Page 109 of Unstoppable Love

Chapter 31

Ava

The game was over. Not that I watched another second of it, but I knew that Colorado ended up winning. The roughing the passer penalty got them a first down, and Potter had gotten them in field goal range. A kick for three points, and the game was over, but there wasn’t a single person who trotted off that field feeling good about their win. Not with the unknowns about Cameron.

My parents left to get Grams back to the home, and eventually, Isaiah took Lydia home before telling me he’d come back to wait with me.

I wasn’t going anywhere, not even to the bathroom, until my phone or one of the Kelleys rang with news about Cameron.

We knew nothing, and it’d been hours. The game was over by nine thirty, and it was now closing in on midnight, and still, we hadn’t gotten a single phone call.

Gavin was upstairs, putting Josie to bed, and Landon and Emily were both upstairs in his room, sleeping too. Emily had tried to stay awake until we heard something, but when her head started dropping, Charles insisted she go to bed.

My phone buzzed with a text, and I had the screen pulled up before it finished buzzing in my hand.

Isaiah

Anything?

“Who is it?” Bryce asked.

“Isaiah.” I sighed and texted my brother we hadn’t heard anything.

“I’m calling Jim,” Charles said and stomped off to the kitchen.

“Jim?” I asked.

“Cameron’s agent,” Dalton replied. “He should know something, but Mom or Dad should have been contacted by now, too. Teams are usually pretty good about that.”

“That means it’s bad.” Dalton, for once, had lost his growly look. Worry had softened his perpetual scowl, but I’d give anything to have that scowl back on his face.

His worried look was much more terrifying.

“Don’t jump to the worst case before we know anything.”

“You sure?” Charles said. “Then why haven’t they called us?”

We all stood on our feet as Charles paced back and forth out of view in the kitchen. His phone was at his ear, face to the floor, and his free hand kept scrubbing the back of his head. “Shit. Okay. Okay. I know. But if you hear something, call me. All right. Thanks, Jim.”

Charles dropped his phone to his side and stared out the door leading to the screened-in porch and the dark night before spinning around to face us. Like he needed the moment to get a hold of himself.

When he saw us all standing there, fanned out in a half-circle, he sighed. “Last Jim knew, he was being taken in for tests and immediate surgery for his broken leg.”

“Oh god.” My hands flew to my mouth, and all the food I’d eaten earlier threatened to revolt. “It is broken?”

“Appears that way, and needing surgery isn’t good at all.”

“What about the rest?” Dalton asked with a vicious clip that made even Charles blink.

“Slight concussion, they think. Part of what the testing is for but also to MRI his knee.”

Bryce cussed, and even Jenny didn’t skewer him with a glare for cursing in her home. “This is bad.”

“Season ending at minimum,” Dalton said.

Tears welled in my eyes. “How… when… did Jim say…”

Jesus. I couldn’t think, much less speak. And they all knew more about this than I did.

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