Rough Love (Tannen Boys 1)

Cooper and Liam look at each other in excitement. “Let’s go before she changes her mind!” They’re off for the expanse of grass, a football appearing from one of their bags.

I don’t give myself even a moment to second-guess this. I walk straight over to Mike and Bruce. “Hey, guys. Thanks for practice. Seems like the boys had fun.”

Mike looks at Cooper and Liam, who are running some sort of zig-zag pattern and tossing the ball between them. He shakes his head with a grin. “I don’t know where they get the energy. I’m beat. Did you need something, Allyson?”

My eyes meet Bruce’s and hold. “Oh, no, I just wanted to talk to Bruce for a minute.”

Mike clears his throat, but Bruce and I don’t break eye contact. I feel like there are so many words churning below the surface but neither of us speaks.

Not yet.

He used to say my eyes were blue oceans he’d drown in, but right now his are raging rivers with currents that’ll pull me under, batter me senseless, and leave me on the shore not knowing what the hell just happened.

“Sure thing, Jamie’s waiting on Evan and me for dinner. See you Thursday.” He hoists his bag onto his shoulder. “Hey, Brutal? Remember what we talked about.”

Bruce breaks our staredown to nod at Mike. “I’m good.”

Mike turns to go, whistling for Evan as he heads to the parking lot. Something about Mike’s parting words pushes my buttons. “You talked to Mike about me, about us?”

Bruce’s entire presence goes dark and cold as he huffs out a humorless laugh. “Conceited much?” He resumes his bouncer pose, defensive and walled off as he explains. “No, we didn’t talk about you at all, actually. But he did warn me that every single mom would be looking for me to be their new daddy figure and that sometimes, it’s not just the single ones. He told me to be careful.”

I blush furiously, knowing Mike’s right. It’s not that the other moms are bad or slutty at all. But Bruce is walking sex, from his hat to his boots and everywhere in between, and I wouldn’t blame any woman for taking her shot with him. Except for me. That ship has sailed and crashed to pieces.

“Well, that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about,” I say, trying to justify this little chat. He grunts like he doesn’t believe me, so I roll into my practiced speech. “Look, what I wanted to say is that I know we have history and this could be really weird. But I hope that we can put aside the past for the boys. Maybe even be friends?”

He lowers his arms to his sides and steps incrementally closer, and I smile, trying to hide my nerves. “History? Is that what you’re calling it?” Something flashes across his face too fast for me to decode it. His voice is a growl, low and powerful, hitting right where he aims. “I’d call it you ripping my guts out, Al.”

His eyes pin me in place like a bug, and I freeze, not finding a response amid the warning sirens going off in my head. Always able to read me like an open book, he must see the fear, scent its bitterness on my skin, because he steps back the smallest inch but keeps his voice quiet, between us.

“Bruce—” I try again.

“No. I can’t do friends with people who I know what they taste like when they come while screaming my name.”

Memories flood me. I remember doing that.

“I’m not friends with people who bail on everything they’ve ever known and disappear for new and shiny shit.”

Ouch . . . and the betrayal burns hot in his voice, searing at my heart.

“So no, we ain’t gonna be friends, Allyson.”

His venom pours over me, but I’ve withstood so much more for so much less. Even so, the verbal lashing from him strikes deep.

I’m not the girl he used to know, and for the first time, I consider that he’s not the boy I once knew, either. This Bruce is cruel and hard. Though he seems warm and friendly with the boys. Which means this treatment is special, just for me.

He hates me.

I don’t know why that hurts so much. Before last week, I hadn’t even thought of Bruce in years, not really. He was this abstract warm, fuzzy feeling from my misspent youth that ended in a painful blaze of glory. No, what’s the opposite of blaze of glory? Because there were no fireworks, no angry fights, nothing like that. We just drifted and my predictions came true, and we were snuffed out like the cherry of a burnt-up cigarette.

A phantom echo stabs at my heart even now at how badly I wanted to be wrong, just that one time. It hadn’t been a sharp ending, but it’d been cruel in its quiet loss.