She needed a chance to redeem herself. She needed Spencer.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Spencer kicked back in his chair in the hotel bar as he and several of his England teammates watched New Zealand hump Scotland in their final match. A few called out encouragement to the Scots—not too loudly. This was a fairly swanky hotel bar in southwest London, and they weren’t football hooligans, for God’s sake.
He’d promised he’d focus purely on his career, but his traitorous brain kept drifting toward fatherhood. He unconsciously rubbed at his achy chest as he sipped his water. What kind of life would his child have growing up in a different country than its father? Could he stop Caitlyn from raising his child overseas?
Should he give up his career and find a way to live in America? His gut heaved at the thought. That would mean being thousands of miles from Granddad during the last years of his life, leaving the old man all alone.
Either way, he lost his family.
A sharp elbow between his ribs yanked his head out of his arse. Next to him, the elbow’s owner, Charlie Fish, hissed, “Bails, I thought you were smarter than that.”
Yeah, he’d thought he was too smart to fall in love during the season, too. Wait—Fishy wouldn’t know about that. “Smarter than what?”
Fishy nodded toward the bar entrance. “That’s your missus, innit?”
Swiveling around, Spencer tried to swallow the panic that leaped up to choke him. A woman with curly ginger hair stood in the lobby with her back to him, scanning the crowd. This last week, he’d caught glimpses of other women and mistaken them for Caitlyn, but this was no mistake. No other woman would wear khaki combat trousers and walking boots to a hotel this posh.
“Fuck’s sake,” he muttered. “What’s she—”
She turned to search the bar, and her tragic expression shattered him. Pink, puffy eyes grew more desperate as her gaze slid across the room without finding him. Her pale face was stained with tears. He jumped out of his chair and rushed to her side, startling her by moving so quickly. Clasping her arm, he bit out, “What’s wrong? Is it the baby?”
She gave her head a jerky shake. “N-no. Can we talk?”
In painful increments, his heartbeat slowed to its normal pace, and the blood in his veins turned to icy sludge. Talk? She wanted to talk? “
Now?
The night before an international match? Caitlyn, are you out of your mind? I could be kicked off the team if the wrong people saw you here.”
She cringed, immediately making him feel like the world’s biggest bastard.
“You’re sure nothing’s wrong with the baby?”
“I’m sure. I’m sorry—I wasn’t thinking. I just had to see you, and your granddad told me you were here.” She turned away as if to go but then gave him one last searing glance. “I needed you to know how sorry I am. I never meant to hurt you, Spencer. You’re the best person I’ve ever met, and I couldn’t leave without you knowing that.”
Pain hit him like being tackled by the entire New Zealand front row. “Shit. You can’t make anything easy, can you? What brought this on?”
She swallowed so hard he heard her throat muscles working. “I got a call today. My father’s dying.”
Shocked beyond words, all he could do was stare. A tear welled up and rolled silently down her cheek. He brushed it aside, the caress of her tender skin sending jolts through his calloused thumb. Her jaw trembled beneath his palm. “Your father? I didn’t think you were still in touch with him.”
“I’m not. Not anymore. Not for years.”
She made no sense, but he couldn’t send her away with her heart torn wide open and bleeding. Unable to stop himself, he pressed a kiss to her temple, breathing in the scent of skin, her shampoo, as he cradled her face. “Come with me.”
He hustled her toward the bank of lifts, glancing over his shoulder to see how many witnesses they had. Quite a few, but no one in a position of power on the team. Most of his teammates must’ve caught how distressed Caitlyn was, judging by the concern on their faces. A couple gave him nods of encouragement before turning back toward the match on TV, a tacit signal that they saw nothing. Hopefully his roommate Psycho would either be in the other bar or willing to disappear there for a while.
He and Caitlyn rode silently to the fourth floor, his hand resting on her shoulder, which shook beneath his touch. If he hadn’t steered her toward his room, she might have fallen apart in the middle of the hallway, completely rudderless. God, she’d battled earthquakes and explosives. What had happened to knock her so badly?
He unlocked his room and motioned for her to go first. Gasping, she came to a dead halt, and he bumped into her from behind, reaching out to steady her before glancing at the beds.
“Shit, mate. I thought we were clear,” Psycho growled, glaring at him from one of the beds as a blanket-covered head bobbed up and down in the vicinity of his crotch.
Pressing his lips together to suppress a curse, Spencer grabbed the crook of Caitlyn’s elbow and backed out. “Sorry, mate.”
Caitlyn’s face burned bright red when he got her out to the hallway. She gestured toward the door handle. “Is that why there’s a sock covering it?”
“Yeah.” He bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at her embarrassment. At least she wasn’t crying anymore. But now—now he was well and truly screwed. “I wasn’t paying attention. C’mon. I think I know somewhere we can be alone.”
He led her down the hall to Liam’s room and knocked. What the hell? Chances of hiding Caitlyn’s visit from Liam were grim anyway, and he couldn’t turn Caitlyn away. Seconds later, Liam opened the door wearing only his tracksuit bottoms and a confused look. “Bailey...and Caitlyn. What a surprise.”
“Hi, Liam.” She kept her gaze on his captain’s face, Spencer was gratified to see, not on the naked chest at her eye level.
Liam’s cocked brow communicated shitloads.
You are so fucked
,
Bailey.
Yeah, he was. Had been ever since he’d kissed a sharp-toothed virgin across the street from the tabloid offices. Liam would just have to suck it.
“Mate, we’ve got a problem.”
“We sure have.” Liam tilted his head, gesturing toward Caitlyn without looking at her or letting her know he referred to her.
Spencer pressed on. “There’s been a family tragedy.”
Sobering, Liam said, “Not Granddad.”
“No, not Granddad. Caitlyn’s dad. She just found out.”
Genuine sympathy tinged Liam’s voice as he took in Caitlyn’s distraught face. “I’m so sorry to hear that. Is there anything I can do?”
Caitlyn shook her head, but Spencer tightened his grip on her shoulder in a silent message. “Mate, we need a quiet place we can talk for a bit, and Psycho’s in mine. With a guest.”
Liam cursed, muttering, “I fucking
hate
this. If I can’t have a woman in my room, why should you lot?”
Spencer handed him his room key and gestured down the hall. “Four-oh-seven.”
“Thanks. I’m going to rip his fucking head off.” With a tight smile, he added, “No offense, Caitlyn. My condolences.”
Spencer waited a few seconds as Liam jogged down the hall. He’d stuck his foot in Liam’s door so it couldn’t close, and when he was sure his skipper was far enough that he couldn’t sprint back, Spencer shoved Caitlyn through the doorway and let the door slam behind him.
She rubbed her mouth, clearly trying to hide a sad smile. “That wasn’t very nice.”
“I haven’t been in a very nice mood lately.”
Her smile faded. “I know. And I have a lot to talk to you about.”
The walls shook with the force of Liam’s fists against the locked door. “Bailey! That’s it—you’re not playing tomorrow!”
Caitlyn gasped. “Can he do that?”
“Sort of. But he won’t. Not unless he wants to explain to the press why we lost. It’s Psycho I’m worried about. By the time he’s done with me, I’ll probably never be able to play again.” Spencer moved to the door and peered through the peephole. Liam glowered on the other side. “Mate, we need an hour alone. That’s all I ask.”
Liam flipped him a ferocious V and stalked off.
Spencer turned to the only woman he’d ever loved—the only one who’d ever had the power to make him feel utterly powerless. Watching as she paced in front of him, he lowered himself into a chair across from her, ready to listen. “Tell me about your father.”
* * *
By the time Caitlyn arrived at the hotel, her hands looked like they belonged to a corpse. Blue-tinged and numb, the skin covering her extremities was lifeless. She wasn’t sure where her blood had gone, but it must have found one of the countless invisible punctures inside her and seeped away.
She’d done everything in her power to push Spencer away, yet he’d kept digging. As if he’d found her trowel and detected fertile ground in her heart, he’d dug the tip into each crevice. His explorations had widened the holes he’d found, brushing away the debris until all the pink, raw meat at her core was exposed.
During the long Tube journey across London, she’d examined that throbbing mass and seen that she had never given him her full love. She’d always held something back—not just the most devastating parts of her story, but her full trust, her complete commitment.
That was about to change. She would reveal the bits of herself he’d asked to see, and then they would know whether he could face them.
Standing before him in Liam’s hotel room, she didn’t know where to start. He sat in a straight-backed chair too dainty for his big frame. With his arms folded and his legs crossed at the ankles, he was as closed off as a plane door at thirty thousand feet.
He clearly wasn’t about to make this easy for her.
“My father had a heart attack.”
“I didn’t even know your father was still around.”
“He wasn’t around. Not really.” She dug through her bag and drew out the plastic folder of letters. With only a second’s hesitation, she handed him the packet and sat on the edge of the bed. It was one of the most difficult things she had ever done, but she forced herself to meet his eyes as she spoke. “When I was eighteen, I moved to Berkeley for college. Mom had pushed me to leave Oregon, not that she’d been obvious about it. She didn’t do obvious. My plan had been to live at home and go to Oregon State, but she got really weird whenever I talked about doing that. I didn’t want to leave—I was really worried about her.”
Spencer’s body unwound itself until he leaned forward in the chair, his elbows resting on his knees and his hands half breaching the distance between them. He clutched the letters but kept his gaze on her. The shift gave her courage to go on. She closed her eyes, allowing herself to remember those days while fighting the tide that threatened to overwhelm her.
“My father used to hit her.” She sucked in air and pressed a hand against her throbbing eyes. “A lot. He hit her a lot. I was worried things would get worse if they were on their own together, but I started to get the impression Mom thought they’d get better. Maybe I was the reason he always got so angry with her.”
“He hit you, too, Caitlyn.”
“A few times, when I got in the way of him getting to her. I usually wasn’t his primary target, except that once I told you about.”
She clutched her hands in her lap, and Spencer dropped the letters so he could cover her hands with his. His comfort always seemed so natural, and his willingness to give it whenever she needed it made her whole body ache. “So I moved to Berkeley, and a week later my mom showed up at my dorm. She’d left him. She was almost manic—giddy one minute and terrified the next. I realized she’d wanted me to leave home so she’d have the courage to do it too. She couldn’t leave me behind.”
Spencer’s hands rubbed hers but they might as well have buffed a block of ice. “My father came for her, of course. She wasn’t quick enough. She shouldn’t have even come to me, but she needed to say goodbye before she disappeared. He came for her, followed her until she went into a bathroom at a gas station, and he beat her unconscious. He smashed her head against the floor.”
She’d tried so hard to block out her memories of the weeks that had followed. The visit from the police. Her mom hooked up to machines. The decision that had been forced upon her teenage shoulders. And the only day she’d visited her father in jail, before the trial had started, when he’d lunged for her throat and screamed that she’d murdered his wife as the guards dragged him from the visitors’ room.
Spencer moved to sit next to her on the bed without releasing her hands. He kissed her face, rocking her against him and whispering, “Baby. Oh, baby, I’m so sorry.”
But he still hadn’t heard the worst part of her story. Her breath caught in her throat, making her voice catch as she confessed. “He didn’t kill her. I did.”
Spencer’s hands stilled for the barest second and then squeezed her. “No, my love. No, you didn’t.”
“Yes, I did.” She pulled back enough to gaze into his precious face. His eyes shone with the depth of his love and the unconditional comfort he wanted to give her. Her whole body trembled with the force of it as she told him what she’d never admitted to a single soul. “She was on life support. After a couple of weeks I asked them to turn it off. They said she was brain-dead, and I couldn’t bear it anymore. She’d been trapped her whole adult life. I just kept thinking she was more trapped than ever.”
He wrapped his arms around her and held her against his broad chest, tucking her head under his chin. “Sweetheart, you did the best thing. She wanted to escape. You helped her escape.”
Silent tears ran down her cheeks. Even they felt like they were just one degree away from freezing. Spencer rocked her slightly and she forced herself to wrap her arms around his waist so she didn’t fall off her perch on the side of the bed.
“What was she like?”
The words rumbled through his chest under her cheek. She had to think about his question, a disturbing circumstance considering they were talking about her mother. “I don’t know. Isn’t that sad? I had eighteen years with her, and I can’t tell you what she was like. Most of my memories are of her worrying about
him.
Would he be angry because the store was out of his favorite cereal so she had to buy a different brand? She’d literally stand in the aisle for ten minutes debating whether to buy a different cereal or to go home without cereal at all. Which decision would get her in the most trouble? Would he like the shirt she planned on wearing? Or would he think he saw another man look at her and call her a filthy slut for attracting attention? I only have a few fleeting memories where I caught a glimpse of who she might have been before he reprogrammed her to be his, but I was so shocked at the time that I don’t remember the circumstances.”