The Single Dad - A Standalone Romance (A Single Dad Firefighter Romance)

by Claire Adams

  “Get the hell out of here before I call one of the RAs and tell them you’re harassing me,” I told the big, beefy guy, scowling at him before I slammed the door in his face. I twisted the lock and stormed away from the door, telling myself I’d give him two minutes before I checked to make sure he was actually gone.

  I went into my room and threw myself onto the bed, shaking slightly. Who was that guy to tell me not to have anything to do with Zack? I shook my head, feeling the anger boiling up inside of me, twisting my stomach into knots. I couldn’t get comfortable. I sat up, threw myself back down, got out of bed and sat down at my desk; I couldn’t even manage to get into the reading assignment for one of my classes. Part of me wanted to call Zack and tell him what his teammate had just done. I went through my bag to find my phone and looked at it for a long time; but I couldn’t quite make myself make the call.

  I put my phone back down and considered it. What reason would the guy have to ask me to stay away from Zack? The guy would have had to have come directly from practice to be waiting at my dorm when I got there; had something come up during practice—had Zack told his teammates about ending up in bed with me? The thought of that brought the anger boiling up even more; if he had told his friends he’d gone straight from the dining hall to my dorm and convinced me to sleep with him, I would kill him. But then, I remembered the spectacle he’d created. The guy who’d been at my door had been sitting right next to him—he had probably taken the proclamation of love at least a little seriously.

  I chewed on my bottom lip, thinking about it. Even if Zack hadn’t told his teammates about getting into my pants, I doubted that Zack went around jumping onto tables and proclaiming that he was hung up on girls on a regular basis. The team was reaching the end of its season, and they were close to that elusive ideal—the perfect win-loss record. I got up from my desk and left my room, going to the door to the common area and opening it hesitantly. The guy who’d stood there waiting for me was gone. I went back to my room and climbed into my bed, thinking about the situation from the team’s perspective. I could see where they’d be worried that Zack would get distracted by the prospect of dating me—or anyone. The team only had one more game in the regular season to get through, and then they would be into the national championships. With their record they would be playing against a top-tier school for sure—but a perfect record would definitely bolster their hopes.

  I looked at my phone again and decided that at least until the end of the season—only a couple of weeks or so away—I could afford to put the possibility of a relationship with Zack on hold. It wasn’t that I was doing what I was told; it was that I didn’t want to distract Zack, and I didn’t like how fast things were going between us. I told myself firmly that I would just put the brakes on things for a little while, let things cool down. There would be time after the season ended to reconnect with Zack if he was really, truly serious about being with me—if I wasn’t just some kind of convenient fuck buddy for him.

  I felt a wrench in my chest at the possibility that if I did decide to slow things down—in reality, to stop them until after the season had ended—I might lose Zack altogether. It was a risk I had to take, I told myself firmly. If Zack moved on to another, easier girl while I wasn’t around, that was on him, and I would just have to move on. It wasn’t as though we’d been dating seriously anyway; or even, really, at all. We’d gone on one date together, and at that it was because Zack made it a condition of answering my interview questions. I thought about the fact that about a week after we’d had sex for the first time since high school, he’d told me flat out that it was just sex; if that had been his attitude, then I could easily give him up. I put my phone down and turned my attention back onto my homework as best as I could, even though I was still haunted with the possibility that I would really, really regret my decision.

  CHAPTER TWO

  For the next few days, I buried myself in schoolwork. I barely left my room except to go to classes or the library, and I always made sure to get in early enough to book a private study room. Midterms had passed, but I knew that if I gave myself too much free time, I would come to regret it. Jess rolled her eyes at my diligence, reminding me of her “all work and no play makes Evie a dull girl” crack—but I couldn’t quite bring myself to tell her exactly what had happened, only that I had decided to take a little break from Zack and even dating in general.

  It was harder than I had even imagined; I knew that it was easy for me to become infatuated with him—but I hadn’t counted on how quickly it could happen. I couldn’t exactly tell Zack what had happened either; I didn’t want to start a fight amongst his teammates, and I honestly didn’t know how to explain it to him. I felt guilty, but I couldn’t think of any other way to deal with the situation. The first time Zack texted me—right before dinner hours at the dining hall—I simply responded to his invitation to sit with him that I planned on getting something to go and studying in my room.

  After that I couldn’t bring myself to answer any of his messages or calls. While I sat at my desk in my room going over the class readings the day after my altercation with Zack’s teammate, my phone buzzed.

  Practice was canceled today, the message read, with a little smiley face. We could hang out…maybe you could show me more of those skills you picked up.

  I pressed my lips together and didn’t even pick my phone up to contemplate replying. It buzzed again, breaking through my focus.

  Or if you don’t want to get down we could just hang out and watch a movie.

  I took a deep breath. No—I wouldn’t respond to him. I wouldn’t even reply to tell him that I was too busy with homework. If I did, he might offer to come up and study with me; of course, knowing Zack, he would be able to very quickly convince me to do anything but study.

  The next day, he tried again. I was in the library, in the private study room that I’d reserved for the afternoon trying to make heads or tails of the new Stats lesson. My phone buzzed, on silent per library rules.

  Hey, are you mad at me? Can I at least get a chance to figure out what I did wrong?

  My heart wrenched in my chest. It took all I had not to open the message that was flashing on my screen and reply to it—tell him that he hadn’t done anything wrong, that I wasn’t mad at him, that I just needed some space and thought he did too. But instead I turned it off altogether and tried to bury myself in my textbook.

  When I got back to the dorm, there was a note taped to my door.

  Jess let me in—I’d hoped you were here. Call me, please?

  It was signed in Zack’s messy scrawl. I ripped it off my door and went in, closing myself into my lonely room and deciding that I’d rather just curl up and go to sleep rather than risk running into him at the dining hall. I turned off the lights and tried not to think about the times that Zack and I had been together, or the sound of his voice, or the way that he seemed so interested in being with me. He would give up soon enough and maybe later—if I hadn’t ruined things for good—I could explain to him that I had just needed space, and wanted him to have the ability to focus on the game. Even if he couldn’t forgive me for that, I needed to be able to tell him. Maybe, I thought with a mixture of dread and hope, he would just forget about me completely, and move on with his life. The frat he belonged to must be having parties; there would be plenty of girls all around him vying for his attention, more than happy to take his mind off of me.

  The next morning, I woke up with my stomach in knots, twisting in on itself from hunger. I realized that I had left my phone turned off all night and dug it out of my bag, turning it on. At least I hadn’t managed to oversleep. As my phone loaded up, I saw the flash of two more messages and a voicemail—all of them from Zack.

  Look, just tell me you’re okay. I can’t find you and your roommate won’t tell me where you are. The second one read: If I did something wrong you should at least give me a chance to apologize.

  Steeling myself, I opened up the voicemail he’d left
me. It was three minutes long. “Evie, come on, I know you’re avoiding me. I just want to know why. My phone is showing all the texts are delivered—and I saw you read most of them. What’s going on between us? I already told you: no more public spectacles. I promise. Just give me a chance to figure out what I did wrong and how I can make it right.”

  My eyes stung as I deleted the message, unable to listen to it all, and took a deep breath. I didn’t think he’d try to contact me again after that. At least I hoped not. I just hoped that once everything was said and done, I’d have some kind of a chance to explain to him why. But then, I thought, I didn’t even fully understand why I was doing it myself.

  It would have been bad enough to handle Zack’s texts if I was able to keep my reaction purely emotional; it bothered me to hurt him—and I definitely was—but the sex I knew I was missing out on bothered me almost as much. I had gotten so used to not getting any; even before I started college, I had cut myself off from sex, having too much to deal with after my mom died. Even more to the point I didn’t even particularly want to date anyone after—not just because I was wrecked by having my biggest support and cheerleader gone from my life, but because I had discovered that guys were just a bunch of trouble.

  But from the first time Zack and I had made out, I felt the juices flowing in my veins again. When we’d had sex on the couch at his frat, I’d been easy prey—it wouldn’t have been that difficult even for Zack to convince me to head to his bedroom at the frat house during the party. Now that it had happened again I was consumed with the memory of how good he’d become, of how great it felt to have him touching me, tasting me. I shivered in class as my brain—against my will—reminded me of how great Zack’s cock had felt deep inside me, brushing against my inner walls, filling me up. I couldn’t focus on my work the way I used to be able to easily; I was distracted, having to take breaks to get myself off to the thought of Zack in my bed again, going down on me or working me with his fingers, thrusting into me, rocking his hips against mine until I came. I didn’t tell Jess about it, but I was almost afraid of how intensely I wanted sex—how much I wanted to just give in and call Zack, tell him to come over and screw my brains out.

  I told myself that it would pass—that it had always passed before—but I was on fire constantly, hoping and dreading that I would run into Zack. If I just saw him, I knew I’d end up throwing myself at him, begging him to forgive me and find us somewhere private where we could be together. I could only grit my teeth and hope that it would pass in time, that I would be able to get back together with Zack once the football season ended and I could be with him without distracting him. It occurred to me more than once that it was—for me at least—more distracting to be separated from him than it was to be with him. But I had to stick with what I had decided. Even if it was torturing me slowly every day.

  ****

  I had to miss the staff meeting for the newspaper; I told Professor Grant in advance and also emailed Lisa that I couldn’t be there because of a class. They both told me that it was a perfectly valid excuse, and Lisa said that I could drop by her office in the student union after class to get my assignment from her. I hurried over to the student union as soon as the professor let us out of class, and made my way to Lisa’s office, still drinking the last of the coffee I’d brought for my late class and ready to take notes on the assignment she had for me.

  “Hey, come on in,” Lisa said, gesturing to the chair on the other side of her desk. “I wanted to tell you we all really loved your piece on the last game. The interview was great—you really got Zack to open up!” My cheeks burned with a blush but I didn’t say anything, struggling to keep my composure. I nodded, not quite trusting my voice. “In fact, we didn’t have to do much editing to it at all! Good work.”

  “Thanks—that means a lot.” I took a deep breath. “So what have you got me on for next week, Chief?”

  Lisa grinned. “Since you did so well on the game last time, I figured you were a natural to cover the final game of the season. This time, though, we want you to get an interview with Coach Bullden, about our prospects for the nationals, that sort of thing.”

  I nodded quickly. The very last thing I wanted in the world was to have to go to another football game and watch Zack. But I couldn’t exactly tell Lisa that the reason I’d been able to get Zack to open up to me was because he and I had a history together—a history that I was risking by staying away from him. Besides, since I couldn’t make the meeting, there probably weren’t any other assignments open anymore, and I wanted to make sure I was in the campus paper as many times as I could be.

  Lisa gave me the details and asked me to do some research on my own about the coach—his career, his strategies, the kind of material that would make a good profile on the man to accompany the coverage of the final game of the season and the one that would determine our position in the national level. I took notes, trying to calm myself. I wouldn’t have to even talk to Zack, I told myself over and over again. I would just ignore him—as much as you can ignore the quarterback when it came to a major football game. I would cover the game, talk to the coach, and have done with it. If I had any luck at all, Zack would just head straight for the showers after the game and I could get my interview without any fuss or even any attempt from him to talk to me—he might not even know I was there until the article came out.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Jess had a date for the night of the game—away from campus, with a guy she had met in Women’s Studies. So I went to the stadium all on my own. I had my campus newspaper ticket and my press pass that would allow me to get onto the field after the game, and I told myself that I would be just fine on my own, that it didn’t matter; after all, when I’d gone the last time, Jess had left when I went out onto the field to talk to Zack. With my notebook and camera, I’d be left to my own devices, more or less, by the people seated with me.

  I thought about what I should wear. Jess, I know, would have suggested that I dress up for the event—wear something cute, something just a little sexy. Especially since she would assume that I would be waiting for Zack at the end of the game. On the other hand, the very last thing that I wanted was to look as though I was interested in flirting. I decided to dress as plainly as possible; the main benefit to that was also that it would at least be comfortable—but I also didn’t want to look like a scruffy, unprofessional college kid. Not when I had to interview the head coach. I put on my least-ratty pair of jeans and a medium-brown cardigan over a matching camisole. I put my hair in a bun, smoothed back but not overdone. I kept my face mostly clean, just a little powder and lip tint to make me look polished. It was a relief to be going to a game without having to worry about if I would smear my eye makeup or my lipstick. I could focus entirely on the game; I’d be practically invisible.

  The stadium was absolutely packed with people—as it should be, considering it was the last game of the season, with some of the highest stakes. But the team we were playing against wasn’t huge competition—they were ranked third or fourth overall, with more losses than the team we’d been up against the last game. It should have been a decent game, but overall the chances of us winning were pretty good.

  I grabbed pictures of the packed stands, of the marching bands on either side warming up the audiences. I tried to figure out what my angle for the article would be; after all, it wasn’t going to be a massive struggle like it had been for the team they were up against the previous week. There was no real rivalry between our school and the one we were playing. I couldn’t focus on Zack—because I already had in the previous article, and because I frankly didn’t think I could handle it. I decided that I would—without Jess’ flirting to distract me—look at the game as a way to show off my knowledge of strategy and tactics in football.

  Part of my research on the coach had been on football strategy in general. Of course, the skill of individual players came into play with the game—it was unavoidable. And if you had the best possible players in al
l positions, you didn’t have to worry that much about strategy. But knowing that another team had a particular weakness on the defense, or a lag in their offense because of certain players, could mean the difference between win and loss. I had looked over Coach Bullden’s usual strategies and tactics, the way he put his players to the best possible use. I’d also done a little bit of digging on the strategies of the coach that Bullden would be up against.

  I was starting to feel more than a little bit fidgety as the bands played on, and the crowd of people continued chanting, watching the cheerleaders on the sidelines performing. I just wanted to get the game over with; it would be a definitive win, and then I would get my interview and have a rest from the pounding of my heart.

  The opposing team took the field first, coming out of the lockers with a roar. They may not have been the best team in the division, but they looked energetic, in their white, black, and gold jerseys. They warmed up on the field, garnering plenty of cheers from their fans in the stands. They were clearly hungry to prove themselves—they were up against the number one team in the division, which should have daunted them, but it would be a great opportunity if they could manage to score a few times against us; at least if they put on a good game, they could lose with dignity. They went back to their sidelines, jumping up and down, smacking themselves, and I grabbed a few more pictures of them.

  Our team finally took the field with a burst of enthusiastic musical noise from the marching band, running out of the locker rooms and basking in the cheers of the fuller section of the stadium that belonged to the home team. I tried not to look for Zack while I snapped pictures of the team warming up and showing off. The team looked confident, as they should; they had a winning record, they were on their way to a bowl game, and they were almost certain to win that night’s game. I thought, with a sudden sense of foreboding, that I hoped they wouldn’t take it too easy on the other team—even if they were the best team in the division, they couldn’t afford to become overconfident.