Page 98 of Interference

Simon’s shoulders sagged as he slipped his tie off his neck. He said nothing as he took off his jacket, and after he’d hung that up, he silently stared at it for a solid thirty seconds. “I’m sorry. I…” He shook his head and looked at me, all the anger absent from his expression. “I wouldn’t fuck with your career. I wouldn’t…” His shoulders drooped even more. “I’m sorry.”

Disgust roiled in the pit of my stomach. I suddenly wanted to look back over our entire relationship and see if there were other moments like this. Other red flags he’d waved in my face that I’d fallen for instead of holding my ground.

But I was too tired, and what good would it do anyway? We were still stuck in this room tonight and in way too many hotel rooms over the next few months. There was still no escape from him. From us. From all the ultimatums hanging over our heads.

From his willingness, even when he was just lashing out at me in the heat of the moment, to torpedo my career when he didn’t get what he wanted.

The conversation ended anticlimactically. Simon picked up the room service menu off the table. I drank my beer. Eventually, he passed the menu to me, and we ordered food. After that… silence. He put on a movie while I fucked around on my phone.

It was weird to end an argument like this. No real end—we just sort of… stopped talking and moved on. In hindsight, that was how a lot of arguments had ended. Usually when I’d backed him into a corner and made him admit he was wrong. If I was wrong? Hoo boy. That would be a long and miserable comedown. The makeup sex had always been amazing, though looking back, I had to wonder if that was just because it signaled we were done fighting. Even the most tepid sex was better than sniping and shouting.

There wouldn’t be any makeup sex tonight. There wouldn’t be any sex at all. I was too wrung out for it anyway, but admittedly, I caught myself wishing I could be having sex with someone. Not Simon, because holy fuck, I’d throw up if he touched me right now. But someone. Because… well, because even tepid sex with a random person was better than this bullshit.

I was stuck here for the night, though. No hookups. No hanging out with our teammates across the street. At some point, we’d probably even pose for a selfie with that bottle of wine just to sell the charade.

No one but us would know the truth.

I glanced at Simon as I sipped my beer. Tonight, I’d played my best game so far this season. One of the best games I’d played in my professional career.

And yet tonight would end the same way every away game night had recently and would for the rest of this season:

With me trying and failing to sleep next to the man I’d once thought I knew.

Fucking hell. I wiped a hand over my face. It’s definitely time to move on.

I didn’t think I’d ever been so glad Simon and I had driven separately to the airport. Despite our efforts to maintain the charade of being joined at the hip, logistics were what they were sometimes, and on occasion, we took two cars. That didn’t turn any heads. Sometimes one of us had to go straight from the airport to physical therapy or a dentist appointment. Sometimes one of us was due at a photo shoot or an interview.

In this case, Simon needed to take off for a signing up in Everett, so we’d driven in separately.

Thank. God.

I didn’t think I could handle slogging through morning traffic with him. Not after the whole date night fiasco.

One thing that had stuck with me and kept me up most of the night was that it was time to move the hell on from Simon. Like, really move the hell on. I wasn’t quite sure how I’d do it without drawing attention to the fact that we’d broken up. Hookup apps were risky, since there was no telling who might see dollar signs in the juicy gossip of “Anthony Austin is screwing someone who isn’t Simon Caron.”

But the fact was, most of my energy since we’d broken up had been focused on rethinking us. It was time to rethink me. I didn’t need a partner to be happy, and I was fine with not jumping into a relationship any time soon. In fact, that could definitely wait while I figured things out post-Simon.

Sex, though? Hooking up? Remembering what it was like to be with other people? Oh, I could get on that. I still needed to figure out how to do it discreetly, but I’d figure it out. I just knew it was time to stop spinning my tires over Simon and start looking elsewhere.

First things first: I had to swing into the supermarket for a few things, and while I was there, I marched over to the pharmacy section for a pack of condoms and some lube. I tossed them in my basket and kept walking, refusing to look around and see if anyone saw me. No one did. And if they did, they didn’t care. Most people didn’t recognize me anyway unless I was with Simon or the cats, so no one was going to give a rat’s ass that I was buying some goddamned condoms.

Besides, for all they knew, Simon and I still used them. Or we had an open relationship. Or… no, really, no one would know or care. I wasn’t conceited enough to think the whole world was zeroed in on my every move or gave a damn what I bought at the supermarket; I was just paranoid because Simon and I had so much riding on keeping our breakup a secret.

For fuck’s sake. It was like the reverse of being in the closet—instead of sneaking around as secret boyfriends and hoping no one found out, we were sneaking around as secret exes.

Yeah. Definitely time to move the hell on as best I could while keeping this under wraps. Would it be too formal to have someone sign an NDA before we got naked?

The thought actually made me chuckle. Stranger things had probably happened. I knew for a fact that some of my past and present teammates had cheated on their spouses, engaged in threesomes of varying configurations, and at least one who wouldn’t be named had hooked up with a coach’s wife. Somehow, those hadn’t leaked beyond locker rooms. Maybe there were NDAs involved? Hush money? Or maybe they were just really good at finding tight-lipped participants for their potentially scandalous activities?

I’d find a way. Somehow or another, I was going to put myself out there and remember that sex and intimacy still existed after Simon.

Just thinking about that gave me a much-needed rush of optimism. I still didn’t feel as good as I had when we’d come back to the hotel last night after that amazing game, but I wasn’t an emotional trainwreck like I’d been sleeping beside Simon. I’d take it.

And that was before I walked into the house.

As soon as I’d opened the door, I was greeted by two things that made my entire world brighter and warmer.

One, the familiar sight of my boys on the kitchen island, purring and chirping at me as they kneaded the edge of the counter and demanded pets.

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