Page 30 of Playmaker

Cameron

“I’m never going to make it,” Ethan says, approaching my side at the bar. He signals for the bartender, his shoulders tense. Sweat stains his white button-down dress shirt, and he glances over his shoulder to where Maya and Maddie wait for us at our table, releasing a heavy sigh.

“Come on, man.” I clap him on the shoulder and give him a reassuring smile. “It’s not that bad.”

“Do you even see her dress tonight?” Unable to help himself, he casts another look over his shoulder at her, but Maya isn’t the girl holding my attention. Maddie is wearing a tight red minidress with a sweetheart-shaped neckline bedazzled with tiny crystals. With her curly hair in a slicked-back ponytail, my eyes are drawn to the elegant slope of her neck—a moth to a flame, a magnet to steel, the list of attraction is endless, but each one applies to us.

While their parents are having their picnic, the rest of us went with Ethan’s plan and decided to dine at a fancy restaurant downtown. The food was spectacular, but the view was even better, and I’m not talking about the deep-red undertones of the plush leather booths or the low lighting creating a sultry ambiance. I was able to admire Maddie for an entire sixty minutes without being bothered, so I’m taking that as a win in my book.

“Scotch please,” Ethan says to the bartender. I order the same, and while we wait, he seems deep in thought before he adds, “I want to talk to Maddie soon about making a move on Maya. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and this trip has proven to me that Maya is more than just a crush. I’m serious about starting something with her, but I don’t know how to get that across to my sister without her kicking my ass into next week.”

“You think she’d be upset?” I take a long sip of my drink when it lands in front of me.

“I know she would be. What reassurance have I given to make her trust me with Maya’s heart? I was a dick in high school, and even though I’ve matured now, all she’s going to care about is who I portrayed myself to be.”

I tilt my head to the side. “Portrayed yourself to be? Correct me if I’m wrong, but we were straight up assholes. There was no portraying going on, we just were .”

“It doesn’t matter,” he mutters. “I’ve been wanting to have some alone time with Maya to try to get some sort of confirmation that we both want this before I talk to my sister, but being on a family trip makes it impossible.”

I attempt to hide my grin after another sip of scotch. Ethan just placed a gift in my lap without realizing it.

Alone time with Maddie?

“Why don’t I steal Maddie away from you for the night? I’ll make up an excuse for us to get out of here, that way you and Maya can have the alone time you need to make your decision.”

Ethan’s eyes light up with hope. “Seriously?”

Guilt crawls through my body but I shove it to the side and offer him a tight smile instead. He has no idea what’s going on between Maddie and me, and he’s oblivious to the fact that he’s so worried about what Maddie will think about him liking Maya when Maddie crossed that boundary with me without a second thought about his opinion.

“Yeah. Take the car and take her somewhere. I’ll call an Uber for us.”

After some contemplation, Ethan nods and drains the last of his scotch, wincing from the burn. “Thanks, man. I owe you one.”

No, you really don’t .

When we head back over to the table, I tap Maddie on the shoulder and jerk my head at the doors leading out to the deck. Floor-to-ceiling windows reveal the beginning of the sunset, casting the restaurant in pinks and oranges, but nothing compares to the blue of her eyes.

“Do you want to go for a walk?” I ask.

Her eyes dart to my brother, then to me. “Why would I want to go on a walk with you?”

Ethan reaches his max level of patience when he blurts, “Can you just go on the damn walk?”

Everyone is stunned into silence, especially Maya, who fidgets in her seat, fingers white-knuckled around the edge of the chair.

“Um, okay?” Maddie cautiously rises from her seat, and after exchanging a glance with Maya, she follows me through the maze of tables. It bothers me that I can’t place my hand on the small of her back. Every second spent not touching her is pure agony, especially when a few waiters turn their heads to catch a second look after she passes them.

It’s getting close to closing time, so there aren’t too many people left in the restaurant, and one of the waiters looks like he’s going to shoot his shot until I pick up my stride to follow close behind her, casting a looming shadow over her and him.

I dare him to try to flirt with her. I almost wish he would so I can tell him to fuck off because she’s mine.

She’s always been mine.

The guy takes one look at me and spins on his heel to head in the other direction. Maddie looks back at me expectantly, oblivious to what’s going on around her.

Does she really not understand the amount of attention she draws just by being her ?

I hold the door open for her, and when we step outside, we’re hit with a cool breeze. I’m already stripping myself of my suit jacket when she wraps her arms around herself, and she sends me a grateful smile as I drape it over her shoulders. “Thank you,” she says. “What was that about in there? Why does my brother seem so upset?”

I laugh. “He’s not mad. He wants alone time with Maya but he’s worried as hell about what you’ll think if he makes a move. He’s using this time to be certain about his decision before he talks to you about it.”

“What?” She gasps, spinning to look back inside the restaurant until I grab her wrist. “All he had to do was ask! I’ve already told Maya I’m fine with it.”

I arch a brow. “Easier said than done, right?”

“Point taken.”

“Let them have this alone time,” I whisper, interlocking my fingers with hers. “Besides, I want alone time with you too.”

I drag her away from the restaurant windows until we’re far enough that we’re out of sight. We find a bench that’s empty, smack dab in the middle of the incredible fucking view of the canyon. It goes on for miles , the river at the bottom traveling far into the distance until it disappears.

The view leaves me breathless. Maddie sits beside me and pulls my jacket tighter around her, the side of her body pressed against mine. Now that we’re alone, I wrap my arm around her shoulder and hold her close like I wanted to do at the bonfire last night. I could tell she wanted me to do it, too, and I’m confident if anyone comes out we’ll hear the laughter and chatter from inside the restaurant.

She sighs and rests her head on my shoulder. “This view never fails to make me forget about everything bad in life.”

I frown, attempting to swallow past the sudden lump in my throat. “It does the opposite for me. Views like this make me over think, and it—” My jaw ticks as the memories rise to the surface. “It makes me remember everything .”

My mom.

Saying goodbye.

Watching her take her last breath.

“I miss her too,” Maddie whispers, knowing where my thoughts have led. “Sometimes I can still hear her laugh. Do you remember when she’d laugh so hard that it was silent? There wasn’t any sound, it was just—”

“Her nose would crinkle up.” I smile faintly at the memory.

“And her face would get as red as a tomato,” she adds, reaching up to hold the hand that’s around her shoulder. The gentle strokes of her thumb bring a calming presence, allowing me the space and time to get whatever I need to off my chest.

“Sometimes—” I shake my head, trying to find the words. “Sometimes I think she’d look at where I am in life and be disappointed. Yeah, I’m playing football, but at what cost? I fucked my way through high school to try to cope with the pain, and my dad and I aren’t close anymore. I don’t think she’d be proud of who I’ve become, and the thought of that terrifies the hell out of me.” My first time confessing that works its way into the void of the canyon, and I wait for a sign. Anything to see if my mother heard me and agrees or thinks I’m crazy for relying on the fucking wind to give me an answer.

Maddie tips her chin up to study me, and I hate that she’s always been able to see right through me. It’s useless trying to hide my emotions from her, so I don’t bother with the facade. I allow her to see the hurt and despair that’s stifled me for years. “Is football something you really want to do, or are you only playing to appease your dad?” She bounces her knee nervously before she adds, “I don’t want to overstep, but it’s something I’ve always wondered, and—”

“I’m not mad you asked it. I just . . . well, I haven’t been asked that before.” Until tonight, no one has ever looked closely enough to care about my answer. “Football has always been something I’m good at, and at first, I played for fun. Then I got into high school and coaches started to notice I was talented, and then offers started coming in and I lost sight of why I started playing in the first place. My dad was on my ass about training, and he still is, but I don’t play because it’s fun, and I don’t play for my dad. I play because it makes me feel closest to my mom, and I wouldn’t give that up for anything.”

Tears prick the backs of my eyes, but I blink furiously in an effort to clear them. That very same question has been weighing on my chest for months. The pressure has been insufferable, but whether I make it to the NFL or not, I’m not playing for anyone but me and the connection it brings me to her memory.

Maddie squeezes my hand, blinking away tears of her own. “Your mom would be so proud of the man you are, Cam. Whether you believe it or not, you’d take the shirt off your back for anyone.”

I arch a brow. “Is that a sexual innuendo? Because yes , I’ve gotten around.”

“What? No.” She laughs, and it’s a welcome sound given the depressing turn our conversation took. “Before your mom’s passing, you loved hard. You were the kindest person I knew, and I don’t think that boy went anywhere. He’s still inside you. You’re still you , you’ve just picked up some cuts and bruises along the way that still need healing. Your mom knows that too.”

“You seem to have a lot of confidence in me,” I reply. “Hopefully, I don’t disappoint.”

“You won’t. If that boy was long gone, why would you be so worried about changing?”

I tilt my head to the side, contemplating her answer. “I guess I hadn’t thought about it that way. Are you sure you don’t want to become a therapist instead of a doctor?” Then, after a few beats I ask, “What kind of doctor do you want to be, anyway?”

Those blue eyes of hers lock on mine, and it feels like an eternity before she answers. It’s almost like she’s hesitant about telling me, but the next words out of her mouth steal the breath from my lungs. “I’m studying to become a cancer doctor.”

Of all the things I thought she’d say, that sure as hell wasn’t it.

“An oncologist, to be exact. Well, that’s if I graduate, of course. I still have a million obstacles to face before I can practice, but—”

“A cancer doctor,” I repeat, my voice thick. “ Mads —”

Why am I surprised? Maddie has been a constant in my life even when she wasn’t in it. Even when I broke her heart, she was determined to find a way to mend me. Given how close she was to my mom, it shouldn’t be shocking that she’d try to do the same for her even after she passed. She’s always tried to fix things even when they’re not capable of being fixed.

I’m terrified of letting her down.

“You don’t have to say anything,” she whispers, tears tracking down her cheeks. “I saw firsthand what the disease can do. Who it can take away in the blink of an eye. I’ve watched those I lo—” She snaps her mouth shut, but, fuck, I wish she’d say it. It’s good of her to keep the sentiment to herself because even though I want to, I’m not ready to say it back. Selfishly, I want to hear it spill from her lips that she loves me.

I’ve always known it, but it’d be another thing to hear it.

“This is my connection to her too,” she says, “so, I get what you mean. You lost your mom, and I lost a woman I looked up to immensely.” A mixture between a laugh and a sob escapes her. “She always thought so highly of me. It was a pressure in itself, and although I’ll never carry the amount of pain you do, I can understand it. A part of me holds on to who she thought I was. Nothing short of perfect. I don’t want to disappoint her, either, so I’ve tried my best to be perfect in everything I do. And it’s stupid, because I know she would be proud of me regardless, but it’s a fear I can’t shake.”

Wiping away her tears, I press my lips to her forehead. It never dawned on me that we’d have the same fear, and if only we had talked about this years ago, we could have been there for one another. “She loved you, Mads, and no matter what you choose to do with your life, I know she’s rooting for you every step of the way. A part of me thinks she was trying to set us up a long time ago.”

She lifts her watery eyes to mine. “Really?”

“Yeah.” I turn to stare off into the distance and clear my throat. “That’s why what we’re doing makes me nervous. It’s not that I haven’t always wanted to take this step with us, but if I fuck it up like I do with everything good that comes into my life, it’s just another reason to make her disappointed in who I’ve become.”

“She could never be disappointed in you, Cam. She loved you more than anything.”

“Well, she loved you more than anything, too, and if I wind up being the shittiest boyfriend at the end of this, then—”

“Boyfriend?” She cuts me off, staring up at me like a deer in headlights.

“I—” Knitting my brows together, I’m trying to determine what I said wrong. “Is that not what I am to you?”

“I didn’t . . . I mean, you didn’t specify. I thought—” She giggles, and the sound loosens the ball formed in my chest. “So, you’re my boyfriend?”

“Yes? Sorry, I’m confused here. Did you think we weren’t together? I called you mine , Maddie.”

“I know, but you said you wanted to take things slow, so I thought you meant mine as in just being exclusive until break ends.”

The dark, raspy laugh that fills the silence has her shivering against me. “Christ. Add communication to the things I need to work on.” Then I tug her onto my lap and pull her close until her lips hover above mine. “You’re mine, in every meaning of the word, Maddie Davis, and I don’t want to end this when break ends. I want to see where this goes.”

She smiles, that red lipstick of hers tempting me to smear it. “Okay, then, we’ll see where this goes.”

My eyes dip to her breasts, which are pushed up from the dress and in perfect view for me to admire, but for the first time in my entire existence, sex isn’t my top priority. I’ve never had a girl I’d prefer to sit and talk about life with rather than fool around with in the sheets, but tonight, I don’t have the urge to do anything other than enjoy this beautiful night with her.

“Have I ever mentioned how lucky I am?”

She smiles brightly, a faint pink tainting her cheeks. “No, but I like hearing it.”

“I’m lucky,” I repeat, pressing a kiss to her cheek before I proceed to kiss all over her face, my heart bursting with pride when she erupts into a fit of giggles. “I’m lucky, I’m lucky, I’m lucky.”

“Okay!” She gasps. Then, when she calms down, she runs a hand through my hair and says, “Even though you don’t think it, you’re a catch, Cameron, and I’m the luckiest woman alive to have you by my side. I’ll keep telling you that until you believe it, and after this conversation, I think your mom would be proud of both of us. I think she’d be overjoyed we decided to take this step together, and no matter what we choose to do with our lives, she’s going to be rooting for us, just like you said.”

The sentence is right on the tip of my tongue. Fuck, I want to say it. I want to shout it from the damn rooftops that I’m in love with her, but until our relationship is out in the open, I’m not going to add to her devastation if things can’t work once the secret of us being together is out.

As hard as it’ll be, I’m going to wait.

“I think so, too, baby.”

The cheesy grin she’s sporting is a sight I want to store to memory forever. “What?” I ask.

“That’s the first time you’ve called me baby without sex being involved.”

Huh.

The sentiment slipped out without me having to think twice about it.

“I guess you’re right,” I admit. “I like calling you that, though.”

She surprises me by twisting in my lap so that she’s straddling me. Her dress rides up, but thankfully my jacket hides anything that might be exposed. “I like when you call me that, too, baby .”

Hearing the nickname has my heart threatening to burst. It’s never sounded so right before, and my cock seems to like it too. This was supposed to be an emotional night and nothing more, but with Maddie I’m learning that the emotions are part of the intimacy between us. Having her call me a nickname, and holding her close and talking about life, are all factors that contribute to turning me on now.

It’s going to take some getting used to.

“What do you say we get out of here?” She trails her hands down my chest until she reaches my belt. “I recently found out I have a boyfriend, and I’m desperate to show him just how much I appreciate him.”

I pull my lip back between my teeth when she caresses my hard cock, fighting for its life against the zipper of my pants. “Oh yeah? And who might that lucky guy be?”

With some teasing and all the confidence in the world, she scurries off my lap with a sly grin.

“You wouldn’t know him,” she says with a laugh. “He collects Pokémon cards. He doesn’t play football.”

I spring off the bench before she flees for the parking lot, using the restaurant’s outdoor porch stairs. She’s laughing her head off as I chase after her, and it doesn’t take long before my strides beat hers and I toss her over my shoulder.

“Cam!” She’s trying to breathe but she’s laughing too much. “My underwear is showing!”

“Good,” I reply, pinching her ass as a punishment for the teasing. “Easier access.”

I pull out my phone with my free hand to call an Uber, but I have two missed text messages from Ethan.

Took her back to the airbnb. Hot tub!!!

Then, an hour later, Dude, I don’t know what to tell Maddie, but we definitely crossed a line we shouldn’t have tonight. She’s going to hate me.

I can’t hide my grin when I place Maddie back on her feet and pull up the Uber app. I won’t reveal anything about his night until he or Maya decide to tell her. It’s not my business to share, but I’m really fucking happy for him. He took a leap of faith, and it worked out. He has no reason to worry when Maddie will be more than understanding about it. A part of me wishes she’d put him out of his misery and just tell him it’s okay already, but I get her reluctance. Telling Ethan it’s okay to date her best friend would persuade her to tell him about us, and I don’t know if she’s ready for that.

Why can’t I be like Ethan and push myself to do the same?

I went out on a limb by deciding to be Maddie’s boyfriend, but I’m holding myself back because of my fear of commitment and losing someone close to me again. I’m not who Maddie needs me to be, and I don’t know if I ever will be. And whether or not she decides my baggage is worth putting up with, she deserves better .

She’s always deserved better.

“Maya said the date went well!” Maddie squeals while she checks her phone.

Clearly, we got two different texts.

“Is that what you’re calling tonight?” I tease. “A date ?”

She gets flustered before she says, “What? No. I mean, I don’t know. I can’t determine that.”

“Sure you do. Does this beat going to the movies or bowling or any other dates you’ve been on?”

She shakes her head, shifting her eyes up to mine. “I mean, I can’t determine that because I’ve never been on one.”

“A movie date, or bowling?”

“Neither. Well, I’ve been out to eat a few times with guys at school, but those were always with other friends, so it was never just the two of us. And I’ve been bowling and to the movies before in group settings, but if you mean a date as in a guy formally asking me out, showing up with flowers, and holding the door open for me? Then no.”

The word echoes in the silence, but I still can’t grasp that she said it. Maddie has never been on a proper date? What the hell is wrong with people? If Maddie and I were strangers and I saw her at a club, or even out at the mall, or any public place, really, I’d hit on her in an instant. She’s fucking stunning, and I know I’m not the only one to have this opinion since the waiter earlier tonight was seconds away from doing the same.

“Are you serious?” I ask. “What about Michael? He never picked you up or took you anywhere?”

Her nose wrinkles in disgust. “The few times he picked me up, we didn’t go anywhere. He’d drive to a deserted spot, make conversation, and then try to make a move on me. He was only interested in the one thing I wouldn’t give him.”

For so long I’ve carried the burden of acting irrationally by punching that fucker in the face, but I won’t be carrying it anymore. Not after hearing that.

What a piece of garbage.

“Is that so hard to believe?” she continues. “That I’ve never been on a real date?”

“Uh, yeah . I assumed guys would kill for the opportunity to take you out.”

She tilts her head to the side, studying me. “You think guys haven’t tried to ask me out? I get hit on plenty , Cameron, but I’m not someone who goes out with the first guy who asks. Maybe I wanted my first real date to be special, and maybe—”

And maybe I waited for you .

I can finish the sentence for her, and before she can make up some lame excuse to cover the almost slipup, I smile down at her and say, “Well, I guess this means I have to take you on a date then, hm?”

“Tonight wasn’t a date?” she asks.

I laugh beneath my breath, my eyes locked on hers. “Maddie, when I take you out on your first official date, you aren’t going to question whether or not it’s a date. You’ll know.”

“How can you be so sure I’ll know?”

A smug grin pulls at my lips, and it has Maddie rolling her eyes. “Trust me, baby. You’ll know .”