86

Ryan

Don't Go

That was the last free two hours.

Nothing offered to Cleo cut it. Any time I had left was cut in half and divided again. If I thought I had ten minutes, I needed to be somewhere. If I thought I had five minutes, I didn't.

I stretched out on the couch in the meeting room on the third floor of the training center. The voices all blurred together from the laptop. Forty-five minutes had already passed from the Washington coaches but this was just a formality, basically a long pitch that I had to listen to, with another forty-five minutes left on the clock.

With a sigh, I leaned back and closed my eyes.

I took a deep breath through my nose.

It's going to be a long fucking night .

A soft knock echoed from the door and I blinked my eyes open, tired. No doubt it was a custodian ready to tell me that the training center was closing in ten minutes and I'd jingle the keys from my belt.

The door pushed open and the one person in the world I wanted to see glanced through.

" Hi, " Kassie mouthed.

I straightened up. Her dark hair was swept up in a ponytail that trailed down her shoulder and she wore one of her Romans shirts, cinched at the waist that I loved to grab on to, with her jeans, scribbled with the number four on the front.

I pushed up from the couch but Kassie shook her head, pointing at the phone.

" How long? " she mouthed.

I didn't want to tell her. Another forty-five minutes. Might as well have been hours. I couldn't walk out of the training center with her and she had to go before they locked the doors.

" You have to go, " I mouthed back, trying not to let the letdown show on my face.

" Long? "

I nodded.

Her eyebrows knitted together, concerned. " You want me to go? "

No .

But Kassie needed sleep. And as her boyfriend, my role was to make sure she got that. I gazed down at her for a long moment and nodded slow enough that her lips pressed together.

" Training center's going to close, " I mouthed.

Kassie hesitated by the door. The only time I got to hold her hand anymore was when I slipped into bed. And sex was nice, in the hurried fifteen minutes we had, but I wanted more.

She walked past me and pressed a button my phone. "Muted it. When are you going to bed?"

"I'll head out in about an hour," I said, my voice low.

"You need sleep ." She listened for a moment and rolled her eyes. "Such bullshit. How is this not an email?"

"Coach Lawson and I were supposed to do this together but he had a family emergency. I told him I'd stick around for the call," I explained. I kept my distance away from her, standing next to the couch. If I wrapped my arms around her, I wouldn't let her go. "You have to get out of here before they lock the doors."

Kassie shouldered her bag. "Yeah. We have an early morning."

Don't go .

I nodded. Feeling like shit.

She looked at me for a long moment and started walking towards the door but I couldn't help the last question. "Where are you—uh—sleeping tonight?"

All I needed to get through the meeting was knowing that Kassie would be there in my bed, tangled up in my sheets, wearing one of my shirts and nothing else. But I didn't want to push it.

"I'm going home," she said over her shoulder, reaching for the doorknob.

"Oh." I nodded, disappointed. "Got it."

Kassie glanced back and frowned. "No, Ryan, I meant, I'm going to your—"

Her words died on her lips and the two of us gazed at each other. She was talking about my dorm. And Kassie called it home. The heavy feeling on my chest lifted a little and a tired grin crossed my face. Kassie gazed back at me, surprised.

"I—um—" She tucked a strand behind her ear. "Yeah."

"I'll see you at…home," I said, testing out the words. Home. It was the place where I knew Kassie was going to be.

She hesitated. "We missed you at bowling."

I nodded. Another thing I had to miss.

"King broke into one of the machines at the arcade and it kept spitting out tickets," she whispered, lingering by the door. "Adam and Zariah had a contest to figure out the grossest drink they could make. We…we missed you a lot."

I took a deep breath. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be—I know you're busy," she hurried to reassure me. She dug in her backpack for a moment and picked up something metal from the pocket. "This was supposed to be a present but—um—here."

"I don't need anything," I told her, confused, but Kassie reached for my hand and unfurled my fingers. The moment she touched me, the hairs on the back of my neck rose. I gazed down at her. I could smell her strawberry lotion. My mouth watered.

She stepped away and I got the first look at the present.

A laugh burst out of me. My first laugh all day. It was a keychain with a fake flip phone attached, a completely unusable kid's toy.

"Claw game master right here." Kassie smiled up at me. "I figured this is more your speed."

I held up the keychain and pressed down on the hard numbers that didn't do anything. "It's perfect. You know me so well."

"They had one that flashed pictures but I thought that might be too much for you."

I grinned. I couldn't even tease her back, I was too happy. The first real good feeling of the day and all because of her.

I couldn't tell Kassie but for the first time in my football career, the stress was getting to me, worming its way into everything I did. And the only reason why was because I had something else I wanted to spend time on.

Her.

"I'll see you at home," she murmured and stepped back to the door again.

My fingers curled around the fake phone and I didn't say anything, just nodded. I slipped out my keychain and watched her while she gave me one last look before the door closed.

I didn't realize I'd been holding in my breath until it was released. For a long moment, I stared at the door. With a sigh, I returned back to the couch, slipping it on my keychain and stared up at the ceiling again. I couldn't even text her with the pitch going on in the background.

At least I knew she was going to be at home.

Footsteps echoed outside the door and I half-listened to the phone call before the door opened again. My eyes flickered over. Kassie.

"Art girl, you're going to get locked in," I told her.

"I forgot something," she murmured and turned off the light switch.