Page 45 of Face Off

Sadie was an angel—maybe that was why it was so easy with her. There were no tantrums or meltdowns over every little thing like I’d seen with other kids. She was past the baby stage—I didn’t know how to be around Madi and Chloe’s little guys—which meant she was fun. She had her own personality and interests, and I found myself looking forward to seeing her.

Her mom only had a little bit to do with that.

Fine. A lot.

Holly had a way of putting me at ease. It was cliché to think I could be myself around her, but it was true. I had a near mental breakdown, and she didn’t say I was crazy or being petty. She sat with me and listened. She was simply there for me when I really needed to not be alone. I doubted she understood how much that meant to me. I didn’t tell her. I’d barely thanked her.

Maybe it was her intuition or a side effect of being a mom, but she seemed to just know what I needed.

I didn’t deserve it. Her.

I’d been a complete jerk to her, at first without even knowing it, but she forgave me and let us both move on. Most women I’ve known in the past would have held my mistakes over my head or brought them up as reminders to get what they wanted.

She wasn’t manipulative. As sad as it was, that was new for me.

“I want to skip,” Sadie said a second before kicking up her leg. I had to walk a bit faster to keep up.

“You skip too.” She tugged on my hand and there was no way I could deny her.

Which was how I came to be skipping through a public park in broad daylight, surrounded by hundreds of fans and my teammates.

A whistle sounded, but I ignored it. I would not be bothered by what any of the guys said or thought, because at this moment, I was happy.

Sadie was laughing, and the sound was pure joy.

“Come on, Sadie!” Milo waved over his shoulder, and she tried to move her short legs faster.

It happened in a blink.

One moment she was giggling and tossing her head from side to side, and the next she let go of my hand and was on the ground.

“Owie!” One word, and my heart cracked. I knelt next to her and looked her over.

“What hurts?” I asked as if I had the first clue of what to do.

She held out her scraped palms and looked at her knees. “Ow!”

And there they were. The tears overflowed from her eyes. Huge drops of misery drifted over her bright pink cheeks.

“Oh, Sadie, it’s okay.” It wasn’t. She was broken, and it was my fault. I should have been paying closer attention. I should have held her hand tighter. I could have caught her, prevented all of this, if I’d seen it coming.

“Sweetie, what happened?” Holly was suddenly next to me, and I wished for the sidewalk to open under me and swallow me whole.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t even see her go down. We were fine, then boom, she was on the ground.”

Holly offered me a small smile. “It happens all the time. You just got going a little too fast, huh?” she asked Sadie who nodded with a pouted lip.

I wanted to slam the stupid concrete into bits for hurting her.

“Can I check your knees?” Holly said softly.

Sadie gave a single nod, her lip quivering enough to make me want to scoop her into my arms and protect her from anything bad ever happening again.

Holly rolled up her cotton pants, revealing two angry red spots. “Okay, be tough, Sadie. Can you be tough?”

Her big, wet eyes met her mom’s, and that darned lip still shook. “Yeah.”

The kid was a hero.