Talkin' Trash
Page 10

He didn’t pretend not to know what I was talking about because there was only one game in the last eight years that I could be talking about.
Over the course of Linc’s career, he’d been lucky.
But the one game in particular I was talking about was so bad that it’d forever be ingrained in my heart.
It was pre-season, and he’d just been traded to his current team.
His new team hadn’t really known him well enough yet, and they’d been playing against his former team, who he’d had a beef with since the first day he’d started playing for them.
He hadn’t gotten along with the owner, a man that had been so strictly against all things biker and biker-related that he’d almost refused to allow Linc to play.
Unfortunately, the old owner had wanted to win almost as badly as he hated Linc, so his hand was pretty much forced.
But the moment he had the opportunity to obtain a player who could replace Linc James, he’d taken it.
Overall, it’d been the best move of Linc’s life.
However, it also meant that when Linc played his old team, he knew damn well he had to be on his guard or he might very well get hurt.
At first, it hadn’t been obvious to everyone else.
But, since Linc and I had been keeping in touch with texts and short phone calls when all this shit had started, I knew that Linc hadn’t had it easy.
Even when he’d told me that the time wasn’t right for us—which had broken my heart—I’d still been worried about him. I still watched every single game religiously, even if I had a big test to study for or I had to watch it at work on the TV in a patient’s room. My anger at him just giving up on us was tempered by my need to have him be my friend.
“Merriweather’s a dick.” Linc broke the silence and my thoughts.
Merriweather was a defensive lineman and in Linc’s old team owner’s pocket. Trevin Merriweather was a six-foot-five, three-hundred-and-forty-five-pound powerhouse who hit with the force of a Mack truck and took no prisoners. He hit Linc so hard during that game that he’d knocked Linc out cold.
Not only had he gotten a penalty for helmet-to-helmet contact, but he’d also gotten called for grabbing Linc’s facemask and throwing him to the ground. From there, the flags started coming from every referee like a ticker tape parade.
I’d been so upset at the time, seeing Linc’s still form laying almost brokenly on the AstroTurf, that it’d been almost impossible for me to think, let alone process what had been going on around Linc.
When Linc had gotten up, blood had begun pouring down his white jersey, soaking it and leaving me with a mental image that I’d never forget for the rest of my life.
Head wounds always bled profusely—I knew that. I’d been in my first semester of nursing school. But that knowledge didn’t matter since logic wasn’t prevailing at that time.
Despite being scared out of my mind, I’d called him…and he’d answered.
***
“Con?” I heard Linc rasp into the phone. “Are you okay?”
I gave a semi-hysterical laugh as I said, “You just got hit so hard that you were knocked unconscious, and you’re asking if I’m okay?”
He snorted, and I could hear him hiss in a breath. “Fuck, don’t make me laugh. I think my ribs are broken.”
I felt something twist in the pit of my stomach.
“Really?” I breathed.
God, I hoped he was kidding.
If he’d really broken his ribs, he’d be out for weeks while they healed, and that was exactly what his old team wanted since they both were in the running for a wild card spot that would take them into the postseason.
“No,” he hesitated. “I think. Just fuckin’ sore as hell. Goddamn Merriweather.”
Goddamn Merriweather was right.
If I’d been capable of taking down a three-hundred-and-forty-five-pound man by myself, and I’d been in the same room as that piece of shit, I would’ve done it.
Happily.
And I think Linc knew that, because he started to chuckle.
God, I loved his laugh.
How he could laugh when all I wanted to do was cry was beyond me, but my God, just hearing him made me feel a ton better.
Which it shouldn’t. He left me, not the other way around.
But…
“Owwww, fuck!” Linc hissed.
I felt something in my gut lurch at hearing him in pain.
“What?” I whispered furiously.
“I have to have stitches. They just gave me a local anesthetic. Dammit, my perfect lips!” Linc whined.
That’s when I started to laugh through the tears.
***
“I still can’t believe that you actually answered,” I murmured, shaking my head.
“I’d answer for you. Always and forever,” he promised, sounding sincere.
I looked at my hands and snorted. “Linc…”
“I would,” he promised.
And I believed him.
Really, I did.
But…
“If you really would answer any time that I called…why?” I asked in confusion. Then smacked my head with the heel of my hand. “Never mind. Don’t answer that. It’s none of my business.”
I didn’t expect him to answer, but he did.
I didn’t expect to like the answer, either.
“Because, Conleigh Reins. I want to.” He paused. “And you’ve always meant more to me than just about anyone in this world.”
I felt my stomach somersault as I stared at him. “You left, though. You left. You told me that we weren’t ready.”
He looked at me for a long moment, and then shifted so that he was leaning forward and his face was so close that he could kiss me if he really wanted to.
I didn’t pull away from his closeness, and neither did he.
I just stared into those beautiful eyes that I’d never quite been strong enough to forget and waited for him to explain why he let us go. Oh, and hated myself for it.
I shouldn’t care why he left, or that anybody thought that I was having his baby when I wasn’t.
But I did care.
I cared if he was hurt. I cared if he got slammed by the media—again—for anything concerning me when it wasn’t true.
I just cared about him, and that wasn’t something I’d been able to stop feeling since he told me we couldn’t be an ‘us’ yet.
We’d barely gotten started—had gone nowhere beyond just friends really—when the night that would haunt me and my dating life to this day happened.
Chapter 7
Other people: gosh darn it. That hurt. Football players: motherfucking cocksucking asshole son of a douche, that fucking hurt.
-Linc to Conleigh
Linc
I knew exactly what she was thinking about without her having to say a word, because I was thinking about that night, too. The night that I told her we couldn’t be together. The night that I told her we could only be friends.
It’d been the night that I’d come home to visit my dad, needing some much-needed time away from football and all the bullshit that sometimes came with it. It was a massive party going on, and I’d just been made an official patched-in member of our a motorcycle club. Instead of celebrating like I should have been doing, I had a ginormous fight with Steel and my dad, and I wanted nothing more than to leave and not come back.
Well, at least for the night.
But Conleigh had told me she was on her way, and I told her to come up to my room when she got there, thinking I had time to get a shower and get cleaned up.
Only, she arrived a hell of a lot faster than I’d been expecting, and she’d walked in on me completely nude and sporting a massive erection that only came on when she was near.
We’d stared at each other so long that I’d half expected her to make the move I could see in her eyes.
I wanted her to.
She wanted to.
But then some commotion had come from the room next door, and we’d heard Steel’s voice through the thin walls, causing her to retreat.
I’d just slipped my pants on when my door was once again thrown back open and Steel had made his presence known.
“She’s not ready for you,” he’d growled.