Scrimmage Gone South (Crimson Romance) (29 page)

“Not that many,” Lucy said.

“Maybe not. But still. Nathan has something. Even though there was no spark between us when we tried dating, I recognized at the time that Nathan has this charisma and strength. I’m not saying this very well. It’s practically magic.”

What did they say in fairy tales? That magic always comes at a price? Yes. Always. A high one.

“I know what you mean,” Tolly said in a low voice.

Missy, Lanie, and Lucy laughed.

“I’m sure you do,” Lanie went on. “This media thing isn’t going to last long. In the scheme of things, it’s a moment in time. But if so many people got caught up in the Nathan magic, for even a moment, I can see how a teenage girl would. Not that I excuse her. But as Tolly said, she’s a child.”

What about grown up lawyers? Were they so caught up that they could never recover?

“She’s getting counseling. Mason-Harper made it a condition of her acceptance,” Tolly said.

Lucy smiled. “So maybe the world will get the happy ending they are hoping for.”

It was now or never. And it couldn’t be never.

“Not quite,” Tolly said.

Three pairs of eyes settled on her questioning.

“You see, Nathan and I couldn’t work it out. We aren’t suited. We aren’t together anymore.”

She couldn’t breathe. Boulders moved in and chased her heart away, her blood, every vital thing about her.

“Oh, Tolly. No.” Missy’s eyes met hers. Late stages of pregnancy crazy Missy was gone. The real Missy was back — at least for now. “This isn’t because — ”

“No!” Tolly waved her hands in the air. “No. We broke up the night before Nathan was arrested.
I
ended it. But I had to stand with him, you see?”

Lucy came to kneel beside her.

Lanie followed suit.

With some effort, Missy rose from her place and came to sit beside Tolly. “I can’t get down there to kneel at your feet. Lanie and Lucy will have to be our handmaidens.” She wrapped Tolly in a blue throw.

“But why?” Lucy asked.

“It’s just not working out. But it’s a secret. After all the controversy at the school board meeting, it would be better if we appear to be a couple for a while longer.”

“Better for whom?” Lanie asked. “Not you.”

“Yeah, well … ”

“How long?” Missy asked.

“I don’t know,” Tolly said. “But if it appears that we break up now, it might look like I think he was guilty. I can’t have that.”

Lanie said, “We don’t have any details here. Clearly, you aren’t going to give us any. But I know this. The kind of pain you’re in always has love mixed up in it.”

“If you’d give us the details, we could help you figure this out,” Missy said hopefully.

“Nice try,” Tolly said. “I would have been disappointed if you hadn’t made the attempt.”

“I have no wisdom,” Lucy said. “I’ve never had any when it counted.”

“Ask yourself this question,” Missy said. “If you are sure this is over — ”

“I’m sure,” Tolly said emphatically, because she could not debate this with them. It would kill her.

“Okay. If you are sure, why keep it a secret? What will happen? He’s got his job back. Harris says legally, it’s a done deal. So what if people talk? People talk every day. Get yourself away from this so you can start healing.”

There was sense to what Missy said. And sense to what she
didn’t
say. Tolly could hear it rambling around in Missy’s head, just as surely as if it had come out of her mouth.

You’re keeping up the pretense because you can’t let go
. “I’ll know when the time comes,” Tolly said.

• • •

Game day. Last game day of the season and they weren’t ready. Under the circumstances, Nathan wasn’t sure there was a coach who had ever lived who would be ready, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. He couldn’t blame his team or assistant coaches. They were doing the best they could but they’d all been one big emotional mess all week, not knowing what was going to happen. That was hard to come back from, coupled with the fact that they just had not had enough time to prepare properly.

At least Daryl Grayson was lying low. Nathan had heard that Keith had told his father if he didn’t cease, he would quit football for good, would not consider playing his senior year.

Now the weather had turned on them. They were going to have to play in the rain. That meant half empty stands, which wouldn’t help anything.

But Townshend would be there. That was something. If they could just get this week behind them, get some distance from the hell that had been their lives the last bit, they could start to rebuild. She wanted to. He could tell. She looked at him with a hunger in her eyes, the same hunger he felt every minute of every day. He just needed the time to make it happen.

It was surreal to think that Halloween had been less than a week ago. How could something so good go so bad in such a short time?

People kept bringing him newspapers and magazines with that damned picture on the cover, kept telling him about websites. He had not read one single word of it. And what the hell, anyway? Who cared? But reporters kept calling, wanting to talk. Didn’t they know he had a team to run, classes to teach, and a girl to get back? Answering his phone without checking the caller ID was a thing of the past.

And then there was that totally unexpected, stomach turning, heart stopping voice mail. How had Arianna gotten his number anyway? Apparently has-been supermodels had their ways. No matter. He’d blocked her number.

He’d stopped answering for ESPN too, though he had told Skip Lowery to call Audrey Evans. She’d done him a good turn and if he could help her get a shot at the job she wanted, that might balance the scale a little.

Make them even.
Ha. Even. Townshend talked about being
even
. What did that mean? It didn’t mean anything. They didn’t need to be even. They needed to be together.

And he needed to win this ballgame.

• • •

He did not win the ballgame. What a finish. 21-13. Now, he faced a locker room full of muddy, disappointed, beat-up boys.

“We’ve had a bad week, a hard week,” he said to them. “We lost tonight. We lost together as one, as we always won together, as one. That’s who we are. I know something that you didn’t want me know. And no one told me, so don’t start blaming your brothers for telling secrets. I am your coach. I’ve got eyes and ears in the back of my head, so there’s not much that goes on with you that I don’t know about. I know you wanted to win this game for me tonight, to show your support. I know you wanted to bring me a victory ball that you had all signed. You don’t feel like you can give me that ball now, because you failed. Let me tell you something. I want that ball with your names on it. You did not fail. Oh, we lost this game. I won’t paint that any way except how it was. And, as usual, next week we’ll talk about where we went wrong. But in the here and the now, in the big picture, you are winners. This game does not define this season and it does not define you. You have shown yourselves to be men of character.”

And with no prompting, they all stood and shouted in unison, “We are one!”

• • •

Tolly stood outside the field house, waiting for Kirby. The rain had finally stopped but it was still wet and miserable. The crowd was slim, but she waited, as did most of the other parents, a lot of girlfriends, and some wannabe girlfriends. She’d been told that the last game was always emotional for the team, but most especially for seniors, and most especially for the seniors who knew they had no chance at college ball.

That wasn’t Kirby. So far he had offers from Mississippi State, Clemson, South Carolina, and five smaller schools that were not in the running. Nathan was handling all that. She was not going to be able to get completely away from him until Kirby graduated. That was becoming clearer and clearer.

But she had to have some distance if she was going to survive this. Tonight was a last for her too — the last time she would watch him coach. Something had come home to her tonight as she watched him rant, give praise, throw his headset in frustration, and clap his team in from the field when they’d pleased him. He wasn’t just coaching football. He was coaching young men, making them better than they had been when they came to him. She wondered if he knew that.

Walking away from a man you loved was hard. Walking away from a man you were so proud of was beyond hard. There was no word for how hard it was. There ought to be a word for things there were no words for. But if there were, someone would misuse it.

The door opened, and out they came. Wet hair, letter jackets, and, tonight, some tears. They weren’t crying because they lost. Coach Scott did not tolerate loss tears.
No crying in football.
They were crying because it was over. But Kirby wasn’t crying. Though he was smiling a brokenhearted little smile, there were no tears. He walked straight into her arms.

“No tears?” She felt a little misty.

“Oh, Miss Tolly. Not tonight. I’m saving them for something worse. I’ve seen worse.”

“You have, haven’t you?” And suddenly, she needed to cling to something. She needed some assurance, that something would stay the same. “I need a promise from you. I need you to promise you’ll come home for Thanksgiving next year — home being where I am.”

“I can’t promise that. Not all coaches let you go home because you have to play Thanksgiving weekend.”

What heart she had left sunk. Was she to have nothing? “Right. I remember when Harris played. We always spent every Thanksgiving weekend in Tuscaloosa with him. We’d eat in a restaurant.”

“You could come,” he said tentatively. “I know you have family, but if you wanted. Maybe not until the Friday after but — ”

“You
are
my family, Kirby. My family already accepts you. After you spend some time with the Harris-Bragg-Lee clan, they will never let you go. My guess is, they’ll be right there with us.”

He smiled a devilish little smile. “That would be great. But summer and Christmas breaks. I’m there. You’ll be sick of me.”

“Yeah, probably. Especially after I spend every weekend coming to watch you play.”

“Don’t forget, you might be watching me stand around.”

“If so, I am sure you will be a great stander. Now go have a good time. Take the car. I’ll get a ride.” Missy and Lanie had not come to the game because of the rain. Harris, Luke, and Lucy had offered to wait with her, but she’d insisted they go home. But Sondra Bowman would drop her off.

“You sure?”

“It’s parked in the usual spot. Home by midnight, please.”

“Thanks!”

She didn’t notice that Nathan was standing three feet away until Kirby was gone.

“So you’re carless?” he asked.

“So it would seem. I’m going to get Kirby a car for Christmas.”

“Generous.”

“It has nothing to do with generosity. If I don’t do it, who will? Besides, I want to control what he drives. Safety issues.”

“You’ve stepped up, Townshend. You’ve really been there for that boy. It will mean a lot to him to have you at his games next year.”

She appreciated the words but hurt at the surprise in his voice.

“I come through sometimes,” she said.

“I need to go to Applebee’s. Please come with me.”

“No.” She wasn’t giving up this pretense yet, but not going with him to Applebee’s after the game was not going to cause people to speculate. For that matter,
he
didn’t have to go. “Don’t go. You know you don’t want to.”

“I don’t,” he agreed. “But my boys are going to be there — at least most of them will be. Applebee’s is feeding them, the cheerleaders, and the band free tonight. And I have to be there for them.”

“Then tell people I was wet and cold and didn’t want to go.” Because truly, she’d had about all she could take for one week.

“I need you.”

She looked into his eyes. He meant it. And what could she say?

So she went. They didn’t eat. They didn’t even sit down. She followed Nathan, as he made his rounds, table to table. He talked to every boy who had played for him, every parent, and every Merritt High Bobcat supporter. She knew he was still hurting over the past few days, from the accusation to the less than complete support of the school board. But he put it aside, did what he had to do. Lanie was right; it was magic. They adored him. And the hell of it was, he meant every word of praise and appreciation. It wasn’t all smoke and mirrors.

“Well, that was exhausting,” he said later as he drove her home. “And probably pointless.”

“Make light, Nathan, if you want to, but you’re a good man, a good coach.”

“Mighty pretty words for someone who has been accused of child molestation and lost a ballgame in the space of five days.”

He was trying to be blasé, but there was pain buried in his words. She could hear that pain every time. She hoped the woman he ended up with would be able to hear that pain, and make it go away.

“It wasn’t child molestation. It was sexual misconduct.” Maybe if she set her mind on a technicality track, her emotions would go to bed.

“And that is so much better.”

“Actually, it is.” She could explain the repercussions of each. Maybe she would.

“Thank you, counselor, but not when you didn’t do it.”

He had a point. “Agreed. Still, I was trying to compliment you.”

“Does that mean you are ready to put this unpleasantness behind us?”

She should have seen that coming. Nathan wasn’t one to miss an opportunity.

“No. It’s more than unpleasantness. It has nothing to do with what kind of person you are. It’s about what kind of person you think I am and how you will never trust me.”

“Please, let’s forget it,” he implored as he stopped in front of Miss Caroline’s house. “Let it go, Townshend. Let me come in with you.” He put an arm around her and she broke. The tears came and he pulled her against him.

When he kissed her, she tasted her own tears, and nothing of him at all — no toothpaste, chocolate, or sweet longing. That made her cry harder.

She knew what the answer would be, but she had to try again.

“I’m going to ask you one more time.” She pulled out of his arms. “Please, can we talk about it? Please, will you come in with me and let me tell you the things I need to tell you? Can you please hear me out?”