Risking the Crown (The Crown 2)

I threw my helmet to the ground and walked past the coaching staff.

“Wyatt, come on.”

I waved them off and headed for the locker rooms.

It didn’t matter. There was no excuse for it. None. It was bullshit and they knew it.

This wasn’t the summer season anymore. Didn’t they see that? Summer was fucking over. In more ways than I could explain to them.

No more late night cruises. No more fishing with Cole. No boats that needed work. No dancing on the docks. No sex on the porch with a fucking sex siren. No. That was all over. It had been.

Fall was here and the sooner we all accepted that, the sooner we could leave the summer behind us.

30

Sierra

It had been a month since I drove off the island. An entire month had passed. I stared at the city below me in disbelief. Drinking coffee in a high-rise building didn’t feel the same as it had when I watching the boats from the porch at Aunt Lindy’s. I sighed, knowing that below me was chaos. Noise. Frenetic energy.

I didn’t know how the eight years I had spent here suddenly seemed like a foreign memory. Something I almost didn’t recognize. It was supposed to be the other way around.

I heard my phone vibrating from the kitchen counter. I hopped up to answer it. “Sierra Emory.”

“Sierra, get your ass into the station. There were two hit and runs today in the same neighborhood. Dallas PD thinks it might be a serial case,” the anxious assignment editor barked on the other end.

I looked down at my running shorts and the tank top that I was wearing.

“Ray, it’s going to be at least an hour before I can make it in. Besides, why aren’t you sending out one of the beat reporters?”

It didn’t make sense. I didn’t cover stories like this anymore. I had put in my time at the station so I didn’t have to do shitty work like this kind of assignment.

“I’ve got two people who are sick, an anchor out early, and I don’t know if I can find enough videographers today. Do I really have to ask if you’re a team player today?”

“No. No. I can be there in thirty minutes. It’s just today is my day off and—” I looked down at the phone, but the screen was blank. Ray had already hung up on me.

Great. So much for my workout and my call with Emily. I peeled the tank top over my head and turned the shower on. I carefully stepped over the side of the tub and reached for the shampoo.

Ray wasn’t the only one at the station who barked orders. It seemed like threats and insults were the only way people in the newsroom communicated with each other. A little professional competitiveness was important, but I had almost forgotten the cutthroat environment I had returned to.

I dumped a handful of conditioner in my hand and lathered it into my hair. I really needed to talk to Emily this morning.

We were planning a girls’ weekend in October. Emily had suggested we meet in New Orleans for a little Bourbon Street getaway. I didn’t want to tell her yet that the producers were going to cut my vacation time.

I picked up my razor and shook the shaving cream can in my hand before squeezing the foam along my leg. My tan hadn’t completely faded. As I ran the razor along my leg a flash of Blake’s thumb rubbing that spot hit me.

Shit! A trickle of blood streamed down my leg. I didn’t have time for this. I turned the water off and wrapped a towel around my leg, hoping the bleeding would stop.

I tried to tell myself that it was completely normal for Blake to pop in my head from time to time. It was going to happen. The bleeding along my calf stopped. What I knew wasn’t normal was that those flashbacks weren’t just every now and then. They were all the time.

A month hadn’t done anything to dull the vibrant colors in my dreams. His eyes. His hands. His hot-as-hell mouth.

I fastened the last button on my suit jacket and slid my heels into black sling-back pumps. In the elevator ride to the basement parking lot, I let out a steady breath. The flashbacks had to fade eventually. It was taking longer than I thought it would, but I knew if I put my mind to it, the loneliness would subside.

The gut reaction I felt every time I flipped past a football game on TV would fade.

I pulled out my phone to call Emily on my way to the station. It was Tuesday, and Emily said we couldn’t talk until after work, but I wanted to let her know I had been called in for an assignment. I flipped the Bluetooth switch on the steering wheel and waited for my best friend to answer the phone.

“Hey. I thought we were going to talk when I got off work?” Emily sounded distracted, but sweet as ever.