Sway (Keeping Score Book 6)

by Tawdra Kandle

  Casual sex would be like TNT for two people like Gideon and me. It had the potential to destroy everything between us, and as hot as I might be for his body—and as sex-starved as I’d been for way too long—I wasn’t going to risk losing something so important just to satisfy an itch.

  If there was one thing that I was certain about, it was that I adored Peaceful Meadows. I completely understood why Gideon had fallen in love with the land, with the house . . . we spent countless hours walking together over the rolling hills. It wasn’t unusual, either, for Gideon to reach for my hand at some point, ostensibly to help me across a small stream or to haul me up the last few steps of a steep rock, and once he’d twined our fingers together, neither of us pulled apart. It seemed to be our single concession to the need that was increasingly difficult for me to ignore.

  The storm that had hit the day of my arrival had left four inches of snow on the ground, and the temperatures stayed cold enough that it didn’t melt. That meant that I had plenty of ammunition for impromptu snowball fights. After pretending to disapprove of what he loftily termed my “childish behavior”, Gideon decided if he couldn’t talk me out of it, he’d best me, pelting me with tightly packed spheres of snow and ice until I shrieked for mercy.

  At which point, of course, I used my pretended surrender to get close enough to drop a handful of snow down the back of his shirt. Whoever said revenge was a dish best served cold was right on.

  “We’re probably going to catch pneumonia,” Gideon complained as we stood in his mudroom, unwinding scarves, taking off our coats and boots and shedding gloves. “I’m soaked through.”

  “You don’t catch pneumonia by getting wet.” I rolled my eyes. “That’s an old wives’ tale. You’ll be fine.”

  He glared at me darkly. “If I do get sick and fuck up the game on Sunday, it’s on your head, and I won’t hesitate to tell my coach that you’re to blame.”

  “Have at it, buddy. I’m not scared of him.” I ran my fingers through my damp hair, grimacing as the icy droplets flew everywhere. “Besides, Sunday’s still . . . what, five days away?”

  “Four. Today’s Wednesday. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve.” Gideon opened a chest that sat beneath the rows of hooks and pulled out a couple of towels. “Here. For your hair.”

  “Thanks.” Absently, I rubbed the thick towel over my head. “Um, Gideon, I don’t want to push you here, but since it’s almost Christmas, have you thought about, like, a tree or anything?”

  “Sure, I have.” He ran his own towel over his face. “I thought we’d ride over to the tree farm tomorrow morning, pick something out, then come back here to decorate. I have boxes in the basement that my mom sent me from home.”

  “Oh.” To say I was surprised was an understatement. In my family, Christmas decorations went up the day after Thanksgiving, and the tree was kept in a box the rest of the year. I’d never had a live tree.

  “Is that okay with you?” Gideon paused, frowning at me over his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I should’ve asked you before now. This is just how we always did things . . . and I never even thought that maybe you’d rather do it differently.”

  “No, it’s fine,” I assured him. “Actually, I like this idea. My mom decorated so early that by the time Christmas actually rolled around, I was sick and tired of all the greenery and fa-la-la-la-la.”

  “Great.” He took the wet towel from me and tossed both his and mine into the adjacent laundry room. “I’m going to grab a hot shower and throw on some sweats, then maybe we could watch the new Spiderman movie. I didn’t get a chance to see it before, when it was in theaters.”

  “Sounds good. I’ll make us some hot chocolate—you know, to ward off the impending pneumonia.” I stuck out my tongue at him. “Just let me know when you’re ready, and I’ll bring it upstairs.”

  Shaking his head, Gideon went through the kitchen to the steps, taking them two at a time by the sounds of it. I smirked, thinking about the look on his face when I’d nailed him with my first snowball. It had been priceless and worth all of the hits I’d taken later.

  Once I had the cocoa simmering on the stove, I wandered out into the living room, perusing the bookshelves. I’d already borrowed one novel from Gideon’s collection and finished it. I’d need another to keep me in bedtime reading for the next few days.

  Sometimes, a good book was the only thing that kept me from climbing out of my own bed and making my way down to Gideon’s room.

  “Therein lies madness,” I reminded myself, running my fingers over the spines. Nothing caught my attention right away, but just before I turned to the next shelf, I spied a section of photo albums that had been tucked alongside the books.

  I’d noticed that Gideon didn’t display any pictures in the main part of his house. Upstairs, in what I’d begun calling the Maynard Man Cave, there were several groupings of family photos, mostly old ones from his growing up years, and I’d seen a few framed snapshots on the dresser in his bedroom when he’d given me the tour.

  Part of me knew I should leave well enough alone and not intrude in Gideon’s privacy by flipping through his photo albums. On the other hand, he had them down here on the shelves, which made me think he’d be okay with me taking a look. Curiosity won out over discretion, and I pulled down the first large album.

  I realized pretty quickly that these photos were from Gideon’s high school days. There were pages of football memories, including team pictures and action shots. I smiled, seeing beyond the lingering baby pudge to the face and body of the man he’d grown to be. Teenaged Gideon Maynard had been adorable in a wide-eyed, grinning way that the adult Gideon had apparently left behind.

  Turning the page, I sucked in a deep breath. Taking up one whole side was a full-sized print that was clearly from a school dance . . . the prom, I decided, from the style of the gown that the beautiful blonde wore. Young Gideon stood with his arm around her waist, and the two looked out at the camera with the carefree joy of adolescence.

  “That’s Lilly. From our senior prom.”

  Gideon’s voice at my shoulder made me jump, and I pressed one hand to my heart. “God, you scared me.” I began to close the photo album, then hesitated. “I’m sorry. Would you rather I didn’t look at these? I probably shouldn’t have . . .” I tapped the page.

  “No, I don’t mind.” He squatted in front of the fireplace, using the black poker to stir up the embers there. “I don’t have anything to hide there. I already told you about Lilly.”

  “Okay.” Still, even as I continued to turn the pages, I felt uncomfortable. This section was almost entirely Gideon’s ex-girlfriend: goofing around in her cheerleader uniform, sitting on Gideon’s lap in a room I recognized from his parents’ home, and standing in front of Gideon, both of them in graduation gowns, holding the familiar square caps.

  “She’s so beautiful.” I touched her smiling face with the tip of my finger. “Gideon . . . you two looked so happy together. Are you sure . . . I mean, drifting apart doesn’t mean you can’t, you know, drift back together again. Have you even talked to her lately? Maybe there’s still a chance.”

  “No.” For the first time since I’d arrived at Peaceful Meadows, the old guarded and withdrawn Gideon was back. His voice was harsh, brooking no argument. “We won’t ever be together again. I know this for sure.”

  “Okay.” Feeling more than a little rebuffed, I closed the photo album and replaced it on the shelf before I skirted the chairs and sank into the loveseat. “I’m sorry. It’s none of my business. I just . . . if she made you happy, I don’t see why you broke up.”

  For a long moment, I didn’t think Gideon was going to respond. Then, exhaling long, he replaced the fireplace poker and shifted to move up to the other side of the loveseat, facing me.

  “Sarah . . . what happened between Lilly and me is ugly and complicated, and I don’t come off well in it. I didn’t tell you everything before when you asked because I didn’t want to violate Lilly’s privacy, but . . .” He spread ou
t his hands. “We’re friends, aren’t we? Best friends, we said.”

  “Yes, but you don’t have to share anything that makes you uncomfortable.” I curled up my legs, wrapping my arms around them. “It’s okay, Gideon.”

  He stared into the dancing flames. “I told you Lilly moved in with me after I was drafted by the Rebels. For about the first year or so, it seemed like everything was okay. We were going on the way we always had, you know, since high school. We’d gone to college in the same town, so we’d never really been separated.” He was silent for a beat. “We’d lost our virginities together when we were freshmen in college. At that point, I think we both assumed a lifetime together was inevitable. But maybe that inevitability, that sense that we were destined to be together—maybe sometimes it can be kind of stifling. I don’t know.” He shrugged.

  “That first year in Richmond was just so intense. I was blinders-on about the game, because I wanted so badly to succeed. I worked harder than anyone, because I didn’t want to have any excuse for not becoming the best damn quarterback in the league eventually. I watched films, I studied playbooks, I talked to coaches and trainers—my life was consumed by football, and I liked it that way.”

  I smiled a little. “And things have changed . . . how?”

  Gideon gave a huff of laughter. “Yeah, not much. But even so, there was part of me that realized that maybe things weren’t going so great with Lilly. I think I told myself that once we got past that first year, I’d make time for her. I don’t know, maybe that’s just wishful hindsight thinking. Still, I just kept going, and she didn’t say anything to indicate she was unhappy. It’s possible she wasn’t.

  “The first game of my second year in Richmond was away. We played Atlanta. Lilly sometimes came on the road, but not often, because she had her work, too. It wasn’t a big deal—you know, I was only thinking about the game anyway. But that night, we finished up, barely eeking by with a W, and when I got back to the locker room, Coach asked to talk with me. I was acting all calm and cool, but inside, I was freaking the fuck out. I was terrified he was going to tell me they were cutting me or trading me—there was no reason to think that, but when you’re that new in the pros, you just never know.”

  Gideon’s eyebrows were drawn together, and although his face was turned toward the fireplace, I knew he wasn’t seeing the flames. He was lost somewhere in the past. I had a sudden, urgent need to anchor him with me in the present. Leaning toward him, I took his hand into both of mine, scooting closer to him so I could hold his cold fingers against my chest.

  “But it wasn’t about me. Coach had gotten a call in the third quarter—it was my father. He’d heard from Emmett Berkshire . . . the police had called Lilly’s parents when they couldn’t get in touch with me. I was her emergency contact, but I wasn’t answering the phone, because, you know, football.” He gave a harsh bark that hardly resembled laughter. “They called Lilly’s parents, because she was in the hospital. She’d been found in an alley about five blocks from the condo—a homeless man found her and managed to flag down a cop.”

  I could hardly move, but inside my stomach was roiling. Holy God, what had happened to her?

  “She was in pretty bad shape, Dad told me.” Gideon pursed his lips, his head bobbing as though he was listening to his father break the news all over again. “She’d been beaten. Her orbital socket was broken, and they were worried about her sight. Couple of broken ribs, fractured wrist . . . her knees were messed up from hitting the pavement. And . . .” Gideon swallowed hard. “She’d been raped.”

  “Holy fuck.” I breathed out the words. “Holy fucking shit, Gideon. My God. I’m so sorry.”

  He nodded, his head moving only slightly. “I got home to Richmond as fast as I could. I don’t remember how, only that one minute I was sitting in front of Coach and the next, I was in the waiting room at the hospital, sitting with Camilla and Emmett, all of us in shock. We were scared shitless that she wouldn’t make it. She had—” He touched his head. “Her head. A bad concussion and some bleeding, but they did surgery, and she was going to be okay.”

  “Did they catch whoever did it to her?” I wasn’t sure why this was important to me right now, but it was.

  Gideon shook his head. “No. They did a rape kit, and I guess it’s still on file, but whoever it was, he didn’t have any DNA on record, and nothing matched up with any known offender. The police interviewed Lilly once she was awake, but she couldn’t give them a good enough description to help. And in a way, that sucks, and in another way—well, there was never a trial. She never had to testify, and we were able to keep the whole thing quiet. Somehow, no reporter ever picked up that the new quarterback’s girlfriend was raped while he was out of town.”

  “But she was okay.” It was a question, not a statement. Lilly was still alive now, so clearly, she’d recovered.

  “She—she survived,” Gideon corrected me gently. “A few days after, they let me bring her home. Her parents wanted to take her back to New York, but she refused. She said she just wanted life to go back to normal. Only, it never could. We just didn’t realize it at the time.”

  “What happened?” I couldn’t imagine what that poor woman had gone through, and I couldn’t even begin to guess how anyone got past something like that.

  “At first, it seemed like she was doing all right. And then about a month later, the nightmares began. She’d wake up screaming, kicking, hitting, clawing . . . she didn’t recognize me. She was afraid of me in the night. We slept with the lights on, but it didn’t matter. We were both exhausted, on edge all the time. But we never talked about it, about what had really happened. I knew the truth, though. I knew it was my fault.”

  I frowned. “How the fuck do you figure that? You didn’t rape Lilly, Gideon. You didn’t attack her and beat her almost to death. You were in another city, for Christ’s sake.”

  “Exactly.” He pointed at me with his free hand. “I was in another city, because I had to be on the football field, because football is my fucking life. And you want to know the hell of it, Sarah? Afterward, when I should have been offering my girlfriend whatever lame comfort I could, I didn’t do it. Instead, I buried myself even deeper in the game. I used it to hide from what was happening at home. I ran away to the stadium every chance I got. I worked harder, trained harder, and I took every excuse I could find not to be with her.”

  I took a deep, shaky breath. “That doesn’t make it your fault, Gideon. You were both coping with it—doing what you could.”

  “I couldn’t even look at her by the end. Not because I blamed her for the rape,” he hastened to add. “Never that. But because I knew that I was the one at fault, and I knew Lilly was aware of it, too. She was never going to forgive me.”

  “I can’t believe that,” I whispered. “She loved you. Did she get counseling? Did you?”

  Gideon nodded. “Eventually, she did. Her parents forced the issue. I went with her twice, but it was excruciating. And about six months in, I came home and she was sitting in the living room of our condo, with her bags packed. She said she was going back to New York, because she couldn’t stay with me anymore.”

  “Did you try to stop her?” I already knew the answer; this man who had taken on the blame for a senseless, violent act that was not at all his own fault wouldn’t have stopped the woman he’d loved from seeking peace, even if it came at the expense of his own heart.

  “No. I told her I understood, that I hoped that someday we could be friends again, and I called her a car.” He rubbed his forehead. “I never saw her again.”

  “That’s been—what, a couple of years?” I thought of the Berkshires, of the strained encounter with them at the party. Now, I understood. My heart broke for all of them.

  “Nearly three.” Gideon swiveled his focus from the fireplace to me. “That’s when I realized that my mistake had been in thinking I could have it all. I can’t. Football has to come first, and I’m not going to forget that. I won’t allow someone else I l
ove to be hurt because I have to make a choice.”

  “I understand.” And I did, but that didn’t mean I ached any less. It didn’t mean that I found it any easier to hold back the tears threatening to fall.

  I wasn’t sure how long we’d sat in silence in front of the fire before Gideon spoke again.

  “We never did this.” He lifted our hands, still joined. “Lilly didn’t like to hold hands. From the time we first started dating, she said it made her feel like I was either holding her back or dragging her along, so I stopped trying.” He lifted one shoulder. “I know we’re friends, Sarah. I know . . . sometimes, it feels like you’re the only person I want to be with, ever. I can tell you things I never share with anyone else. And being with you is so damn easy.” He licked his lips, started to go on and then stopped again.

  Taking a long breath, he closed his eyes. “But no matter how right this feels, it can’t be more than what we have now. I can’t put someone else through the hell that happened to Lilly. I won’t do it.”

  I wanted to protest. I wanted to climb into his lap and kiss him until he changed his mind and carried me upstairs. But maybe I knew myself too well to argue with him, because I only nodded.

  “I understand, Gideon. This—it’s enough.” I managed a tremulous smile. “We’re friends.”

  “We can be friends who hold hands, though, right?” His grin was crooked, but his tone held so much yearning that it almost pushed me over the edge into sobs. “I like this connection. I need it.” He lifted my knuckles to his mouth and brushed his lips over them. “I need you, Sarah. I need your friendship.”