“No. Last time we talked, he said there wasn’t a point in making plans until the season was over. He knows what I want to do. I don’t want to keep repeating myself. If he wants to pay attention, he can; if he doesn’t want to, he knows my contract with him is going to end right before I’m eligible to sign with another team.”
Huh. “Do you… know where you want to go?” I realized why we hadn’t talked about this topic before. He wanted to focus on the season, not on the what-ifs that would all take place afterward. But suddenly, there seemed to be so much pressure and focus on all the possibilities. The moving. The future.
Casually, casually, casually, he raised a shoulder. “How do you feel about heading up north?”
North? “How far north are we talking about?”
Those coffee-colored eyes peered at me over his shoulder. “Indiana… Wisconsin…” he threw out.
“Ah.” I looked forward to collect my words and put them in an order I wouldn’t regret. “I can live just about anywhere. I’ll just have to buy better winter clothes.”
“You think so?” Why did his voice sound so amused all of a sudden?
I snorted. “Yeah. Some winter boots, a scarf, and some gloves, and I’ll be fine. I think.”
“I’ll buy you a dozen jackets and winter boots, if that’s what you need,” he threw out there in a tone that was getting more amused by the second.
It made me perk up a little bit. “You don’t need to do that. You do enough for me as it is, big guy.”
His fingers drummed the steering wheel and he seemed to shake his head. “Van, I’ll buy you a jacket or ten if I want. We’re in this together.”
Ovaries. Where were my ovaries?
“Aren’t we?” Aiden suddenly asked in a hesitant voice.
I lifted my head off the window and really turned to look at him. There was something so devastating about his profile it was annoying. There was something about him that was so great it was annoying. He was so dumb sometimes I couldn’t handle it. “Yeah. Of course. We’re Team Graves.”
He made an amused sound and I suddenly remembered what I’d kept making myself put off asking him. “Hey, are you… when are you going to Colorado?” I mean, the season was over. The last two years, he’d left as soon as he was able to, yet this year, he hadn’t said a word to me. Then again, why would he? I wasn’t the one leasing out a house or making plans to rent a car or anything.
Just like that, his body language completely changed. He went rigid. His fingers curled over the steering wheel. His tongue poked at his cheek. “I’m supposed to leave the second week of February.”
“Oh.” That was about three weeks away. “Are you still going for two months?”
He didn’t vocalize his answer; he simply nodded.
But the response still hit my heart like a sledgehammer. He’d be gone for two months. Sure we didn’t have in-depth talks every day, but at least in the last month and a half, I couldn’t remember a day where I hadn’t spent some time with him, even if all we did was watch television quietly or sit on the floor with Leo between us.
“Cool,” I kind of mumbled, but it wasn’t cool at all.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Tossing the fifth shirt over my shoulder, I groaned. It wasn’t until I had to pack that I ever thought I didn’t have enough clothes. It was like a ninja snuck into my closet and drawers and stole everything that fit me well and looked good.
“What are you doing?” Aiden’s low, grumbling voice asked from behind me.
I turned around to spot him leaning against the doorframe, hands in the pockets of his gray sweatpants, one ankle over the other. I blew a lock of pink hair that had fallen into my eyes away in frustration. “I’m trying to pack for my trip tomorrow.”
“What’s the problem?”
Damn it. I sighed. He really did know me, and that only made me feel sheepish. “I can’t find anything I want to wear.” That was mostly the truth. The other half of the truth was that I’d been pretty grumpy since his last game when he’d admitted he was going to Colorado after kissing me like it was no big deal. He was leaving in two weeks. For two months.
He raised his eyebrows as if telling me to continue, only egging on my nerves.
“I feel like I’m going to the first day of school tomorrow. I’m so nervous,” I admitted the other tiny part of it.
Aiden frowned as he uncrossed his legs and took a step inside my room. “About what?” he asked, bending down to pick up two of the shirts that had landed on the floor. Setting them on the bed, he took a spot right next to them on the mattress facing me.
“The convention.” This was exactly how I’d get before the first day of school. The nerves. The nausea. The dread. The worry about who I would sit with. If anyone would actually come by my table. What the hell had I been thinking registering? It wasn’t like I was starving for business. I got a steady flow of new customers, on top of my returning, loyal clientele.
“It’s a book convention. What are you worried about?” He picked up the last shirt I’d tossed on the bed and held it up, looking over the long sleeves and royal blue color. “What’s wrong with this one?”
Nerves were eating up my chest and my soul, and he had no idea or any way to comprehend what I was going through. I didn’t think Aiden knew what insecurity was. I ignored his comment about the shirt. “What if everyone hates me and no one talks to me? What if someone throws something at me?”
Aiden snorted, setting the shirt he’d been holding aside and picking up the next one on the pile. “What are they going to throw? Bookmarks?”
That had me groaning. “You don’t understand…”
Aiden peeked at me from over the collar of the blouse, and from the wrinkles around his eyes, I could tell he was smiling just a little bit before he put it on the other side from where he’d left the blue one. “No one is going to throw anything at you. Relax.”
I swallowed and went to take a seat on the bed next to him, his thigh touching mine. “Okay, probably not, but what if… no one comes by my booth? Can you imagine how awkward that would be? Me sitting there all alone?” Just thinking about it was making me anxious.
Shifting on the mattress, he reached over and touched my thigh with his fingertips. The smile on his face melted completely off and he stared at me with that hard, serious face. “If no one goes by your booth, it’s because they’re stupid—”
I couldn’t help but crack a little smile.
“—and they don’t have any taste,” he added, giving me a squeeze.
My smile might have grown a little more.
“I looked at your website. I saw the before and after images of what you’ve done. You’re good, Van.”
“I know I’m good—”
His chuckle cut me off. “And people think I’m cocky.”
I elbowed him in the arm with a laugh. “What? I am. There’s not a lot of things I’m really good at, but this is the one thing no one can take away from me. I’ve worked hard at it.”
The expression on Aiden’s face hinted at amusement as he held up the blue shirt he’d previously set aside. “Then you know you have nothing to worry about. Take this one with you.”
I grabbed the shirt he held with a huff and nodded, quietly folding it. I moved around the room and collected the other things I wanted to take with me. I was only spending two nights, I didn’t need a whole bunch, but I was still taking more than enough just in case. I’d rather have too many shirts than not enough.
I kneeled down to grab my carry-on luggage from beneath the bed, casting a glance at him as he folded the shirts I’d set aside that I wasn’t taking.
He caught me looking at him and only slightly raised his eyebrows. “Stop looking like you’re going to be sick, Van. You’ll be fine.”
“You keep saying that, but then again you’re not intimidated by anything, big guy. You run at guys the same size as you or bigger for a living.”
His eyebrows crawled up even higher on his forehead. “Fear is all in your head.”
“I hate it when people say that.”
“It’s true. What’s the worst that will happen? People won’t talk to you? They won’t like you? People who really know you like you.”