There are a few defining moments in a man’s life.
Moments when you don’t fully understand the ways your life is about to change, but you know that from that moment forward, shit is going to be awesome. I had one of those moments when I signed my first pro contract. I had another when I made the decision to man up and be a dad to Harper.
Then there are moments when you know that shit is never going to be as good as you had it the day before. I had one of those moments when I lost my parents. Then there are moments where you know that you’re fucked or that you fucked up. Royally.
I had one of those moments in Richard’s office when I denied that anything was going on between Gabrielle and me. The words weren’t even out of my mouth, weren’t even cold yet, and I knew I had fucked up. Royally.
I had walked into that office thinking that I was about to have one of the best moments of my life. Instead, it turned out to be in the top three worst days of my fucking life.
It took me awhile to figure out why, but watching Gabrielle drive away from me clarified things. I’d never felt pain like that before. It was different from losing my parents, of course. But it hurt like a son of a bitch nonetheless.
That’s when it hit me, like a knockout punch from Mike Tyson himself. I was in love with Gabrielle. I fucking loved her like I hadn’t ever thought it was possible to love a woman. Like I had never loved anyone before, because I hadn’t. Not like that.
Instead of stepping up like a man, I’d thrown her away with both hands. The expression on her face when I denied our relationship to her father and his reception bitch, the agony that I saw there when I caught up to her car, it told me that she might just have felt the same way about me.
Before I’d ripped her heart out and stomped all over it like a one-man marching band. It haunted me all night. I didn’t get one minute of sleep.
All that I could think about was that I had to make this right. If she wanted to have nothing to do with me after, so be it. I had to tell her that I loved her. I had to face Richard and tell him that I loved her.
If he chose to revoke the offer, that was the price I would have to pay for making the biggest fucking mistake that I’d ever made.
I would leave Miami and never look back. I would work my way up with another team and give Harper the future that she deserved.
I would throw myself into work every second that I wasn’t with Harper and resign myself to the fact that I’d fucked things up with the love of my goddamn life. That I was damned
to be lonely forever as a result of my own actions.
The plan that had taken me all night to come up with wasn’t exactly rocket science. Although, from what I’d heard, rocket science wasn’t exactly rocket science. The plan wasn’t necessarily complex.
It wasn’t the big romantic gesture that Gabrielle deserved. It was all I could come up with through the blinding pain that wrecked me from the inside out.
It started with Richard. I had to come clean to him first. When I told Gabrielle, I had to be able to tell her that I’d been entirely honest with Richard. That I wasn’t asking her to go behind his back again.
If she chose to forgive me, to be with me, we’d be doing it right. It was the only way to take a real shot at having a real relationship. No sneaking around, no doubts about what we were to each other, or why we were in it.
All of which relied on my not having entirely misread her the day before, and she would actually want me after what I had done.
Jesus, I sounded like a pussy. Even to myself.
Strangely, I found that I didn’t mind it so much. I wasn’t stupid. I had found my girl. The only one who had ever held my interest for longer than a couple of fucks. The only one that I had ever wanted to talk to, to learn about, to wake up with.
I would be a pussy if I gave her up because I was too afraid to face her father, or if I let her go without laying my cards on the table and fighting for her.
After a long, fortifying shower, I pulled on a pair of jeans and a Henley, grabbed my keys and my sunglasses, and went to fight for my girl, hoping to all that was holy that she knew me well enough to know that I was being honest today, not just covering up my fuck up from the day before for another shot at getting into her pants.
I marched past Olivia, ignoring her scathing stares and calls that Richard was busy and that I couldn’t just burst into his office. I no longer gave a flying fuck about her or her opinions.
Not being a complete asshole, and on the off chance he was doing something in there that I shouldn’t see him doing, I rapped my knuckles on his door and waited for his gruff voice to bark, “What,” before turning the knob and letting myself in.
I didn’t know where I expected Gabrielle to be that morning, but it wasn’t sitting in her father’s office gaping at my sudden appearance.
My breath caught in my lungs.
Holy shit, she was fucking beautiful. Even with tired circles under her eyes and red rims around them and all.
To an ordinary onlooker, she might just look tired. I could see that she’d been to hell and back since we’d been in that very office not 24 hours before.
She sucked in a deep breath at my appearance, letting it out with a shudder. God, what I wouldn’t give to feel her shudder underneath me again, while I wrapped a fist into that soft hair that hung loosely over her shoulders that morning—