Page 31

31

Holt

What’s that feeling when the woman you’re falling hard for is due back any minute, but your teammates have invaded your house for an impromptu party to celebrate you being off crutches, and if they see your team’s owner’s daughter walk through your front door, you’re fucked?

Right.

Panic.

That’s what I’m feeling right now.

Ziggy hasn’t answered any of my texts, to the point that I went and hid in the bathroom to make sure I wasn’t accidentally texting someone else.

It’s too early in our relationship to use a location app so we always know where the other is.

And that’s stalkerish. Right?

But in a bad way?

It would be good to know when she’s done with brunch .

And what happened at brunch.

Sounded like she was in danger of running into Abby Nora.

I hope she’s not upset somewhere.

“What the fuck?” Porter crows in my living room. “That wasn’t offside! Are you shitting me?”

“Was too, my dude,” Tatum says to him.

A half dozen guys are crowded in my living room, all of us watching the local women’s soccer team. Nice that they’re broadcast. Sucks that the guys didn’t think—or couldn’t afford—to get tickets at the match for us to celebrate me being off crutches.

Why the fuck isn’t Ziggy answering my texts?

Is she hurt?

Was there an accident?

Did she tell her dad about us and he took her phone away and she’s locked in a Heartwood Valley mansion, needing me to come rescue her?

Fuck .

I’m getting worried and I need to breathe and not panic and trust that everything will be fine.

She’s okay.

She’s okay.

There’s a legit explanation for her not texting me back.

And I will find out.

Soon.

“Better not cost us the match,” Crew mutters.

They’re passing around brown paper bags with Cadbury chocolate inside. Fletcher says it’s the real stuff from the UK, not the imitation stuff they make here in the US.

He says he got it from a senior citizen smuggling ring.

I tell him to shut up because I don’t want to know .

Haven’t touched a single bar. Not when I’m still on activity restrictions. Eating chocolate means working off chocolate. I haven’t even let myself ask for more cherry hand pies, and I actively asked Ziggy not to make more so I wouldn’t have to work them off, which was freaking hard.

But if I don’t hear from her soon, I might have two chocolate bars.

Or more.

I hope she’s okay.

I will fucking kill something if she’s not okay.

“What’s with all of the potatoes in your kitchen?” Zander asks me.

Focus . “What are you doing in my cabinets?”

“Looking for peanut butter.”

“We bring our own peanut butter when we invade someone’s house,” Silas tells him.

“How was I supposed to know there’d be chocolate that would need peanut butter?”

“There’s always chocolate,” Fletcher answers.

Silas hooks a thumb at him. “What the shitbasket said.”

Fletcher smirks. “Thank you, fuckwanker, for acknowledging that I’m always right and always do what’s best.”

Silas flips him off.

Fletcher rises and stretches like he’s about to moon Silas and doesn’t care who’s in the blast zone of having to see his ass when the door opens and Ziggy walks in.

Relief that she’s okay floods my body.

She’s okay.

She’s in one piece.

One beautiful, glorious, curly-haired, wide-blue-eyed, full-breasted, baby-carrying piece.

And all of that relief almost instantly headbutts against the shit, we’re caught panic taking over the did something happen to her panic, and I leap to my feet and almost trip over my boot.

“ Oh my god , the way everyone kept staaaaarr—oh, fuuuuuuuck.”

Crew drops his chocolate bar on my couch.

Porter makes a choking noise.

Zander stares at her, mostly in horror, which is a mirror of how she’s now staring at me.

“Heh. Called it,” Silas mutters.

Fletcher shoves him. “Shut up.”

“Called what?” Tatum asks.

Everyone else just keeps staring while Ziggy’s face breaks out in that blotchy blush.

I curl my hands into fists to keep myself from leaping across the room to wrap her in a hug and hustle her out of here, which would give us away.

But what won’t?

What the fuck won’t ?

“Thanks for coming, food lady,” Fletcher says. “We need to talk about the banquet menu and there’s no fucking way we’re talking about it when there are cameras in the office. I don’t want witnesses to my opinions.”

Ziggy blinks at him while I freeze halfway across the room, blocking the TV as the announcer shouts about a goal.

“There are cameras in the office?” she says to Fletcher.

My wingman.

It’s impossible to not love and hate him at the same time.

He shakes his head as he replies, “Yeah, they’re everywhere. In case anyone does anything that’ll go viral on the internet and sell more tickets.”

“There aren’t fucking cameras,” I mutter .

My heart is about to beat out of my chest.

Only about a quarter of the team is here, but all of them have phones with cameras, and all of them know that Ziggy Barnes should not be in my house.

Crew’s staring at me. So is Porter.

“Fuck yeah, we scored,” Tatum says. “But wait. What’s wrong with the catering menu for the banquet?”

“It’s tofu,” Fletcher says.

“With a side of lima beans,” Silas adds.

Freaking both of them.

Working together.

I will never understand their relationship.

I look at Ziggy again, trying to silently ask her what she wants to do without putting it all on her. And I’m coming to a realization I don’t like.

“Hey, don’t hate on limas.” Porter shoves Silas from the other side, but he’s still half eyeing me. “And don’t talk shit about Ziggy’s food choices. She promised me we’re getting steak. And not bad catering steak either. Good steak. Like, she’s hiring a rancher to come in and fix it for us.”

“How do you know about the rancher?” Ziggy asks him. She’s clutching her handbag so tightly that her knuckles are white.

He grins. “I was with the social media team for a volunteer thing this week and I told them I’d show my tattoo for the camera if they told me how you could keep a promise about good steak.”

Ziggy squeezes her eyes shut. “I didn’t hear that. I don’t want to know who you’re showing your tattoo to.”

“It’s on my arm. See?” He lifts his sleeve, and there’s the tattoo that all of us in the locker room are familiar with but the rest of the world doesn’t see often .

He has the cartoon lion mascot of his favorite breakfast cereal on his shoulder.

Ziggy blinks at him, glances at me, then swiftly looks away.

Like anyone’s gonna believe she doesn’t know me when this is my fucking house and it’s pretty clear no one believes the catering story.

“You still gonna be playing for us next year, Cap’n?” Zander says quietly.

“Yes,” I grit out.

He looks at Ziggy, then at me.

Then at Jessica, who runs as fast as her little barrel body will go as she dashes in from the porch.

I’ve been leaving the doors open so she can go in and out as she pleases, and as she pleases is right to Ziggy.

Even if it means being in the same room with a half dozen men.

“How’d this happen?” Crew asks me.

“How did what happen?”

He looks pointedly at Ziggy, who’s squatting down and whispering things in Italian to Jessica, who’s soaking in the love, then back at me.

I get the eyebrow cock of don’t fucking lie to us .

“Oh, shit, are you the father?” Tatum says.

Ziggy jerks her head up so fast she almost falls over. “ No .”

I swallow a muttered thanks because it wouldn’t come out as nice as it should.

I know what she means.

He didn’t get me pregnant .

But fuck yes that baby is mine.

All of those eyeballs shift between us.

My house isn’t big enough for this mountain of scrutiny, and all I want to do is pick Ziggy up and carry her somewhere away from the prying eyes and ask if she’s okay.

What happened at brunch.

If something happened to her phone.

What I can do.

“So what’s going on then?” Porter says.

“What’s going on is nobody’s fucking business until someone makes it everybody’s fucking business,” Fletcher says. “Maybe something’s going on. Maybe nothing’s going on. You want to sit here and speculate on some shit that could get Holt fired? Even if it’s not true?”

If they’re really family, they’ll be on your side , I hear Caden say. I’d be on your side.

Shit.

Fuck .

I look at Ziggy again.

Pretty sure she wants to crawl through the floor and live in the floorboards for the next few months.

And I have to tell my teammates what’s going on.

Trust them.

This is a fuckton easier when it’s someone else’s problem. Someone else’s secret.

“It was an accident,” I say on a sigh.

“You are the dad!” Tatum says.

“Christ on a cinnamon roll,” I mutter to the ceiling.

“I was pregnant before I came back to the States,” Ziggy tells him, her attention still half on me.

I nod. Tell them .

She’s not getting fired.

Roland will take good care of her.

It’s me. I’m the one with the most to lose. With everything to lose .

We both know it.

So I have to do this. Not her.

“Ziggy and I met by accident,” I say, louder. More specific. “I asked her to house-sit for me while I was in Spain.”

“Like you met in a car accident?” Tatum asks.

“At my night job,” I tell him.

“Where the other staff told me he played lacrosse,” Ziggy fills in.

Groans go up around the room.

She stifles a smile by pinching her lips together, and that little smile—knowing she mentioned lacrosse on purpose to get a reaction and unite them—it helps me breathe again.

Jessica snorts happily.

She can apparently handle being in a room of men so long as Ziggy’s rubbing her belly.

Relatable.

“Why didn’t you tell him who you are?” Zander asks her.

“Wasn’t relevant,” I say. “She needed a place to stay. Jessica needed a keeper.”

“And people treat you differently when they find out Roland Keating is your stepfather,” Ziggy says. “I don’t tell anyone if I don’t have to.”

“So you two are…” Porter says, letting the rest of the sentence hang in the air.

“Trying to not get me fired,” I finish.

Ziggy winces.

“So that’s how brunch went?” I ask her.

“My mom might come around.” She looks down at Jessica and adds, “In another year or two.”

My teammates all share a look.

They don’t need more context.

Even the slower ones .

“Fuck this,” Crew says. “You treating her right?”

“It’s the captain, you dipshit,” Porter says. “He treats everyone right. Of course he’s treating her right. Probably better than right. You think a single woman choosing to have a baby on her own’s gonna tolerate being treated like anything less than a queen? Not a fucking chance.”

“She treating you right?” Silas asks me.

Fletcher hits him in the face with a pillow. “Don’t talk about your sister’s friends like that.”

Silas pushes the pillow away. “Since when are they friends?”

“Since high school.”

“Goldie doesn’t see anyone from high school anymore.”

“That’s because Ziggy lived overseas after she graduated culinary school. Who knows your sister better? I know your sister better.”

“Why do we invite both of them to stuff like this?” Tatum says to Zander.

“Because when we say things like knock it off and focus, you assholes , they’re the ones with the time and resources to make shit happen,” Zander replies.

“Dammit.”

“Agreed.”

Tatum looks at me. “How can we help?”

“Help what?” Ziggy says.

“Help convince Roland that you two should get to date.”

She blinks at him.

See? Told you , Caden whispers while another knot deep in my stomach loosens.

Might be one in my heart area relaxing too.

“Captain’s been through shit the past couple years,” Crew tells Ziggy .

“Haven’t seen him happy in a while,” Porter adds.

“It’s like he came back to life even though he’s been walking around on crutches,” Zander says. “I’d be a shit show if I was on crutches. But he’s been happy. Guessing it’s not the broken foot effect. So that means it’s you.”

Crew nods. “And that means we’re your guys for whatever it takes to win your family over and not have our captain get fired when your stepdad finds out.”

I swallow the lump at the base of my throat. “Just don’t tell anybody while we figure this out.”

“Lame,” Silas says.

Fletcher nods. “Fuckwanker’s right. We can do a lot better than not tell anybody.”

“You two have a very strange relationship,” Ziggy says.

“He’s a whiny-ass baby,” Fletcher says, jerking a head at Silas.

“He’s a stuck-up bossy shithead,” Silas replies.

“But I make his sister happy.”

“The day he cheats on her, he’s a dead man, and I’ll enjoy every minute of torturing him before I murder him.”

“We’re on a truce until one of us dies because I’m never doing another thing in my life to make Goldie anything less than ecstatically happy.”

“Can we focus on the captain and his lady?” Zander says to them.

Silas hooks a thumb at Fletcher. “He started it.”

“You must truly be a superhero if you convince these guys to play nicely together on the field,” Ziggy says to me.

“ Pitch ,” everyone replies at once.

Ziggy stifles another smile, and once again, I’m positive she used the wrong word on purpose.

Glorious woman .

She gets them all back on the same page so easily.

“Pitch,” she says. “Apologies. Your pitchinesses.”

“We wouldn’t get along for another captain,” Fletcher says. “I’ll make sure everyone knows if Captain goes, this team’s never making the playoffs again because I’m quitting.”

“You’re old,” Silas fires back. “They’d just retire your ass if you said that.”

“And then I’d be your boss from the office.”

“Unless you go work for league headquarters,” Porter says. He looks at me. “So those two are out, but don’t worry, Cap’n. The rest of us will still help.”

“Lots of talking about how much we like playing under your leadership,” Crew says.

Zander nods. “And we’ll get you back out on the volunteer circuit for some community recognition. Make it so you’re selling more tickets than Fletcher does.”

Fletcher snorts. “Not likely. But I’ll give you credit for half the tickets I sell.”

“How do you even track that?” Ziggy asks.

Fletcher whips out his phone. “Selfie,” he commands, and half the guys lean in, showing off their Copper Valley Scorned soccer jerseys or flashing peace signs.

Including Silas.

“It’s ridiculous,” I tell Ziggy.

I’m too far away from her.

It’s maybe six feet between where I’m standing and where she’s squatting and rubbing Jessica’s belly, but it’s too far.

I want to hold her hand. I want to hug her. I want to kiss her.

I want to promise her this will work out.

I want her to promise me she wants it to.

The guys pull away, and Fletcher bends over his phone. “ Grabbing a promo shot from last season too…and posting both together on socials…”

“He’ll text the ticket office that he posted, and they’ll tell him how many more tickets move this weekend than did before,” Porter says.

“Are you an influencer?” Ziggy asks.

“I don’t do titles,” Fletcher says. “I just am .”

“That was the captain’s inspiration,” Porter says. “The just am thing.”

Fletcher snorts. “Was not. It was Goldie.”

“Is now. That’s what I’m telling everyone I see at headquarters. Captain made you a better person.”

I look at Ziggy and shrug. “I can’t fully explain them, but they’re mine.”

Her slow-growing smile makes my heart beat faster. “Like a real family. Complete with the annoying siblings.”

Exactly.

I might lose my job.

But for the first time in a long time, I’m finally not worried that I’ll lose my family.