Red Card (16 page)

T
here was
something about getting out of London that made me a little more carefree. Not that there was any more less press or photographers, but Italy and Florence were just so rustic, relaxed and old world that you couldn’t help but slow down a little, take pleasure in the leisure.

It meant that I couldn’t help but take Leah out, holding her hand or planting searing kisses on her lips when we turned the corner of an old church hallway or at the top of the Duomo.

I took her to the Boboli Gardens, where we walked hand in hand through the fragrant flowers and collections of statues. Leah goofed off, posing with some of the weathered, half naked bodies, joking that I should be jealous of some of their anatomy. I had to pull her under the privacy of a big oak tree and show her just how unenvious I was.

We were due home to London tomorrow, and I wasn’t quite done romancing Leah. After everything I’d put her through with the Judarski thing and dropping the Eve bomb on her, she deserved it. And there was also something about her, and being in Italy together, that made me a sappy wanker. Not that I’d admit that to her.

Windingham had won our game against ACF Forenza in a blaze of glory. I’d almost had a hat trick, that third goal soaring wide over the net still bugged me even as I sat at the table with Leah. But Reese had scored a goal, and Olivier had added another shutout to his already record setting season.

To celebrate I’d rented out the back room at Cibreo, one of the most delicious fish restaurants in the whole country. I wanted to be able to feed Leah bites of lobster and prawns off my fork in privacy.

And how right I’d been about this decision. She sat across from me in the cavernous room, candlelight illuminating her eyes, highlighting those delicate cheekbones and shadowing her full lower lip. I wanted to lean across the table and suck the buttery sauce I could see shining on her plump mouth.

She made another little sigh of contentment and smiled at me, her eyes dreamy and satisfied.

“Killian…I am never going to be able to eat when I go back to the States.”

A pang of fear radiated through my bones. I didn’t want to think about that. We hadn’t discussed what happened next. Did she stay? Did she go? The thought of her leaving had pain radiating through my entire form. It was as if I’d gotten side tackled, cleated and headed all at the same time.

“That’s my wicked plan, love. Keep you here under threat of fried chicken and what do you call it…fried pickles?”

She snorted. I thought even that was cute. “I’d love to see you eat a fried pickle, Mr. Refined. God you’re spoiled. You should come visit me in Oklahoma. Let’s see what you look like out in the country.”

I grimaced. “This is as country as it gets for me.”

Leah blinked. “Killian, we are in one of the most gorgeous, expensive cities in the world. This is not country at all.”

“Come on! We traipsed through those gardens today. It’s a far cry from London’s busy streets.” I scooped up some more lobster and chili sauce.

Leah was rolling her eyes at me again. It only turned me on more and I had to readjust myself in my pants. When it came to her, I was constantly stretching out my boxers and tailored suit slacks.

The three piece band I’d hired for the night began to play the instrumental version of La Vie En Rose. The Louis Armstrong version was one of my favorites, so I stood and held my hand out to Leah.

“Dance with me, my beautiful woman.”

Her cheeks flushed, changing from their normal peachy cream to the crimson of the ripest apple. She stood, the top of her head reaching just below my chin in her heels. I walked her out onto the floor slowly so that I could examine her.

Or more like undress her with my eyes. A skintight dress hugged her curves and was basically the color of her skin, making her whole ensemble appear as if it really was a second flesh. My cock jumped as my eyes raked over her ass, perfect and plump as she swung around to face me.

Her heels were a blood red, and they made me want to run my tongue from the curve of her ankle all the way up until I connected with her sweet pink folds. That hair, the color of buttermilk, hung down her back in one straight waterfall of softness, and my fingers tangled in it as I circled one arm around her waist and the other up to the nape of her neck.

God she smelled heavenly. Another wave of anxiety rolled through me. I was really falling for Leah. I was scared out of my bloody mind and excited at the same time. It had been so long since I’d been happy, and I thought that I may never find what I had with Eve again. The fact that it was a woman as young as Leah, and someone American no less, was surprising but pleasant. She was exactly the type of person I needed to be with. But I was also a blimey coward. Because even though I knew how perfect, beautiful, funny, smart and every other adjective a bloke uses to describe the girl he fancies, I couldn’t bring myself to voice any of it. I was broken from the damage Eve had caused in her wake.

We swayed to the music, caught up in each other’s feel, scent and smile. My heart was beating so hard, as if I’d played an entire 90 minutes and the match was going into overtime. Leah’s small hands gripped my neck and shoulders, the same way they did when I was deep inside of her. Like she was trying to hold onto me forever.

The band played the melody over and over again, and I bent my cheek to touch hers and whispered in her ear.

“And when you speak, angels, sing from above, everyday words seem to turn into love songs. Give your heart and soul to me, and life will always be, la vie en rose.”

Leah shuttered, her breathy gasp cluing me in. She was falling for me too. Would she say it soon? Would she want to talk about the future?

My heart took the final steps, like it was inches away from an open net and about to score. With a final touch, a final word from her, she would have me. Completely.

T
he thing
about living a life that was so near perfect was that the other shoe had to drop sometime. And it did, two days after Killian and I got home from Italy.

I was sitting on Killian’s kitchen stool, drinking tea in one of his Windingham long sleeves when he came out and plunked a kiss on my forehead.

“You really shouldn’t do that.” He grinned, his body bare save for his boxers and the hair dusting his chest that did something for me south of the waist.

“Do what?”

“Sit on my furniture with no underwear on. You never know what perverted man will come out and try to get his hands on you.”

I smiled into my tea. “I’m not worried about it. I think I can handle whatever perverted things said man tries to do.”

Killian chuckled as he opened the door to get the paper from where it sat on the welcome mat outside the door.

“Bloody hell…” I heard him curse, thumping his fist hard into his thigh.

“What?” I didn’t have to wait long for an answer before he slammed the paper on the counter in front of me, our faces staring back at me.

No, not our faces…our bodies. Thank god we were fully clothed, because lord knew we’d done some stuff not involving anything covering our flesh in those vines, but someone had snooped on us. Invaded our privacy. Took the most secluded, romantic place on the planet and turned it into something scandalous. Cheap.

In the pictures they’d gotten, Killian was kissing me with a fervor, a passion close to pain. We were clinging to each other on the large back patio overlooking the vineyard, completely engulfed in each other. I remembered my emotions in that moment; so turned on, falling for Killian deeply. I had felt amazing, that moment had been so close to perfect, I’d never felt that close to complete in my life.

And now it was ruined. Dirtied.

“Fuck. FUCK!” Killian was grabbing his black locks almost painfully as his hands fisted in his hair. “What the bloody hell are we going to do now?”

He immediately ran back to the bedroom for his phone and began to email and text before dialing and putting Jimmy on speakerphone.

“Jimmy, what the fuck? How did they get those pictures?”

“Were you on the vineyard property?”

“Does it bloody look like we were on vineyard property?” Killian pointed to the paper as if Jimmy was standing there looking at it with us. “I will fucking end whoever took these. You hear me, Jimmy? Find out who this was. I want charges brought at once. And get a security team to sweep my Florence house. I’ll build fucking electric fences five miles around the property of my house to keep them out. GET IT DONE NOW.”

Killian didn’t even wait for Jimmy to answer. I’d seen Killian pissed. Seen him livid, sad, enraged, the whole gamut. But this was different. He was desperately angry, and my stomach dropped as I tried to convince myself this wasn’t about me.

I tried to put a soothing town in my voice. “Kill…is this really so bad?”

“Are you fucking kidding me, Leah? Not only is this an invasion of privacy, but they outed us. Everyone will know about us now!” He threw his hands up, pacing distractedly on the white marble tile.

My stomach dropped a little at his words. “Yes, I agree, whoever invaded our privacy needs to be dealt with. But come on, they were going to find out sooner or later. We are always together, sleeping over each other’s houses and barely hiding our affections when we do go out.”

Killian made a low choking noise in the back of his throat. “You’d like that wouldn’t you? For me to claim you publicly. That’s what you’ve wanted all along!”

I felt slimy nausea gather at the base of my throat as tears threatened to fall from the corners of my eyes.

“That’s not fair at all. Especially with what I’ve told you about my past. I don’t want the media all up in my business either Killian, but we’re stupid to think that we could hide this for much longer.”

I had tried hard to keep the emotion out of my voice, but it broke as I ended my argument.

Finally he looked at me, really saw me, and moved in front of where I’d turned on the stool. He grabbed my body, wrapping his arms around my back and smoothing my hair.

“I’m sorry…I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry.”

I sniffled into his chest, feeling only marginally better as he strapped his strong arms around me. I knew he was panicking, unraveling from this. We’d gotten to such a good place, a place I didn’t think I would have ever been again this soon. And I was falling, hard. I was in love with Killian.

The realization didn’t startle me, but it was an odd time to come to it. I loved him for such different reasons. It was a second time around kind of love. A wiser, smarter kind of love, but head over heels love nonetheless.

I didn’t want to lose that, but I knew this would be a setback.

“We will have to say something. Make a statement. It will only get worse if we let it sit.” The PR guru inside of me began to work, the gears in my mind turning.

“No!” Killian’s voice was manic, and it ripped my insides apart.

The doubtful, broken girl spoke up inside of me. It reminded me that men were selfish, they took advantage of your emotions. It tried to remind me that I was supposed to be stronger than this, forging my own path, not letting the men I loved make decisions for me any longer.

“It will make our relationship and everything around it a circus. Please, Leah, let’s just keep this quiet a little longer. I saw what this did to me, after Eve. I know what it would make you do. You promised me before the party, we wouldn’t go public. I don’t want anything like that to happen ever again. Please.” His eyes pleaded with me as his hands kneaded the skin on my arms. “Please, can we just not draw any more attention to ourselves?

And even though every single fiber of my being was screaming at me not to do it, I nodded my agreement. Because I loved Killian so much, that I was willing to start sacrificing little pieces of myself.

A
pparently
, Killian did not feel the same way about me.

As April came to a close and the middle of May drew near, he pulled even further away. He’d become distant, avoiding my eye contact and conversation whenever we had to appear publicly together. I was heckled, cursed, mocked and every other possible thing you could think of by the media and the public alike. Each of his games I attended, which I still had to go to as it was my job, I was constantly asked about those pictures. And I couldn’t say a damn thing.

Killian wasn’t much better when we were alone. He had brushed off my advances the first few times, so I stopped trying altogether. We’d had a few good days, but those were few and far between, his moodiness and sullen attitude invading every aspect of his life.

Especially his game. He was disjointed and sloppy on the field, drawing a number of penalties in his last couple of games. He’d let multiple defenders slip him, and had even marked up three own goals in a month. His game was so off, and I couldn’t help but feel that it was my fault. He hadn’t necessarily said it, but I knew it was what he was thinking each time he looked at me now.

My finals loomed closer, which meant so did my departure date. I’d tried and failed all week to focus on them, locking myself in the apartment and attempting to drill the information into my brain. I had been doing okay all semester, but needed these to secure my average GPA for graduation. Nothing was working though.

I just kept thinking about Killian and how angry he was, how he wasn’t opening up to me and how this was all somehow my fault.

But then I’d internally yell at myself. Nothing about this was my fault, and he was an asshole for pushing me away just because we were in some hot water right now.

The other part of me, the one who said I should be standing up for myself right about now, was starting to punch me in the gut. No really, I felt a sharp pain there every time I conceded to something Killian wanted. I had let myself fall right into the life Taylor had carved out for me, only it was just a different city and a different guy.

I was pathetic. And currently making myself sick. I couldn’t do this much longer. Stay silent? Stay with Killian? I didn’t know. I was so in love with him that I only wanted to see him happy, for us to be just as happy as we were when we’d gone to Italy.

But now I didn’t think I’d ever get to tell him just what my feelings were. Or if he even felt the same. The whole situation was the fucking worst.

I sat in the stands at Cafsham next to Jimmy, trying to ignore the jeers and jabs that were being hurled my way from every section of the seats around us.

Because if it wasn’t bad enough that all of London, and Europe for that matter, was discussing my love life, Cressida Bennett had no sympathy for me either.

She’d called me in shortly after the pictures broke, informing me that I’d created this mess, again, for myself and that I would see it through. That it would give me character.

I either hated her guts, or took pride in her faith in me. Right now, I think it was the former.

Killian was playing like utter shit, again. And everyone knew it. It hadn’t helped make my case to the Windingham fans.

“Ignore them, love. This is Kill’s battle. He’s letting them get in his head, I saw the same thing after Eve died and the circus started up. He’ll make it through. Just have faith in him.”

Sweet, loving Jimmy. Who took all of the abuse Killian had thrown at him the past couple of weeks in stride and tried his best to get things handled. He’d done as Killian had asked, found the paparazzi who’d snapped the photos and they were being prosecuted, albeit slowly.

We still spent most nights together, our attraction towards each other pulling us like magnets. I couldn’t have said no to the sex even if I wanted to. Even if it made me pathetic. It was the only way he would allow me to be close to him anymore, even if it was just in the physical sense. When we were done, he would roll over and nod off. We didn’t cuddle anymore, we barely spoke, and especially not about the scandal or our relationship. I was a masochist, silently praying each day that this boulder of tension and awkwardness between us would lift, but doing nothing to make it happen.

I didn’t know if I had the patience to weather this storm. Or the time. I was leaving in just two and a half short weeks, and Killian and I hadn’t even discussed that. Would we just part ways when I left? Would he take that as his way out?

My heart stuttered and flipped. For some reason, I thought that would completely ruin me. The breakup of my five year relationship and future would be nothing compared to the devastation Killian Ramsey would leave in his wake.

The second half had been pretty uneventful. I yawned, closing my mouth when I thought about all of the people who were probably tweeting hateful pictures of me from the game.

The crowd began to yell, and I glanced down to see Killian sprinting across the field as if he was running over water. The ball bobbed in front of his feet, like a magnet or a string was connecting the object to his body and it just wanted to keep coming back from him.

“Go, go!” I started screaming, not caring enough to keep my demeanor calm over things that Killian did on the field.

One of the players on the opposite team charged him just after he reached the 18 yard box, sliding in and sending the ball sailing.

“Shit.” Jimmy sighed and sat back down.

All of a sudden, Killian was running back across the field, but he wasn’t heading for the person with the ball. He aimed straight for the player who had nearly side tackled him, jumped in the air, and kicked the guy in the back.

“What the ever-loving fuck?!” Jimmy screeched, seeing exactly what I just had.

The crowd collectively gasped, and then gasped again when the replay was shown over the big screen on the side of the stadium wall.

Killian was busy getting in the face of the defender who’d stolen the ball from him, who was currently writhing on the grass in pain. I made out the words cunt, bloody, worthless and more as they formed on his lips. I cringed, remembering the worst parts of him that had quickly emerged the moment I’d met him.

Killian didn’t see the referee coming over, the red card already pulled out his pockets. The fans started to boo, even though the ref was totally justified in handing Killian the ejection and three game suspension. I sighed, my stomach clenching in tight knots. He would not take this lying down.

The ref neared the two players, Killian and the defender, now on their feet arguing heatedly. The ref thrust his arm into the air, brandishing the red card for all the crowd to see. The opposing team’s fan section burst into joyous screams and applause.

I saw Killian turn, glance up at the card in the air, and immediately redden. Not good.

He exploded. That’s all I could think of as he began shouting at him with such rage I thought he was going to pop a blood vessel. He ran over to where the ball lay nearby and punted it into the crowd, running over to the visiting fans and flicking up the middle fingers on each of his hands. Then Killian ran over to the visiting team bench and began spitting near the head coach.

Finally security subdued him, dragging him to the locker room kicking and screaming like a petulant child in the throes of a temper tantrum.

“Come on, we better go down to him.” Jimmy sighed, and I really didn’t want to follow him.

If Killian hadn’t been in any mood to see me these past couple of weeks, he certainly wouldn’t be now.

“Get her out of here.” It was the first thing he said when I walked into the locker room behind Jimmy.

I’d been expecting it, and yet it hurt like hell. Killian sat slumped on the bench in front of his locker, the same one he’d done dirty things to me on only months beforehand. Back when we were happy, or flirty, or something. Now he just looked defeated, and for someone so muscular and larger than life, he looked miniscule.

“Not only is she your bloody girlfriend, but she’s your publicist. Get your bloody stupid head out of your god damn ass!” Jimmy yelled at him and I jumped with surprise. Jimmy must have been at the end of his rope, because so far he’d done nothing but capitulate to Killian.