Page 40 of The Girl He Loves

We watch in silence as Dax cruises into my driveway. I’m not going to lie. Seeing him approach makes my stomach flutter with nervous excitement. My body betrays me every time Dax is around.

He moves slowly as he kicks his long leg over the motorcycle to stand. I’m not one who generally gets all hot and bothered around bikers, but Dax on a bike in tight jeans works for me. Works for me on all levels. Darn him.

He slides his helmet off and rests it on the seat, then runs a hand through his hair. He smiles at Josie, but his smile falls when he looks at me.

He says, “All right, I’ve been thinking. I don’t want a repeat of what happened in college. I don’t want to walk away from here thinking things could be different if we’d communicated better. Also, I came prepared to fix things around here.” From his jacket pocket, he pulls out a small pack of light bulbs.

Josie points to it. “Microwave. Nice.”

I say, “I don’t need you to fix things around my house.” I’m holding a screwdriver, and I tap it against my palm.

He points to the garage door opener. “So that works now?”

“Yes,” I say.

“No,” Josie says. “But darn it if she didn’t try.”

Because she’s still standing slightly below me, I’m able to kick her. Which I do. Right in the shoulder.

“Ow.” She looks at me over her shoulder, but she’s not scowling. She’s smiling. “I should leave so you two can hash this out. I can take Tyler with me to give you plenty of time.” She turns to face me and winks. Then mouths “go for it” as she’s backing up.

She asks, “Am I taking Tyler?” She gestures to the house.

I shake my head. “Doug wants to take him to a flag football event at the local park. Against my better judgement, I agreed.”

She gives me two thumbs-up. As she walks by Dax, she pats his back. I’m sure she says something too, but I can’t make it out. Then she gets in her car and drives away.

I climb down the ladder then face him, waiting for him to say whatever it is that made him come back.

He blows out a breath. “That call was from my agent. I have a couple offers on the table, but nothing really appealing. So on Saturday I asked him to put some feelers out. See if maybe there might be another opportunity we didn’t consider before.”

“Do you really think telling me this might jinx whatever opportunity your agent brought you?”

He gives a boyish shrug. “You can take the boy out of the locker room, but you can’t take the locker room superstition out of the boy. I’ve been this way since Pop Warner football in first grade.”

“Fair enough. Then your agent called because…?”

“Because something new popped up, and he wanted me to meet and have a casual conversation with the interested team.”

I wag my brows. “Ooohh, so it was a team. Ah ha. A clue. You’d better stop there. You’re telling me too much.”

He gives me a light shove. “Stop making fun of me.”

“Dax, the good things that happen to you aren’t because you wear the same socks four days in a row, or whatever. It’s because you’re good at what you do.”

“Is this a right step in the direction of friendship?”

I nod. “You have to understand that letting you in is hard for me, too. Letting anyone in is.”

He swipes a hand down his face. “Since leaving the NFL, I’ve floated around, trying to figure out what’s next. And for three months now, I haven’t come up with one single thing of interest. Until I saw you. I can’t stop thinking about you, Heather. When I think of how I want to spend my day, I think of spending it with you.”

His declaration warms me to my core. And scares me, too. Being with Dax is easy. It feels natural and right. Which is why I fight him so hard. To lose a connection like this again, I just don’t know if I could take it. All these years later, what haunts me the most about our previous time together is the loss of our easy relationship.

I open my mouth to speak, but he puts up a hand to stop me.

He says, “I understand your concern for Tyler. I don’t take his part in this lightly. I’m not out to hurt him.”

“Promise me you won’t just vanish from his life. It will hurt him.”

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