Page 19 of Secret Love

“Is Cassidy okay at school?” Bowie, God bless him—he’s always trying to help us stay focused on what’s important.

“I hope so. I guess we’ll find out.” I spot Rhodes while he lifts and once he’s done with his repetitions, he sits up.

“I wish you’d sent the flowers,” he says, grinning up at me.

I look everywhere but him when I say, “I gave her cinnamon rolls from Serendipity…oh, and she might be Cassidy’s teacher permanently.”

“What?” Rhodes sputters, standing up. “Why didn’t you start with that? The cinnamon rolls…” he clarifies.

“It was no big deal.” I shrug. “She was one of the dance teachers in the girls’ class on Saturday and it’s right by Serendipity.”

“What? You did this on Saturday and we’re just now hearing about it?” Penn asks. “And she’s the girls’ dance teacher now? Bro, you’ve gotta get these things off your chest.”

“I really don’t.” I laugh.

“You could almost call this serendipitous,” Rhodes teases, pulling out a British accent. He does it well—he’s always lived in the States, but his dad is from London, England, and his mom is from Cape Town, South Africa, so he can go between their accents like it’s nothing.

“Did it work? The cinnamon rolls?” Weston asks, grinning. “Did she soften at all?”

“Minimally.” I lift a shoulder and sit on the bench, waiting until Rhodes gets in place to lie back and lift.

“Define minimally,” Rhodes says, looking over me.

“Can’t. I’m busy.”

They all groan and it gives me too much joy to irritate them.

“Well, what are you taking her today?” Penn asks.

I pause before lifting to ask, “Do I have to take her something every time I see her?”

“It doesn’t hurt to grovel a little bit.” Weston flings a towel over his shoulder and smirks.

“Nah. I’m not taking anything today. Bree will be there and?—”

“Bree’s moved on. You should too,” Rhodes says.

“I have moved on. It’s not about that at all. It would be weird if I’m taking Cassidy’s teacher gifts…”

When I glance up, they’re all looking at me with varying levels of concern.

“What?” I frown.

“Youareover Bree, right?” Bowie asks.

“I’m absolutely over her,” I say. “That doesn’t mean I’m not hesitant about relationships, but Bree and I—we’re better as friends. I like where we are now.”

“Well, don’t let her sabotage your chances with Tru, even if it’s unintentional,” Rhodes says.

“She wouldn’t do that. She’s dating and happy, and even if she wasn’t, she wouldn’t want to mess things up for me.”

Bree might have thrown my world upside down when she said she wanted a divorce, but I’d known she didn’t love the football life. We dated when we were in high school and college, and neither one of us had any idea my career would explode the way it did after I signed professionally. She’s a perfectionist who’s always had her life planned out, and she admitted later that she’d thought my love for football wouldn’t go very far. Me becoming famous and being gone a lot didn’t fit into her plans at all.

The more excited I was with the way my career was going, the more miserable and drained Bree became. We were bothtempted to stay together because of the girls, but Bree said she wanted to give the girls her best self and she couldn’t do that when she just wasn’t happy.

She was completely right, of course. It wouldn’t have been healthy to raise the girls in our dysfunction.

Now that I’ve had a few years to process our divorce, the root of what we couldn’t overcome was that we’d been growing apart for years and felt more like roommates who were never on the same page.

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