Rivals, page 43
Freaking out with every passing second.
I know it’s just stress; of course it is. But…it’s a thought that won’t go away. And whatever, a test will settle my damn nerves.
Because it’ll be negative, of course.
I go through the drug store checkout line with a red face, like I’m a teenager buying condoms for the first time or something. And it just sits there in a plastic bag in the car seat next to me, the whole drive back to my apartment - this illicit thing.
And what was a “oh I should do this” thought becomes a burning necessity as I drive home.
I have to know.
Right fucking now.
I slam the door shut to my apartment and run to the bathroom, tearing the packaging, feeling my pulse race. I can feel my knees shake and the sweat break out on the small of my back as I sit.
It’s fine, I tell myself.
You’re not pregnant, obviously.
This is just mental maintenance - shoring up my nerves.
I finish and place the stick on the sink counter.
I pace the bathroom, picking at my cuticles while I stare at the second hands on my watch.
This is just reassuring myself that I’m not-
Three minutes is up.
I stop pacing.
I suck in a deep breath, staring at my reflection in the mirror as I pick up the test stick. I steel myself, and I swallow.
And then I glance down.
Seconds tick by like hours as I stare at the little window.
I drop the stick into the sink as I start to tear the packing off another test. The words “false” and “positive” reverberating through my head as I try and force myself to pee again.
This time, after getting the same little plus sign, I sit on the floor after, holding my knees and drumming my fingers across them as I try not to hyperventilate.
One test is a false positive. Two is bad luck, I tell myself.
But after 15 minutes of me chugging water and trying two more tests, the odds are very much against me.
Holy shit.
This can’t be happening.
I’m sitting on my sofa later, shaking my head.
I can’t be pregnant, with his baby.
But that’s real.
That’s happening.
I’m pregnant.
This isn’t in the plans. I don’t have metrics for this, or spreadsheets. I don’t have stats in front of me, only the unknown - a gut feeling.
And that’s what got me here in the first place - here being wrapped up and involved with the hottest, most consuming, most notorious man in pro football.
And now I’m carrying his baby.
Holden is many things - incredible player, fantastic at making my body shatter and come in ways I’ve never even imagined it could.
But father?
I drop my head in my hands, knowing how shitty that even sounds to think, but knowing it’s true.
This is the man who’s famous for throwing a ball harder, faster, and with more precision than really anyone in the history of the sport. But also, for sleeping with half the women in Denver. And their friends.
Holden Cade is not known for his life skills or his ability to hold shit together.
You know, essentials for becoming a parent.
I sigh as I drop my head to my knees. In any case though, he needs to know. No one doesn’t deserve to know, that’s for sure, no matter how ill-equipped they are for the job.
I go and grab my phone I’ve basically forgotten about since Tom’s text this morning from my bag. I glance down and frown: fifteen missed calls from both my office and Richard.
Jesus, one day away from the office and you’d think the building was on fire.
I decide to call Holden first.
“Hi,” I say, my voice cold, scared.
“Hey sugar,” he purrs. “Just finishing practice and was thinking about you and last nigh-”
“Can we meet?” The words drop like rocks from my lips. “Later?”
My voice is cracked as I push my finger through my hair.
Holden clears his throat.
“Uh, yeah?”
I swallow the lump in my throat.
“My place?”
He chuckles darkly.
“Guess someone didn’t get enough last night, huh?”
I shake my head, squeezing my eyes shut.
“Just come over later, whenever you’re done. Please.”
There’s no flirtiness in my voice, no sass or smile.
He must hear it, because his voice loses that charming drawl.
“Yeah, I’ll be there. London, what’s-”
My phone rings on the other line, and I glance down to see Richard’s number popping up.
“I have to go, I’ll see you later.”
“Yeah okay-”
I click off quickly, dropping the phone in my lap.
I can’t do this.
I don’t know how to do this.
I rock myself on the couch, chewing on my lip before I take a deep, shaky breath. I pick up the phone and call Richard back.
“London.” Richard’s voice is strained sounding, and for a moment, I’m terrified that it’s something to do with my dad before I remind myself that I’d have certainly gotten a call from the hospital if that were the case.
“What’s up, Richard?”
“London, where were you?”
A horrible sensation creeps through me.
“What?” I croak out.
“The meeting, London! The board meeting today!”
I’m shaking my head, feeling the blood drain from my face.
“No, Richard, it was postponed.”
“It just happened, London.”
I’m falling.
I’m in total free-fall, and there’s no bottom in sight.
“No, that’s impossible-”
“London, I’ve been trying to reach you for over two hours!”
“My phone…” I trail off, my voice sounding like it’s outside my body. “Richard, what-”
“London, it’s Joanne; she’s taken control of the board, entirely.”
What.
I stand abruptly from the couch, feeling my head reel and the room sway.
“That’s impossible.”
“Not with the right votes it isn’t. She invoked your father’s position on the board as a forty percent voter.”
“She can’t do that!” I yell in the emptiness of my apartment.
“Yes, she can,” Richard says icily. “She’s automatically in a position to speak for him legally when he’s not well.”
“He’s fine!” I’m screaming now.
“But he’s in the hospital, which legally declares him ‘unfit’.”
This isn’t happening.
“This can’t be real! How could she-”
“Tom,” Richard mutters under his breath. “Tom got to Hutchins and Peterson somehow and the three of them plus her forty percent vote swung things.”
“Richard,” my voice is quieter now, but shaking. “What does that mean?”
“It means your stepmother is now effectively running this organization.”
“What? She can’t do that.”
“She can, and she just did. And she’s using your dad’s current medical stuff as proof of his being “unfit” to run, including his wishes for succession.”
This can’t be happening.
“She could take the team, London.” Richard says with a heavy voice. “With a board majority, she could vote in a new president or even transfer ownership.”
My head’s spinning as I try and focus on what he’s saying.
“London, where were you?”
Making mistakes.
Making huge mistakes.
Because suddenly, the rug’s being pulled out from under me.
I’m losing the team.
I’m failing my father’s legacy.
And I’m pregnant with Holden Cade’s baby.
39
London
My dad still lives in the house I grew up in - outside the city limits out in the country. And I normally love visiting here. The memories of this place are of me and my dad - just the two of us against the world after my mom skipped out with her tennis instructor.
And even after Joanne, who I’ve never really clicked with, coming home to this house always feels like I’m recharging a little.
Not this time.
I grit my teeth as I roar up the driveway at breakneck speed, my eyes narrowed and my mind set.
I see Joanne’s silver BMW parked in the driveway turnaround as I slam the breaks on, screeching to a stop by the front door.
There’s too many unknowns right now. Too many things happening all at once, and it feels like I might get sucked under and drown beneath it all.
I’m pregnant.
The words don’t seem real, even though there’s no denying it anymore. I’m pregnant, and the father is the most ineligible man I can imagine. But that one is so large I can’t even really process it right now.
I should go to him right now.
I should figure this out.
But I can’t. It’s just too much; it’s too big.
Instead, I’m going to knock down the door and see just what the fuck Joanne thinks she’s doing.
She answers the door after me pounding on it for a minute straight.
“Oh, hello sweetness,” she smiles a saccharine, painted smile at me, her heavy eye-shadow making her eyes glint even more than they usually do.
“Do not call me that,” I hiss, stepping into the house and pushing her aside. “Where do you even get the fucking nerve to-”
“That is just no way to talk to me young lady!” she snaps, one hand shaking a finger at me like she’s scolding a child.
Oh hell no.
“I will speak to you how I please, Joanne, you gold digging-”
The slap comes sharp across my face. I gasp, staggering back as my hand flies to my cheek.
“Are you fucking serious?”
Joanne only rolls her eyes at me.
“I can’t believe he raised you the way he did! Look at you, running around playing with the boys and pretending you know what’s best! You’ve got no respect no-”
“You’re trying to take his team?”
She stops, her eyes narrowing at me as her lips purse shut.
“So it’s true, that’s your plan.”
“London, London, London,” she sighs, shaking her head. “Honey you clearly don’t understand.”
“Joanne, you hate sports. What the fuck do you want a pro football team for?”
She smiles wickedly. “Oh, I don’t, sweetness.”
I glare at her and she rolls her eyes.
“Oh, c’mon, you’re just like your father with this nonsense! Holding a torch for this joke of a football team.”
“It’s not a joke,” I hiss.
“Oh it is.” She rolls her eyes. “I don’t want the team, London, but the point is, if they keep losing, no one will want them, especially now that you’ve locked that disgusting Holden Cade into this bank-breaking contract. Not only is it a losing team now, it’s a losing team with a crippling payroll.”
I blink, slowly shaking my head as I stare at her.
“What the hell is going on?”
“I’m going to sell the damn team, honey, is what’s going on,” Joanne snaps.
What.
“It’s still actually worth money for now, so it’s the right time.”
I can feel my temper rising like fire inside of me as I shake my head at her.
“My father-”
“Your daddy never would because of his nostalgia for it. Believe me, he’ll thank me.”
I bark out a laugh,
“Will he thank you for screwing him over?”
Joanne shrugs, tsk-ing at me.
“Archie will get his cut, don’t you worry. Fifty-fifty, right down the middle. After all, there’s a prenup.”
She grins wickedly.
“You’re disgusting.”
“Yeah well, deal with it, honey.”
“I think a prenup goes out the window after I tell my dad and his lawyers about this,” I spit out.
I start to turn, ready to storm away from all of this when Joanne’s voice stops me.
“Oh, I don’t think that’d work out well for you, sweetness.”
I turn back
“Excuse me?” I hiss.
Joanne smiles.
“Misappropriation of funds to finance your own little fling?”
What.
My blood chills in my veins.
“Have you ever even read the fine print in your employment contracts?” Joanne grins evilly at me. “Specifically the morality and conduct clauses?”
Oh, God.
Joanne goes to a side table by the door and picks up a manila envelope.
“Do you know what business my first husband was in, honey?”
I shake my head, feeling numb.
“Insurance.” She smiles thinly, her heavy eye-shadowed eyes glinting at me as she hands me the folder.
The black and white pictures almost fall from my hands as I take them out.
Oh my God…
They’re of me.
Me and Holden.
Hand in hand. Kissing outside the restaurant the other night. Entering his apartment together, his hand on my ass.
“I’m leaving your father, London, I think you’d be happy about that,” Joanne says with smug smile. “We can do it the easy way, where he and I part, I take some of his money, and I end up making him a lot more when I sell this deadweight of a team. Or we can do it the hard way.”
I’m shaking, feeling my stomach drop as my head reels.
“The hard way?”
“The hard way,” she says crisply, “is I still leave your father, I still take half of what’s mine, but I make sure you never work again. That famous LJ Jacobs persona of yours? Done, after word gets out about you screwing players like the trampy little slut I always knew you were.”
“I- I-” I’m grappling at nothing, feeling like I’m in free fall.
“If you make this difficult, I make it difficult. The first way is just easier, London,” she says, shrugging. “You played a game, I played it better, and you lost.”
I don’t remember driving home. It’s a daze of highways and then city, before suddenly I’m in my building’s parking garage and moving like a zombie for the elevator.
Everything is shattering.
Everything is coming down around me, and there’s nothing I can do about it.
I step off the elevator in a blur, staggering for my apartment. All I want is bed. All I want is to drown myself in the blankets and never come back up for air until-
“Hey.”
I look up sharply, and my heart almost breaks.
Holden.
Holden who I forget was coming over.
Holden who’s baby I’m carrying.
Holden who my being around might shatter anything I have left and rip my life apart even more.
Holden who I can’t have anything to do with.
No, not right now.
“I- I can’t.” It’s all I manage to croak out as I push past him, grabbing for my keys.
“Hey, hang on.”
There’s a hand on my shoulder - warm, comforting.
No
I can’t.
I shake him off.
“Please,” I whisper hoarsely as I turn, my face stricken as I shake my head. “Not now.”
His dark eyes narrow with concern.
“London, talk to me.”
“I can’t.”
“Look, will you just-”
“This was a mistake, okay!” I shout out, words slicing through the space between us.
My eyes lock on his.
“You and me, I mean.” I say quieter. “This was a mistake. This never should have happened.”
“I disagree,” he growls, his eyes flaring.
“Well, that’s on you then,” I spit out.
I’m pushing him away, because I have to. Because holding onto him might just break whatever I have left.
“I just can’t do this right now.”
“This?” He glares at me. “And what exactly does that mean?”
“You and me!” I yell in the hallway. “I cannot do this, Holden! It was casual, it was just us having fun, or whatever. And now it’s done, okay?”
His jaw tightens as he glares at me.
He steps close, and I gasp as he presses me against the door.
“Tell me one more time,” he growls. His hands cup my face as he looks deep into my eyes. “I know this ain’t you, sugar,” he husks darkly in the deep velvet voice. “Tell me one more time, and I’m gone. Because other than that, there’s no way I’m walking away from you right-”
“I’m pregnant.”
The silence of the hallway is deafening as my hand flies to my mouth, as if to stop the words from coming out.
But it’s too late, and there’s no stopping them now.
Holden’s jaw tightens as his eyes go wide.
“What?”
“I’m pregnant.” I whisper it this time, feeling like I’m outside my own body watching this conversation happen across a movie screen. “I was late, I took a test - four actually - and I’m pregnant,” I say with a leaden voice. I close my eyes, sucking in a breath of air and feeling the shakiness as I do. “I’m pregnant, and it’s yours-”
“London,” he says hoarsely his eyes wide as the color drains from his face. “You’re-”
I can’t do this.
I shake my head back and forth, my eyes locked on his and willing myself not to let the tears fall.
“I’m pregnant, it’s yours, and I’m sorry but I can’t do this right now.” I barely choke the last words out before I turn and unlock my apartment door.
“Wait,” his hand is on my arm, “hang on, let’s talk-”
“No,” I whisper hoarsely, turning back to him with my hand on the doorknob.
And there’s so much else I want to say - so much else I want to tell him, and explain to him. I want to tell him I’m terrified. I want to tell him to save me. I want to tell him words I’ve never spoken to someone else.
But I can’t, because that’s not what this is.
That’s not what this ever was, and I know if I open my mouth right then, I’ll lose it.
