Change of Hart

by M. E. Carter

  Realization crossed her face. “Because celebrities keep their mouths shut about each other.”

  I shrugged. “It’s not my secret to tell.”

  “Which I’m normally thankful for,” Sara said. “But right now Elaine and I both want to kick his ass for not telling you this sooner.”

  Addison turned to look at Sara. “But why is it such a big secret?”

  Sara sighed. “Two reasons, actually. The first has to do with my public image. My publicist and agent and everyone know. We’ve had discussions and decided that if I’m going to have a sexy bombshell image, we need to let people see that public image. It kind of sucks, but with Elaine being my manager, she still gets to travel with me and we live together. We’ve learned to deal with it. We look at it as the same kind of situation a rock star might be in . . . sure he may be married with kids and on the PTA. But when he’s on stage, he’s a flirt who drips of sex appeal and makes everyone want him. Same thing.”

  “What’s the second reason?” Mick asked.

  “That one is not as easy to answer,” she said with a sigh. “I grew up in an extremely judgmental, religious home. Not like Elaine’s,” she said with a smile. “Elaine’s family loves Jesus and goes to all kinds of Bible studies. But there is not a judgmental bone in their bodies. They don’t necessarily agree with us, but they love Elaine and me for who we are. Truth be told, it makes me like their Jesus, too,” she said with a smile. That smile faded quickly. “But my family . . . if they knew I was living with a woman, the very strained relationship I already have with my parents would be severed. My mom has been sick in recent years and I just don’t feel comfortable coming out of the closet knowing I might not have enough time left to fix it if our relationship went wrong.” She shrugged. “Again, it sucks, but Elaine gets it. And she’s ok with it.”

  Addison nodded. I could see the wheels turning in her brain as she processed all this new information. We all sat quietly, watching her sort through it all. Finally, she closed her eyes as she prepared what she wanted to say. This had shaken her to her core. I wasn’t about to push her to explain how she felt.

  “I get it. I do,” she said. “I understand why you couldn’t tell me the truth about Sara. That’s her story to tell and there’s a lot at stake if word got out.” I nodded in agreement. “But why didn’t you tell me you had to stay in New York? Why didn’t you tell me you were going out on a publicity date before I had to find out about it from Samantha?” The tears started flowing down her cheeks again. “Do you know how that felt? Like . . . like . . .”

  “Like it was happening all over again?” I said, finishing her thought for her.

  “Exactly,” she said. “Like it was happening all over again. And I kept thinking, what did I do to deserve this? Why did it have to happen? Twice?” She was full-on crying now and I couldn’t keep myself away any longer. I swiftly moved off my chair and kneeled between her legs, cupping her face in my hands so she would look me in the eyes.

  “Do you know I have been beside myself all day, knowing that my stupidity made you feel that way? Ask Sara . . . I’ve been driving her crazy.” I wiped some of her tears away with my thumbs. “I never, ever wanted to make you feel like you weren’t the most important thing in my life. Addison,” I said, scooting a little closer and wiping her hair off her face. “I am so fully, completely in love with you. I didn’t want to tell you that in front of an audience, but you need to know the truth. I have been in love with you, well, probably since the day you first walked into that stadium. I never, ever want to make you feel like he did.”

  She was sobbing now as her body collapsed forward into my chest. I wrapped my arms around her, around this woman I loved so much, and just let her cry it out. When she calmed down enough, she pulled away and looked around for something. Sara apparently anticipated this move and quickly handed her a tissue.

  “I feel so stupid, being all dramatic about something that didn’t actually happen,” Addison said with a grimace.

  “I don’t think that’s the only thing you’re crying about,” I said, rubbing my hands down her arms.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, wiping her nose again as she sniffled.

  “I know things were bad with Austin toward the end. Really bad. But babe, it hasn’t even been a year since he died.” Her shoulders slumped as I talked. “I know you don’t miss the guy he was when he died. But I think you’ve spent a lot of time avoiding grieving over the man he was when you married him.”

  “He’s right, Addison,” Mick said, causing us to look over at him. “I know you think I didn’t know what he was up to, but I knew the whole time. In fact, the last conversation we ever had was me telling him I was disappointed in the way he was treating you. It may be the biggest regret of my life that it was the last time I ever spoke to him, but it was the truth.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” Addison asked.

  He shrugged. “We were all struggling with our own demons after he died. What was the point in bringing it up? But I think Jason is right. I never saw you break down and grieve over what was lost. Not after the affair. Not after the accident. Not after any of it. I think some of what you’re feeling right now is all that old stuff finally coming up.”

  She nodded as she started sniffling again. “When I saw those pictures on the internet, I wanted to call Austin so bad,” she said to me as the tears started to roll. “Not the guy from a year ago. But the guy I met in college. The guy who was my best friend. The guy who couldn’t wait to propose and yelled ‘I’m getting laid!’ through the roof of the limo after our wedding. I miss him so much.” She fell into my chest again. The crying wasn’t as hard this time. It was more like she was leaning on me for support.

  “I know, babe. And it’s ok with me if you miss him. As much as I wanna punch him in the nuts for what he did to you, I think he was probably a really good guy deep down. And I’m not gonna take that away from you.”

  She nodded, her breath still hitching from all the crying. It was gonna take a while for her to finally calm down. “I’m sorry for being a drama queen,” she said, quietly avoiding my eyes.

  “I’m sorry for being a dumbass who can’t remember his own schedule,” I said, causing her to look up and give me a half-hearted smile.

  “I’m sorry I believed the stupid internet before talking to you about it.”

  “I’m sorry I waited until we had a room full of nosy nellies to tell you how much I love you.” A smile crossed her face and she wiped her nose again.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t say it back,” she said quietly.

  “Addison,” I said, inching closer to her.

  “Yeah,” she said, looking right in my eyes.

  “I love you so much.”

  She smiled. “I love you so much, too.”

  And I kissed her. I kissed her until she pulled away because she couldn’t breathe, which wasn’t long considering how long she’d been crying. And then I picked her up, spun around and sat down on the couch with her in my lap, wrapping my arms around her, just soaking up everything that had gone down in the last twelve hours.

  “Well, I think my work here is done,” Sara said, standing up quickly. “Mick, would you mind giving me a lift to the airport?”

  “I would,” Mick said with his usual southern drawl, “but I don’t have a car here, remember?”

  “And you don’t even have a plane ticket to get home yet,” I added. “Maybe you should call your girlfriend and have her hurry up and book you a flight.”

  “Hmm. Good point,” she said with her hands on her hips. “Well, how about, Mick, you and I head into Jaxon’s room and play Legos for a bit so these two lovebirds can regroup.”

  “That actually sounds like a good idea,” he said as he stood up and walked toward her. “You can tell me about that Leo DiCaprio fella. You ever work with him?” His voice faded away as they made their way down the hall.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked after several minutes of silence.
She was just snuggled into me as I rubbed her back and kissed the top of her head.

  “Better, actually,” she said, pulling away and looking up at me. “I guess I didn’t realize how much all of that was taking me back to a bad place with Austin. I’m not even sure how much of that was about you. It’s kind of a weird feeling. Like I freaked out over nothing.”

  “It wasn’t nothing, baby,” I reassured, still rubbing her arms and legs. I didn’t want to stop touching her. I had gotten too close to losing her. “I think it was a long time coming. And my dumb-assery was just the catalyst of it all.”

  “Dumb-assery?” she giggled. “What kind of word is that?”

  “It is the kind that perfectly describes how badly my ideas go wrong sometimes.”

  “I have another phrase that describes you sometimes.”

  “You do?” I asked, moving my hand behind her neck. “What’s that?”

  “Sweet fuckery,” she said seductively.

  “Addison Bryant!” I said as I feigned offense. “Are you making a comment about my sweet skills in the bedroom?”

  She grinned as I leaned closer to her. “Maybe. We’ll have to do some research a little later so I can see how sweet those skills really are.”

  I looked into her eyes, so bright and, what was the word I used when I first met her? Oh, yeah—joyful—and I fell in love with her all over again. Now that I had told her, there’s wasn’t gonna be a day that went by without me making sure she knew, knew how I felt. I’d make sure of it.

  “I love you, Addison.”

  “I love you, too, Jason,” she said, cupping my cheek with her hand. “Now shut up and kiss me.”

  So I did.

  Sara and Mick left a little while later after Elaine coordinated a car to take Sara to the airport and drop Mick off at home. The two of them got along ridiculously well. So much so that Mick invited her to bring Elaine down for New Year’s Eve. Apparently, Mick’s entire street loaded up on fireworks every December and they shot them off until the surrounding neighbors finally called the cops on them. It was a sight I was looking forward to seeing.

  After they left, I excused myself to the spare bedroom so I could call my mom and Lindsay. As I suspected, I got a nice-sized ass chewing from my mom and was called quite a few choice words by Lindsay. I was looking forward to hearing how Emma used those same words the next day at school, since Lindsay always seemed to forget her child’s ears were more powerful than a freaking sonar.

  The biggest relief, however, was Jaxon. He came out of his room with Mick and Sara looking a little hesitant about what to expect. But when he saw his mom laughing at something dumb I’d just said, his eyes got bright and he gave me a big thumbs up. Then he asked me to make hot dogs on the grill for dinner. How could I say no to that?

  I helped Jaxon with his homework while Addison cleaned up after dinner. I wouldn’t call second grade math hard. But they definitely don’t teach it the way they did when I was a kid. I had no idea what all these number lines and block graphs were for. He probably helped me more than I helped him. The entire evening felt very . . . domestic. And I loved every second of it.

  I spent the night for the first time that night. It had been such an emotional day that I didn’t want to leave Addison, even for the night. She seemed to agree with that, so I stayed. Despite our earlier banter, when I slid under the covers and wrapped my arms around her, there were no thoughts of sex. Just sleeping next to the woman I loved. It was kind of a revelation. For the first time in my life, I was starting to understand what true intimacy was all about.

  “‘Carter, what do you want to grow up to be?’” The next morning, Jaxon was reading out loud while I got in some pushups. “Carter thought for a moment, while he chewed his peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Then his face brightened and he said, ‘I know what I want to be—I want to be a kangaroo!”

  “Good morning,” I heard Addison say as she padded into the room with a yawn. And then she stopped. “Ummmm . . . what are you doing?”

  “Reading ‘Carter Kangaroo,’” Jaxon said. “Jason said I needed to get a jump on my reading log for school ‘cause Christmas is coming and we want Santa to know I’m studying really hard.”

  “Okaaaay,” she said slowly. “Jason, what are you doing?”

  “Push-ups,” I grunted as I kept count in my head.

  “I can see that,” she said. “Why are you doing push-ups while Jax is sitting on your back, reading?”

  “Forty-nine, fifty.” I slowly lowered myself to the floor. “Ok, bud, you can get off now.” Jaxon rolled off me and sat next to me. “I canceled my workout with Deuce so I could take you guys to work and school this morning. So I thought Jaxon could help me get a few reps in before practice.”

  “Isn’t it hard to do push-ups that way, though?” she asked, still looking confused. “Isn’t he heavy?”

  “Not really. I’ve had bigger people sit on me while I push-up,” I said, waggling my eyebrows at her.

  “Ohmygod,” she said with a laugh. “You are such a dork.”

  I smiled at her as she headed toward the coffeemaker. “That’s a fresh pot in there.”

  “Wow,” she said over her shoulder as she poured a cup. “I could get used to this.”

  “It’s nice, isn’t it?” I agreed. She turned and looked at me, taking a sip of her java.

  “You know what would be even nicer?” I asked her as I stood up to give her a good morning kiss.

  “What’s that?”

  “For you to hurry up and get dressed so I can take my two favorite people to breakfast.” I slapped her on the ass and she squealed.

  “Hurry up, Mom!” Jaxon cried. “I wanna have some pancakes before school!”

  So she did. And we did. Have pancakes that is. Then I got in line behind all the other parents dropping their kids off for school and let Jaxon out right at the front door of the building. It was apparently Lindsay’s day to help the kids through the car line. When she saw me driving up, she caught my eye, and I just smiled as she shook her head and rolled her eyes at me in amusement.

  Dropping Addison off took a little longer. Her goodbye kisses and “I love you’s” weren’t nearly as quick. She finally pulled herself away from me when she saw her boss drive up and got nervous that we’d be caught making out in the front seat like teenagers. I let her, but only after she agreed to let me pick her up again after she was done.

  I spent the rest of the day with a goofy grin on my face. No one said anything about it except Deuce, of course, who would never miss an opportunity to razz me. I shut him up real quick when I asked if he had poked his baby in the head yet when he had sex. I couldn’t help myself. I knew he was gonna be running home to scour through that damn baby book to make sure he wasn’t going to inflict any brain damage on the kid.

  As I hit the road to head back north to Addison’s house, I couldn’t help but realize how full circle it had all come for me. I had grown up in that town. One of my best friends lived there. And now, the woman I loved lived there with her son, whom I also loved. Never in my life did I expect to fall in love with something or someone more than I was in love with football. But here I was, goofy grin still hanging on. And for the first time ever, I could honestly say I had never been happier.

  9 months later

  It was the first game of the season and we were pumped. The rookies were finally starting to gel with the veterans on the team and I knew we had a fighting chance at making the Super Bowl this year.

  Of course, I said that every year and it hadn’t happened yet. So what did I know?

  “I know you’re tired, baby,” Deuce said gently into the phone. “I won’t screw around after the game is over. I’ll come straight home, I promise.”

  Deuce had calmed down a lot since little Michael Johnson the Third had been born a few months ago. The baby was cute, but apparently he was colicky so neither Deuce nor Vanessa were getting much sleep. I had no idea what all that entailed, but I knew it wasn’t good so I
tried not to poke fun at him too much about his sad lack of a sex life.

  As I suited up, my phone beeped. I picked it up and checked the text.

  Addison: We’re here and wearing your jersey. Have a great game. We love you!

  She ended the text with a selfie of her and Jax in their seats wearing my number. Damn, I loved that woman.

  “Well, look who’s still hanging out in Dallas, being his big bad self.” I turned around to find my favorite reporter, Catherine Hernandez, standing across the room with her hands on her hips.

  “Hey!” I said, walking over to give her a hug. “What are you doing in a nasty-ass football locker room? Aren’t you supposed to be hobnobbing with all those pussies you call football players in San Diego?”

  She smiled. “Yeah, but I was sent here to cover a story about a drug ring that has a connection in both our cities. So the bosses had me stop by and get some footage while I’m here. Anyway, how the hell are you?”

  “I’m great,” I said with a smile, lacing up my cleats and grabbing my gloves. “I really can’t complain.”

  “Not even about Gill?” she chided.

  I groaned. “Don’t remind me. She’s like a boil on my ass and she just won’t go away.”

  Catherine laughed. “Yeah, I’m not sad about leaving that one behind.” She looked over at Deuce who was still on the phone. “What’s the matter with him? He’s not as . . . hyper as he used to be.”

  “He became a daddy to a baby with colic,” I said, patting him on the shoulder. He flipped me the bird, not even bothering to turn around in the process. I just laughed.

  “That explains it. How about you, Hart?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest. “I hear you’ve gotten pretty serious about some woman since I’ve been gone.”

  I broke out into a wide grin. “Addison, yeah. She’s amazing.”

  “I’m glad,” she said, patting me on the arm. “I always wondered when the right woman would come along and snatch you up. You’re too good of a catch to be single the rest of your life.”