“Shit. Fine.” She waved her hand. “Go do your thing. I don’t want to hold you back.”
Her words held an ominous ring. Some things never changed. Usually he’d run ahead. She’d walk. Then he’d angle back once he was ready, and they’d run home together. But this wasn’t about that.
“Let’s walk a bit,” he said, dropping his pace to a simple stretch of the legs.
She stumbled and went down on one knee. Hard. Touchdown barked in response to her pained cry.
He was kneeling beside her in seconds. “Here. Let me see.”
She sat down and grimaced at the blood seeping out of the wounds. Brushing at the gravel and dust, she bit her lip.
“Go ahead and shout. I know it has to hurt.”
She swatted his hands aside, which only pissed him off. He ripped off the hem of his shorts and dabbed at the wound.
“Stop coddling me!” she yelled. “I’m fine. Now, go ahead and finish your run. I’ll follow you at a walk.”
His jaw popped. “I’m not fucking running ahead.”
She put her hand on her knee, almost protectively, still gasping for air. “But you always run ahead!”
“I don’t have a quota anymore.” I’m not in the NFL anymore.
“Keep going, dammit! Don’t stop for me. It’s only a little scrape.”
Anger shot up from his liver to his throat. “I’ll damn well stop for you if I want to. Spending time with you is more important than ticking off miles—even if you’re pissed off, even if you don’t want to be here. And I’m certainly not leaving you when you’re bleeding on the trail.”
Her lip wobbled before she bit it again. In those seconds, something horrible and ugly shimmered between them, something that reminded him of those last days they’d lived together.
He sat on the ground next to her. Dared to lower his hand to her calf to create one tenuous connection between them, a few scant inches from the Celtic knot tattoo on the inside of her ankle, the one he still hadn’t asked her about.
“How is it we’re farther apart today than we were yesterday? What happened?”
“I don’t know,” she said with an edge to her voice.
Her breathing was stabilizing. Touchdown was nuzzling her torso, giving her comfort, something Blake wished he could do.
“Yes, you do know,” he pressed, prepared to hear the truth at last. “Tell me why.”
Her gaze flew to his. “Because everybody thinks I’m crazy for ever leaving you! You’re the best guy on the planet. Everyone thinks so.” The hand she was using to prop herself up grabbed a fistful of soil. “You take your drunken ex-wife home when she drinks too much. You don’t screw her when she throws herself at you even though you probably wanted to.”
He felt sick. “I’d never screw you.”
“And to make it worse, you hold my head when I puke, put me in a nightshirt, and sleep in your clothes on top of the covers because I asked you to stay.” Her ice-blue eyes narrowed. “I asked you, didn’t I?”
His throat closed. “Yes.”
Her breath gusted out. “Oh, Blake.”
Touchdown lay down on the ground between them, adding to their fragile connection. Blake’s free hand stroked the dog’s belly. He couldn’t bear to mention he’d seen the black box holding her rings in the hope chest.
He made himself look into her eyes. Hers were wary and filled with pain. “You said you loved me.”
She hung her head. “I cut you like that, and yet you stayed?”
“You asked me to.” His heartbeat pulsed in the hand on her calf, as if coming alive through the sheer act of sustained touch.
“Sam pretty much called me a bitch for leaving you,” she whispered.
“He’d never do that.” His friend was brutally honest, but he wasn’t cruel.
“Don’t be so sure. And coming from him…well, it hurt. Even if it was true. I never expected him…”
“I’ve told you before, and I’ll say it again. No one’s opinion matters to me—not my friends or your family or the press. The only one that matters is yours.” And you told me you loved me the other night.
“I’m so confused,” she admitted softly, so softly he had to strain to hear it.
He wasn’t confused. He knew what he wanted. But he could admit to his own weakness. “Well, I’m afraid. Being near you again, even sitting in this dirt beside you while your knee bleeds, makes me want to wrap you up and never let you go. I’m afraid you won’t let me.” Again. He left the words unsaid.
She scooted closer, her bottom spreading dirt out like a fan behind her. Touchdown ambled to the side as she set the side of her body flush against his. His hand curved around her calf, and when she didn’t protest, he kept it there, his fingertips tingling now.