13. Sawyer

Chapter 13

Sawyer

A hand claps on my shoulder, startling me on the bench where I just finished packing my gym bag. Noah smiles at me when I turn to face him, his hair still wet from his shower after practice.

“Everything okay?” He lifts a brow. “You seemed lost in thought.”

“Oh, yeah, I’m fine.” I nod and stand, hoisting the bag over one of my shoulders, but Reese has picked up on the conversation and turns to face me.

“You sure about that? You were all over at practice today. That’s not like you.”

“I noticed that too,” Noah agrees, but I just blink at them both.

I don’t want any of the Aces knowing what’s going on between me and Violet—least of all Reese. He’d kill me right here in this locker room if he knew that several days ago, his sister was basically grilling me about my cock piercings and cheerleading me to have sex again.

Fucking hell, she had no idea how crazy she was making me. Having her walk in on me while I was jerking off to the thought of her was bad enough, but the way she asked me about my piercings with that curious glint in her eye did nothing to help erase the dirty thoughts about her from my mind.

I shake my head, both to clear it and to deter the guys. “It’s nothing. I’m just a little stressed about house hunting.”

There’s no way in hell I’m about to tell any of them that Violet and I set up dating profiles for each other recently. Or that she walked in on me with my hand wrapped around my cock. The less my teammates know about any of that, the better.

Noah raises his eyebrows at me. “House hunting, huh? That’s news to me. You haven’t secretly been traded to another team, have you?”

I shoot him a look. “Don’t be ridiculous. No, I just think it’s time to get out of that house. There are way too many memories of Miriam for both Jake and me, and I think it would be good for him to live in a more kid-friendly neighborhood.”

Noah claps me on the shoulder again. “Good for you, man. After all the shit Miriam put you through, I can’t believe you’ve stayed in the house this long.”

“Yeah, I would’ve been gone right after the divorce if it was me,” Reese agrees.

“Easy for you to say now, but you might not have felt that way if you were actually in it. Uprooting your kid right after something traumatic like that isn’t exactly an easy decision to make. But I think we’re both ready now.”

“Yeah, I get that. I guess I’ve never gotten a divorce or had a kid, so I should probably shut my mouth.”

“Good idea,” Theo chimes in, grinning playfully. “That’s a lesson I’ve had to learn the hard way.”

“But apparently the lesson still hasn’t sunk in,” Grant, our grumpy, typically quiet goalie, fires from another bench at the back of the room, and the whole team erupts in laughter.

“Oh, he’s got jokes now, huh?” Theo rolls his eyes at Grant, whose face is set in its usual stoic mask. “I liked you better when you were quiet.”

“We could say the same for you,” Noah points out, and everyone laughs again. Even Theo chuckles.

“Alright, I’m out of here before Theo and Grant start doing dueling stand-up sets. See you guys,” I say and head for the door.

“Good luck with the house hunt!” Reese calls after me, and I wave at him without turning, despite the twinge of guilt I feel in my gut every time he speaks to me these days.

It’s fine , I tell myself. Nothing has even happened .

And it never will.

Jake and Violet are watching TV in the living room when I get home, some new cartoon that Jake loves. It’s weird how quickly she’s become a kind of fixture in the house, something I expect to see when I get there, and that makes me feel out of place when she isn’t.

Violet turns on the couch and smiles at me when I walk through the front door and Jake scrambles off the couch. “Hey. How’d practice go?”

“Daddy!”

Jake interrupts before I can answer, throwing himself around my leg like he always does. I ruffle his hair.

“Not great, but at least there weren’t any stakes. Better I have an off day during practice than during a game. I can’t afford another one of those,” I say, thinking back to the awful game we played against the Falcons in Chicago. “Are you two ready to go look at some houses?”

“Let’s go!” Jake nods, then looks up at me with wide, excited eyes. “Daddy, can I have a whole floor to myself in our new house?”

I laugh and shake my head. “If anyone’s getting their own floor, it’s gonna be me, buddy. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

“Aw, okay.”

Violet joins us by the front door and smiles down at Jake. “I’m sure you’ll have plenty of room wherever you end up.”

“Maybe Chewy will get his own room!” Jake says, and Violet and I laugh together.

“He knows how to dream big, huh?” she asks, and I nod.

“Race you to the car, Ms. Violet!” Jake says and darts past me outside. I sigh at him, but Violet laughs and follows in a hurry, leaving me to make sure the house is locked. Surprising no one, Jake beats her with his head start, so she helps him get into his booster seat. I hear him laughing while she tickles him when I reach the car.

“That’s what you get for cheating, buddy,” I say over his winded laughter as I climb into the driver’s seat. Violet finally lets up and joins me up front, but Jake is still giggling behind us. I turn the key in the ignition, and my eyes drift to his in the rearview. “You’d better save some of that energy for house hunting. We’ve got a lot to see.”

“I’m ready!” Jake declares, nodding emphatically. I snort and lean over to Violet to whisper, “How much you want to bet he’ll be passed out in the back seat within an hour?”

“That sounds like a losing bet if I’ve ever heard one.”

Smiling, I put the car in reverse and head out for the first house of several on the agenda. This one’s in the next neighborhood over, so it wouldn’t be too unfamiliar for Jake, but there are a lot more families living here judging by the number of kids I’ve seen playing at the park at the center of the neighborhood on my drives through.

“Oh, I love the playground here, Daddy!” Jake exclaims, jabbing his finger at the glass to point at it on our way by. I smile at him in the mirror.

“Yeah, I had a feeling you would.” We drive to a large but modest looking ranch-style house toward the back of the neighborhood that doesn’t have the best curb appeal, but that’s not what we’re moving for anyway.

“Aw, no stairs?” Jake asks, unbuckling himself after I’ve parked.

“No. But trust me, your knees will thank me for it when you’re older,” I tell him and Violet laughs, but Jake doesn’t get the joke so he just ignores it and hops out of the car, both his feet thudding against the ground in the jump.

“Bright side, you’ll be able to run in circles around the whole house,” I tell him when I meet him, and his eyes light up.

“Really?”

“See for yourself.” I take his hand and lead him to the front door, then punch in the combination on the key guard that the realtor gave me and open the door for us. Jake leads us inside and looks around, then drops my hand with his eyes widening.

“It’s huge ,” he whispers. “Way bigger than it looks!”

“That’s exactly what I said when I saw the pictures online. But it’s even bigger than I thought.”

Violet trails in behind us and closes the door, then does a double take. “Wow. I wasn’t expecting this.”

There are high ceilings that stretch up the plain white walls, and while the tile in the entryway is a little worn and will probably need to be replaced along with the carpet, the bones of the place are solid—and there’s a part of me that’s kind of excited about the idea of getting to put my own touch on a house. I didn’t get to do that with the last one, no thanks to Miriam. She wanted everything her way and wouldn’t hear a word otherwise.

“How many bedrooms are there?” Violet asks as she casually walks toward the open-concept kitchen adjoined to the living area.

“Three. The master on one side, and two smaller guest rooms on the other.”

“Perfect for the three of us!” Jake says before he goes tearing off down the hall in search of the room that would be his.

Violet and I share a slightly awkward look, but I don’t bother correcting Jake’s assumption. For all I know, he might’ve been referring to Chewy as the third occupant, not her.

“What do you think?” I ask Violet as she spins around in the kitchen.

“It’s nice, and I can see the potential. Plenty of room to grow. Looks like the kitchen’s been remodeled too.”

I seize on the kitchen remodel to keep from reacting to her comment about having room to grow. “Yeah, the owners gutted it and put in all new appliances.”

Jake comes tottering down the hallway, a disapproving look on his face.

“What’s wrong, buddy?” He shrugs at me.

“It’s okay, but the bedrooms are kind of small. Where am I gonna put all my toys?”

I laugh with Violet. Of course that’s his biggest concern. “Well, we’ll have a whole other bedroom besides yours. I thought you could turn that into a playroom or something when it’s just the two of us again.”

Jake’s eyes shoot wide open. “So I’d get two rooms?”

“They wouldn’t both be yours alone, but kind of.”

“Sold!” Jake nods excitedly, making Violet and me laugh again.

“Not so fast, buddy. We still have a few more houses to see.”

We tour the rest of the house, peeking into the bedrooms and bathrooms before exploring the huge, fenced backyard that has plenty of room for a pool, then lock up and pile back in my car to head to the next one.

“Well, what did you think overall?” I ask Violet as we back out of the driveway.

“It was nice. Really nice. I could definitely see you and Jake living there, and it’s within walking distance to the playground, so that’s great too.”

“What about you, Jake?”

“I love it! But I wish it had a pool.”

“Then you’re gonna love the next place,” I tell him and watch his face in the mirror as his eyes widen again.

The next house is in a neighborhood about ten minutes’ drive south of where we are now, but Jake presses his face to the window when we finally turn into the entrance to a gated community.

“Whoa, they have a fence?”

“Yup. And a security guard,” I answer, pointing at the uniformed guard waiting at the upcoming booth to talk to us.

I tell the man that we’re there to meet a realtor and view a property. He makes a copy of my driver’s license, then lets us through, waving to Jake as we pass by.

Fittingly, the houses in this community are much nicer than the one we live in and the one we just viewed. Most are relatively new construction, and the house we’re going to see is one of the newest in the community. I wasn’t really interested in living in a gated community like this, but the real estate agent talked me into at least looking at it, so I gave in.

But as we drive through the neighborhood, with its perfectly manicured lawns and HOA-managed community foliage, I already feel out of place. This is clearly where rich people live, and while I guess I’m technically a rich person now too, I’ve never really fit in with that crowd. Maybe it’s my working-class background, or maybe it’s because it’s all my ex-wife ever saw in me, but I don’t like flaunting my wealth.

This house is on the western side of the community. It has a dark, navy-slate exterior, its lower third made with faux stone trim, and it’s a single story as well, just like most of the homes in the area. It has a huge garage with a raised addition made to store an RV out of the Denver elements that I’ll almost certainly never use, and as soon as we pull into the driveway that’s already occupied by the realtor’s Mercedes SUV, Jake lets out an impressed breath.

“Wow,” he whispers.

“I was thinking the same thing,” Violet says as she unbuckles her seat belt. I park, and she climbs out, glancing at me with raised brows. “Do I even want to know how much this place costs?”

“A lot,” I admit, leaving it at that.

I’m really not trying to impress anyone. The only thing I care about is if it’s a good fit for Jake and me, and as the realtor climbs out of her car to meet us, I’m already feeling like it isn’t.

“Nice to finally meet you, Mr. Townsend,” she says with a huge smile, her hand extended. I close the car door while Violet gets Jake out and shake the realtor’s hand.

“Nice to meet you too, Ashley.”

“And you must be Jake! Welcome to Vermillion Cliffs,” she says to Jake and Violet. “Come on in.”

She leads the three of us into the house, which takes “open concept” to a whole new level. There basically aren’t any walls in the place except for the four keeping the roof up, and a few half walls that are supposed to serve as dividers for the bedrooms. Violet steals a glance at me, and my dislike of the place must be pretty easy to read on my face, because she hides a laugh behind her hand.

“Whoa, look at the pool!” Jake points across the living room at the huge sliding glass doors that lead out into the backyard, which is more of a courtyard. He makes his way over and presses his hands against the glass. “It has a waterfall, Daddy!”

“I knew he’d love that,” I say to Ashley, who chuckles indulgently.

It’s difficult to peel Jake away from the pool, but we eventually tour the rest of the house, including the massive garage. By the time the tour is over and we’re standing in the living room again, I’m overwhelmed. It’s way too fancy for me. I’m afraid I’ll break everything in the place.

After politely informing the realtor that I don’t think the place is the right fit for us, I head back to the car with Violet and Jake.

“That place was gorgeous, but was it just me or did it seem kind of, I don’t know… cold?” Violet asks as she helps Jake clip into his booster seat.

I grin, liking that she got the same vibe I did. “That’s exactly what I was thinking. It didn’t feel like a house you could really live in, you know?”

“But what about the pool?” Jake asks as I start the car and pull away. “It was so cool!”

“The pool was definitely my favorite part of the house, and I feel like that says a lot,” I say, more to Violet than to Jake, and she laughs.

“Yeah, I could tell as soon as we walked in that that one was probably a ‘no’ for you.”

“You know me pretty well, heartbreaker,” I tell her with a grin.

I put the car in reverse and drive out of the community, not at all disappointed to see it go. Even Jake doesn’t seem to be bothered, which is good because I really don’t think he’d be happy living there. Besides, I don’t think I saw a single other kid in the neighborhood on our drive in or out, despite Ashley’s promises of Vermillion Cliffs being super kid-friendly.

“Daddy, I’m tired. Are we almost done?” Jake asks, squirming in the back seat.

“We’ve got one more house to see today, buddy. But it’s a bit of a drive from here so you can take a little nap if you want.”

“Okay,” Jake grumbles, his head falling against the window. I glance at the clock in the dash, then smile at Violet. “What did I tell you? Out cold in an hour, almost on the dot.”

Violet shrugs. “There’s been a lot of excitement today. Can’t say I blame him.”

The final house is on the north side of town, so it takes about thirty minutes to cross up there. Violet and I stay quiet during the drive to let Jake sleep, but as soon as we pull onto the street where the house is, Violet perks up.

“Is that it?”

“Yup, that’s the one.”

I pull into the driveway and park, and Violet just sits staring through the windshield. It’s not new construction, but it’s not ancient, either. The front yard sports a full, well-maintained garden that gives some privacy to the otherwise exposed house. There are only a few others on the street, which I appreciate. And there are several kids playing in the nearby yards, which is a good sign.

“It’s so cute,” Violet says as she unbuckles her seatbelt. “Not too big, not too small.”

“Exactly what I thought when I saw it online. It’s got a few more square feet than the current house, but not so much that it would be impossible to take care of for a single dad. And guess what? It has a pool. Not a very big one, but it’ll do the job for the few months it gets hot here.”

“Jake will love that.”

“So will I.”

I kill the ignition and turn in my seat to find Jake passed out and drooling a little on his shirt. He’s not going to be happy about being woken up, but there’s no way around it. I open the back door quietly and shake him gently.

“Jake. Wake up, buddy. We’re here.”

He rubs his fists into his eyes, then drags the back of a hand across his face to wipe away the drool and blinks away his confusion. “We’re home?”

“Well, maybe. But no, we’re here to look at a house, remember?”

“Oh, yeah.”

He’s still kind of out of it, so I unbuckle him and hoist him up on my hip to carry him into the house. It’s a private owner selling, and they gave me a code for the lockbox in advance, so I pull it up on my phone and use it to let us all inside.

“I love the glass work on this door. It’s beautiful, and so detailed,” Violet says, trailing her fingers across the stained-glass artwork depicting a rising sun.

“Apparently, all of the glass in the house was done by the owner,” I tell her, and her eyes widen.

“Wow. I can’t wait to see the rest.”

I set Jake down on his feet and close the door behind us carefully. The glass really is gorgeous, even if it is a little old fashioned, so I don’t want to damage it. I can be a little hard on things.

Beautifully stained hardwood floors stretch throughout the single-story house, and judging from the looks of them, they’re made from real wood, not vinyl, and are probably the original floors. The foyer feeds right into a large, split-level living room. There’s space for a large TV and other typical stuff on the lower level, and space for what could probably be a small office area on the upper.

“This one has some stairs!” Jake says as if it’s the coolest, best thing in the world, and hurries over to the four or five steps that lead to the upper section. “All my toys can live up here!”

“Yeah, we’ll see about that idea,” I say, and Violet laughs as she strides into the living room.

There are raised ceilings, but only here in the living room, and two skylights are built into the roof to let the sun stream in along with the huge floor-to-ceiling windows built into the front of the house that each give the place a lot of natural light.

“This house has so much character,” Violet murmurs, pointing at more stained glass built into the top third of the front windows. “Look. Each little panel there tells a part of a story, from sunrise to sunset.”

She’s right. The sun moves across the sky above a flower in each panel until it sets in the final one.

“Even the banister has flair.” She smiles softly as she shifts her focus to the little handrail built above the steps leading to the upper level of the living room. She runs her hand across its beautiful, smooth and polished stained wood. “I wonder if the owner built the house himself? This is pure craftsmanship. You can tell so much of it was handmade.”

“He didn’t give me the whole story, but he did say that a lot of the pieces in the house are original. Apparently, he took up woodworking and that kind of stuff as a hobby when he retired.”

“It shows,” she says and trails out of the living room into the adjoining kitchen. She knocks on the wall between them. “I kind of wish this wall wasn’t here though. The open concept would work so well with this layout.”

I follow Violet through the rest of the house, more impressed by her attention to the details than to the details themselves, until we arrive back in the living room where she draws open the curtains on a pair of doors that lead out onto a beautiful stone patio that surrounds a modest in-ground pool. An equally beautiful garden wraps around everything, giving the space a great amount of privacy and making it feel almost like it’s not even in a public neighborhood.

“There’s a pool!” Jake stares in disbelief and as soon as Violet opens the doors, he goes streaking through them to check it out. “It doesn’t have a fountain, but it’s still cool. Look at the edges, Daddy!”

Amazingly enough, there are a few stained-glass pieces built into the upper rim of the pool as well, each depicting a different view of a mountain, presumably one of the many that are nearby.

“Wow,” Violet says quietly as she walks around the pool, drinking in all the details. “You’d never get me out of here.”

I laugh. “This is definitely one of the big selling points of the house.”

“I love it. I mean, not that it’s for me or anything, I’m just saying. It’s beautiful all around. What do you think, Jake?” she asks, shifting the focus off herself.

“It’s so cool! And I love the living room.”

“Glad you like it, buddy. Guess I’ve got a lot to think about,” I say and lead everyone back inside, making sure to lock up the backdoors before we head out. Outside, I drop the key back in the lockbox and spin the numbers to scramble them, then walk Jake back to the car and help him inside with my mind racing. The screeches and laughter of happy kids playing outside reaches my ears, and it tugs at me.

“Alright, now that we’ve seen all three, what did you think of them all? And be honest,” I ask Violet when we’re back on the road heading home.

“They were all great in their own ways, honestly.” I stare at her, smiling to encourage her to let the truth out. But she just laughs. “What? What’s the look for?”

“Oh, come on, the last one was far and away your favorite. I mean, you lit up as soon as we pulled in the driveway, so you don’t have to be so diplomatic about it.”

Her face flushes and she tosses her hands in the air. “Alright, fine. Guilty as charged. The place was amazing, but like I said, I’m not picking a house for myself. I’m helping you and Jake find a place that would be perfect for you. And all three houses had what you and Jake are looking for, although some had more of it than others.”

I nod. “You’re right. It’s not gonna be an easy decision to make. Well, other than ruling out that second house. I just can’t see us living there.”

“Not even for the pool?” Jake chimes in from the backseat, making both of us laugh. I shake my head at him in the mirror.

“Sorry, buddy. That pool was great, but it was pretty much the only thing I liked about that house.”

“Oh well. The security guard was kind of creepy anyway,” he says matter-of-factly, and Violet chuckles.

But the conversation mostly dies out after that, and she stares out the window as we drive. When we’re a few blocks away from home, I notice that she’s slumping in her seat. Judging from her reflection in the side mirror, she’s fallen asleep.

The warm evening sun casts a striking orange-yellow glow on her face, somehow making her look even more beautiful than she normally does. It’s hard to keep my eyes on the road because I can’t stop glancing over at her and soaking in the details. Her skin looks so soft, and the sunlight strikes her lips in a way that brings out their vibrancy.

“Hey, bud,” I whisper to Jake, glancing at him in the rearview mirror. “Wanna take a drive up to the mountains? I think Ms. Violet probably needs to sleep a little more, so I don’t want to go home quite yet. Maybe we can spot a bighorn sheep.”

“Yeah!” Jake beams and nods eagerly.