His face was that same immovable mask as always. Those brown eyes I’d seen hundreds of times in the past bore down on me, his eyes going over the bright ruby red I’d let Diana color my hair two weeks ago. He didn’t comment on it. “You live here?” His question cut the air between us abruptly. His gaze dropped to the hand I had on my pepper spray and the set of keys clutched between my fingers.
I thought about my neighbors, the crappy building, the number of cars parked in the lot that were always in some sort of disrepair, and the cracked sidewalk with a dying lawn straddling it. I rarely had people over, so it wasn’t like I had any reason to care about where I lived. All I’d needed was a roof over my head. Plus, it could be worse. Things could always be worse. I tried to never forget that.
Then I thought of the beautiful, gated community Aiden lived in, and the awesome kitchen I’d cooked in so many times before… and finally, I envisioned the stained carpet in my apartment and the peeling vinyl countertops with only a slight cringe.
I wasn’t going to be ashamed that I didn’t live in an upscale condo. It was the first place I’d ever had all to myself, and it had done what I needed it to do: give me a place to sleep and work in peace.
So I nodded slowly, surprised—okay, I was shocked as hell—to see him. I’d talked to Zac a few times since I quit and had gone to eat with him twice, but except for once, he hadn’t brought up Aiden in any of the conversations we’d had. The extent of what he’d told me about my ex-boss was that they’d been working out together. That had been more than enough.
Aiden’s gaze didn’t waver for a moment. His remote, clean facial expression didn’t change at all either. “I want to talk to you,” he demanded more than said.
I wanted to know how he found out where I lived, but the question was trapped in my throat. The one syllable word I knew I needed to tell him had taken a stroll down the block… and then I remembered: dinner roll.
That fucker Trevor had called me a dinner roll of all things, and this man had said nothing.
I couldn’t help but squeeze the loose side of my shorts. I’d lost almost ten pounds over the last five weeks, and it had taken its toll on most of my clothes. But thinking about Trevor’s comment only made me angry and more resolved.
“No.” There, I said it. Easy. It was so easy to say it. “I don’t have time. I have a lot of work to do.”
Guilt nipped at my head for being so rude, but I squashed it. I didn’t owe him a single thing, not a moment of time or a single extra thought.
That stubborn, strong chin tipped up, that full, masculine mouth flattening, and he blinked. “You don’t have a few minutes for me?”
I swallowed hard and fought the urge to fidget under his gaze. “No. I have a lot of work to do,” I repeated, looking at that familiar face evenly.
The lines that came over his forehead settled the emotion he’d been fighting with a second ago. Shock. He was shocked for what was more than likely the first time in his life, and that gave me a boost of strength and confidence not to waver under his glare.
“We need to talk,” he brushed off my comment in typical Aiden-fashion.
What the hell did we need to talk about? Everything that needed to be said between us had been said. He’d been an asshole, and I was done. What more was there?
“Look, I really am busy.”
I was just about to make up some other excuse when one of the doors in the building in front of mine closed with a loud snap. I didn’t want to find out what could possibly happen if anyone in my complex found out who was standing in the stairwell to my building. I’d been home enough Sunday evenings to know there were football fans everywhere.
With a sigh and a promise to myself that he wasn’t going to get whatever he came here for, I waved him toward the door. “I don’t think there’s anything for us to talk about,” was the only thing I managed to respond with. Did I want to stand outside my apartment? No. Did I want to go inside? No. But I definitely didn’t want my neighbors finding out a semi-famous millionaire was standing right outside my door. “But you can come inside for a little bit before anyone sees you,” I said in more of a mumble than anything, turning back to unlock the door. “I guess,” I added just because the sight of him made me pretty bitchy.
You should have told him to beat it, Van, my brain said. And it was the truth.
I held the door open for him, watching out of my peripheral vision as he squeezed inside. Once the door was locked, I flipped on the lights as the big defensive end took a few hesitant steps inside. I could see his head turning one way and then the other, looking at the pieces of stretched canvas art I had on the wall—not that he knew they were my work unless he looked closely at the initials in the corners. He didn’t make a comment and neither did I. He’d never asked what I did when I wasn’t at his house or with him, and I’d never mentioned it either.
Which was funny when I thought about it, because there were players on his team who knew exactly what I did. Players who had sought me out to redo their website banners, two of the guys I’d actually done tattoo designs for—and here was this guy. This guy that I had twice said to, “I was thinking your promo shots could be a little simpler. The font they used for your name doesn’t look very clear and the placement looks weird. Do you want me to change it for you?” and what had he done in return each time?
He’d said, “Don’t bother.”
He’d brushed me off. It had taken me weeks to get the nerve to make that suggestion to him, and I would have done it for free. But it was fine. It was his career and his branding, not mine.
He planted himself on the love seat in my living room, and I spun my desk chair around to face him, looking at him as evenly and unattached as I possibly could. The room was pretty small. The entire apartment was sized for one person. The only furniture that fit, cramped, was the two-seater couch, my desk, chair, and a bookshelf that doubled as a TV stand. Nerves didn’t pound through me as I watched him practically consume the space.
I was over this thing with him, and I just didn’t have the faintest urge to try and be friendly. I didn’t feel like joking with him or making it seem like there weren’t any hard feelings. If anything, I was annoyed he was at my apartment.
I had nothing left to lose, and he wasn’t in charge of my paychecks any more. I hadn’t even stressed when I realized I wouldn’t get paid for the last few days I was with him because there was no way I was contacting Aiden or Trevor. Walking out the way I had and flipping him off in the process, had been worth every penny lost.
“Why are you here, Aiden?” I finally broke the silence when a minute or two had passed after we’d sat down.
Aiden had his hands on his lap, his face was as remote as it was before a game; even his shoulders were as tight as ever, his spine eternally straight. I didn’t think, even when he was at home, that I’d ever really seen him at ease. His hair was freshly buzzed, and he looked fine and healthy. Like he always had. As if a month hadn’t passed since the last time we’d been in each other’s presence.
He leveled his dark gaze on me and said, “I want you to come back.”
I was dreaming. That probably wasn’t the best word to use. Nightmaring? Delusional, maybe?
“Excuse me?” I breathed as I took in the whites around his eyes to make sure they weren’t bloodshot. Then I took a brief sniff to make sure he didn’t smell like a skunk. He didn’t, but apparently anything was possible. “Are you… are you on drugs right now?”
Aiden gave me one hard, slow blink. His short but incredibly thick lashes went to rest for a brief second. “Excuse me?” His tone was subdued, guarded.
“Are you on drugs?” I repeated myself because there was no way he’d be here asking me this sober.
Right?
He stared at me with his unflinching eyes and hard, no-nonsense mouth. “I’m not on drugs,” he said, clearly insulted.
I eyed him like I didn’t believe him, because I didn’t. What the hell would give him the idea that I’d go back to work for him?
Drugs.