by Alisha Rai
“Lousy lay? If that’s not the pot calling the kettle black.”
His cheeks flushed red. “I could show him the pictures.”
She went rigid. “You know what happens when you go down that route.”
A knock came on the door. It startled Peter enough that he stepped away. Before either of them could speak, the door opened and Samson stuck his head in the opening.
She’d never been happier to see someone.
Confusion crossed Samson’s face as he took in Peter’s presence. “Excuse me. I didn’t realize something was—” Then his gaze fell on Rhiannon’s face, and he stopped and shoved the door wider, stepping over the threshold. “Is everything okay in here?”
“Everything’s fine,” Peter snapped.
“Peter was just leaving,” she said, with as much calm as she could muster.
“I was not.”
“I want you to leave,” she insisted, dropping all pretense.
“But you want him here? I see what’s going on.” That familiar cold fury was in Peter’s voice, the fury she’d always shrank away from toward the end of their relationship. “Fuck you, you bitch—” He strangled on the last word because Samson strangled him.
It took a blink. That was all. The same fraction of a second it might take someone to swipe right or left on a photo.
Samson pinned her ex against the wall with his arm across Peter’s throat. “If I hit you,” Samson said, in a calm, quiet tone, the same chilling tone he’d used when the drunk on the rooftop had called him the Curse, “I could kill you. Do you see how that’s possible?”
Peter gave a short nod, his range of motion limited by Samson’s grip.
“I don’t care what your relationship with Rhiannon was, but if you ever speak to her like that again, if you ever ignore her request to leave her alone, I will find you. One hit is all it would take. Understand?”
“Yes,” Peter choked out.
Samson waited a beat, then stepped back, releasing him. “Leave,” he said, and Peter bolted like his feet were on fire.
Samson closed the door and looked at Rhiannon. “You okay?”
She should say yes. She should nod and grab her sweatshirt and put it on. Layers on layers. No vulnerabilities.
But instead, she sank to the side of the bed and dropped her head into her shaking hands. The bed depressed next to her, and a big hand rubbed up and down her back in a soothing motion.
This wasn’t so much a reaction to Peter scaring her, though that was part of it. No, this was about Samson.
He’d come, right when she’d asked him to. She hadn’t really even doubted that he’d come, not if he got her text. When had she decided to trust him like that? When was the last time she’d dared to trust a man like that?
Hope, her enemy. It had crept in and taken root.
The remnants of fear and anxiety twisted her up inside. He scooted closer and she pressed herself against him, pathetically grateful for his warmth. “I’m scared of the dark.”
“What?”
Her words spilled over each other. “It’s me. Not Peter. My little brother went missing one day during a game of hide-and-seek. I went looking for him and got locked in a shed. They didn’t find me for almost nine hours.” Her mom’s employer had taken an ax to the door, because no one had had a key to the old shed. She could still recall the smell of her mother’s sweat when they’d gotten her out. “I’m not claustrophobic, but I can’t stand the dark.”
He seemed to know exactly what she needed and when, because he shifted and drew her into his lap. He squeezed her so hard, she made a noise. He loosened his grip immediately, but she rested her hand on his arm. “No, you know I like being held like that. Can you do it again?”
He squinted at her, but obliged. “You’ll have to tell me if I hurt you.”
“Tighter,” she said instead, and murmured happily when he complied. Her own little head-to-toe compression force.
“You two had a personal relationship? You and Peter?”
She was held so snug, it was like she was in her own world of comfort, a world where she could confess anything. “Peter and I dated when I was at Swype. He had pursued me for years, and it was flattering. He was a great boyfriend at first. Then he stopped being a great boyfriend. He started to make me feel . . . small. I hated it. It took me a couple months, but I ended things.”
“And you left Swype?”
“I didn’t want to, but I had to. Because I stopped sleeping with him.” She hadn’t realized her hands had tightened into fists until her nails cut into her skin. “He couldn’t fire me because of my contract. So he set out to tell everyone I was a gold-digging whore who was terrible at my job. People in the company, people out of it. He harassed me daily until I cried every day on my way to and from work. He told me he’d stop if I came back to him. How could I go back to him after that?”
“Why didn’t you sue him?”
“He told me he’d destroy me if I did. When we were together, we sexted. He had sent me some sexy photos. I’d reciprocated. Nudes. A video. We were dating, it was fine.” Her voice faltered. “If his nudes got out, he’d be high-fived. If mine got out, I mean, now, yes. I could spin them, it wouldn’t hurt my business. But they’d still be out there. Everyone would see me.” Naked. She shuddered and burrowed deeper into his embrace.
His exhale was long and low. “When we were filming, you said you wanted our footage in your control. Makes sense now, after what he did.”
She nodded. “Quitting felt like I was admitting to everything he was saying about me, but I didn’t know what else to do. He gave me a settlement for a fraction of what I was owed, and I left.” Her smile was bitter. “He kept those photos quiet, but the damage was done. Everyone believed him or, at least, was wary of me. Getting a job at the same or higher position seemed impossible. If it hadn’t been for Katrina putting up the money for Crush, I don’t know what I would have done.”
He kissed her neck. “I’m sorry that happened to you and I’m glad you had your friend. I’m going to punch Peter tomorrow. Don’t worry, I won’t really kill him.”
Her laugh was choked. He sounded suspiciously like Katrina. “Please don’t. No one can know about this, Samson. I mean it. Especially not Annabelle.”
He rubbed his hand up and down her back. “I can’t let Annabelle do business with a predator, Rhi.”
“He’s not a predator, not to anyone else.” She leaned back, more anxiety piling on. Why had she said anything? How could she have abandoned her usual tight-lipped stance on this subject? “He has a vendetta against me, personally, that’s all. Please don’t tell Annabelle. I can’t have him saying I won by snitching on him. I have to beat him fairly. I—”
“Okay, okay.” Samson pressed his finger over her lips. “I won’t tell Annabelle.”
She moved her head away so she could speak. “Promise?”
“Totally promise.”
He sounded sincere. Rhiannon sagged against him and rested her head against his shoulder. “I should have checked to see who it was before I opened the door.” Hadn’t she had the rules of how to be wary drummed into her from the time she was a young girl?
“Don’t blame yourself. He shouldn’t have come to your room.”
“I don’t want to sleep here. Not under the same roof as him. I can’t.”
He brushed a kiss over her head. Either she’d imagined his disinterest earlier in the day, or it was simply gone now, because his response was filled with warmth. “You don’t have to. Grab your sweatshirt and put on your shoes and take anything else you’ll need for the night.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
SAMSON WANTED to run along the beach again, but this time, it wasn’t grief and loneliness guiding him.
It was barely banked rage.
You can’t hit Peter.
He’d wanted to, even before he’d learned of the full extent of Peter’s villainy. The second he’d seen the fear in Rhi’s eyes and put together a rough und
erstanding of why she’d sent him that cryptic text, he’d been ready to smash something.
Samson’s fists clenched.
His threat had only been a mild exaggeration. He may not be in the shape he’d been in during his pro-athlete days, but he could put enough power behind his blow to lay a man out cold.
Samson consciously shortened his stride when he noticed Rhi was trotting to keep up with him. He’d told her to grab her shoes, but she’d yanked them off the second they’d hit the soft sand.
It was silent this time of night, the townspeople snug in the glowing warmth of their houses. The full moon cast a silvery curtain over everything, turning the ocean and the large rock formation in the distance into a magical landscape.
Rhi tilted her head toward the ocean. The moonlight caressed her cheeks and forehead, a natural highlight for her luminous dark brown skin. The vibrating tension that had shaken her body in her room had eased as soon as they’d hit the beach and started walking.
She wasn’t herself, though. Normally, her dynamic personality gave her the illusion of being so much bigger. Tonight, with her shoulders hunched and her heart-shaped face pinched, he was conscious of how physically small and fragile she actually was compared to him. Compared to Peter.
He breathed in deep, the familiar salty air and the cool sand between his toes calming him down a little as well. He couldn’t go back to the numbness that had protected him earlier, not while Rhi needed him, but red-hot fury wasn’t productive either. “Can I hold your hand?”
The look she shot him was startled, but after a beat, she held out her hand, and he took it. “You’re a hand holder?” Even her voice was smaller than usual.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I guess so. Is that a problem?” He’d never been with a woman long enough to determine if he was a hand holder.
Her cold fingers clenched around his. “No.”
Another slice of his mad slipped away. He’d concentrate on making sure she had a safe place to sleep tonight, the night before her big pitch.
Ah jeez. No wonder she’d asked who else was pitching. “Did you know Peter would be here?”
She sighed, the sound carrying on the breeze. “I had a hunch. That night I rushed to your apartment, I had heard a rumor he was cozying up to William.”
His mother had liked to say, if you waited long enough, everything made sense. “Ah.” He didn’t like keeping his aunt in the dark on this, and there was no way he’d let Belle do business with Peter, despite what Rhi had said about her being the only target of his cruel behavior. But he’d figure that out tomorrow. He didn’t want to upset Rhi any more tonight.
“Where are we going anyway?”
He nodded at the weathered blue home as it came into view. “My place.” He’d been relieved That Night, when she’d proposed going to her rental. He wouldn’t have felt comfortable bringing someone into the home he shared with his uncle. When his uncle was alive, that is. Now it was nothing but an empty house.
They walked up the steep stairs leading to the back porch from the beach. The spare key was under a green frog-shaped planter, as it had been his entire life.
He slipped inside the back door and entered the security code. He should change it at some point, he supposed. It was his mother’s birthday still. “Come on in.”
He flipped on the lights in the living room and the kitchen while she placed her small bag on the couch. The place wasn’t musty at all, so he suspected that Aunt Belle had directed someone to come over regularly and air it out. “This is, uh, it.”
“It’s nice. Not what I expected. I thought you would have grown up in a huge house like Belle’s.”
Samson looked around, trying to see the home through Rhi’s eyes. Though sitting on prime real estate, the place was relatively cozy, one giant room split into a kitchen, dining area, and living room. The furniture was large and of good quality, to accommodate his large-framed family, but decidedly dated. Except for his and his uncle’s bedrooms, no one had redecorated in here since his mom had passed. “My parents were pretty frugal.”
“A beautiful place to grow up.”
He softened. Sometimes he avoided thinking about his parents entirely, because his father’s behavior after the Switch had been so painful, but he should probably work on that. They’d had so many good times together. His childhood here had been idyllic. “It was.” He rested his hands on the back of the floral couch. “The place was closed up for a long time. Since my uncle died, and before, too, since my mom died.”
At her questioning look, he continued. “When I started taking care of Uncle Joe, we lived in the big house. A little over a year ago, it started to get challenging. He kept getting lost, not remembering where anything was, not recognizing Aunt Belle when she visited. He was calmer here.” He nodded at the mantel of the fireplace and the display case next to it. It held photos and memorabilia from his uncle and father’s football-playing days. Samson had moved the elder Lima’s Super Bowl rings to his safe deposit box, but they’d carefully been enshrined in the case when Uncle Joe had been alive. “He liked to sit up here and look at all of that. He could remember.”
Rhi drifted over to the display case and peered inside. “This is really cool.”
“I suppose I should donate it or something now.” That was something else he’d put off, along with thinking too much about the endless future. There was a reason this place had been preserved so well. Packing it up and deciding what to do with it had always been too painful of a chore.
“Or keep it. For future Limas.”
Samson blinked. He hadn’t considered having a family or children for a long time. “I have to think about it. Some of it might be better off in a place where fans could see and enjoy it.”
“You must miss him an awful lot.”
“My uncle? Yeah. I do miss him.” The words that had been so hard to say to his aunt spilled from his lips. “I got a call today, confirming his CTE diagnosis.”
She faced him. “I’m sorry.”
He nodded. “I knew it was coming.”
“Still hurts, I’m sure.”
Again, it was remarkably easy to make his confession. “More than I thought it would. Like I lost him all over again.”
She walked toward him, skirting the flowered couch. “Is that why you’ve been so distant today?”
He scrubbed his face. “Was I?” Samson didn’t need to ask, though. He’d chased down and welcomed the numbness. “I’m sorry. I guess I have a tendency to shut down when I’m upset.” He grimaced, thinking of the fog he’d been in after his uncle’s death. “I’ll work on it.”
The corner of her lips kicked up. She didn’t tell him that he didn’t need to work on anything for her, because what they had was temporary, and for that he was grateful. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him tight. “I don’t know exactly what happens in situations like this, but I presume his diagnosis will be released to the public?”
“Yes. My uncle wanted that. It’s good,” he added, to convince himself. “It’ll increase the pressure to make the game safer.” Two brothers, long NFL careers, both passing away over fifteen years apart due to the same degenerative brain disease? Headline writers would have a field day.
Her hand moved over his back, and it was then that he realized how tense he’d become. He was glad she was calmer than she’d been in her bedroom, but he didn’t much like that she was now the one soothing him.
“You’re good with publicity.”
He should put an end to this line of conversation, show her to a bed, but he couldn’t. “Not this kind.” His throat grew tight. “I was the one who pushed for my father to be diagnosed after he died. I wanted a reason, some scientific proof that explained why he’d changed. I didn’t need a diagnosis for my uncle, I knew what was wrong with him. I guess it’s not just grief that upset me today, but apprehension about what will happen now. The inevitable public reaction.”
She peered up at him. “I underst
and that, but can I say, as someone who has had to weather a good deal of negative gossip myself and who is fully aware of the current conversation around you, I am pretty sure any attention you get from this will be positive and supportive.”
He tried to scoff. “How are you fully aware? Did you google me despite our no-googling pact?”
“Nah. But occasionally someone will show me the comments. I have football fans who work for me. I’m an outsider, but even I can see that your retirement was a flashpoint for CTE activism.”
Samson’s face flushed. “I didn’t set out to be an activist.”
“No, but it seems like you are one anyway.” She hesitated. “Guys like that drunk on the rooftop, he’s going to be the odd man out. Like, do I think your former employers are going to be happy? No. They’re in the business of men smashing their bodies against each other, not health care. But the majority of public opinion will be firmly and loudly on your side, I bet. You made your industry better for the young men who came after you, and the older men who came before you, and you did it just by living your life. You’ll be a sympathetic face for the disease, whether you like it or not. I don’t think that’s a bad thing.”
He thought about Trevor. “I was recently asked to represent a CTE nonprofit. I turned it down,” he admitted.
“Why’d you turn it down?”
“My team’s old quarterback runs it. He was the one who started calling me the Curse.” Samson’s jaw tightened.
“Ah, he’s done a one-eighty. I’m familiar with those.” She shook her head. “I am like the queen of dead-to-me so I don’t feel comfortable telling you whether you should forgive him or if it’s worth hearing him out. But it sounds more like you hate the guy and not the idea of working for this place.”
He pulled her close and squeezed her tight, because he didn’t know what else to say. He hadn’t brought her here to comfort him, but that was exactly what she’d done.