I laugh, and when Ollie glares at me, I cover my mouth.
“Um…thank you?” Jonah looks at me and shrugs.
“She’s a huge fan.” I cough on a laugh.
He smiles down at her uncomfortably then pries her hands off him. “How about an autographed UFL shirt.”
She gasps and looks up at him. “Yes, please, who me? Of course I want that.”
He jerks his head toward the locker room. “Give me a minute. I’ll go grab one.”
“Thank you.” She reaches for him again, to shake his hand maybe, but he jerks back in time to avoid it and heads to the locker room. “Assassin, it will be one of yours, right?” She calls to him, but he continues his path. “A dirty one is totally fine!”
“Oh, come on, Fleur!” Ollie groans.
She cups her mouth to be heard over the distance. “Seriously, though! If it’s dirty, that’s fine with me. I’d much rather prefer—”
“Fleur, shut up!” Ollie silences her with a hand over her mouth. “I told you not to embarrass me.”
My eyes are watering from withheld laughter as Ollie and Fleur argue in French. These two are constant comedy.
“Killian?”
I turn toward the calling of my name and see Layla smiling up at me. The hilarity I was feeling dissolves, and my heart thuds in my chest.
“Layla, hey.”
She moves in for a hug. “So happy you’re home.” There’s a heaviness in her voice that makes me think maybe she’s not as happy as she’d like to be.
“I’m happy to be home.” A couple of awkward seconds linger between us as if she’s waiting for me to ask about Axelle, or maybe she’s hoping I don’t.
“Listen. If you’re looking for Cam, he’s in the conference room.”
“I don’t want to bother him—”
“You won’t. He’s waiting for you.” She looks over at Fleur. “Hi, I’m Layla, Cameron’s assistant.”
“Right, sorry.” I rub my forehead, trying to bring my brain back online after the complete one-eighty. “Layla, this is Fleur and her brother Olivier.”
They exchange greetings, and Layla mentions their beautiful accents, but I can’t shake the feeling that something about the exchange is making her sad.
I try to ignore it, grateful that I have a few days to pull myself together before I reach out to Axelle. I have to prepare myself for the possibility of seeing her and Clifford as one big happy family, and the certainty of seeing her as a mother.
“Well, fuck me stupid.”
Fleur snorts with laughter and Ollie chuckles.
Layla rolls her eyes. “Blake! Not in front of guests.”
Blake comes up beside her and pulls her to him. “How the hell did I fall in love with a woman with such sensitive ears? She gives me shit, yet she talks like a trucker when we’re alone.”
She rocks her hip into him. “Behave. Fleur and Olivier, this is my husband, Blake Daniels.”
Fleur tenses beside me, obviously recognizing who Blake and Layla are, or better yet who they are to Axelle.
“Killer.” Blake holds out his hand and I shake it. “Good to have you back.”
Seeing as the last time we were together he gave me a black eye, things are less than comfortable between us. “Thanks, Blake.”
“Haven’t missed one of your fights.” The pride in his voice swells in my chest. “Always knew you could do it.”
I nod, afraid that speaking will give away my delicate emotional state. I expected it to be difficult seeing them again. I didn’t expect it to be—
The door next to us swings open, which surprises me at first because it’s an old office that was used for storage.
A guy saunters out wearing nothing but a pair of loose workout shorts and a lazy and very satisfied smile. Judging by his size, he’s a fighter, but he’s also new. “Damn, woman, you’ve got the magic touch.” He rolls his shoulders back. “God, I love you. Are you sure you won’t marry me?”
“Easy, asshole.” Blake growls.
Blake’s reaction sends my gut tumbling, as if my body is trying to tell me something I should already know. Then I hear her.
And just like that the earth beneath me shifts.
“Oh, Trick, you don’t love me.” She appears in the doorway, and I swear to God I fucking choke on my own heartbeat. “You just want me for my hands.”
It’s her. It’s really her, and I never thought it possible for her to get any prettier than she already was, but here I am staring at the proof.
Suddenly, I’m sixteen again.
Gazing upon the kind of beauty I’d only read about in books.
Her hair is longer, pulled back in a sleek chestnut ponytail that reaches her mid-back. Her skin, at least the little I can see with her dressed in leggings and a polo, looks even softer than my dreams imagined over this last year.
She must feel me staring because slowly her smile falls as she turns her head toward me.
When our eyes meet, it sends lightning through my veins.
Everyone dissolves around us. An A-bomb could go off and I’d never know it because locked in the liquid blue gaze of this girl, this woman who I’ve loved for as long as I can remember, nothing else exists.
“Kill…”