AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"Adam, I was still a little out of it from the night before but that’s no excuse." She opened the top of the box to reveal homemade chocolate chip cookies. She couldn’t have shocked me more. "I pushed you and said some stuff I didn’t mean. I’m sorry."
She’s apologizing?
“No—I’m—” I struggled with my words for a moment. “Fuck, Piper. I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have anything to apologize for.”
A laugh burst out of me. “I freaked out, ice princess. That’s on me. I’m the one who should—uh…”
I couldn’t stop stumbling over my words. It was a mixture of confusion and embarrassment and shame and my tongue felt thick in my mouth. But honestly, I was just happy she wasn’t telling me to fuck off for the rest of my life.
“Adam.” Piper shifted back against the ledge. “You’re such a great guy. And I’d never in a million years want you to think that I think otherwise.”
Finished with that, she placed the box of cookies in my lap and turned to face the scenery. A flush crept up my neck. I couldn’t stop gazing at her. She called me a great guy.
Piper Fontaine thinks I’m a great guy.
I couldn’t believe it. It was like downing a double shot at the bar. My heart pounded in my chest, staring at the beautiful girl next to me.
She took a deep breath. “You’re a great guy, Adam.”
“I think you’re the most amazing person I’ve ever met,” I said, my voice low.
Too fucking far, dude.
Piper jerked back to look at me, the blush reaching her face. Her eyes widened. “Oh.”
It was too far and it was too heavy but it was already a heavy conversation. Part of me wanted to switch topics. Football, the rodeo—hell—we could talk about the weather. But the other part of me wanted her to understand why I’d blown up. Which was new. I didn’t even like talking to people about my parents, much less analyzing why I didn’t like even talking about it in the first place.
“I didn’t want you to find out because I don’t—I didn’t want you to look at me differently,” I admitted. “It’s a stupid reason. But that's all I have.”
Slowly, Piper shook her head. “I don’t think it’s stupid.”
I stretched out my legs and kept Piper in the corner of my eye. If I was going to tell her, I wanted to do it right.
76
Piper
Still In Your Corner
Sometimes you meet people and they do things and you think—how could they do that? How could they do this? Why would they do that? And sometimes people tell you something and everything just clicks into place. You understand them on a deeper level. Pieces of them that were a mystery to you are presented and you understand.
The more I gazed at Adam, the more everything shifted inside me. And the more I looked at him, the more it broke my heart.
“My coach—my dad—” Adam corrected himself and I winced. “Uh…he and my mom started training me when I was—I don’t know—four years old? Diet plans, exercise, the whole thing. My dad coached one of the best high schools in Texas and it was just a fact that I was going to succeed, no matter what. And I was good.” Adam nodded slowly. “But my parents pushed me to be better.”
Don’t say anything.
I had to bite back every comment I wanted to blurt out while struggling to keep the look on my face neutral. Inside though, I was stunned. Four years old? They put a four-year-old on a diet plan?
“That was the difference between me and the other guys,” Adam acknowledged, gazing out to the Houston lights. “Every new team I joined, if I was the best, my parents took me out and pushed me into something higher. If there’s nobody to beat, there’s no point.” A humorless grin tugged up on his lips. “One time, my mom forged some documents and pretended I was homeschooled to get me on a little league team when I wasn’t old enough.”
Don’t say anything. Don’t say anything. Don’t say anything.
My nails dug into my palms with the effort to keep silent. Because I wasn’t even sure what I could say. Everything I could think of sounded so hollow.
“And the accident happened…and he said if I couldn’t get up, I lost my spot on his team. It was everything I worked for. To have my dad as my actual coach.” Adam glanced over at me. “In the hospital, my mom said, all their work was for nothing.”
