Her guy. Those words sent fireworks shooting off in my chest. Brushing her hair back from her face, I kissed her. “I like the sound of that.” God, did I like the sound of it. I loved it. I grabbed the soft gray hat and stuck it back on her head, forcing her hair in front of her eyes like a curtain.
She swatted at my hands and yanked the hat off, shoving her hair out of her face. “Jerk.” But her smile was as wide as mine.
Hovering over her shoulder a couple yards back, Eric and Holden stood sentry, conspicuously inconspicuous. For a split second, I forgot how careful she needed to be and was glad they were there keeping her safe on the way to me.
“Was that one yours?” She pointed to the belt jammed with bags.
“Yeah, let me…” I craned my neck looking for it. Sprinting down the line past my teammates, I spotted it. With a clean yank, I got it free from the pile of bags and took off back to Bay. “Got it.”
“Now are you ready for your surprise?”
“I thought you being here was my surprise.” I couldn’t stop looking at her, and slipped my arm around her waist, shifting to keep my bag on my shoulder. There was more? What more did I need when I had her here?
“No, it wasn’t. This was.” She bent, reaching for a bag I hadn’t noticed at her feet. Out of it, she slipped a thermos and a small clear plastic container holding a cinnamon roll. “I wasn’t sure if you needed to leave straight from here with the team or if you might be able to come with me, so I brought this inside.”
“Did you pick this up for me?” Even with everything she had going on, she was thinking about me, maybe even half as much as I was thinking about her.
She held them out. “No, I made it.”
Electric pulses rushed under my skin. She had made all this for me.
The woman who everyone wanted a piece of spent time making hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls for me. I took the thermos from her hand and opened the lid, sniffing the dark, rich scent. Memories of sitting in her kitchen, touching her under the table, and making sure her mom didn’t see flooded my mind. The hearty, sweet liquid had coated the yawning pit of hunger in my stomach then. I’d made myself slow down and savor the tastes and smell instead of devouring them like I’d wanted to. “It’s hot chocolate. Your hot chocolate.”
She nodded.
“You made this too?”
The clear clamshell container sat in the palms of her hands. She nodded.
So many feelings rushed through me, burning deep in my chest. With everything going on in her life, she’d made this for me. Hell, I’d have been happy if she’d picked it up for me on the way here. But the time she took to make this…
“I can’t wait to have it. I swear, nothing compares to your cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate.” I wished I could see her eyes, hidden behind those sunglasses. And I wished she didn’t have to hide herself away.
But the rest of her radiated happiness—happiness to see me. “Do you need to stay or tell someone you’re going?” She tipped her head, looking down the line of football players and staff.
“We’re good. This is the best surprise I’ve ever gotten.” Normally, I hated them, but these were the kind I could happily experience every day. I wrapped my arm with the thermos around her shoulder. She held onto the cinnamon roll and my mouth watered—not only for the sweet treat in her hands.
“The car’s out here.” She pointed through the sliding set of doors where a black SUV idled with a driver standing on the curb. Even if it was only a ride back to the hotel, I’d take it. It was still time alone with her.
Holden walked in front of us and Eric behind.
Bay hugged me with one arm around my waist, under my coat, her giddy excitement was catching.
“Bay?” The question shot out like a scream when we were five feet from the door.
All four of us tensed. I could feel it in the air. This had gone from light and fun to potential disaster.
Her shining expression faltered. Worry seeped into her grip on me.
“Oh my god, it’s Bay!” Another voice added to the normal airport chatter and bustle. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end and my muscles turned to granite.
A hand gripped both our shoulders. “Bay, let’s move.”
Bay looked over her shoulder and picked up the pace, I did too. The crush of panic swamped me. Voices rose, phones came out and people rushed toward us.
I dropped the thermos. It fell along Bay’s side and bounced off the floor, spraying hot chocolate out the lid. I pulled Bay in tighter to me, shielding her and needing to get her out of here, fear rippling through me.
We made it through the doors. I checked over my shoulder to make sure we weren’t about to get slammed. Eric stopped, spinning to hold back the crowd in the doorway, and Holden had the door open already and jerked my duffel from my grasp.
Bay jumped into the car and I followed behind her. Holden slammed the door before I could reach for the handle. His urgency ratcheted up my alarm. We needed to get her out of here.
Eric climbed into the front seat. The door slam rocked the car.
Emily let Holden in through the back door behind Bay. He shot into his seat and chucked my duffel over his shoulder into the back.
We peeled away from the curb. The driver had to veer around people who’d flooded into the road in front of us. That could’ve gone bad. Really fucking bad.
“Everyone good?” Eric looked back from the front.
“We’re good. Just a little messy.” Bay’s brittle laugh sent all my protective instincts into red alert. She was putting on a brave face for me. Maybe even for herself. The handful of times she’d wanted to walk back to her room alone…I wasn’t going to let her do it again. The spiral was starting. Catastrophizing and dread were working themselves into a needle-spiked ball rolling through my chest.
A hand extended from the back seat with a napkin. “Do we need to stop for a change?”
“No, it’s all on my coat.”
Bay popped open her buttons. A large white icing smudge smeared across the front of her black jacket. On one arm, hot chocolate dripped from shoulder to the end of the sleeve. From when I’d chucked it. The hot chocolate she’d spent her precious time on making. I went into freak out mode and tossed it aside like it was nothing to get her out of there.
“Shit, I’m sorry.”
She shoved the coat off and folded it, keeping the stains from touching anything else. Her hand rubbed my leg. “It wasn’t your fault. I could’ve stayed in the car and had Holden go get you.”
I hated thinking about her sitting in the car, behind tinted windows, unable to step outside the bubble made to protect her. “You should be able to come and get me from the airport if you want.”
She shrugged and smiled, her hand continuing the reassuring strokes up and down my leg. “I’m not sorry. We all make trades. And I wanted to see you.”
Even if she hadn’t been who she was, I couldn’t keep her safe every minute of every day. How often did bad things happen to people going about mundane tasks in their lives? I took deep breaths. I couldn’t control the situation. I couldn’t control that crowd of people. All I could control was how I reacted to it, and I didn’t want to spoil our time together by losing my cool. I’d talk to Holden and make sure she didn’t take a risk like that again.