Imaginary Lines (14 page)

She nodded, and then shook her head. “Yeah, but...I don’t know.” When everyone kept staring, she put down her drink with a burst of energy. “She was too... She tried to walk across a muddy field in high heels. Who does that?”

Mike O’Connor, the redheaded running back, smiled. “You just didn’t like her because she flirted with me.”

“A falsehood,” the blonde said. “Undoubtedly.”

Carter turned back to me. “Are you going to report on anything that happens here, or are we entirely off the record?”

I had a split second to decide, and it didn’t take that long. “Off the record.” Any connections I made here by bypassing a few newsworthy flecks would be worth a gold mine in the future.

Ryan turned to Abraham. “And you vouch for her?”

Abe stepped to my side. “I do.”

Ryan ran his eyes over the rest of his players. “Then I don’t see what the problem is.”

And that, apparently, was that.

Everyone went back to their own conversations, and Abe led me over to Mike O’Connor and the blonde. “This is Mike and Natalie.”

I knew who Mike was, of course, but I soon learned that Natalie was an archaeologist. They’d recently returned from a summer in Ireland excavating an ancient port. It sounded like a dream, something people did in fairy tales, but I was quickly realizing that everyone I met in this city came with their own strange tale.

Another woman moved to join us, and somehow the conversations split up by the sexes, leaving me facing Natalie and the stunningly gorgeous Briana Harris. She was even more recognizable than the star players, since she’d been part of the show
Boomerang
before dropping acting for grad school. She smiled at me, but it was a considering smile, not unlike Rachael Hamilton’s. “So you’re Abe’s friend.”

She and Natalie kept the conversation flowing so seamlessly it took ten minutes before I realized I hadn’t asked them a single question; I’d been so easily answering the ones they threw at me. They deflected anything about themselves, until I’d told them not only about my move to New York but my move to California a eleven years ago, and how I’d met Abe, and how we’d grown up together. I finally had to interrupt. “And here I thought I was the investigative journalist.”

Natalie’s lips quirked. “Maybe. But we’re equally nosy.”

“And while you might investigate their professional lives, we’re quite adapt at ferreting out the secrets of their personal.”

Natalie lived her glass in a silent toast to Briana. “You could say Bri’s even undergoing the most in-depth undercover investigation of the Leopards.”

Briana groaned.

I nodded, remembering now. “You’re getting married?”

She nodded. “In almost exactly one month.”

A smile played on Natalie’s lips. “Not that she’s panicking.”

“I’m certainly not panicking. But. Do you know how hard it is to plan a wedding when most of the guests are men who are terrible at organizing themselves? Like this one.” She roped Abe into the conversation as he came by and fell comfortably in at my side. She narrowed her eyes at him and spoke dryly. “You’d think it wouldn’t be so hard to drop a letter in the mail.”

Abe smiled at her. “You already know I’m coming. Why do you need a piece of paper? Tree killer.”

She rolled her eyes in fond exasperation. “It’s far too late to RSVP. This is for your meal. Because I can’t do that for everyone. And it would be nice to know if you’re bringing a date.”

My stomach had no reason to clench, but it did anyway.

Abe shrugged with utter nonchalance. “All right, then. I am.”

Bri looked astonished. “You are? Who?”

Abe’s gaze settled on me, and low burn began in my stomach. A smile slowly spread across his face, purposeful and sure. “Hey, Tamar, want to go to a wedding with me?”

The tension in my stomach turned into a paralyzing shock that raced through my entire body. I shook my head. “You’re supposed to ask a girlfriend. A date.”

He let the pause stretch for just long enough to be noticeable, and then responded comfortably. “I don’t have a girlfriend. And I want to take you.”

They all stared at me. I stared back, and then helplessly nodded. “Yes. Okay. I’d love to come.”

“Good.” Abe stood up and smiled. “I promised I’d help Rach take the dessert out, but I’ll see you in a bit.” His hand caressed the back of mine as he left.

Natalie and Bri stared at me, and then Bri let out a laugh. “So I’ll see you at the wedding.”

I swung back to her. “If that’s all right? I don’t want to intrude.”

The two women exchanged a fast look. “I wouldn’t worry,” Natalie said with gentle amusement. “After all, I expect we’ll be seeing you a lot more in the future.”

* * *

I was leaving the bathroom later in the evening when I heard raised voices coming down the hall to my right, and the reporter instinct in me—fine, the endless nosiness—inched me closer. The door at the end of the hall had cracked open, and I peered inside, though guiltiness instantly overwhelmed me.

Rachael Hamilton and Ryan Carter stood locked in a tense conversation.

“I don’t
care
about what everyone else does
.
” Rachael sounded close to tears. “I care about you getting hurt.”

Carter remained stoic. “It’s better play.”

“That’s absolutely ridiculous. It’s ridiculous for the League to have rules for your safety that you guys just sneak around and ignore. Are you guy are so blinded by your bro-code that no one’s going to say anything? I can’t watch you keep getting hurt!”

He reached out for her. “Rachael—”

She pulled away, apparently too worked up to be comforted. “It’s not okay.”

“This is football.”

She spun back to him. “This is your
life
.”

He pulled her toward him and kissed her with such passion that I quickly backed away, unwilling to eavesdrop on such a private moment. I stood in the hall, my heart thumping. What was going on in there?

The door swung open and Rachael stormed out into the hall and almost bumped into me. Both of us froze.

“I am so sorry,” I blurted out. “Are you okay?” For such a pretty girl, she wasn’t a pretty crier; her face had turned red, her eyes watery and scrunched up.

She tried to smooth out her face and paste on a smile, but it was wholly unconvincing. “I’m fine. I just need to...” Her voice broke and she ducked by me and into the bathroom, where she splashed cold water on her face.

I turned and hovered in the doorway. “Can I help?”

“No, it’s fine.” Her eyes met mine in the mirror, looking extra green from the red that surrounded them. “I’ve been in this world for two years now, and it still barely makes sense to me.”

“What’s wrong?”

The words burst out of her in an explosion that seemed to have been bottled far too long. “I don’t know! They act like such
boys
sometimes, like they’re just roughhousing in the backyard, and it’s no big deal, like it’s always no big deal, because it’s part of the
goddamn fucking game...
” She broke off and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I’m ranting and I barely know you. Tamar, right?”

“Yeah.”

Realization crossed her face and she slowly turned around and spoke with finality. “And you’re a reporter.”

I shook my head quickly. “I wasn’t asking because—”

“I believe you,” she said, but too quickly, like she’d only said it to be polite. She pulled up a half smile. “I just...overworry, I guess. That’s what you do about people you love.”

I thought of Abe, and then was irritated I had. “If there’s something illegal...”

“No, no. No. No...no. So! You know Abe. Abe knows your dad. How does that work?”

Despite my painful curiosity, humor bubbled up in me. “That wasn’t a very good transition.”

She made a face, but I was glad to see it was one with more color than the expressions she’d worn earlier. “I know. I’m not very smooth.”

I decided to give her a pass, given that she hadn’t been the one who invited a reporter into her home. “Abe and I grew up together. Our moms are best friends.”

True surprise lit her face. “Really?”

Too much surprise. “He never mentioned me?”

“No.”

My stomach twisted in a cold, hard knot. “Oh.”

Sympathy flooded her features, and I distantly noted that both she and Abe showed their emotions easily. Maybe that was why they were friends.

Why hadn’t Abe told his friends about me?

Why was I enough of an idiot to think he would have?

“Tamar.”

I looked up.

She seemed to have difficulty wrangling her words “Abe—talks about a lot. A lot of...outward things. Or to other people about their lives. He doesn’t always...talk about what’s important to
him.
”

I’d never heard it put into words like that, but it was an interesting observation. I wasn’t positive I agreed, though, because Abe had talked plenty of times about his family or his worries about his grandma’s health or when he’d been stressed out about football scholarships or getting drafted.

She looked at me intently. “He’s always been special. Better than the others.” She smiled to herself, small and secret. “Galahad, perhaps.”

I smiled despite myself. “Not
that
pure.”

She laughed, but sobered quickly. “No, but he’s always wanted
more.
He’s always wanted friends outside the team, and he’s always been so aware of how everyone interacts. He’s a good friend.”

I didn’t say anything.

“Anyway.” She turned back to the mirror and frowned, and then seemed to give up. “We should head back.”

I trailed her back into the living room. I spied Abe sitting on a couch at the far end of my room and made my way over to him. He smiled when he caught sight of me and kicked the teammate beside him off the couch so that I could sit beside him.

If I stayed very still, I could see the effects of the game on the people gathered around us. A crooked pinkie. Curved fingers. A bruise creeping out from under more than one player’s sleeve. A scar beneath the hairline. They called football war without death but it was not without damage, and these men, laughing and joking, were the casualties that kept living.

I knew that football was filled with disposables: a cast of thousands with only three or four names above the fold. Abe lucked out by landing in this golden circle with Carter and Lindsey, but he’d always moved in extraordinary ways.

When we left, we cut through Central Park so I could catch the Q or N train at the southeast corner. We crossed Sheep Meadow, the wide-open green still bright as jade, though the round trees that ringed the grass had turned shades of red and gold. We walked near them, over the shed leaves that crunched beneath our feet, a patchwork carpet of an autumn we never saw at home. Everything here was crisp and sharp; the streetlamps bright, the moon clear in the blue-black sky.

“Thank you for bringing me.” I shoved my hands in my coat pockets as we walked. “I had a lot of fun.”

He turned his head to smile. “I’m glad.”

I hesitated, a little unsure of how to proceed, how to let him know that this was more than a form of gratitude. “No, but Abe—I mean it. Thank you. It meant a lot, that you brought me there. It couldn’t have been easy, since my job and yours puts us a bit at odds.”

“They’re my friends,” he said simply. “I want you to know them.”

I stopped. We’d reached the pond, and the water below us reflected back the shining lights of the city, like a gleaming fairy-tale world. It felt like we were the only people that existed. “Why did you want that?”

His hand reached out; the back of his fingers touched my cheek. “It’s important to me that everyone I care about gets along.”

I couldn’t breathe. My feet tingled and my heart beat wildly. “Abraham...”

His voice turned husky and low. “When you say my name like that, I want to...” His mouth opened but no words came out.

I couldn’t resist. “You want to what?”

His eyes were dark as night yet bright as the moon when he looked at me. How was that possible? “You want me to spell it out?”

Though my stomach danced and spun, my outer body stayed perfectly still. “Sometimes I do.”

He groaned and leaned back. The lamplights silhouetted him perfectly, light and dark. Dreams made real. When he looked back, he cupped my face in his hands. “I’ve been resisting doing this for years.”

I just stared. I was melting. I was hot clay under the summer’s sun.

He let out a soft sound of desire. The air between us simmered with need, and my whole body yearned toward him. I could barely think, couldn’t blink. Small breaths slipped in and out of me like the hopeful flutterings of a hummingbird and then his lips were on mine.

His were warm and firm, a gentle pressure against mine. My heart rate spiked. It was bliss. I had dreamed about this moment for so many years, and it was everything I had always imagined—more. I could never have dreamed of the way his lips would move, the powerful, drugging effect of his mouth on mine. Ecstasy lay in that kiss, in the way his tongue slowly tangled with mine. Heat spiraled tightly though my body, and my back arched. I gave everything to the kiss, falling into it like a flower to sun.

His thumb stroked the sensitive back of my neck and I opened my mouth with a tiny gasp. He groaned and pulled me closer, drawing my lower lip lightly between his teeth. His hands tangled in my hair as my mouth opened under his. All thought was driven from my mind, just the desire to be closer to him. My hands ran over the smooth, hard muscles of his arms, slipping up beneath his sleeve to saver the curve of his bicep. One of his hands wandered down my neckline, playing with soft skin and trailing fire over the gentle swell of my breast, and I forgot how to breathe.

I let out a mew deep in my throat and he responded by hardening the kiss, pressing me roughly against the brick wall. Everything was pressure and sensation. The rest of the world melted away as we fell against each other. Heat pooled low in my stomach and all my weight drained away, leaving my bones turned to water and my spirit floating high. His lips were hot with desire, his breath labored, and it drew heady warmth to every part of my body. When he pulled back a breath, I couldn’t move.