Rally (Treasure State Wildcats Book 3)

“Where are you going?” I asked Maverick because I doubted it was home.

He grinned as he walked to his truck, hitting the unlock button on the fob so the taillights flashed. “I met a girl at the bookstore yesterday. She gave me her number. Think I’ll go to her place for a while.”

As expected. He had a hookup preplanned.

“Have a good time.” I waved and veered toward my Yukon.

He wagged his eyebrows. “That’s the idea.”

Since Thanksgiving, Maverick had yet to spend a night in his own bed. Even last night, when we’d been under curfew orders from the coaches to get some rest and not fuck around, he’d, well . . . fucked around. It was his way of escaping the shit going on with his mom. As far as I knew, he hadn’t talked to her in over a week.

Considering Maverick was as tight with his parents as I was with mine, that was a long damn time to go without a phone call. Sooner rather than later, he’d have to face reality. And sooner rather than later, he’d have to realize he couldn’t waste a minute with Meredith.

But for now, he needed football and meaningless sex as a distraction. I’d save my lecture for later.

At least we’d won today. I wasn’t sure how he’d react to a loss.

Fuck, it felt good to win. It was a high like no other. Adrenaline coursed through my veins. My heart still raced, even hours after the game. The whole team had been jittery during the postgame meeting. Most of the guys, like Maverick, had hurried through showers in the locker room so they could leave and burn off that excess energy with sex.

Since the only woman I wanted was Faye, that wasn’t an option for me. Until she was ready, if she was ever ready, my fist was going to have to suffice like it had all season.

The sun had nearly set and the streetlights illuminated the roads as I drove through town toward an empty house.

My parents had stopped by after the game to say congratulations, but they hadn’t wanted to wait around for dinner. There was a winter storm blowing in, so they’d loaded up the camper from my driveway and headed home to the ranch.

Faye would still be working at the diner. Part of me wanted to go to Dolly’s, but since Thanksgiving, I hadn’t spent much time with Faye.

I’d said what I’d needed to say.

I picked her. I wanted her.

The ball was hers. She had to make the next play.

The lights were on at home, both in the living room and upstairs in Faye’s room. Her Explorer was parked on the street. Guess she hadn’t worked late tonight. Maybe Dusty had sent her home in anticipation of the storm.

I took the spot in the driveway where the camper had been, a rectangle clear from the snow that had fallen earlier in the week. With my duffel slung over a shoulder, I made my way inside. It smelled like green apples and soap.

I flipped the lock on the door and shut off the lights in the living room before I hauled my stuff upstairs. A sliver of light escaped from beneath her door.

Her closed door.

I turned toward my room, about to go inside and crash, but then came the clunk of a handle turning and the swish of her door opening.

“Rush?”

I glanced back but refused to move my feet. “Hey.”

“Hi.” She stepped into the hallway, walking closer. “Good game.”

“Thanks.”

Her face was clean and fresh, the sprinkling of freckles across her nose on full display. Her hair was piled in a mess on top of her head. She looked beautiful with makeup and her long, sleek hair left down. But this was my favorite version of Faye.

I loved those freckles.

“It was fun to watch. Even if it was freezing.”

Wait. My bag slipped off my shoulder as I spun to face her. “You came to the game?”

“Yeah.” She gave me a sweet smile and shrugged. “I’ve never been to a game before. Thought I should do that before I graduate.”

Well, damn.

She’d left the house early yesterday morning, but I hadn’t thought much about it. Figured she was just heading to campus to get a jump start on studying, with finals coming up. But she must have gone to wait in line for tickets.

“I would have gotten you a ticket.”

“It’s okay.”

“Is it the money? We get a few tickets for free. I wouldn’t have had to pay.”

“No, I just⁠—”

“Didn’t want me to know you were coming.”

She blinked. “What?”

“Why?” Why hadn’t she told me about the game? Why wouldn’t she let me in? I would have looked for her in the stands. I could have shared today with her, even in some small way. Our victory would have been so much sweeter if I could have shared it with her.

Why would she cut me out? When would she stop putting this distance between us?

Did she not feel this pull? If she did, how could she be so strong to fight it? When she was in the room, every cell in my body screamed to get closer. The distance? It was killing me slowly.

“I wish I had known.” I scrubbed both hands over my face. “It’s been a long day. I think I’m going to crash.”

“Rush—”

“Night, Faye.” I snatched the bag off the floor and tossed it into my room, then followed it inside, kicking the door shut behind me. Then I walked to the bed and fell face down on the mattress. “Fuck.”

She had me so keyed up that I couldn’t even be polite.

I balled my hands into fists, slamming them into the bedding beside my ears. Then I sat up, about to retreat to the bathroom, when a knock came.

On a sigh, I climbed out of bed and opened the door.

Faye stood in the hallway, her shoulders pinned with her arms clasped behind her back. Poised and ready for a fight. Her rigid posture pulled the material of her tee taut across her belly.

She was the most stunning creature on this earth. And she was carrying my son.

“I should have locked you in my room that night so you couldn’t sneak out,” I said. “I should have tracked you down the next morning and brought you back.”

Her eyes softened.

“I had this plan.” The confession came on an exhale and my shoulders slumped. “It was all planned. One more season with the Wildcats. Play smart. Don’t get injured. But play to win. Play hard. If I got drafted, no matter the round, no matter the team, give professional football a shot. If I didn’t make it, then I’d find a job coaching. But football was my future.”

“It can still be your future.”

“Damn straight.” My future didn’t need to change. I’d been spinning my mental wheels for months, trying to find some traction. Turns out, it wasn’t about a new direction. It was about making room in my plan for Faye. “Here’s how this thing is going to go.”

Her eyebrows arched as I crossed my arms over my chest.

“I don’t want to take control away from you, Faye. The last thing I want is for you to feel trapped. But I’m hoping, if you’re with me, if we do this together, that it’s not my plan anymore. It’s ours. It’s us.”

“Rush—”

I held up a hand. “Don’t say anything yet. I’m not done.”

She had to know it all, every detail. She needed to go into this decision eyes wide open. She had to know the play, otherwise we’d fumble.

“We make it through this next year. I’ve got another season and two semesters of school. If you don’t want to live in this house, we’ll move. If you want to stay home with Squish for a year, then you can. If you want to keep working, we’ll figure it out. If you want to jump into grad school, that’s fine. Whatever you want, I’m here. One more year in Mission. Then we go.”

She opened her mouth, but I wasn’t done yet.

“If I don’t get drafted, then we’ll choose a school you want, and I’ll find a coaching job, either at a college or high school. I’d like my parents to know Squish so if we can stick to the western half of the country, that would be great. And if I do get drafted, every city with a professional team will have a decent university, so we can get you into a speech pathology program. Ideally, I’d play for three to seven years. That should be enough time for you to get your master’s. Then you pick where we land for good once I retire.”

There. That was the whole plan. It was solid. It was a way for us both to chase dreams. Still, I sounded surer about it than I felt. My heart pounded, and I was breathless.

If she hated it, if she said no, I wasn’t quite sure how I’d recover.

“Are you done now?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Good.” She shifted, unclasping her hands from behind her back. And when she brought them forward, they weren’t empty.

Clutched in a fist was a silver canister.

Her bear spray.

She looked at it, turning it sideways. “I came to the game today because I wanted to see what it would have been like if I was just me, just another student watching the hottest guy on campus play a football game. I wanted to have that experience since so much of this year has been anything but normal.”

“Oh.” Well, damn. That made sense. And now I felt like an idiot for spewing my plan.

“I realized something in the fourth quarter,” she said. “I’m not just me. I’m not just another student.”

“Not to me.”

She stared at the can for another moment, then she held it out between us. “I pick you too.”

My heart left my chest. Gone. It floated past that can of bear spray and into her arms. Because it wasn’t mine anymore.

It belonged to Faye.

This was what it felt like to fall in love, wasn’t it? Misery and bliss.

She took a step forward, letting her arm drop to her side and the can slip from her grasp. It landed on the carpet with a muffled thud. Then she lifted on her toes as she pressed a hand over my chest, fisting my quarter zip to pull me closer.

She wasn’t quite tall enough to reach my mouth, so I bent, hovering slightly out of reach. Every time she came close to a kiss, I pulled away.

“Rush.” She tugged harder on my shirt. “Stop playing.”

“Seems only fitting I torture you for a minute. You’ve been putting me through hell for months.” I reached for the tie in her hair, pulling it loose until her hair tumbled down her shoulders. Then I threaded my fingers through the soft strands, leaning closer until our noses touched. “Do you have any idea how much I think about you?”

“More than football?”

“More than football.”

“Good.” She smiled. It was a smile so bright it lit up her entire face, like the white-gold rays of a Montana sunrise.

This time, when she tugged, I didn’t fight back. I waited until her lips brushed mine, holding still while she initiated the kiss.

It was sweet and light. Knowing Faye, it was probably a test to see how long I could hold out.

I growled.

She giggled.

“Can I kiss you now?”

“If you must.”

I sealed my lips over hers, my arms banding around her back as I lifted her off her feet.

Her tongue instantly tangled with mine, and fuck, she tasted good. Like honey and mint. A moan escaped her throat. Or maybe it came from mine.

We sank into each other, kissing without restraint or hesitation. Her arms looped around my shoulders and her fingers dove into my hair. She hooked one leg around my hip as I kicked that fucking bear spray into the hallway.

It clattered against a baseboard, ricocheting toward the stairs.

Good fucking riddance.