Hard to Lose (The Play Hard Series Book 4)

by K. Bromberg

  My head shakes back and forth as panic ricochets through me.

  No. No. No.

  “It’s not what you think.” They’re my first words and an absolutely shitty first defense, but it’s all I’ve got.

  Gunner stares at the envelope in his hand as if I’ve sliced him completely open, allowing every memory and every vulnerability to be laid bare. But it’s when his eyes finally lift to meet mine that I realize an iota of the devastation I might have caused with this charade.

  The deep brown of his eyes beg and question and despise me all at the same time. I struggle with what else to say or what to even do. I want to look away. I want to hide from the hurt I’ve caused but know that I can’t do either.

  I owe him that much at least.

  “Where did you get this?” he finally whispers.

  “It was delivered to my office a couple of months ago.” My voice is timid. I’m so afraid to do or say the wrong thing when I’ve already done so much wrong to begin with.

  “To your office? Kincade Sports Management is your office?” His voice escalates in pitch with each word. “I thought you were a grad student working on her thesis. I thought you were learning about military life, deployment, and Jesus Christ,” he says and runs a hand through his hair. “Kincade Sports Management. I remember it now. The dad and the daughters working for him. You’re one of his daughters. YOU are part of it. You’re a sports agent.”

  “Gunner.” His name is a plea to forgive me, to let me explain, to anything.

  “Now it all makes perfect sense to me. Fucking perfect sense—don’t you take another step toward me,” he thunders, causing tears to spring to my eyes and stopping me in my tracks.

  “It’s not what you think. This is all a mistake. A white lie that tumbled out of control before I could fix it, and by then it was too late. By then I was falling for you and knew deception was something that was a deal-breaker for you—”

  “You’re goddamn right it is. Have you not listened to me? About the deceit that cost me the life I had? The dreams I once had?” He shoves up off the bed and paces back and forth in the small space, the orange envelope gripped in his hand. “I thought you were . . . everything I thought about you . . . you’re not you.” His voice is barely audible. The disbelief edged with hurt in it is like a knife to my heart.

  “I am me. I promise. I just got—”

  “You warned me. Fucking told me I wouldn’t like the real you and I . . . I argued with you about it. Fought you on it and”—his eyes are defeated but sparked with anger as he shakes his head—“you were right.”

  “No. Don’t say that. I am me. I am the same person. I just—”

  “What about the boys?” he asks, switching gears as if he can’t focus on one thing at a time. My surefooted Gunner is anything but that right now. “You made promises to little kids. And for what? To win me over. To use them to get to me—”

  “Those promises are real,” I shout with an exasperated desperation. “You have to believe me. The boys have nothing to do with this. I never would—”

  “Believe you?” He laughs, arms out to the side, looking at me like I’m crazy.

  “Gunner, you have to believe me—”

  “You played me.” He pounds his fist on the desk beside him and then storms past me out of the close confines of the room. I scurry behind him, desperate in a way I’ve never been before. “And for what?”

  “I thought . . . I thought I’d find you and maybe, I don’t know. Get you an audience in front of a major league scout.” He snorts, and I hold up my hands in front of me. “I know now you don’t play anymore, but I thought it would be cool to realize your dream. To tell your grandkids someday that you did it.”

  “All this off a letter, huh?” The muscle in his jaw pulses as his eyes bore into me.

  “I just . . . I thought we could make a whole thing of it. KSM would host a veterans’ game type of thing. Raise some money for a good cause—”

  “What cause would that be?” he snaps.

  “I don’t know. The Center? Wounded Warrior . . . you tell me.”

  “You didn’t know The Center existed until you got out here. Until you met me. Until you pretended to be someone you weren’t.” His voice escalates in pitch with each and every word. “So what’s the real story, Chase? What is it exactly that you wanted from me because from my experience, agents only want you if it’s good for them. Screw your talent so long as you can make them money or give them notoriety or—oh my God.” His face falls as he stares at me with wide eyes full of disbelief. “You saw me as a publicity stunt, didn’t you? That has to be it. You saw the attention that one agent got a few months back and figured you’d get yourself some of that attention too. You thought you’d get me an audience with an MLB scout or hold a charity game, all while having KSM strategically placed everywhere so the world would know who was doing all of these selfless, good deeds.” Sarcasm drips off his last words as I swallow over the lump in my throat.

  “That’s a lot of supposition.” My voice cracks, and for some reason the sound feels like it’s an admission. “I wasn’t—”

  “Anything to make a profit, right? I can see it now. The great benevolent agent goes searching for a wounded vet whose letter was lost in the mail. She’d swoop in, put him on display. A dog and pony show of sorts so you could claim you were doing good, but it would only benefit yourself.” There are tears in his eyes when he looks at me. He blinks them away but the sight of them will be forever burned in my memory. Betrayal and hurt. Disbelief and disappointment. “You were going to use me.”

  Each word cuts.

  Not just because they hurt him, but because they are true.

  Because I was that callous, that selfish. I was so fixated on a goddamn goal that I never once stopped to consider how the faceless Ryan Camden I’d yet to meet would feel about it.

  How Gunner would feel about it.

  “That’s not fair.”

  “You don’t sound so sure of yourself.” His eyes narrow as he stares at me. “I thought Big City Chase always sounded sure of herself.”

  “That was never my intention.”

  “The dog and pony show part or the you lying about who you were part?” he yells.

  “I was warned that military protected their own. That if I asked about you, people would close ranks and—”

  “Warned, huh? Because we’re such a crazy group of people.”

  “No, because my questions would be frowned upon since I was an outsider.”

  “So you thought it would be better to lie?”

  “No. I didn’t know you and Ryan were one and the same until after”—a sob hiccups out of me—“until after we danced in the rain, and then it was too late to tell you the truth.”

  “But you lied about everything else. About school and your thesis and . . .” He grabs a pillow off the couch and squeezes it so hard with a feral growl. “Was everything you said to me last night a lie too?”

  The tears in his eyes are unmistakable now. He doesn’t blink them away, doesn’t hide them. This time the pain and betrayal are much more evident.

  “That wasn’t a lie,” I whisper as my own tears course down my cheeks. “Please let me explain. I need to explain.”

  “There’s nothing to explain.” He looks down to his hands, to his cell phone in it, and sighs. When he looks back up, the hard glint in his eyes scares the shit out of me. “I’m going to leave now. I have to get the fuck out of here and away from you.” He sniffs. “And when I come back, I want you gone. I want it to be like you were never here in the first place.”

  “Gunner. No.”

  But the last look he gives me before he grabs his keys and walks out of the house tells me everything I need to know.

  No amount of pleading will fix this.

  Nothing will.

  I did this to myself.

  I did this to us.

  I stumble backward and slump onto the couch. Agony swallows me whole.

&n
bsp; I stare at the front door hoping he’ll come back in. Wishing he could see through his anger. Desperately begging for him to give me a minute to explain how this spiraled out of control.

  To look past his devastation and see mine too.

  To know that with every step he runs from me, my heart is also breaking like thousands of shards of glass. Like the plate I shattered with my name on it in the rage room.

  But he doesn’t come back.

  And that’s what I deserve.

  He’s not coming back.

  “I have to get the fuck out of here and away from you. And when I come back, I want you gone. I want it to be like you were never here in the first place.”

  That’s when I completely understand what misery feels like. Because my heart will never recover.

  And I will never, ever forgive myself for the utter despair and anger I put on Gunner’s face and in Gunner’s heart. I will never forgive myself for breaking a man who never deserved anything but good.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Gunner

  I drive.

  My route is aimless and it does absolutely nothing to clear the noise in my head and hurt in my heart.

  She wasn’t a grad student collecting info on military life.

  Does it matter? Yes. God yes, it does. Not because she wasn’t a grad student but because she didn’t tell me who she was.

  Because she lied to me.

  Because she deceived me.

  I end up at the national cemetery several towns over. I sit in the truck and watch the American flags wave in the breeze on the headstones. They’re a sober reminder that I’m alive and this is a blip in the game of life . . . but why does it hurt so fucking much?

  In my head I can hear Dickman’s voice telling me to suck it up. That she’s only hard to lose if I let her be. That life sucks, but you’ve got to move on.

  After the cemetery, I end up sitting beyond the outfield fence watching a high school baseball game. The innings wear on but nothing becomes clearer in my head. Instead, the hurt becomes more, the reality of it all settles less, and I’m left to wonder how I could have been duped. How I could have fallen for Chase Kincade so effortlessly when normally I’m so guarded?

  I drive some more.

  Through wooded neighborhoods and farmland, but nothing eases the ache beneath my breastbone. Nothing calms the doubt I feel toward my own judgment. And nothing is going to make any of this any goddamn easier.

  I’ve never wanted to talk to my mom again more than I do now. She received one of those orange envelopes too. She chose Sal over me, and I had to move on for my own sanity. For the first time since I sent it, I wish I could call her up for no other reason than to ask her how she can love someone and hate them simultaneously.

  I know that’s how she felt about Sal.

  And it’s currently how I feel about Chase.

  When street signs become blurred and night calls to the sky, I finally go home.

  The house is like a ghost town. Deserted when she had been everywhere. Quiet when it had been so full of life.

  I want it to be like you were never here in the first place.

  But who am I to lie? Chase is fucking everywhere. Her hint of perfume still lingers in the air. The blanket she folded in that triangle is still on the couch. The goddamn kitchen island we made love on sits there as a reminder.

  No regrets feels like it has a whole new meaning now.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Chase

  “Are we going to talk about how you’re sitting at your desk—here in our office—and no one knew you were coming home?” Brexton’s voice asks from the doorway of my office.

  “Just trying to catch up on work,” I say without lifting my head up.

  Truth be told, I’ve been back in town for four days but this is the first day where my eyes don’t look like I’ve been crying.

  “You couldn’t even peek your head out and say hi to us? We wouldn’t even have known you were here if Letty hadn’t told us,” she says, referring to our receptionist.

  “I got in early.” I steel myself before looking up to meet her eyes to make sure I won’t cry when I do. And if I don’t look at her, she’ll know something is wrong. “Did you see the stack of shit on my desk to do?” I meet her eyes and give a quick, tight smile. “It would have been nice if you guys helped out a little. Christ.”

  I’ve given her enough of a look and a semi-bitchy comment, so when I avert my eyes, I assume she’ll walk away.

  Instead she sits down in front of my desk.

  “I don’t have time for this right now. Maybe we can catch up after work?” I offer, full well knowing I’ll bolt out and say I have to deal with a client and dodge her.

  “No. We can catch up now.”

  Silence settles through the room and even though I keep typing away, not really having any clue what I am, in fact, typing, the weight of her stare grows heavier and heavier.

  “You’ve been gone for seven weeks. You cut off communication with us except for the obligatory emoji response to our texts after you asked Dekk and me for advice. And now, out of the freaking blue, you just show up to work without warning? All that and you don’t think I’m going to plop my ass down in your chair and demand to know what in the hell is going on?”

  My fingers are flying over the keys as the tears threaten. All I can do is keep my head down, staring at my monitor. “Everything is fine. I promise.”

  But I never should have added those last two words because when I do, my voice breaks. It breaks in front of my sister—who gets me way too well and knows exactly what that sound means.

  “Chase. Look at me.” Her tone softens. Where it was previously annoyed, now, it’s soft and compassionate. Of all my sisters, she’s the one most used to the heartbreak that comes with love. Now of course she has Drew, but before him, there were many men who made her cry.

  Of all my sisters, she’ll understand me right now.

  I bite my bottom lip and shake my head as my eyes blur with tears. “I can’t,” I all but whisper. “I just can’t.”

  “Okay. I’m going to leave you alone and tell the rest of the staff you’re on some calls negotiating and not to bother you.” I nod but keep my eyes on my screen. “And I’m going to tell you that I know it’s not something you want to hear right now, but know this—heartbreak sucks. It hurts and it feels like you’re broken. But when the smoke clears, you’ll be able to take something from it that will make you a better and stronger person somehow. And even simpler than that is the notion that every heartbreak brings you one step closer to the one who was meant for you.”

  “I can’t do this right now,” I repeat, my voice hoarse, my heart aching.

  “I know.” The chair squeaks as she gets up from it. “I love you, and you know I’m here for you if you need me.”

  “Thanks.”

  When the door clicks behind her, I let out a shuddered breath as the first tear slips over.

  But I only allow myself one.

  I can’t do this.

  I won’t do this.

  I repeat the same thing I’ve said to myself ever since I left Destiny Falls and Gunner behind.

  My heartbreak was inevitable.

  Regardless if he knew the real me or not, I was still leaving. There was still no future when it came to us.

  And still, a piece of me was holding on to the possibility. A possibility that I could have told Gunner every detail before he found out the way he did. That if I had been able to do that, I’d have had the chance to tell him how falling in love with him completely crushed me—because of my lies between us. I’d give anything to have not hurt Gunner. To have not sent him running from me.

  A bigger piece of me was hoping that love could conquer all. Because sadly, my sister was wrong.

  When the smoke clears, there’s nothing I’ll be able to take from this pain. Gunner is the one who made me a better and stronger person. And now he’s gone.

  CHAPTER FORTYr />
  Gunner

  “Just call her.”

  I look over at Ellie and sigh. She’s leaning back in the office chair with her feet up on the desk and her eyes on me.

  “Why should I even give her a chance to explain herself?”

  “Why should you not?” she counters.

  “What is it with you?” I’m irritated and hate that for the last week all she’s done is grill me on this. “Aren’t you supposed to be on my side? Aren’t you supposed to be telling me what she did was shitty and shady and that you understand how I feel?”

  “She was shady and shitty and I do understand how you feel, but man . . . what I saw between the two of you was real. It was clear as day.”

  Her words punch me in the gut because I felt the same way. I thought what we had was real too.

  Ellie has no idea how many sleepless nights I’ve had since Chase left. How many nights I’ve picked apart our every interaction, looking for any evidence from our time together that proves that what we had wasn’t real.

  I couldn’t though, other than the obvious.

  And that makes the knife cut that much deeper.

  “But real isn’t built on lies. Real is built on honesty and trust and being straightforward.”

  She nods and twists her lips. “It is.”

  “She came here looking for the old me to use.”

  “Maybe you’re right. Maybe she was going to exploit war hero Ryan for her own good. Maybe she wasn’t. The problem is you don’t know if she was or wasn’t because you never gave her a chance to explain why she was searching for you in the first place. And you sure as shit haven’t done anything more than delete her texts or messages.”

  I close my eyes and lean my head back on my chair. “I’m so sick of thinking about this. Of second-guessing myself. Of missing her and hating her at the same time.”

  “As one does with heartbreak.”

  “It never would have worked anyway. She’s from New York, and I’m from here. She has her big-city life and I have the bar and this town, The Center—”