Page 15 of Hell Bent (Portland Devils #5)

DEFINITELY NOT THE REASON

Alix

Did I put the whole thing resolutely out of my mind after that call, and focus on … whatever there is to focus on when you’re in rebuilding mode, know nobody, and live in a travel trailer outside of a strange city?

No, I did not. Maybe you would have, but not if you’d seen the way Sebastian grinned, or the way his amber eyes lit up when he did. Lupine, that was the word, because I’d looked it up. Wolflike, all strength and sinew and watchfulness. And then there was the way he made me laugh.

All right, those weren’t the whole reason. The other part was that I watched his game on Sunday while I did my meal prep for the week, which mainly involved cooking a pot of turkey chili on one burner and a pot of beef stew on the other, because a gourmet cook I was not.

See, I was watching, but as background. Background was fine.

I couldn’t figure out at first where he was.

He’d said he wasn’t a star, but if you weren’t on the offense or the defense …

would his uniform stay clean because he wouldn’t actually be on the field, or what?

I saw Harlan Kristiansen, but then, he was obvious, making two spectacular catches in the first quarter, the second of which he took at the twenty-yard line.

Leaping high, his gloved hands plucking the ball out of the air like it was easy, then coming down and somehow stepping and swiveling and spinning all the way around, shedding tacklers like he was greased before seeming to find another gear and racing down the sideline like a greyhound.

Somebody on the other team tried to catch up with him, but there was no hope, and then he was across the goal line, trotting to a stop, and flicking the ball to an official as if he didn’t even need to celebrate.

My hand stilled on my knife and I was yelling, then was embarrassed to be doing it. I wasn’t even a football fan!

I went back to chopping during the replay, determined not to get my adrenaline pumping like that again, and then my hand had stilled again, because somebody else was loping onto the field down there, buckling his chin strap. Moving with a kind of easy grace that reminded me of …

Well, of a wolf. And the name on his back was Robillard.

He wasn’t out there long. He kicked the extra point and ran off again, and I tried to figure out why my heart was beating so fast. Because he was a professional athlete? I sure hoped not. I didn’t judge by money, and I didn’t judge by appearances.

At least not solely.

Usually.

Except there was that wolf thing.

Another extra point in the second quarter and two in the third, and I saw what he’d meant. He didn’t get dirty, he was out there for seconds, and all he did was score that one point at a time.

Is that shallow of me? Don’t answer that.

Then something changed .

The Devils were down by three, barely across the 50-yard line, with two minutes to play.

Not huddling up now, but the quarterback yelling instructions as they ran down the field, got set fast, and snapped the ball for the next play.

Two running plays that went almost nowhere, a short pass and catch that got them five more yards, and it was third down and four yards to go.

The announcers were saying something about a slant route and another short pass, but instead, the ball was sailing through the air.

Too high, surely. Too high. Harlan Kristiansen had run farther down the field, but now he came back, running the same way he had earlier, like he was part cheetah, then turning and jumping impossibly high, his body bent backward, completely exposed, almost at the sideline.

The ball sailed out of bounds two feet over his reaching hands.

“Oh,” I exhaled aloud. Fourth down and four yards to go, and they were only at the 40. What did you do now, with the game that close? Did you throw a really long pass and hope, or what?

Wait.

Players sprinting off the field, players sprinting on, and that had to be Sebastian. They were all dressed the same: white jersey with the number in red and black, black pants with a red slash, black helmet. But only one of them moved like Sebastian.

It was so fast. Seconds. Before I could blink, the ball was snapped, the holder was spinning it around, and Sebastian was running, planting his foot, one arm in the air like a rodeo rider, and swinging his leg. All completely seamless, like a ballet, his upper body bent forward, his head down.

How could he even see where it was going? How could he even aim? I was thinking it, and then I wasn’t, because I was watching the ball. Up, up, up, then beginning to fall again. Sebastian wasn’t looking, but I was.

It was going to be short. It was going to …

It cleared the bar.

The crowd didn’t erupt or anything like that, because they didn’t want the Devils to win.

But I did. The announcer was saying, as Sebastian and the rest ran off the field, “And Robillard shows why the Devils picked him up. Ten days on the team, and he’s already put eighteen points on the board.

That one was from fifty-seven yards, and it’s put the Devils into overtime. ”

“He makes it look easy, Dan, doesn’t he?” the other guy said. “Eleven years in major-league soccer without making much of a mark, then comes to the NFL and, boom, that leg’s worth something.”

“It’s all about finding your sport,” the other guy said.

So what happened in the game? The Devils lost in overtime, that’s what.

The Ravens went out there and scored a field goal, the Devils didn’t score at all, and it was over.

The camera had shown Sebastian on the sidelines at the end there, kicking into a net, but you couldn’t kick a field goal from your own 50-yard-line, I guessed, because they went for a crazy long pass instead into the back of the end zone, Harlan Kristiansen went up for it, and it sailed two feet over his outstretched hands. Again.

Sebastian didn’t look upset running off, but none of them did. I wondered how you did that: lost, flew across the country, got home in the middle of the night, and were somehow at work the next morning. On Christmas Day.

I was a hard worker. I’d been told it. I knew it. But I didn’t have to lose, have people talking on TV about what was wrong with me the way they were doing right now, and then gear up to work even harder and prove them wrong.

I’m telling you all that to possibly explain why I drove into Portland for some more grocery shopping that afternoon, telling myself I wanted shaved brussels sprouts and broccolini and pesto, which the little store in Cascade Locks definitely did not stock, and that Trader Joe’s had sweet potato gnocchi, too.

Oh, and I also needed to buy a really good bottle of wine if I was going to this Christmas thing.

Somehow, though, after I collected all that and threw it into the back seat, the truck steered itself to Nordstrom, the store where I’d bought the sparkly silver cocktail dress Sebastian had liked.

You’ll look like you’re trying too hard, half of me said.

What, compared to not trying at all? the other half answered, and, yes, I was out of the truck and headed through Christmas-Eve madness, two hours from closing time.

But I couldn’t actually wear a hoodie to Christmas dinner, or my Target tennis shoes, could I?

Marginal respectability, that was what I was going for.

It had nothing to do with wanting a guy because he’d kicked a ball on TV, especially not when he’d apparently found me attractive in a hard hat and smeared with mud.

I couldn’t possibly be more superficial than a man. I didn’t even want to be a princess!

Lying to yourself is never pretty.

Sebastian

I was on top of a box in the gym the next morning when Kristiansen sauntered by. I jumped down, and he said, “That’s forty inches.”

“Yep,” I said. “When they make box jumps an Olympic sport, I’ll be all set.”

He grinned, and I grinned back, liking him. He said, “Jennifer told me to tell you that you don’t need to bring anything to dinner. ”

“Good thing,” I said, “since it’s going to be about four o’clock before we get out of here. On Christmas.”

“That’s what I said. Said, ‘How would he do that anyway, when he got home at two in the morning?’ And she said, ‘He could be worried about it, though.’ Were you worried about it?”

“No.”

“Good. Like I told you, it’s casual. Family style.”

“Also a good thing,” I said, “since my holiday wardrobe is going to be jeans and a button-down shirt.”

“Owen’s too, because he never wears anything else. But you’re doing it because of those jeans of hers, I guess. Alix.”

“That would be it.”

“Mm,” he said, a light in his eyes that told me … something.

“What?” I asked.

“She’s not going to be in jeans,” he said.

“Yes, she is. You heard her. That’s what she has.”

“Fifty bucks says she’s not in jeans.”

“She’s making a point,” I said. “She’ll be in jeans.”

I drove east in the dark, the city turning to outskirts and the outskirts turning to not much.

The black river on one side, and the black hills on the other.

Half an hour, and I was taking the exit for Cascade Locks, driving through blocks of small town, driving some more, and turning in at the sign.

KOA. Campgrounds of America. I pulled in and looked around. A dozen motor homes and trailers, lights gleaming yellow in the windows. Christmas at the KOA. I guessed it was as good as anyplace. I thumbed Alix’s number, and she said, “Hi.” A little breathlessness in her voice, and I relaxed.

“I’m here,” I said .

“Drive around to the very end,” she said. “I’ll open my door.”

Creeping along the paved track beside what looked like giant evergreens, and yes, there was a door opening, the light spilling out.

I owed Kristiansen fifty bucks.

She was coming down the stairs before I was even out of the car. I barely got around to open the door, and she was sliding in and saying, “Thanks.” And not looking at me.

I got in on my side and said, “Merry Christmas.” Looking at her in the light of the dome lamp and wanting to kiss her cheek pretty damn badly. Short jacket, heels, and what looked like some lace on her dress. A bottle of wine in her hand, too.

“Merry Christmas,” she said, set the wine on the floor, and tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear so I could see the tiny gold hoops that were all the jewelry she was wearing.

She had very pretty ears: neat and tucked in close to her head, with those attached kind of lobes.

I’d known that already, because she’d always had her hair pulled up before.

Dark brown, it fell to just above her shoulders and was a little messy tonight in that way that’s deliberate, like she’d just got out of bed, and it had some wave to it and a whole lot of shine.

The kind of hair you want to wrap around your hand.

She looked away, then, and said, “Follow this same road around to the exit.” Sounding shy, like I’d never heard her be.

I did, thought a minute, and said, “I wish you’d invited me in.”

“Yeah, right,” she said, “like I’m doing that on our first date.”

I grinned. “Has to be our second. You’re forgetting that burger.” She snorted, and I laughed and said, “I wanted a chance to look at you, that’s all. ”

“Excuse me?” she said. “You’re going to be looking at me all night. All evening, I mean. Evening.”

“I meant,” I said, “when I’d have a chance to take all that in and tell you how pretty it is.”

“I couldn’t actually wear jeans.”

“Well, yeah,” I said. “You could’ve. But you look very beautiful.

” Because she did. The old-fashioned face made up like it had probably been the first time I’d met her, but I’d forgotten.

Huge dark eyes, lined and shadowed to look even bigger.

Skin like cream. High forehead, and on that mouth, with its full lower lip …

Red lipstick. Deep red. I knew I hadn’t seen that before. I also knew she’d bought it for tonight. No other possibility.

She said, “I didn’t buy a dress because I watched your game yesterday. That’s not the reason.”

“Ah,” I said, not sure where this was going.

“Sorry I said the thing about not wanting to go out with you if you lost,” she said. “I was … I was impressed. By you. Impressed by you.”

I glanced over. I couldn’t tell, not in the dark, but I had the feeling she was blushing. “And you didn’t want to be impressed.”

“Well,” she said, “it would have made it less confusing if I hadn’t been.

” I laughed, she did too, and before I knew what I was doing, my hand was reaching for hers, and I was lifting it to my mouth and kissing the backs of her fingers.

She sucked in an audible breath, I tightened in all the places a man does tighten, and I thought, I do not want to go to family Christmas.

She said, “Uh …” and didn’t seem to know how to go on.

I said, “Want to skip this thing?”

“What?” she said. “No. Of course not.” And crossed her legs. The legs were long. The black heels were high. And that was definitely lace at the bottom of the dress.

This was going to be one long night.