Heartless

by Jennifer Sucevic

  “Awesome, man!” His head bobs manically.

  “Great.” I give Skye a bit of side-eye and her smile widens. Normally, I don’t mind being recognized, but right now, all I want is to enjoy a little one-on-one time with her. I’ve been looking forward to it all damn day.

  “Hunter, this is my friend, Max. We have sociology together.”

  Cool. Now leave.

  “Nice to meet you,” I say with far more politeness than I’m feeling.

  “Right back at you!” Max enthuses. “I’m a huge fan! I can’t wait to see where you get drafted this spring.”

  “Yeah, me, too,” I agree.

  Skye clears her throat as Max continues to stare worshipfully. “Hunter and I are meeting up to work on a project for our health class.”

  “Oh.” Max’s face falls as he shifts his weight. “I guess I should leave you guys to it.”

  Yup, that’s exactly what you should do.

  “I’ll see you in class, Max,” she says.

  “Yup, catch you on Tuesday.” His gaze strays to mine. “Hey, Price…I was wondering if maybe you’d like to grab a beer later.” He pauses before tacking on, “You know, if you’re not too busy.”

  Ummm…

  This conversation has definitely taken a turn for the awkward.

  I glance at Skye, hoping she’s going to throw me a much-needed lifeline. But her head is bowed, and her shoulders are shaking. Clearly, I can’t count on her for any help.

  “Thanks for the offer, but I think Skye and I are going to be here for a while.”

  A crestfallen expression flits across his face. “No problem.” He jerks his thumb toward a table on the other side of the second floor. “I should probably get back to what I was doing.”

  When I nod, he adds, “Maybe we can grab that beer some other time.”

  Sheesh.

  “Sure.”

  His smile broadens, overtaking his face. He looks like a kid on Christmas morning. “Great!”

  I give him a small salute when he finally takes off.

  That was seriously painful.

  Once he’s gone, Skye glances up at me with a smile simmering around the corners of her lips. Well, I’m glad someone found the situation amusing. It sure as hell wasn’t me.

  I slide onto the chair across from her and unpack my computer from my backpack.

  When she remains silent, I nod toward the table her friend now occupies. “He seems nice.” In a creepy stalker kind of way.

  She glances at him and shrugs. “He’s a good guy.” A smile flashes across her lips. “He liked you a lot.”

  I roll my eyes. There are a ton of people like that on campus. Cleat sniffers and jersey chasers. What I’ve come to realize is that it’s not you specifically they’re interested in, it’s your celebrity. The sooner you can grasp that, the sooner you can weed out those kinds of individuals. It’s best to keep a tight circle of friends that you can trust.

  It was always Skye who was the most important person in my circle.

  Silently I acknowledge that Mason may have guilted her into taking off, but I’m the one who lashed out and hurt her when she returned. What I did was unforgivable.

  I know it.

  And so does she.

  Just like Skye said at the beach—we can’t alter the past, we can only change the future.

  I clear those thoughts away before digging around in my backpack and grabbing my health class folder. Nerves churn in my gut as I slide it across the table toward her. “There’s something I want to show you.”

  Her brows furrow as she picks up the folder. “What’s this?”

  I gesture toward the red plastic she now holds in her hands. “Open it and see.”

  My breath lodges in my throat as she pulls out the twenty-five-page paper I’ve been working on in my spare time. It’s not like I have a ton of it, but it’s funny how much time opens up when you stop playing video games and hanging out with the guys.

  “I don’t understand,” she mumbles, thumbing through the pages before glancing up at me.

  Even though I shrug, wanting to play it casual, my heart jackhammers painfully in my chest. It’s only now that I wonder if she’ll be pissed off. What if she’s mad that I wrote it up myself without asking for her input? We’ve been emailing back and forth, so I was able to take what she sent and synthesized it into a cohesive piece about vaccinations. I also spoke with my childhood pediatrician and got his professional opinion on the matter before emailing a spokesperson from an anti-vax group, the National Vaccine Information Center, along with The World Health Organization who is a proponent for vaccines. In the end, I feel like it’s a pretty damn good paper.

  But…that doesn’t necessarily mean Skye will appreciate me hijacking the project.

  The longer she remains silent, the more jacked up I feel, which is ridiculous. I have nerves of steel. On a weekly basis, I play football in front of ten thousand screaming fans and have to make split-second decisions that could potentially cost us games. And somehow, this means more.

  Skye means more.

  “It’s finished?” Shock reverberates throughout her voice. “You completed the entire project?”

  “Um, yeah.” I’m tempted to rip the paper from her fingers and stuff it in my bag. “I had some extra time. It wasn’t a big deal.”

  “Wasn’t a big deal?” she echoes, carefully looking over the pages. “You contacted the World Health Organization and,” she points a finger at the third paragraph on page ten, “an anti-vax group?” Her wide eyes lift to mine.

  “Yeah, they were awesome about getting back to me and answering my questions. So was Dr. Zelman, my old pediatrician.” I clear my throat. “We’re going to grab lunch next week.”

  Skye collapses against her chair and shakes her head. “I can’t believe you did this.”

  “Are you mad?” Honestly, I can’t tell.

  Her gaze falls to the paper before she blinks her eyes.

  Well, shit…she’s crying. No one cries over something happy. Especially schoolwork.

  “Look,” my voice rises in panic as I wave my hand toward the folder. “If you don’t like how I organized the information, feel free to add whatever you want, or we can start over from scratch. I don’t really care.”

  “What?” Skye glances at me with tears swimming in her eyes. “Redo it? Why would I want to do that? It’s absolutely perfect.”

  The air rushes from my lungs as everything in me collapses with relief. Okay. Good. She’s not pissed off, but she’s still upset. “Then why are you crying?”

  A tear treks slowly down her face and her voice fills with emotion. “I can’t believe you did something like this.”

  Doesn’t she get it?

  I would do anything for her.

  “I know you’ve got a lot going on and I thought if I took care of this on my own, you wouldn’t have to stress over it. Then you could spend more time with your dad.”

  Wetness slides down her cheeks as she glances at the paper in her hands. “This is really amazing, Hunter. Thank you.”

  Unable to bear Skye’s tears, I pop to my feet and walk around the table before hunkering down in front of her. I slip her hands into my own. As I do, everything settles inside me.

  “Whatever I can do to help you, I’ll do it.” Maybe this isn’t the time or place, but I can’t hold back anymore. I don’t want her to ever doubt my feelings. “I love you, Skye. I always have. Even when I didn’t want to, you were still there in my heart.”

  She sucks in a shaky breath before her teeth sink into her lower lip.

  Yup. It was too soon. I should have kept my feelings to myself. Instead, I blew my load and ruined everything. If I know Skye, she’ll probably push me away again and I’ll be back to square one.

  Hastily I add, “I get that you’re not there yet, but I hope someday, you’ll love me the way you used to. For now, I’ll be the kind of friend you can lean on.” I swallow down my disappointment. “Even if that means you nee
d to date other people.” I jerk my head toward the guy on the other side of the library and force out the rest. “Like Max. Although, as your friend, I’m going to be completely honest. You can do a lot better than—”

  She slips a hand free from mine before laying it across my lips and silencing me.

  “Shush.”

  My brows rise.

  “Is it my turn to talk yet?” she asks.

  I nod and wait. I’ve kind of made a mess of things. Usually I’m smooth when it comes to the ladies, but not with Skye.

  “You’re right, I wanted time to deal with what’s going on with my dad. I didn’t want to think about anything else, but you’ve made that impossible. You’ve been here for me when I’ve needed you the most. As much as I’ve tried to move on, I couldn’t do it.”

  Does that mean what I think it does?

  “I love you, Hunter,” she whispers.

  A huge grin breaks out across my face as relief rushes through my body, filling me with a happiness I haven’t felt since we broke up.

  “I love you, too.” I jump to my feet, tugging her up with me before yanking her into my arms and sealing the moment with a kiss. I pull away enough to add, “So.” I smack my lips against hers. “Fucking.” One more time. “Much.”

  Her lips curve and when her mouth opens, my tongue slips inside.

  God, I’ve missed this.

  Someone clears their throat from behind us and we jump apart only to find one of the librarians glaring at us with her hands planted firmly on her hips.

  “Perhaps you two should take this elsewhere,” she grumbles.

  That’s the best damn idea I’ve heard all day.

  I grin at Skye. “What do you say? Are you ready to take this elsewhere?”

  A blush fills her cheeks as she nods.

  “Perfect.” I shove everything into my backpack as she does the same, then I grab her hand and tug her down the steps and out the library doors.

  Now…I’m sure you’re thinking that I’m going to go all caveman on this girl and drag her back to my place so I can have my wicked way with her.

  Well, guess what?

  You couldn’t be more wrong. My plan is to take this nice and slow. We’re going to ease back into this relation—

  “Want to go back to my place and fool around?” she asks.

  “Fuck yeah! I thought you’d never ask!”

  With that, I grab her hand, clenching it tightly in my own. I let her get away once, there’s no way in hell I’ll let it happen again.

  Epilogue

  Hunter

  Eighteen months later…

  S kye wades out into the water with a small decorative box that holds her father’s ashes. As much as I hate the ocean, there’s no way I’d let her do this alone. Once the water swirls around her calves, she turns until the wind hits her back as it whips toward the shore. I step behind her and slip my arms around her waist before resting my chin on the top of her head.

  As we stand silently, her body trembles with emotion. It’s been more than a year since Dean passed away. Some days, the grief nearly eats Skye alive. The hole he left in her life has been impossible to fill, but I’ve been doing my best to ease the ache of his loss.

  This trip to Claremont has been an emotional one for her. Even though Dean has been gone for a while, this is just another part of the grieving process she has to pass through.

  “It’s time, babe,” I whisper in her ear. “Time to let him go.”

  Skye nods as if she knows this in her heart but is unwilling to accept the reality. “I wish he would have lived long enough to see me graduate.”

  “Me, too.” I press a tender kiss to the top of her head. “But he did get to walk you down the aisle.”

  She turns until our gazes can lock. Even though her lips lift into a ghost of a smile, tears stream freely down her face. “Thank you for that. It meant so much to Dad.”

  I shrug. “We both know it was only a matter of time before it happened.” The circumstances might have been less than ideal, but after being separated from Skye for three years, I was more than happy to make her my wife and bind her to me for the rest of our lives.

  A soft sigh escapes from her lips. “Do you have any idea how much I love you?”

  My heart clenches. There’s no way I could ever tire of hearing her say those words. There was a time when I didn’t know if she could feel that way about me again. The fact that Skye was able to forgive me makes me feel like the luckiest bastard in the world.

  We’ve been married for more than a year now and it’s been the most amazing time of my life. Everyone has always assumed that my dream was to play professional football and I’m not going to lie, I did want that, but it was never more than I wanted Skye. Without this woman standing by my side, all of my accomplishments would be meaningless.

  After graduation, we settled into our life in Atlanta. I was drafted by the Falcons and started training camp in the summer. Skye applied to and was accepted at Georgia State for graduate school. She’s working on a master’s degree in educational psychology so she can become a school counselor. We’ve also been talking about starting a family. Once she finishes school and finds a job, we’ll work on that. For the time being, we’re enjoying our life together.

  “It can’t be more than I love you,” I tell her because it’s the truth.

  The water continues to lap at our legs as Skye holds the tiny turquoise and silver box clenched tightly in her hands. Even though her father will always be in her heart, it’s still difficult to let him go.

  It’s gently that I ask, “Should we do it together?”

  The breath she had been holding escapes in a rush as she nods. Carefully I place my hands over hers as we open the box and then the small bag inside that holds a portion of Dean’s ashes. Together we turn it over until all of the tiny fragments scatter before getting carried away on the breeze.

  I tighten my hold on Skye as she sobs quietly in my arms. “He was so proud of you, baby.”

  She sniffles and continues to fight back the emotion. “I miss him so much.”

  “I know. It’s going to take time but eventually, the pain of his loss will lessen. You’ll remember all the good times you spent with him. Your dad wouldn’t want you to mourn him forever. He’d want you to live your best life and find your happiness.”

  Her gaze latches onto mine. “I did find my happiness. You.”

  Those words mean everything. “I’m always going to make you happy, baby. Always.”

  She tilts her head until I can capture her lips with my own. The sun breaks free from the clouds and beats down on us.

  This woman owns me heart and soul.

  And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  ~The End~

  Just Friends

  Chapter One

  Reed

  W ith a sigh, I collapse onto the couch in the living room of the house I share with a couple of guys from the hockey team and pop open a can of cold beer, guzzling down half of it in one thirsty swig.

  Goddamn, but that hits the spot.

  Know what else would hit the spot?

  Yeah, you do.

  It’s the second week of September and Coach Richards has us skating two-a-days, lifting weights, and running five miles for extra cardio.

  As if we need it.

  Oh…and he added yoga to this year’s regimen.

  Fucking yoga.

  Can you believe that shit?

  Let me be perfectly clear about this, I’m not into contorting my body into a pretzel and breathing deeply from my diaphragm. Sure, I get it. He wants us to work on our flexibility. And I’ll do it, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

  Coach R is a total masochist.

  Or is it sadist?

  I can never keep those two straight.

  No matter. Whatever kind of ist he is, the man thoroughly enjoys working our asses over. The only amusement I get is from listening to all the incoming freshman piss and moan about
what a tough schedule we have.

  Welcome to Division I hockey, boys. Buckle up, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

  Pile on fifteen credit hours and I don’t have time for much else.

  “Reed, baby, I’ve been waiting all night for you to return.”

  A curvy female drops onto my lap like an angel falling from heaven before she twines her slender arms around my neck and pulls me close.

  I stand corrected. There’s always time for that.

  Hell, half the time, that’s what gets me through the grind. Sex is an amazing stress reliever and don’t let anyone tell you differently. I’m way more chill after I’ve blown my load. And if I’m fortunate enough to do it twice in one night, then it’s like I’ve slipped into a damn coma.

  Pure bliss, baby.

  Luckily for us, the Red Devils hockey team has its fair share of puck bunnies on campus who are always willing to provide some much-needed stress relief on a regular basis. God bless every last one of those ladies. They have no idea how much their team spirit is appreciated.

  That being said, there are always exceptions to the rule.

  And the girl currently cozied up on my lap is the exception to my rule.

  Megan thrusts out her lower lip in a sexy pout. “How is it possible that we’ve never hooked up before?”

  The answer is simple. I go to great lengths to avoid her like a particularly nasty case of crabs.

  Megan flutters her mascara-laden lashes and tilts her head. Her voice becomes lispy and toddlerish as she twirls a dark curl around her finger. “Don’t you think I’m pretty?”

  Pretty?

  No, Megan is flat out gorgeous.

  Her long black hair is as shiny as a crow’s wing as it floats around her shoulders in soft waves. She has dark eyes that are tipped at the corners giving her an exotic look. And her skin is sun-kissed all year round. If that weren’t enough to have any guy giving her a full-on salute, she’s got gravity defying tits and a nice round ass.

  Have I imagined fucking her from behind and smacking that bubble butt a few times before blowing my wad?