Page 34 of Any Second Now (Fort Collins Blizzard Hockey #2)

Fucking Disaster

ATTICUS

“ C an I bring you home?” I’m in my kitchen pouring coffee into a to-go cup for Raleigh. I desperately want to come back to the RV with her, but she’s having none of it.

“No.” Raleigh shakes her head definitively. “I have a busy day and I can’t handle your, uh, distractions.” She gives me a small smile. I wish she’d step around the island and wrap her arms around me, but she stays put behind the granite barrier.

Something changed since her ex-husband showed up yesterday. It’s like she’s put on an extra layer of armor on. She’s not the same open, free woman I’ve been spending time with. Or she is, but guarded. Worse even than after the flower delivery.

I think she’s slipping through my fingers.

At least she came to me last night. I was a mess in the hours after I fled the campground like a petulant child. I should’ve stayed to help Raleigh in whatever way she needed. Instead, I ran.

“You sure you don’t want to hang out?” I hand her the coffee, wincing at my neediness .

“I gotta run. I need to feed Megghen and make sure she’s not escaped her tent to lay eggs everywhere.”

I force a chuckle. “Tonight then?”

It’s like I’m begging her to spend time with me. I hate it.

“Can’t today.” Raleigh shakes her head and rejects me yet again.

My stomach drops. “I have to catch up on cross-stitch orders, then clean up my RV, then this evening I have video calls scheduled with my mom, and also Lucy and January….” She ticks off a list of tasks that I feel like could be done in two hours, tops, not stretch the rest of the day.

But she clearly doesn’t want me around.

“Alright. Barrett and Lachlan want to get drinks tonight, so I’ll go do that. Lach’s still a mess.”

“I can’t believe his girlfriend dumped him.” Raleigh looks almost relieved at the change of conversation, her face relaxing a tad.

“I can.” There’s never been a relationship more predictable to blow up.

“Really?” Raleigh cocks her head. “Why?”

The reasons tick off in my head. Because he’s not meant to be in a serious relationship. Because they’re simply too different from each other. Because she probably realized he’s not the guy you settle down with.

I’m definitely not going to say those things. They sound like all the reasons Raleigh and I shouldn’t be together.

“I saw them together. The chemistry just wasn’t there.” I did see them together earlier this summer, but they had chemistry. That wasn’t the reason they were destined to break up.

Raleigh’s phone buzzes in her pocket, ending the conversation. Her eyes widen for a split second.

“Everything okay?” I ask, fishing for information.

“Yup.” She takes a few steps around the counter and leans up for a kiss. I press our lips together, but it only lasts a beat as she pulls back too fast. “Talk to you later. ”

And then she’s gone.

Lachlan is absolutely trashed.

And Barrett is egging him on.

“I’m coming back with shots and beers,” Barrett announces, seemingly unaffected by the alcohol. Damn twenty-five year olds and their superior livers. He weaves his way through the crowds at Black Diamond and steps next to a short blonde woman at the bar, smiling down at her.

I have a feeling he’ll be a while.

“So what happened, dude?” I turn back to my destitute friend. “You ready to talk about it yet?”

“Fuck.” Lachlan groans and drops his head in his hands. I shoot my hand out and still the wobbling beer bottle that he bumps with his elbow.

“I thought everything was going great?”

“I thought it was too.” He looks up with glassy eyes.

“But then I showed up for another one of her stupid faculty barbecues. It was going fine—boring as shit and filled with her judgmental colleagues—and I made an awkward joke. No one laughed. Then she walked over just as one of them asked where I went to college. I said I didn’t and they all gave each other this look.

Like I was the scum of the earth. But I went straight to the NHL, mate? ”

“They sound like assholes.”

“Yeah.” He nods. “She didn’t defend me. Went all cold and distant. Afterwards, I drove her home, and before she got out of the car, she said she has to focus on her research. And she doesn’t want to be in a serious relationship. With me.”

“It sounds like what you usually tell women, but swap in hockey instead.” I say it more to myself then to my friend, but he jerks his head up to look at me.

“That’s fucked up, mate. ”

“I know, I’m sorry. But isn’t it true?”

He groans. “Yeah.”

“And I didn’t mean to offend. I was more thinking about me.” Oops . Hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

“You? Raleigh?” He perks up.

“Uh—” Oh, shit. But I forget why I’m even hiding this from one of my closest friends.

“Oh come on, mate.” Lachlan lifts his eyebrows. “It’s obvious you’re fucking her. I might be distracted with Melissa—” his voice hitches. “—but I’m not an idiot.”

I run a hand roughly over my face. Might as well talk through this. For his sake, at least. It might help distract him from the breakup.

“Yeah, things have happened with Raleigh.”

“Things?” Lachlan cracks a smile for the first time all night. I glance over at Barrett, who looks like he has no intention of moving from the spot next to the blonde woman. He even got himself a drink, but I don’t see shots or beers for the rest of us.

“We’ve spent a lot of time together.” That’s an understatement. Every day. Almost every night. “We’re not official. And she’s leaving in a few weeks.”

“How much time together?” Lachlan narrows his eyes, studying me.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” It’s one thing telling him that Raleigh and I have been hooking up, it’s a different story to talk about how things are getting more out of control.

“Love is worth it, mate, even if you get your heart broken into a million pieces.” Lachlan’s voice squeaks at the end like a pubescent boy, and his eyes fill with tears.

Fuck.

I do not want to end up like Lachlan. He’s a fucking mess. A pathetic mess.

“It’s not love. ”

But as I say that, my gut clenches and a lump forms in my throat.

It better not be love.

I’m not equipped for love.

I don’t want to be equipped for love.

I scoff and cast an annoyed glance at Barrett. I could use a fresh beer right about now. And that shot.

If by some stupid chance this is love, I need to squash it. Suffocate it. Hide it. Beat it down until it goes away, because there is no future for me and Raleigh.

Fuck. Maybe it is love.

An hour later, the three of us are stumbling down the street, weaving around the Saturday night crowds.

Barrett is trailing behind us, one arm slung over the blonde girl’s shoulder, the other arm wrapped around her tall brunette friend’s waist. At first, I think the tall girl was interested in Lachlan or me, but we’ve both steered clear.

Lachlan pulls out his phone.

“No way.” I grab it out of his hands, his reflexes even slower than mine at the moment. “No texting her.”

Lachlan groans and stops in front of Horsetooth Brewing.

“Remember when we were here, and Melissa was out of town?” Lachlan nods to the busy restaurant, tables filled with people, crowds standing around the bar.

He’s got a dreamy look in his eyes that turns miserable.

“Was she even out of town for the reason she said? Or maybe she was at her sister’s, but planning on how to break it off with me. ”

“I’m sure it didn’t happen that way.”

I’m sure of no such thing. I think that woman was just fucking around with Lachlan all summer for entertainment, but she was never going to accept him in her snobby academic life.

Maybe he was her trophy, but when it came down to it, she couldn’t swallow that he was an athlete without a college degree.

Maybe her colleagues shunned her. Maybe a hundred reasons.

My eyes scan the tables to look for the one we all sat at together those weeks ago. That was before anything happened with Raleigh. Before I had a clue how hard I was falling for her.

Fuck! I’m not falling for her.

“Hey, is that Raleigh?” Lachlan says, pointing to the far corner.

“Huh?”

My eyes follow his finger.

Raleigh is sitting at the table. My heart does a little leap, until I see who’s sitting across from her.

Her ex-husband.

“Who the fuck is that dude?” Lachlan rolls his neck. “Want me to fight him?”

Right. I chose not to tell Lachlan all the dirty details, so he has no idea that I know exactly who the man is.

I don’t answer Lachlan, but I watch Raleigh and her ex. They are leaning close together, talking intently. She’s got her fingers wrapped around a glass of wine, and he has a pint glass of amber liquid. I can’t tell if they’re arguing, but they are far too close together for my comfort.

“Atter? Wanna go fight?”

I shake my head.

Wasn’t she supposed to be home? Video calling with her mom and my sister? Wait—she wouldn’t be video calling with Lucy and January in the evening anyway, since they are seven hours ahead in England.

I’m such a sucker.

She lied to me. Her plan was to go out with her ex-husband instead of with me, and then cover it up with a lie about talking to my own sister. A lie that I could easily uncover.

Fuck this .

I want to go in and rage at them. I want to see what she has to say to me when I walk up to their table. I want to punch that asshole in the face for having the absolute fucking nerve to show up here in Fort Collins uninvited and try to get Raleigh to take him back.

She doesn’t want him. She’s told him that.

She’s told me that.

But what if that’s not the whole truth? Would he really show up at her RV across the country six months post-divorce if he didn’t think there was a real chance of her taking him back?

As I watch, she shakes her head and he reaches over and touches her forearm. She glances down at the contact with a furrowed brow, but doesn’t pull away. I can read his lips: please, Raleigh . She sighs and shuts her eyes.

“Look at Barrett.” Lachlan elbows me and nods behind us, where Barrett is getting into a hired car with both women. He lifts a hand at us with a smirk before disappearing into the vehicle. “That should be us, dude. Fuck relationships. Fuck women who only want to mess with our tender hearts.”

I snort and watch the car pull away with Barrett and the two women.

Back in the restaurant, Raleigh’s ex stands and weaves his way to the back of the restaurant.

I could go pop in and talk to her now before he gets back. Find out what’s going on. Be a mature adult.

But as I watch, she pulls out her phone and starts typing.

Maybe she’s messaging me.

I look at my phone, but nothing pops up. Then I do something I know I shouldn’t.

Me

hey, how are you?

Raleigh stares down at her device. She taps some more, then flips it over and looks in the direction Jacob disappeared .

Well, shit. I’m getting ignored. Plus, she’s messaging someone else. Lucy? For her to read when she wakes up in the morning? Not me, that’s for sure.

“Let’s go,” I growl.

“Where to? Wanna go try to find girls?” Lachlan’s slurring his words. He’s got bags beneath his eyes, and his blond curls are wild. Maybe now that Melissa’s gone he’ll grow his hair long again.

But there’s no way this dude wants to go find girls. And I sure as hell don’t either.

“No. You’re going home. And so am I. Then we’re going to wake up and go to the gym and sweat all this out. It’s time to start getting ready for hockey season.”

I give Lachlan’s considerable forearm a push.

“Hey. Fine.” He sighs.

I cast one final glance at the table. Her ex is approaching and Raleigh offers him a tight smile as he sits.

They look like a married couple working their shit out. And that’s pretty close to what they are. So they’re divorced—that doesn’t have to be permanent. They have history.

Fuck this.

I’m done.

Done with pretending to be someone who I’m not.

Done with going down a path that will only lead to heartache.

I’m gonna go tuck the Aussie into his bed and then head home and do a hundred pushups. Remind myself of who I am.

And it’s no one’s boyfriend.