at Brad. His eyes were closed, and his breathing was deepening with every inhale.
You must be so tired
, I thought,
this schedule is so crazy.
I shifted a little and his leg straightened, then he sighed contentedly.

I love you, you know.

I wanted to wake him up and tell him, right now. Though I had no idea how to actually put what I was feeling into words. It wasn't love-struck awe. I didn't feel like making any sort of gasping, tearful revelation to him. Just a quiet acknowledgment, a statement of fact.
Yeah, Brad. I love you. Isn't that weird?
I had a feeling he'd agree with me. About how strange it was that I even needed to say it out loud.

He rolled over with a deep, caveman grunt, the kind of sound I used to make fun of him for. But now? Now it gave me a profound sense of safety, because he was
here
. If I wanted to, I could reach over and poke him in the ribs, and he'd feel as solid and real and warm as he always was. Steady. That was what Brad was. A steady, solid person.

My person.

The person I loved, who had turned every expectation I had on its ear. The guy who had dragged me, kicking and screaming, into my first real, adult relationship. Everything about this was new for me, and more than a little terrifying.

I leaned over and kissed his forehead.
I love you,
I thought,
and soon I'll be brave enough to tell you.

Chapter 24

Brad

I was down on the floor, completely preoccupied with letting Romeo slobber all over my fingers, when Olivia suddenly stood in front of the front door with her arms crossed.

"I've decided you can't go," she announced.

I looked up at her, ready to start laughing. That is, until I saw how serious she was. And then I narrowed my eyes.

"Liv," I said. "Where the hell are my bags?"

She widened her eyes in a way I'm sure she thought looked innocent. But Olivia had probably never looked innocent in her life. "What bags?"

"The bags I just spent a half an hour packing back up again. The bags that have all of the shit I need for the next five days?"

"Oh well!" she shrugged. "If they're gone, you'll just have to stay here."

I exhaled, shaking my head as I pushed myself up to a stand and went over to her. "Hey," I murmured, cupping her face in my hands. "What's up?"

"Nothing," she pouted, looking away from me. "Except that you're leaving again."

"I know. But I'll be back."

"In like a year."

"In a week, Olivia. Come one now, you know how this works."

"I do," she said suddenly fierce. "And I told you from the very beginning that I had a big, big problem with how this works."

"Well, I'm sorry," I said, through clenched teeth. I was starting to get impatient. "But this is the best I can do. I spend every moment I have at home with you. I don't even sleep at my place anymore. I'm here,
with you
, right up until the moment I have to leave. Which," I exhaled and tried a gentler tone, "is what I have to do, right now."

"You really have to leave?"

"I really do, Olivia."

Her face twitched and for a second she looked as vulnerable as a child. Then something else crossed her face, something
settled
across it and I got the distinct impression that some kind of inner argument had just been resolved.

And I got the even-more-distinct impression that the wrong side had won.

And even though I really needed to get going, even though I was running the risk of fucking the whole team over with being tardy, I took a deep breath.

Because I had seen this look before. This was what Olivia looked like when she was building up the walls around some private hurt. She always built them up too thick, and unless I did something quickly, she'd wall herself right off from me.

"Hey," I told her, firmly. "I'm leaving, yeah. But I'm coming back to you."

Her green eyes darted past my face and landed on a spot over my shoulder. "I know you are," she said leadenly.

"No, it looks like you don't." I took a deep breath. "Olivia, I'm no fucking good at words. If I were, I'd spend most of our time together telling you exactly how I felt. I can't tell you a lot of the time. So I have to just...show you."

I slid my hands down her sides, tracing the curve of her waist and coming to rest on her hips. I gave a gentle tug, pulling her flush against me. "I thought that'd be enough for you, but it's not."

She shivered as I sucked gently on her earlobe. "It is," she gasped.

"Don't lie to me. It's not enough. So I'm going to tell you, okay? Here's how I feel, and here's why I will always come back to you. Are you ready?"

She blinked and pulled back. "Okay."

I took a deep breath trying to summon the words without stammering. I started, and then stopped, fitting different combinations together in my head, substituting words I could say for the words that got stuck on my tongue. "Liv," I began. "If I'm smiling, nine times out of ten it's because I'm thinking about you."

A soft smile twitched at the corner of her mouth and that was all the encouragement I needed. My tongue loosened and suddenly I
wanted
to keep going. "You make me happy," I told her, smiling with relief that the words were finally coming, that I could finally say those words I'd been meaning to say for weeks now. "You make me laugh and you make me proud and...." I took a breath, going for broke, "And I am completely, totally, one hundred percent in love with you."

Her eyes widened and she opened her mouth, but I clapped my hand over it before she could speak. "Don't start. Not yet, anyway. Let me finish talking before you make fun of me or start busting my balls about being a pussy. Just let me tell you that...I'm yours. I need you to know that. Do you hear me? I need you to know that when I leave, it's not because I am leaving
you
. Because I love you and that means you're
in my fucking heart
. I carry you everywhere."

She blinked and I loosened my hold on her mouth. She licked her lips, and then caught her lower one in her teeth. "You carry me everywhere?"

"Yep. You're very well traveled now."

She laughed.

"So that's how I feel," I trailed off.

"Brad...."

"What? Are you going to bust my balls now? I just tore open my soul for you."

"I know you did." She went on her tiptoes and kissed me. "And I am so happy you said those things."

"Yeah? You're not going to tease me?"

"Not too much, no."

"Why's that?"

She broke out into a wide open, beautiful grin. "Because I love you too," she declared, letting the walls she had been building fall back down and letting me in again. She touched my face, brushing her fingers up to my hair. "I love you too, you gigantic, bearded idiot."

"You do?" I sounded relieved, baffled, and almost completely unhinged.

But she, on the other hand, sounded completely calm. "I do. I realized it yesterday. I had no idea how I wanted to tell you, but you made it easier for me by telling me first." She brushed a kiss across my lips. "You always make it easier for me, Brad. You always know what I need."

I wanted to agree with her, stand on the sofa and make a declaration about how I would always do just that. Fuck, if I had a shred of musical inclination, I'd write a fucking song about her, what I'd do for her, which was anything and everything at once.

But I'm no fucking good at words, so what I said instead was, "Oh."

Her mouth twisted. "Yeah,
oh
. Do you feel better after your little tantrum?"

"Yeah. I kind of do. You needed to hear it."

"I guess I did."

"You're completely impossible."

"Don't push your luck here, Scott."

"Fine. But I still reserve the right to call you out on your shit. That's what people who love each other do." I kissed the tip of her nose. "This is me, your loving boyfriend, kissing you goodbye and promising to come back to you first thing Saturday morning. I'll probably get here even before you wake up."

"And you'll make me coffee?"

"You want me to?"

She wrinkled her nose. "You could. But, you could maybe stand to use a few more scoops this time"

I laughed, running my fingers through her hair. "I love you," I repeated. Now that I had said it, I wasn't sure if I'd ever be able to stop saying it.

"I love you," she breathed, resting her forehead on mine. She exhaled sharply. "Your bags are in my bathtub, by the way."

I laughed again. "I would have found them eventually."

"I know. I just hoped I'd slow you down enough so you'd miss your bus."

"You might have actually succeeded."

She took my hand and squeezed it and some of the mirth came back into her eyes. "Have fun twirling around on the ice."

"I don't exactly...twirl. It's a lot harder than that."

"Whatever, it's not hard and you know it."

"And what makes you say this? All your experience with ice-skating?"

She waved her hand. "I used to go to the rink as a kid. I could totally skate circles around you." Her lip curled into a teasing smile even as she jutted out her lower jaw.

I kissed that stubborn chin of hers. "Yes, you totally could," I agreed. Because I loved her. And I wanted to make her happy.