by Anne Lange
“Thank you.” Serena glanced up to watch the girl flounce way, but her attention swept across the room, landing on the same woman she’d just noticed a few moments earlier. She was speaking to her companion, but her eyes were still on Mitch. Sorry, honey. He’s taken.
A young man appeared in front of her, cutting the connection.
“Good evening, folks. What can I get you to drink?”
Mitch looked across the table at her, his eyes hooded.
She smiled at their server. “I’ll have a diet cola, please.”
“Certainly. And you, sir?”
“I’ll have a beer. Whatever you have on tap is fine.”
“Perfect. I’ll be right back with your drinks, then I’ll take your dinner orders.”
Mitch made a good show of reading the menu. She hadn’t even opened hers.
“So what are you having?” She tapped her foot under the table when he didn’t respond. “Mitch?”
“Huh?” He raised his head, his eyes and his expression clearly not on the here and now.
“I asked what you’re having.”
“Oh.” He dropped his gaze to the folded black leather menu in his hands. “Ah. Um. Steak. I guess.”
“Honey. I know I’ve said this before, but apparently I need to say it again. Please, please talk to me.”
She watched and ached over the struggle of emotions that fluttered over his face. The defeat she saw in his eyes.
He opened his mouth, though she wasn’t sure what words would spill out, because the server chose that moment to reappear with their drinks.
“Here you go.” He set their beverages in front of them then slipped the tray under his arm as he looked at them expectantly. “Have you had a chance to look over the menu yet? Or would you like to hear our specials for tonight?”
Serena just wanted the young man to leave. “Why don’t you tell us the specials?”
“We have a shrimp pasta primavera in alfredo sauce, a top sirloin in a peppercorn sauce with fresh seasonal vegetables and your choice of potato, or grilled salmon in a lemon butter sauce, with a rice pilaf and the vegetables. I’ve tasted all three and would recommend any one of them.”
“I’ll take the salmon, please.” She looked at Mitch.
“I’ll take the steak, please. Medium, with a baked potato.”
“Any additional sides, toppings for your potato, or an appetizer to start?”
The tall young man swung his attention to her.
She shook her head. “I’m good. Thank you.”
Mitch just stared into space.
“Perfect. The wait won’t be too long. If you need anything in the meantime, just let me know.” He wandered to a table two booths down to greet an older couple who had just been seated.
“Are you going to tell me what’s going through your mind?”
Her husband sighed and leaned back against the bench seat. He fiddled with his napkin and cutlery.
“Mitch. We’ve been married for seven years. I’m tired of this. Why are you shutting me out?” She hadn’t expected those words to spill from her mouth. Not here, in a public place. She’d wanted to talk to him about his career, not his recent lack of communication. But apparently, her subconscious did.
He looked at her in an odd way. “I’m not trying to shut you out, Serena.” He shrugged. “I’ve just had a lot on my mind.”
“You haven’t been yourself for weeks. If I hadn’t taken that job and planned a couple of interventions to spend some time with you, I have a feeling I’d be sitting at home right now, alone, wondering if my husband still loves me.”
She dropped her head and looked at the table, fighting to keep the tears at bay. Damn it. This is not the place for this. Serena Ryland, shut the fuck up.
He reached across the table and grabbed her hands in his. “Serena. How can you even wonder that? Of course I love you.”
She sniffled. “Do you? Sometimes I have to wonder, Mitch. You’ve been so distant for weeks. Christ. I thought after last week we were starting to get past it, but I know you’re still keeping things from me. Even today, I had no clue just how bad your injury was until I saw you walking over to me, all your defenses down for once. You sure as hell hid it from your trainer, doctor and coach.”
He dropped her hands and fell back in his seat. “Of course I hid it from them. I couldn’t let them down. For all the fucking good it did me.” He grumbled the last, fisting the napkin in a tight squeeze.
“You’re not letting anyone down, Mitch.”
He raised his head, stormy eyes glaring at her. The muscles in his jaw ticked as he clenched and unclenched it. “Of course I am. I’m letting everyone down. The team, Coach, fans, Mason, you.”
“Honey. Shit happens. Injuries happen to players all the time. The team will go on. I know it sucks to hear that, but it’s true. And Mason may be your agent, but he’s also family. And as for me, I’m sorry you’re hurting, I’m sorry you’re unsure of your future, but you’re not letting me down, Mitch. I thought you knew I’d be the first person in your corner.”
He hung his head. When he lifted it, his eyes had cleared a bit but they’d taken on a faraway look.
“My father said I’d be a failure,” he whispered, shocking her to stillness.
“Excuse me?”
“When I was younger, my father said I was too weak to amount to anything. I was a sickly kid that my mom had to care for. She hated it. He hated it. They both hated me for it. And when she finally left, he blamed it on me. He said I wasn’t strong or likeable enough for her to want to stick around.”
Serena blinked and used her anger to shove back the tears welling in her eyes. “Sweetheart, you were just a little boy. Whatever happened between your mother and father had nothing to do with you.”
He carried on as though she hadn’t spoken.
“Football was the only thing my father cared about. He tried to teach me how to catch the ball once, but I kept fumbling it. He told me I clearly didn’t have what it took to be a football player. That I never would.”
“How old were you when he told you that?”
Mitch shrugged. “Five, maybe.”
Her heart broke for this big man who’d always been so strong, so protective and so compassionate with others.
“After my mom left, my father starting drinking heavily. He finally drank himself to death. My grandfather blamed me for his son dying—said I should have tried harder.”
And she guessed that’s when he went into the foster care system. Thank God he’d finally been placed with the Walkers. They probably saved that little boy’s life. If she could, she’d go back and deal with his family herself.
“But you ended up playing football,” she said instead, so proud of what he’d accomplished despite parents and grandparents who never showed him any kind of love.
His gaze cleared and he looked at her. “A decent diet finally helped with any health problems I may have had, and when I hit high school, I finally had a growth spurt. The first opportunity I had to join the football team, I did. And I worked my ass off to prove my father wrong. To do the one thing he said I’d never be able to do.”
“Mitch, you are no failure. You’ve accomplished so much for dealing with the crap your parents put you through. But none of it was your fault then, and none of it is your fault now. You’ve already been playing longer than most quarterbacks do. You’ve made a name for yourself. Yes, it’s time for you to move on. But that doesn’t mean you’ve failed, it simply means it’s time for a change. And I know you. You will succeed at whatever you take on.”
Their server appeared at the end of their table with a dish in each hand.
“Here you go. Salt or pepper?” After the seasoning was added and he’d retreated, Serena waited until they each took a few bites of their food to continue the discussion.
“It’s all going to work out, Mitch.”
He lifted one shoulder and shoveled a bit of steak into his mouth. He chewed while she wait
ed for his answer.
“Mason said he wanted to talk to me about an idea. But before I deal with what’s next, I need to deal with the here and now.”
“And the past?”
“The past is the past.”
If he truly believed that, she wouldn’t be sitting across from him, seeing the ghost of a child still trying to receive love and praise from parents who never deserved him. “Then it’s time to let it go, Mitch.”
“I’ll probably need surgery then rehab.”
“What about your contract?”
“Mason’s looking into it. There will be buyout clauses. Thankfully, I have language that protects my salary for a period of time. But that will need to be renegotiated now. Then I’ll become either a restricted or unrestricted free agent. Depends on if they think I’m of use to the Mayhems or not. Personally, I’d rather just be bought out.”
And it will rip his soul out. “There’s got to be something you can do that keeps you involved in the sport even if you’re not actually playing anymore.” Coaching maybe? He’d make a great coach. She wondered what Mason was thinking.
“Excuse me. Mitch? Mitch Ryland?”
Serena looked up at the pretty woman standing at the table staring at her husband. The same woman who’d been watching him when they’d come in. A fan? Serena let her gaze slip to the woman’s hands but she wasn’t clutching a pen or a piece of paper for an autograph. Serena almost rolled her eyes, hoping to God that the lady didn’t plan to yank down her top and ask her husband to sign her breasts. That had happened once—and only once. Serena had made it crystal clear to her husband that she had no issue with him signing autographs for football fans—it went with the territory—but she drew the line at his hands on another woman’s body or her husband’s name on some woman’s private parts.
“Patty?”
Serena’s gaze flew across the table to her husband. Her stomach rolled and nausea gripped her. Mitch knew her?
His face blanched. His shocked expression said it all.
Chapter Twelve
What the hell was Patty Agosto doing here? Christ he hadn’t seen her in… It had to be twelve years. Since a few days before he’d left for college.
After she’d miscarried their child.
He cleared his throat. “Patty. What are you doing here?”
“I live here now.” She gestured across the room. “I was just having dinner with a friend. I thought it was you when you walked in. I wasn’t sure, but I needed to find out.”
Patty’s gaze swung to Serena. His did too. His wife looked green and was staring at his old girlfriend with wide eyes and an open mouth. Fuck.
“Um. Sorry. Serena, this is Patty Agosto, a girl I went to school with. Patty, this is my wife, Serena.”
Patty held out her hand. He watched as Serena reached out to shake Patty’s hand. Both of their hands trembled.
“It’s nice to meet you, Patty.” Serena’s gaze darted over to him. “You guys went to school together? Was that before or after you moved in with the Walkers?”
“After.” He swallowed hard.
“I met Mitch in high school. We dated our senior year.”
“I see.” Her smile disappeared, but the questions in her eyes didn’t.
The woman he’d once thought he loved turned back to face him. “You look good, Mitch. I’ve watched your career over the years. I’m very proud of you. I knew you’d make it.” She turned to face Serena again. “He was the star on our high-school team. We all knew he’d go pro someday.”
“Thanks.” The last thing he wanted to talk about was his career, which only left his and Patty’s relationship, and her life since as potential topics. And he didn’t want to talk about their past either. “So, are you married?”
She shook her head. “Widowed, actually. My husband was killed in a car accident two years ago.”
Shit. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Thanks. I’m doing better now. I moved to Saint Paul to be closer to my friends.”
She’d always been somebody who bounced back from adversity. That was one of the things that had drawn him to her all those years ago. She’d had a tough childhood too. Lost her parents when she was ten, but at least the grandparents who had taken her in loved her and never once blamed her for the loss of their own child. Not like his family did.
“Do you have children, Patty?”
Serena’s question sucked the air from the room—or at least from around their booth. He wanted to drag his eyes away, but he couldn’t. His gaze was pinned to Patty’s face. He couldn’t miss the pain that flickered across her expression, the heartache in her eyes.
“No. Unfortunately, I can’t have children.”
“What?” He hadn’t meant to blurt that out as loud as he had. He scanned the room to see if anyone had noticed his outburst. “What do you mean you can’t?”
Patty shuffled on her feet. “I just can’t.”
“Is it because…?”
“Mitch”—she shook her head—“that was a long time ago.”
Even with his eyes glued to Patty, he saw Serena’s attention shift back and forth between the two of them.
“Patty—”
She threw up a hand. “It’s okay. I’ve gotten past it.”
“But I thought—”
“It wasn’t that simple,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.
A miscarriage was far from simple, but that didn’t mean you couldn’t have other children. Oh, Lord. Was it his fault? Should he have done something different? Acted faster? Taken better care of her? Shit. Once again, he’d let someone down. God, she had to hate him.
“Patty, I’m—”
“Mitch. Please. I’m just so surprised to see you. I wanted to say hi.” She turned and smiled at Serena. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Serena. You have a great guy here.”
“Yes. I know. Thank you.”
He couldn’t look at his wife. He didn’t want to look at Patty. Finally coming clean with Serena had opened up something inside him. Made him think perhaps he could leave the past behind. Maybe—not easily—but maybe. Now all his doubt came roaring back to the surface, and that one last piece of guilt he’d thought he’d dealt with was front and center.
His house was shaking beneath him again.
Patty gave him a shy smile, her eyes sad. “Take care, Mitch.”
“Yeah, you too.” He watched her walk away, his mind going back to that day.
“Mitch?”
He heard Serena’s voice, but in his head, he was in his old car with Patty crying in the seat beside him. Spots of blood on her dress, a puddle pooling between her legs. He’d torn that seat out of his car afterward.
“Mitch.” Serena laid her hand on his arm and squeezed. He blinked and looked at her.
“Clearly you two have a history. You’ve never mentioned her. What went on with you and Patty?”
He closed his eyes. It wasn’t the time or place, but he’d rather get it over with now. “Patty and I dated in high school. We were out with a bunch of friends at a campfire party on the beach.” He picked up his fork and pushed his now cold and totally unappealing dinner around on his plate. Not that he had an appetite anymore. “An end of the summer thing. A graduation party of sorts.” He picked up his beer and took a long swallow. “She started to get really bad cramps. I thought maybe it was food poisoning. By the time I got her to the hospital, she was bleeding.” He could still remember the tears running down her cheeks. The deep guttural moans.
And the blood.
“I didn’t know what was happening.” Serena pushed her plate aside and clutched her fingers together on top of the table. “She told me later that she had planned to tell me she was pregnant.”
Serena made a funny noise. He glanced up. She didn’t look too well.
“Are you okay, honey?”
She swallowed, her eyes big in her pale face. She shook her head. “I’m not feeling very well. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Mitch fiddled with his utensils and ordered another beer when the waiter passed. He asked for their meals to be removed and Serena’s water glass to be filled, figuring she’d need it when she returned.
He was just about to go look for her when she ambled back to the booth and slid in across from him, still pale, her eyes a little glassy, but she tucked her hands down in her lap and looked straight at him.
“I realize I’ve never pushed you to talk about your past before. And I understand now why you don’t like to talk about your family,” she said in a monotone, “but were you ever going to tell me about any of it? Patty is the reason you freaked out after I suggested starting a family, isn’t she?” Serena lifted her water glass to her mouth, her hand shaking.
“I consider my family Elaine and Grant. Before them, I don’t like to think about any of it.”
“We’ll talk about that later, Mitch. Right now, tell me about Patty.”
He sighed. He’d never been forthcoming about his past with Serena. All he’d told her was that he’d had a shitty childhood, his parents were dead and his grandparents didn’t want him. He’d even skimmed on the details of his life with the Walkers. He’d said his life turned around when he met them, they’d given him a good home and he now had brothers and sisters he considered closer than blood. But he’d never talked about why he’d gone into football, and he’d never encouraged a discussion about having kids someday.
Frankly, he had never considered himself father material. He didn’t want to be like his old man. He didn’t want to belittle his own kids.
“After she lost the baby, she became withdrawn, letting her grandparents console her while I blamed myself for taking her to that party. If we’d just stayed home and watched a movie or something, they could have gotten her to the hospital faster.” He had hated seeing her in pain, and he hadn’t wanted to cause her more. “We drifted apart after she got home from the hospital. I didn’t know what to do for her. Now I realize she was grieving. At the time, I was a confused eighteen-year-old kid. Then I left for college.”