DIRTY REBOUND

by Mira Lyn Kelly

  He would never want to hurt me. But maybe he didn’t think it would… because it wouldn’t matter to him. Because he’s already moved on and that crazy possessive side of him just isn’t engaged anymore.

  My stomach turns and I push my untouched dinner aside.

  God, I need to get over him. I need to put what we shared behind us… because we’re friends. And just like we’d agreed would happen, that’s all we are.

  My phone pings with a text from Jeremy letting me know he and Matty are on their way up. I dump my dinner in the trash and wipe down the table. Head over to the front door just as Jeremy knocks.

  The man is beyond dedicated to announcing his presence these days. Not that there’s anything to interrupt.

  I open the door and am rewarded with my own bit of sunshine when Matty gleefully throws his arms around me, thanking me for letting him stay longer. Then he’s whizzing past me, mouth moving a mile a minute, as he tells me about making eggs with Jeremy and the park where they raced and then finally that he’s going to take a shower and put all his things away on his own.

  And then he’s gone and Jeremy and I stand there in stunned silence for a few seconds before shaking our heads with a smile.

  “Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have given him the ice cream after dinner.” Walking past me, he holds up Matty’s bag. “Can I drop this in his room?”

  “That’s great, thank you. And thanks for bringing him home.”

  I hear the shower turn on, accompanied by a series of thuds that make me wonder how one small boy can make so much noise.

  Jeremy walks back out. “Least I could do.”

  He stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jeans and I can’t help but notice how different he looks doing it from Rux. How it almost makes his shoulders look smaller instead of bigger.

  Not that it matters.

  “Cam, I really appreciate what you did for me today.” He drops his head and lets out a long breath. “I appreciate every day. I know each one is a gift. That every time I get to see that boy smile or call me Dad, it’s because of you.”

  “Jeremy—”

  “Let me finish. Because, I’ve been wanting to say this for a while now and it never seems like the right time. But I need to get it out there.”

  “Okay. What do you want to say?”

  “For seven years, you did it all. You were mother and father—everything our son needed to grow into the incredible kid he is now. I know you didn’t get the breaks that come from having a second parent there with you every night. You didn’t have the shoulder to cry on when you were overwhelmed. And you didn’t have the one person who should have had your back through all the tough times. There’s nothing I can do about the past, no way I can convey how sorry I am. How much I wish I’d done everything different, starting with the day I walked out on you.”

  Jeremy has talked about this before. And I appreciate the way he is taking ownership of his mistakes. But tonight it feels different. Like he’s trying to tell me—

  “Babe, I never should have left you.” He steps into my space, eyes searching mine. “I’ve never stopped loving you.”

  No. I try to step back from what I should have seen coming, but the kiss catches me off guard. I freeze at the press of Jeremy’s mouth against my own, a kiss I haven’t had in more than seven years. One that’s both foreign and familiar.

  “Jeremy,” I choke, trying to break the contact with a gentle push. But when my hands meet his chest, his covers mine and the noise he makes is pure misguided relief.

  I pull away, shaking my head. “I’m sorry, Jeremy.”

  Chapter 27

  Rux

  The security in my building is top notch. No one gets in without approval. You can’t even get security to call me if you aren’t on a very short list.

  Jeremy Levenson is on that list. So when he shows up at the front desk demanding to see me at the ass crack of dawn, they call up… And my world fucking ends because the only scenarios that involve this dickhead coming to my place are worst case.

  The kind there’s no coming back from.

  Frantic, I trip getting out of bed, try to shake off the fog of sleep as I hop around, jerking on the first pants and T-shirt I can lay eyes on. I race out the front door, shoes in one hand, phone, wallet, and keys in the other.

  What if it’s Matty? Damn it, I can’t breathe even thinking about it. His little body. That joyful face and staggering mind. His generous joyful heart.

  I wish you were my dad.

  I double over, bracing a hand on the wall as I try to breathe through the searing pain in my chest. If it was Matty, Cammy wouldn’t leave him. But if it was Matty, and Cammy was okay… there’s no chance in hell she wouldn’t have called me herself.

  It doesn’t matter what’s been going on between us. She would have called, because she would need me. More than Jeremy, more than even Julia—I’m the one she can count on. The one she turns to. No matter what. Forever. She knows it.

  I know it. Christ, I feel like I’ve been back-checked into the boards.

  Why the hell did I ever think walking away was the right choice? That giving them up was even fucking possible?

  I can’t lose them.

  I can’t. I love them.

  I love them more than my own life. For once my eyes are open, and I’m praying for the chance to tell them. To beg Cammy for another chance to show her that I can be the man she deserves. That I want her in that white dress, smiling up at me. I want her today, tomorrow, and every moment of her forever.

  They have to be okay. They have to. I would know if they weren’t.

  Where the hell is the elevator!

  No missed calls or texts from Cammy, but my notifications are blowing up and I’m too terrified to open them.

  Pull it together, man. Be ready.

  I’ve got one shoe on by the time the elevator doors glide open and I get a look at Jeremy’s ravaged expression.

  They’re going to be okay. Because they have to.

  Hands limp at my sides, I stand. “Tell me.”

  Jeremy lurches forward and—

  “The fuck? Did you just punch me?”

  Based on the way he’s furiously cradling his hand, looks like it. And then I’m smiling, my heart starting to beat again. Because this fucker isn’t gutted… he’s pissed. And I’m about to drop to my damn knees for that, but I don’t want to risk Matty’s dad doing something stupid like breaking his other hand trying to hurt me. Especially when I’m going to win my girl back, right out from under him.

  “Dude, what’s your issue?”

  Jeremy sucks a breath, and stalks toward me. “My issue?” Clearly, I’m the only one who’s feeling some relief. “My issue is that you’re a goddamned hypocrite, Meyers. She’s in love with you!”

  The needle screeches off the vinyl and I blink.

  “She’s okay? Matty is okay?”

  “What? Yeah, they’re fine. Physically. But when they hear—”

  That torn up spot in my chest starts to beat again. One thump. Two… two thousand.

  “She loves me.” All this time, I’ve been reminding myself there was a difference between love and being in love. Trying to wrestle my emotions back across the line to protect her and Matty. But I’ve been an idiot to think anyone could protect the two people I love most in the world better than I would. “Hey, Jeremy. Man, your hand doesn’t look so good. Come in and I’ll get you some ice.”

  He laughs, but the sound is bitter and again I see that shift between pain and rage and back again in his eyes.

  “She told me last night. I thought with you two broken up and then you were out with that brunette—”

  “Wait, what?” The brunette like the nutritionist Coach made half the guys on the team hire?

  “—she’d be ready to give us another chance. I thought, deep down, she had to still love me the way I still love her. But she doesn’t.” He groans, his eyes shining. “Do you have any idea what it’s going to do to her when
she realizes that you lied to her? That you’re every damn bit as bad as I am. You’re worse.”

  She doesn’t love him.

  She loves me.

  He’s clearly worked up. And there’s something about what he’s saying I know I should pay attention to, but—

  “She hadn’t seen the article yet,” Jeremy snarls. “She doesn’t know that she picked the one guy she and Matty should trust even less than me.”

  “What article?” All the hope and joy and relief that had started filling my chest evaporates, replaced with a sinking sense of dread. Jeremy isn’t here swinging at me because he’s jealous. He’s here because he loves Cammy and whatever he read this morning was bad enough he was willing to take me on.

  “Here you’ve been looking at me like the worst kind of asshole. Like you’re so much better and you’d never let anyone down the way I did. Only that’s not true, is it?”

  Fuck. It’s not possible. There’s no way.

  Beth said she didn’t talk to Waters.

  But even as I pull up my phone and open the first notification, I know someone did. The headline comes up.

  “SLAYERS CAPTAIN RUXTON MEYERS ABANDONED PREGNANT HIGH SCHOOL GIRLFRIEND… Leadership abilities in question.”

  Cammy

  My hands are shaking, my eyes a blur of tears and confusion.

  It took everything I had to hold it together long enough for Natalie to come over and get Matty out of here. It’s not even eight in the morning and the phone’s been blowing up for an hour. One silent notification flashes across the screen after another. I can’t turn it off in case something comes up with Matty.

  And I can’t stop watching the screen, waiting for the one call I need more than my next breath… Rux telling me that it’s a lie. Because it has to be. I know it down to my soul, he wouldn’t have done that. I know him… he would never have walked away like Jeremy did. Never.

  He told me long ago that marriage and kids weren’t in the cards for him. That he wasn’t made of the stuff it took to be a good father or husband. But that doesn’t mean—

  The front door to the apartment bangs open and I jerk around to see Rux rushing in, regret carved into every line of his face.

  The dam inside me breaks and, holding out my phone, I choke on a sob. “Just tell me it isn’t true. I know it already. I do. But I just need you to say it.”

  There’s agony in his eyes and before he even opens his mouth, I want to call him a liar. Because it’s not possible.

  I know him.

  Rux is the most loyal man I’ve ever met. The most ridiculously dedicated and faithful.

  I love him.

  “It’s— Christ,” he chokes out, raking a hand over his haggard face. Haunted eyes meet mine and I wait, leaning into the silence. “We weren’t in high school.”

  And that’s when it hits me. This is the girl. The one he was so torn up over after it ended. This is what nearly cost him his career. Regret on a Rux-level scale.

  The air leaks from my lungs as I stumble toward the couch.

  Rux is there beside me, taking my hands in his. Telling me he’s sorry. He should have told me, but he was ashamed. All the while, I’m shaking my head, no. Thinking about those times I would see him staring at Matty with that strange mix of love, longing, and pain in his eyes.

  I know him.

  “Rux, make me understand,” I beg, tears running down my face. “Tell me what happened. Because that article makes it sound like you got your high school girlfriend pregnant… and left.” Left her to miscarry their baby alone. And never looked back.

  Pressing a hand against my belly, I fight the rise of nausea.

  I. Know. Him.

  “I left, but not because of the baby. Not because I didn’t want her.”

  “What?” I whisper, clutching at his forearms like I’m clutching at hope. “You didn’t abandon her?”

  “I might as well have. We were supposed to go to school together, but then at the last minute, I changed my mind and went to Juniors. She was so hurt. So mad. We’d had a plan, but I couldn’t stick to it. I saw my shot and had to take it. I should have talked to her about it first, brought her with me, something. But I thought one of us should get to go to school. Maybe it would have been different if I did.”

  “She got pregnant?”

  “Just before I got picked up in the draft. I found out when I surprised her at school.” He swallows hard. Meets my eyes with a bleakness that devastates me. “She wasn’t going to tell me. I begged her to keep the baby. We were supposed to get married. We’d planned it. I bought her a ring.”

  “Rux, why would she tell Waters you abandoned her?”

  He looks past me. “She didn’t. She called me a while ago. Let me know he’d been digging around. When she didn’t give him anything, he must have found out about it from someone else.”

  “Did she lose the baby?” It’s what the article said. But the way he said he begged her to keep it has me bracing for something else.

  “She told me we could talk about it. But when I came back the next night she’d already terminated it. I—fuck, I know it’s her choice, but I was wrecked. I asked her why she wouldn’t wait for me. She was so angry.” His head drops low. “She said I’d let her down too many times already. She’d seen what kind of man I was, only good for a good time. But I was unreliable, and the only thing she could count on was if she’d decided to keep the baby with me, she’d have two children to raise alone.”

  “Why would she say those things to you?” I gasp, breaking beneath the pure anguish in his words.

  “She was angry. At herself. At me. It took a few years, eventually she sent me a letter. The baby wasn’t mine. She felt like I’d abandoned her at school. Saw the posts on social from me hanging with guys outside of practice. It always looked like a party. And one night she drank too much and made a bad decision. Didn’t know how to own up to it and it just got worse when I found out.” His breath leaks out and he rubs his eyes with the heels of his hands. “If she’d told me, I would have forgiven her. I would have loved them both.”

  Oh God. “Rux, I’m so sorry.”

  “No.” He turns to me. “Cammy, I’m the one who’s sorry. I’m sorry you had to find out like this. That it scared you. That it hurt you.”

  “I wish you’d told me, but only because I hate that you’ve been carrying this alone all this time. I hate that there is any part of you blaming yourself.” I hate that I suddenly understand those times that he joked about never getting married because he didn’t want to have the kind of power to wreck someone’s life like that. That when he leaned in and kissed my cheek telling me he’d rather be my bestie and keep me forever… I should have told him then and there that he would never let me down.

  I reach for him, stroke his cheek.

  His eyes close and then, because he really is the most perfect man, he pulls me into his lap and holds me against his chest. We stay like that for a long time, just holding each other. When his hand moves over my back, I sit up and—

  “What are you wearing?”

  Brows buckling, he looks down… and laughs.

  I press my hand to his chest, and sigh. “There’s my sunshine.” Because that’s what he is.

  He shakes his head, gives me a crooked smile. “I was in kind of a rush this morning. Grabbed the first things I could get my hands on without thinking much about it.”

  And apparently the first things were his tuxedo pants and the T-shirt I got him to match the panties he’d gotten for me. It says, I licked him so he’s mine, across the chest.

  I run my fingers over those words, wishing they were true. Wishing this man was mine in all the ways a man could be.

  I’m going to have to tell him I love him one of these days. I don’t want any more secrets between us, and he can handle it. I know him.

  Rux’s big hand closes over mine.

  My cheeks start to heat, and I realize what I was doing. That that reverent touch wasn’t exactly on the r
ight side of platonic. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be. I mean, it’s true. You licked it and it’s yours.”

  He doesn’t mean it like I want him to.

  He draws that trapped hand to the center of his chest, flattening it over his heart. “But this, pretty sure this has been yours far longer than that.”

  I blink. Feel those tears I’d barely gotten control of threatening a return.

  He means in the way friends hold each other’s hearts. Because we’re besties.

  Right?

  I meet his eyes.

  I know him. I trust him.

  “I love you,” I whisper, trusting that he knows me the same way.

  The corner of his mouth hooks up and my belly does a little flutter. “Like love, love?”

  My hand presses harder and I let him see all the things I’ve been trying to hide for these past weeks. “Like I’ve been dying without you, my heart breaking a little more every time I saw you and knew I needed to let you go.”

  “I wanted you to have more. I thought I couldn’t give you the kind of confidence and security you deserved in your forever. But Cammy, I swear, I’m never going to stop working to become the man you deserve.”

  I shake my head. “Rux, do you love, love me?”

  “So fucking much.”

  “Then you’ve already given me everything that matters, more than I ever dreamed of.”

  He swallows, opens his mouth. Closes it and looks away. But then looks back and it’s there in his eyes. The future neither of us ever believed we could have, the one we were too scared to see, but had been waiting for us all along.

  “I love you, Cammy. I love Matty. And I’m going to ask you to marry me, but not yet.”

  I lean back and whisper, “What?”

  “Yeah, don’t want you to think it’s just Rux being Rux, all rash and impulsive.”

  I shake my head. “But what if I love Rux being Rux, and rash and impulsive are a couple of my favorite things about you. Like loyal, loving, dedicated…”

  God, that smile!

  “Cammy?”

  “Rux.”