Completing the Pass (24 page)

“I dumped a lot on you before I left.” Carri waved her friend and employee's apology away. “I deserved it. I should have had a better contingency plan, and that's my fault. You did more than I could have hoped.” She watched as a construction worker came out of the front of the house and walked down the steps, then around the back.

“Are you angry about the house?” Jess's voice sounded unsure, timid. Not at all like the PM Carri knew and counted on.

“Not angry. A little . . . sad, I guess. It's a great house.” But that was over and done. “It's a fantastic start for your own company. I'm really happy you're stepping out on your own . . . even if that means I'm out a good employee.” She pushed at Jess's shoulder in mock frustration. “Now I have to hire someone else. That's a pain in the ass.”

“I can do it for you. I'm in no rush. This house won't be ready for another few weeks. And I could still use the cash,” she added sheepishly. “I'm not quite as good at construction as you are. I'll have to pay someone to paint and lay the laminate and do trim work.”

“It adds up,” Carri said absently.

“No kidding.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes, listening to the hum of saws, the buzz of an electric drill, or the quick punch of a nail gun.

“Are you back for good?”

Carri blinked, if coming out of a daze. She still felt dazed, if she were being honest about it. Dazed and confused about life. About family. About . . .

Love.

“I'm back,” was all she said. Because at this point, it's all she knew.

***

Josh sat in his car in Santa Fe, staring at the empty foreclosure in the back of his mother's neighborhood. The house he had, without even knowing it, started to think of as “their house.” His and Carri's. As if that even made sense. As if she'd appreciate the idea.

But the way she'd spun out ideas for the house, the way she'd seen the potential in her mind's eye, he understood why she was good at her job. She taken a shell of a house, neglected and undervalued, and turned it into a showplace of comfort, respect, and love.

Like she'd done with his own ego. His heart.

That, he thought with a snort, was going a little overboard. But then again, a guy with a broken heart was entitled, wasn't he?

Maybe it was wrong of him. She'd chosen Utah. That much was clear. She had the option to leave, and she'd taken it, rather than staying. He should be pushing the thoughts of her out of his mind, not pulling them in more and holding on to them. Not sitting here, dreaming up images of a future in a house they would never own together, with a fictional family they would never create together.

But he couldn't let go. Try as he might, his fist was still clenched around the hope that she'd come back. That it would still work. That there was a future there.

Stupid.

His phone rang, and he answered without looking at the display. There was no point. He'd given up hoping to see Carri's name there. “Hello?”

“Josh, it's Burt.”

His attorney. “Hey, Burt, what's going on?”

“Just wanted to keep you updated on the charity,” his lawyer said cheerfully. Burt defied the
shark in a suit
stereotype of attorneys but still got the job done, and Josh liked him all the more for it. “Things are rolling, and so far it looks like your test family is having a good experience. So we're just waiting on your go-ahead to begin expanding out to more families.”

Josh sat back in the driver's seat, his heart clenching a little at the thought. He'd checked in on Herb last night, the day after Carri left. He'd been happy as a clam to have a young nurse hanging out with him. And if he mistook the nurse for Carri at times, there was no harm in it. “Glad to hear that. Yeah, you've got the green light.”

“Roger. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Hey, Burt?” he asked before his lawyer could hang up. “Do you know any real estate guys?”

Sunday afternoon, Carri sat on the blow-up mattress in the recently vacated rental and made notes on her phone while waiting for Jess. The rental wasn't one of her best, and it carried the smallest mortgage, so she wasn't in a rush to find someone to fill it. Especially since, well, she didn't have her eye on a new property to flip next, which was usually where she stayed. Quickly glancing around, she sighed at the sad offerings. No couch, no entertainment stand, no TV. Just a router on the floor in the corner for her laptop, the blow-up mattress, and a folding table with a few chairs in the eat-in kitchen. Add in enough kitchenware to fill the single storage tub that she toted from house to house, another two tubs of clothing, plus what fit in her suitcases . . . and that was that. The entirety of her adult life.

“Oh, my God. I'm so sad,” she moaned, flopping back on the mattress. It squeaked in response. Probably agreeing with her.

Jess knocked on the door, her own personal little
rap-tap-tap-tap
she did when she was entering a residence to do a maintenance check. Carri called, “Come in!” and didn't bother getting up.

“Hey, I— Oh. Wait, are you taking a nap? I thought we were meeting today.” Jess closed the door behind her, but didn't advance into the living room. Instead, she adjusted her glasses, looking concerned.

“We are. I'm just sitting here, feeling pathetic.” Carri patted the mattress beside her. “Come join me.”

“I'm not going to pretend to be pathetic, because I'm pretty awesome, but I'll sit.” Jess lowered herself to the mattress, which bounced Carri up a little. Even that small, comical motion couldn't crack a smile out of her. “I brought over the applications that were at least passable for a new property manager. The ones that were one step up from a joke, I already tossed.”

“You're a goddess.”

“I know.” Jess's voice was disgustingly cheerful as she set the folder down. “You know, with all your talk about the Bobcats while you were gone, I'd have thought you were watching the game this afternoon.”

“That's not for another hour,” she said absently, holding out a hand for the stack of résumés without getting up. If she had to search for someone to replace her most valuable asset, she would do so comfortably.

“They're playing in Minnesota today.”

“So I heard,” Carri said dryly, reading the first résumé's objective.
To pay my rent?
What kind of a résumé objective was
that
?

“Which means they gave the start time in Central Standard Time. Which means the game started three minutes ago.”

“No, that's . . . What?” Carri sat up so suddenly, Jess nearly toppled off the mattress. “You've got to be kidding me!” She lunged for her laptop, which sat on the floor several feet away, and opened it to bring up the website where she could stream the game live. “How did I screw that up so much?” she growled to herself.

“Well, that answers that question,” Jess said quietly. “You're clearly not over lover boy.”

“He's not a lover boy, and there's nothing to
get over
. We just . . . I mean, he was just . . . and I . . .” When she glanced over her shoulder while the video buffered, she saw Jess watching her impassively. “Shut up.”

Her PM just shrugged and picked up another résumé to look it over herself.

“Everyone thinks they know everyone else's business,” Carri grumbled. “Sometimes, people know their own lives better than other people know their life, you know? Sometimes, meddling is just annoying, and counterproductive.
Sometimes
—”

“Oh, my God, shut up.” Jess threw her hands in the air, scattering résumés around them like confetti at a parade. “I get it! You're annoyed you left the guy you claim to not love but clearly
do
love. You're annoyed at your mother because she pushed and prodded you into it. You're sexually frustrated because you aren't getting any. And you lost the best house ever to your brilliant property manager who is stepping out on her own, whom you now have the impossible job of replacing. Life sucks. I. Get. It.”

It was the slap in the face Carri needed to step outside herself and evaluate the situation. “Life doesn't . . . It doesn't suck.”

“Your dad's slowly slipping away, Carrington.”

“He can't help that, and he still has some good days,” she retorted, because the truth hurt too much to face. He was slipping away.

“Your mom drives you over the edge of insanity and should be locked up for how pushy she is.”

“She means well,” Carri defended, for God knew what reason.

“The guy you love doesn't love you back.”

“He
does
love me back,” she shot back at her, then froze.

Jess smugly began picking up résumés as the video on Carri's laptop began.

“And starting for the Bobcats today,” the announcer began, “is the one and only Trey Owens, recently returned from an ankle injury. It'll be interesting to see how that foot holds up under this brutal Vikings defense tonight.”

They kept going on, but she didn't hear a word as she dove toward the laptop. Trey was starting? Not Josh? What? She waited for them to pan the bench, but the cameramen stubbornly stuck to Trey, who was tossing balls with someone else on the sidelines to warm up.

“C'mon, c'mon, c'mon,” she muttered, clutching her laptop as if she could choke it into doing what she wanted.

Then the camera panned one perfect spiral thrown by Trey into the open, waiting hands of one Joshua Leeman. The love of her life.

“Oh my God,” she breathed as she watched. He easily threw the ball to a waiting coach standing beside Trey, who handed him another ball to throw. And that was all they showed of him.

They'd built up Josh's fame into this gargantuan thing, shoving him up onto a pedestal he didn't ask for, hadn't built himself, and had no intention of standing on. And then the second their golden boy was healed, he was flicked off as if he were no more significant than an ant.

It was probably unfair of her to think of Trey that way. He'd been nothing but supportive of Josh, and Cassie was a complete doll. But in the moment, she wasn't feeling very fair. She was feeling anger for the man she loved and was watching be treated like nothing.

She heard her door shut quietly, but she didn't look up. She watched with rapt focus as they played the first few rounds—downs? sets?—and the Bobcats offense jogged off the field to make room for the defense. The camera followed Trey as his light footsteps carried him to the bench where he sat down beside Josh in a slightly off-centered area, away from the rest of the group. He immediately began talking to Josh, and the two bent their heads together as they used their hands to discuss—she assumed—strategy. A coach knelt down between them and joined their conversation, but it seemed like, for the most part, it was really a meeting of the two quarterback minds. The announcers ignored Josh's presence completely, talking only of Trey.

Idiots.

When they moved into a commercial break, Carri took the first full breath she'd had since she'd scrambled to get the laptop up and running. It was then she realized Jess had left entirely, not just stepped out. And she'd taken the file folder of résumés with her.

Except one, which her friend and employee had flipped over to scrawl on the back a simple message.

Go home, or you're a fool.

“You're probably right,” she muttered. Then she flopped back onto the air mattress. That wasn't even possible. She'd rejected him. She'd left her mother thinking she wouldn't return for months.

And the idea of her mother's happy dance still flitted at the edge of her mind, giving her eyelid a little twitch. God, the rapture her mother would feel if she honestly did come back and get together with Josh . . .

But would she really be willing to give up Josh, a life with him, because it played into her mother's sappy-sweet fantasy she'd been spinning of the two of them since they were babies?

And did that even matter anymore?

She'd chosen Utah. She was miserable. Maybe that was the simplest answer. Ignoring her mother's hopes and desires, and focusing on her own. She wasn't her mother's daughter, she was Carrington freaking Gray, an independent woman, gosh darn it. And if, coincidentally, what she wanted in life just so happened to meld with what her mother wanted for her daughter's life . . . well, it was happenstance. Nothing more.

Because by choosing to be miserable in Utah, she was still letting her mother's wishes dictate her life. And it sucked.

“Okay,” she murmured, picking up the sheet of paper and moving it to the side. She called Jess, smiling a little when her friend sang, “Yeeeeeees?”

“Get back here. We've got work to do. And ditch the of résumés. We're going to need comps instead.”

***

Josh sat in Coach Barnes's office, looking around the room. It was still pretty bare, given the coach had been with the Bobcats for three seasons now. But then again, not everyone liked a decorated space. Maybe it was distracting. He noted a diploma from Michigan State, a few photos of him playing in college and during his time with several different NFL teams, and some team posters of the Bobcats from the last three years. But even his desk was ruthlessly organized, with very little in the way of personal flotsam.

Hell, the Bobcats' assistant coach's desk had everything from a clay ashtray his daughter had made thirty years ago—he didn't smoke, it held paperclips—to the latest photo of his grandbabies.

In the future, if Josh ever had a desk in an office, he'd trick it out with so much personal junk, it would feel like an extension of home, he decided.

“Leeman.” Coach Barnes walked in and shut the door. He wore exactly the same outfit he wore to practice daily . . . a Bobcats polo, a pair of khaki cargos, and running shoes. In his hand was the hat he wore often, though he tossed that on the bookshelf behind his chair. “How are things?”

“Good, Coach. Really good.”

“You're a shitty liar, Leeman. Remind me to invite you to poker sometime. I could clean you out.” With a small smile, he sank into the chair across from Josh. “Upset about being relegated to the bench?”

Josh reared back at that. “Hell no. Trey owns the field. Why would I be mad at that?”

“Hell if I know. Then why've you been moping around like a teenage girl who got passed over for the prom?”

Josh crossed his arms and sat back in his chair. “I didn't know this was going to be a therapy session. Should I lie down?”

“Smartass,” Coach Barnes muttered. “Look, I'm just . . . checking in on you. I was rough on you during camp, and when we got back. But it's because I knew your potential, and I was sure you could handle it. Now that the pressure's off, you're crumbling. What's going on?”

“What's going on is I finally found the one person I want to spend the rest of my life with, and she left the freaking state.” He realized he was breathing heavily, and he fought to control it. “Sorry. That . . . was unexpected.”

The look on his coach's face agreed with that statement. “Okay so, uh, it's personal stuff. That's . . . not my department.”

Josh snorted. No kidding.

“Look, if you want someone to sit around and paint toenails and gossip about girls, check at the front desk. I'm pretty sure Kristen's your person. I'm here for football, and I won't apologize for it. So if you're good on that front, and there's nothing I can help you with there, I think we'll just call this meeting to a close and move on.” Coach Barnes stood and held out a hand, looking a bit wary, like he was afraid Josh might take it and try to use it to wipe his tears.

“Sure, Coach.” He shook and headed back out into the hallway, wondering exactly when life had gotten so damn complicated. But he didn't have time to dwell on that. His mother had asked him to come with her to dinner at the Grays' house.

And if he had to sit there all damn night without looking around for Carri and acting like a lovesick fool in front of her parents, he'd do it.

***

Carrington Gray . . . had been outbid.

No, not outbid. Scooped.

Carri stared at the note on the door of the foreclosure stating there was a sale pending and huffed. “You've got to be shitting me.” Only a pro would know how to spot a house like this in the back of a neighborhood, and know how to get it before it officially went on the market.

She'd been scooped for sure.

Sitting down on the front porch concrete, she sighed and wrapped her arms around her knees in a defeated pose. This was supposed to be her big entrance back into Santa Fe.
Look, everyone, I'm here to stay, and I can prove it with this purchase! I'm putting down roots! It's real!

Nobody was going to buy that she was here to stay without something tangible. Not that she cared what her parents thought . . . they'd figure it out eventually. But Josh . . . Josh. He needed to see. She'd left him. He'd be pissed. She couldn't blame him. But this house had been, in her sappy, love-soaked mind, the proof.

Bye-bye, proof.

A car crept by, and she refused to look up. Then it parked in front of the house, the car door opened and closed. She stubbornly kept her eyes down. Probably the new owner, she thought bitterly, staking the place and wondering who the hell was sitting on
their
porch.

“Carri?”

Or it was Josh. She glanced up, propping her chin on her knees. Her eyes watered, making him a little blurry as he approached from his car. “Hi.”

“Hey.” He approached cautiously, as if not sure whether she'd bite. His hands were stuffed in the pockets of his jeans. “When did . . . I mean, how long are you . . .”