by Linda Kage
So we waited just outside the gates where the team came through. More people gathered, waiting for them as well. When Ten and Quinn came through together, their helmets off, with their sweaty hair sticking to their foreheads while they grinned out their victory, a crowd erupted with cheers.
Some groupie grabbed Quinn by the face and stamped a kiss to his mouth, but he immediately pulled away and scowled at her. I couldn’t even be outraged; I didn’t blame the girl at all for her enthusiasm and wanting a piece of him. And since he instantly wiped the back of his hand over his mouth and glanced around until he spotted me—only me—well...groupies could try to get at him all they wanted. I knew he wasn’t interested in them.
This man was all mine.
His grin grew. He mouthed my name, or maybe he shouted it, and I just couldn’t hear it through all the people. As he tried to make his way to me, the crowd parted for him and suddenly, there he was, his shoulder pads making him larger than ever.
He picked me up off my feet and spun me in a circle before kissing me hard on the mouth. “We won.”
Laughing, I stroked his face and touched his dimple. “I saw.”
“Blondie!” Ten yanked me out of my boyfriend’s arms before engulfing me in a bone-crushing hug. “Did you see that shit? We’re so fucking awesome.”
He glanced around, looking for more people to hug, maybe. But when all he saw with me was Asher, his face fell. “Where’s everyone else?”
“They all went to the hospital for Noel.”
Quinn nodded and grasped my hand. “Give us a minute to change and we’ll go over with you guys.”
I stepped back to Asher’s side, and Ten and Quinn let their team sweep them along to their locker room.
Half an hour later, the four of us entered Noel’s hospital room, where everyone else was already gathered around Noel’s bed. We lurched to a stop when we found him sobbing against Aspen’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he kept telling her. “I’m so sorry.”
“What are you sorry for, baby?” She smoothed his hair out his face. “You played an amazing game. I’m so proud of you.”
“I lost us the game, a shot at nationals, and no way do I have a chance at going pro now. How the hell am I going to support you guys with no future?”
“You do too have a future,” Aspen scolded. “You’re a smart, amazing, talented man. You’ll be able to do anything outside professional football that you want. And don’t you dare even worry about money. If we have each other, we can always work around that. Besides...” She shrugged. “I was scared about you going pro, anyway. You’d be out of town on so many away games, having all kind of gorgeous woman, nationwide, trying to get into your pants.”
“Are you insane?” he squawked. “I would never cheat on you.”
As he pulled her in for a hug and kissed each one of her closed eyes before kissing her mouth, I cleared my throat. “And you didn’t lose us the game today, either.”
Caroline gasped, “What? We won?” just as Noel and Aspen broke apart in surprise to gape at us.
As Quinn, Ten, Asher and I entered the room, Ten hooked his thumb over his shoulder to point at Quinn. “Mr. Second-String Quarterback here broke free of the line and ran forty-five yards for a touchdown. We’re going to nationals. Again.”
“You’re going to...holy shit,” Noel breathed. A smile broke across his face before he nodded respectfully at Quinn. “Way to go, Hamilton. I knew you could do it.”
“I’m sorry,” an authoritative voice broke in from behind us, making Quinn and me part and turn around to see the man in a suit standing in the doorway. “Is this Noel Gamble’s room?”
“Dr. Frenetti?” Aspen gasped. She moved away from Noel’s bedside to frown curiously at the older gentlemen. “What’re you doing here?”
He frowned in acute displeasure when he met her gaze. “Aspen,” he bit out, even as his gaze shifted to Noel, who was lying pale and sweaty on the bed with his arm wrapped in a cast. “I came to see if it was true. Your collarbone’s broken, then?”
Noel nodded. “Yeah.” His eyes narrowed. “But somehow, I’m not sensing your concern.”
Dr. Frenetti held his hands behind his back. “We had an understanding the last time we talked, Mr. Gamble.”
With a scowl, Noel glanced around the room at everyone gathered inside. His confused frown clearly told us he had no idea what this Dr. Frenetti guy was talking about. He returned his attention to the older man. “And I did what I was supposed to do. I stayed on the team and got us this far.”
Lips flattening in a thin, disappointed line, Dr. Frenetti shook his head. “I only agreed not to expose her,” he paused to send Aspen a significant, distasteful glance, “if you won nationals. This…” He flashed out his hand to motion to Noel’s injury, “…is no better than where we ended last year.”
Noel shook his head. “No.” He glanced at Aspen, his gaze desperate. She went to his side, and he immediately took her hand. “You can’t do that. She…you’ve already fired her. She’s been gone from there for months. How could you…it’s not my fault some asshole broke my collarbone.”
“And it’s not my fault you broke your word. I’m sending your story to the tabloids in the morning.”
“What?” Aspen and Noel cried together.
Caroline waved her hands. “Wait. What? You’re going to punish her just because she fell in love with my brother? What kind of douchebag—”
The rest of her rant was muffled behind Ten’s hand. “He’s a very powerful douchebag, sweetness,” he told her quietly enough that only Quinn, Caroline and I could hear him. “Aspen’s old boss can still destroy her with just a few words in the right ears.”
“I’m punishing her,” Dr. Frenetti stated, “because she broke university policy and slept with a—”
“Oh, would you look at the time!” Reese spoke up loudly as she slapped her hands over Colton’s ears, while beside her, Eva was busy trying to plug Brandt’s. “It’s time for us to take these minors out of the room.”
But Noel’s brothers were having none of it. They smacked the hands aside. “I’m not going anywhere,” Brandt said, glancing back and forth between Noel and Dr. Frenetti. “I want to know what’s going on. What did Aspen do that was so bad?”
Worried for the entire Gamble family, I gulped and reached for Quinn’s hand. I glanced up at him as he took my fingers. He met my gaze before stepping forward and holding up a hand to gain everyone’s attention.
“Aspen did nothing wrong,” he answered Brandt before he turned to Dr. Frenetti. “And this man here isn’t going to do anything to hurt her, either, because Noel is going to keep his word. Nationals are still two weeks away, and we’re still going to win that game, whether he plays or not.”
“And who do you think you are?” Dr. Frenetti asked, eyeing Quinn with some serious censure.
Rooting myself at my man’s side, I squeezed his hand and smiled up at him with proud admiration. “He’s Quinn Hamilton.”
Dr. Frenetti’s eyes widened. “Q-Quinn Hamilton, the backup quarterback who just—”
“Won the divisional championships for us?” Ten spoke up with a smirk. “Yep, that would be him. And I’m Oren Tenning, by the way. And no fucking way are we letting you get the drop on our man Gamble. Nationals are in the bag, and we will win.”
“You should go back to wherever you came from now,” Quinn said, “Because Noel is going to keep his end of the bargain, which means you need to keep yours too.”
Aspen’s old boss didn’t seem to know what to say to that. He stuttered for a moment, glancing between Ten, Quinn, and Noel before he said, “You better win at nationals, or I’m taking that whore down.”
“What did you just call her?”
While Asher, Pick, Mason, and Quinn surged toward the bed to keep Noel from coming off it to charge Dr. Frenetti, Ten threw his arm around the older man’s shoulder and sent him a stiff smile. “Good to know, but you should probably go now.”
He forcibly steered Dr. Frenetti from the room, and the other guys started talking all at once to calm an enraged Noel. I moved toward a white-faced Aspen, but Caroline, Reese, and Eva were already surrounding her and trying to comfort her.
Ten strolled back into the room, sans the asshole. He looked completely unconcerned that his best friend was freaking out on a bed and Aspen was nearly in tears. Instead, he strolled up to Asher and wrapped a companionable arm around his shoulders. “Hart, for the love of God, just start singing or something.”
Asher glanced at him as if he was insane. “What?”
“This is a good day. We just won our biggest game of the year, Gamble’s not going to leave us for the big leagues after all, and his woman just avoided becoming a scandal. So, why’s everyone so upset? We should be celebrating. Now, get the party started with that special voice of yours that seems to drop panties on command and sing something.”
Asher shook his head, but after a moment, he did start singing. When Noel realized he was singing Bob Marley’s “Everything’s Gonna Be Alright,” he snorted and threw his pillow at Asher.
“Asshole.” But it was obvious that Ten had been right—the song was already calming Noel’s temper.
Asher caught the pillow to his chest. Then he strolled to Aspen, knelt in front of her, and began to serenade her through the rest of the song, flinging the pillow around with a flourish.
When I glanced up at Ten, who’d stopped beside me, I smiled at him and bumped my elbow into his. “That was unconventional, but it worked.”
He grinned back, proud of himself. Then he scowled and shook his finger threateningly. “If you pet my head again and call me a good boy, I’m kicking Ham in the nuts so he can’t pleasure you for at least a week.”
“Do it anyway, Zoey,” Pick called with a grin. “Hamilton’s still got a tongue to please you with.”
I groaned and buried my scorching hot cheeks in my hands. This group had a dirtier mind than any I’d ever thought I’d be a part of, but I loved being one of them anyway.
“Hey, leave her be,” Quinn chided as he came to me and wrapped his arms around my waist from behind. “No one is going to prevent me from pleasing her in every way possible.”
“Aww. You two are just too cute together.” Reese nudged Eva and continued bobbing her head and swaying back and forth to Asher’s song. “Didn’t I tell you they were going to end up together the first day I met her?”
Eva looped her arm with Reese and they swayed together. “You called it, sweetie. Way to go.”
I looked up at Quinn and he looked down at me. We started grinning simultaneously because I think we both realized we’d known it somehow too. We were just meant to be together. As our friends kept being crazy and ridiculous around us, we leaned into each other and kissed.
Tired of waiting, worried out of my mind, and shifting in my seat because my butt had gone numb, I glanced at my forearm I had crossed over my chest. Fresh ink stared up at me, amazing me all over again that I had an honest to God tattoo.
I traced the National Championships emblem in awe just as Ten elbowed me from his seat at my right.
“I still think you’re fucking crazy for getting that tattoo. You know that, right?”
With a grin, I shook my head. “I was just following tradition. All you guys got your tattoos the night before the big game last year, so I had to do it this year.”
“Yeah, and if we would’ve kept following tradition, we would’ve lost the next day, too.”
“But we didn’t.” We’d won the national championship title, and Dr. Frenetti had kept silent about Noel and Aspen’s relationship.
Ten snorted. “Yeah, you’re a lucky we didn’t lose.”
I shrugged. “We had a reason to win this year.”
“Hell, we had a reason to win last year, but we couldn’t pull it out of our asses then.”
“We had a better reason to win this year.”
Ten seemed to think that over before he nodded. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Gamble and his woman didn’t need to turn into a national scandal. That’s for sure. And what are up with these damn waiting room chairs? Do they purposely want your ass to go dead while you’re sitting in them?”
I smiled. “You didn’t have to wait with me.”
Ten glanced away and grumbled something under his breath. I bumped my knee into his as my way of telling him thanks for sticking around anyway. It was Christmas Eve and everyone else in our group was home with their families right now, celebrating the holidays.
I was sitting here, though, because this was the date Cora had chosen from a handful of options to receive her new kidney. Worry lanced through me anew. They’d already been in surgery for over two hours. How much more time did they need for Zoey’s part of the whole ordeal to be over?
“You think everything’s going okay?” I asked under my breath as I glanced across the room to where Mr. Wilder and his wife—Cora’s mother—were seated, waiting for news about her.
“Blondie?” Ten asked with a snort. “Hell, yes, she’ll be fine. God wouldn’t let something bad happen to one of his angels.”
I glanced at him in surprise, because what he’d said didn’t sound like anything he would say, ever. But then I saw the anxious gleam in his eyes, and I realized he was worried too.
He and Zoey had grown close since she’d moved in with us two months ago. He always found a way to talk her into doing his laundry or cooking his favorite breakfast, and she not only tolerated his crude, foul mouth, but she seemed to adore it and liked to pamper him. They acted almost like…siblings.
I was just glad they got along as well as they did because to me, they were the closest thing to family I had. Zoey was my other, better half, and Ten had turned into a much better friend than I’d ever thought he’d be.
Before I could respond to Ten’s uncharacteristically sweet comment, Zoey’s surgeon appeared in the doorway of the waiting room. I’d met him before they’d put her under the anesthesia. Remembering me, he came straight over. “Her surgery went well.”
Relief poured through me, and Ten patted my knee in congratulations. Across the room, Cora’s dad stood as if to stretch, but I could tell he wanted to listen in on Zoey’s report. I narrowed my eyes at him and then kept listening to the surgeon’s technical jargon until he said we could go wait in her room and be there when she was brought down from recovery.
We waited for a little over half an hour before they wheeled her in. Her eyes were drowsy and her face a little swollen and pale, but her smile was all for me.
“Hey, you.” Her voice was hoarse and barely above a whisper, but I didn’t care. She was alive and smiling.
“Hey, yourself.” I took her hand and sat beside her. “How’re you feeling?”
“Cold.” Her teeth began to chatter, so Ten and I hunted up some blankets to cover her.
I tucked the last one gently over her shoulders. “Any better yet?”
She closed her eyes and nodded with a sigh. “Yes. Thank you.”
I kissed her forehead and began to stroke her hair behind her ear. “The doctor said you did great. Hardly any bleeding and no complications.”
“Any word on Cora yet?” she asked, her lashes fluttering open.
I shook my head. I didn’t care what happened to Cora or how her end of the surgery worked out, but then...I guess I didn’t want Zoey to part with a kidney, only for it to go to waste and be rejected by Cora’s body. So maybe I did care a little.
“No. Haven’t heard anything.”
Zoey nodded her understanding, and her gaze shifted to the other side of her bed where our roommate lingered with his hands stuffed in his pockets.
“Ten,” she said and slowly reached out an IV-stuck hand his way.
He caught her fingers. “Hey, Blondie. Glad you didn’t die. Ham probably would’ve become a pain in the ass to live with if you had.”
Her chest shook as she laughed softly. “I imagine he would have.” Her smile settle
d into a gaze of adoration. “You’re seriously never going to call me Zoey, are you?”
Ten shrugged. “Probably not.” His eyes filled with a pain I’d never seen in him before. Glancing away, he mumbled what sounded like, “That was my sister’s name.”
Zoey’s smile died. “Was?” she repeated.
He cleared his throat and met her gaze before nodding. “Yeah. Was.” With a wince, he shook his head. Then he leaned down swiftly and stamped a quick kiss to her forehead. “I better go. I’ve got a fucking family thing I should probably go suffer through before the holiday’s over. Just…take care of yourself, will you? And make sure this asshole takes care of you, too.”
“Okay.” Zoey let go of his hand and watched him stride from the room. Then her concerned gaze found mine. “Did you know he had a sister named Zoey who died?”
I shook my head, in just as much shock as she was in. “I had no idea he’d even had a sister.” Much less that her name had been Zoey, or that she’d died.
“Poor Ten. I wonder how he was ever able to talk to me at all.”
A smile lit up my face. “Easy. How could anyone not talk to you? You’re a freaking angel.”
She snorted and rolled her eyes, but the smile that followed told me how much she loved the praise. “I love you,” she whispered.
I kissed her knuckles. “Not as much as I love you. In a way, I’m glad you decided to come to Ellamore and give away one of your kidneys, because it brought you to me.”
“You know what,” she slurred, “So am I. Thank God my half-sister is an evil, conniving witch, or we never would’ve met.”
Together, we laughed softly. We’d discovered that finding a way to laugh and make light of it was easier to handle than the cold, dark truth: Cora was evil, and Zoey would always be connected to her.
Zoey’s eyelashes fluttered, and I knew she needed rest. I was about to tell her to get some sleep while I kept watch over her, but someone knocked softly on the opened doorframe.
It was Cora’s father. I straightened and stiffened indignantly, but Zoey’s grip on my fingers warned me to behave.
“Hi,” she said simply, not welcoming him, but not giving him the cold shoulder either.