Authors: Kat Latham
Tess swallowed hard, but pride didn’t go down easy. “I don’t want a pity job.”
“Fuck’s sake, don’t be daft. Cousin or not, I wouldn’t waste a salary on someone who was a waste of the office oxygen supply. You’re clever and you’ve a ruthless business perspective few of my other staff do. You’re good for us, whatever role you end up in. But you have more important things to think about now. What’re you going to do about Liam?”
“I don’t know. I hurt his pride.”
Charlie snorted. “Hurt it? You fucking napalmed it. Have you seen the papers today?”
She scrunched up one side of her face in a “Sorta” expression, and he lifted his man bag from the floor, flipped open the flap and drew out a tabloid. Dropping it onto the counter in front of her, he said, “Look at the picture.”
She forced herself to look. Only the headline—
Red Carded!—
and the top of Liam’s head showed above the fold, so she flipped it open. The photographer had caught the expression that’d haunted her all night. Liam, with his brows drawn down and mouth slightly open, as if he couldn’t believe the words he was hearing.
“I know that expression, Tessy. I’ve seen it in the mirror. That’s the look of a man who’s staring at his own heart and can’t figure out why it’s beating outside his body. Whatever happens, you at least own him an apology.”
She couldn’t bear the look on Liam’s face anymore, so her body conspired to hide him. Tears pricked Tess’s eyes until he blurred and swam in her vision. “I owe him more than that. I love him. I can’t believe how badly I messed this up.”
An envelope dropped onto the newspaper, making Tess blink. “What’s that?”
“Tickets. I already told your dad you have them, and he was so excited I think he just about pissed himself, so you can’t back out.”
Dread gurgled low in her belly. “Tickets to what?”
“The ballet,” he said, irony dripping from his voice. “The World Cup final—what did you think?”
“I can’t go to that! I’ve distracted him enough this week. My being there would totally throw him off.”
“It’s not like they’re tickets to the changing room. He won’t know you’re there, but I think you need to go. You need to figure out how you can make it up to him. And don’t worry about the fact that the producers will no doubt be looking for you in the crowd and make sure to show you on TV. Only millions of people will be watching. Including me.”
Tess’s brows shot up. “You? You’re going to watch a rugby match?”
“You bet your sweet Fanny Adams I will be. You’re going to look like a complete tit when you try to win him back, and—after the way you’ve been ignoring my calls—I can’t wait to see it.”
* * *
A few hours later, Tess and her dad stepped off the train with several hundred others and joined the swell of thousands making their way toward the stadium. Enterprising homeowners on either side of the main route had set up barbecues to sell burgers to hungry passersby, but even the tantalizing aroma of fatty grilled meat couldn’t ease the knot making a mess of her stomach.
Her dad hadn’t said anything about her current scandal since she’d met him at Waterloo. She’d gone there dreading his disappointment in her, but his silence on the matter was much, much worse. Instead, he chatted about the team selection and speculated on the referee’s competence, two topics Tess would happily have joined him in if she could pay attention to anything other than manically scanning the crowd for camera phones pointed her way.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m starving,” her dad said as they reached the grounds.
“That bacon sandwich you had at Waterloo didn’t last long, did it?”
He rolled his eyes. “Is that a hint of censure I hear, Tessy? Ooh, look! Kangaroo burgers.” He grabbed her elbow and steered her to the side of the street, where a man was flipping several rows of huge burgers on a family-sized grill in his front garden. “Let’s celebrate Australia’s crushing defeat early.”
She followed her dad with a resigned grimace and waited patiently in the queue next to him, trying to gently feel her way around a topic that had been brewing in her mind for a while. “Dad? Do you ever think about changing your diet?”
“What’re you talking about? I
do
change it. I’ve never had kangaroo burgers before. That’s a change.”
“Not what I mean, and you know it.”
He sighed. “Seriously?
You’re
going to give
me
advice on how to make good choices?”
And there it was. The parental disappointment she’d expected. A bit delayed, but present nonetheless. Her fingers curled until the sharp clawing pain of her nails bit into her palms, a futile attempt to distract herself from the burning fear that had simmered just below her consciousness for as long as she could remember.
This will be the last straw.
Except, forget straws. She’d been heaping great, heavy sycamores of disappointment on her parents since social services had first dropped her at their house. From raging temper tantrums that included flushing her grandmother’s wedding ring down the toilet, to yanking a young Gwen’s hair until her scalp bled, to being suspended from school for passing around that boy’s unfortunate erection photo, to having a one-night stand that ended up publicly humiliating her parents. Where was the awards committee for Daughter of the Century when you needed them?
She trained her gaze on the kangaroo patties and let it go unfocused on the plumes of smoke drifting into the air. “I’m really sorry, Ben. For everything.”
He reared back. “Ben? Who the fuck’s Ben?” Grabbing her elbow, he tugged her out of the queue. Only once before could she remember her dad physically handling her, and—much like right now—he’d marched her down the street so he could lecture her in private instead of making a scene. She seemed to be the only one in the family who made scenes. And she did it well enough for all of them.
With his big hand wrapped around her arm, he gave her little choice but to stumble after him down a narrow road between two rows of houses. The hordes of rugby fans swarmed down the street they’d just stepped off, paying them no attention whatsoever. When they were far enough away to be out of earshot, her father stopped and spun to face her. “I’m Ben to your mum. I’m Ben to my colleagues. To
you
, young lady, I’m
Dad
. I always have been and I always will be. Got it?”
“I didn’t mean any disrespect.”
“‘I didn’t mean any disrespect,
Dad
,’” he repeated. “And respect isn’t the issue here. You know I couldn’t give a monkey’s toss about that normally. No, this is about trust—or lack thereof. More specifically, it’s about your distrust of me and your mother.” His face flushed an unhealthy shade of rose all the way up to the roots of his pale hair, but he didn’t give her a chance to react before his lecture continued. “What have we ever done to make you think we’re not going to keep you?”
She gasped, her breath catching painfully in her chest. “Wh-what do you mean?”
“You know
exactly
what I mean. When you first came to us, we changed your nappies and cuddled you through nightmares. We taught you how to read and tried to protect you from everything and everyone who might hurt you. For almost thirty years, we’ve bragged on you to our friends and we’ve stayed up nights worrying about you. People just don’t do that for kids they don’t love.”
His voice broke and he thumped his chest hard, as if to emphasize his point—or dislodge the emotion caught there. “Tessy, you might not have come from our bodies, but you live in our hearts just as much as Gwen does. You are
ours
, little girl. And nothing you do will change that.
Nothing.
”
“I know...Dad,” she finished quickly when one of his brows shot up.
“I know you
know
it, but it’s not a matter of knowing. I wish to hell you’d finally believe it. You are no longer Countess Appleby and you never will be. Maybe we should’ve ignored social services when they warned us not to change your first name, but fucking hell, that is
not you.
You will never be abandoned by this family. We are
your
family, and you are ours. Now will you quit the hysterics and finally believe that?”
His hands gripped her shoulders, giving her a small shake as he bent forward to be as close to her eye level as he could get. If anyone was in hysterics, it was him...but she knew he wasn’t referring to this moment in time. Like a near-death experience, her life flashed through her mind, playing a flickering film of rash decisions and thoughtless actions. She’d lived her life reacting hysterically to every conflict, and each time she’d expected her family to disappear on her. “Oh, God. You’re right.”
He rolled his eyes. “One would think you’d realize by now that I’m
always
right. It comes with the territory of being a father—like the annual Father’s Day tie.”
But his return to the sardonic father she knew and adored didn’t make a dent in her moment of revelation. “All these years, I’ve been daring you to leave me.”
His face softened into a gentle reprimand. “Not just me. And not just your mum and Gwen, either.”
Liam too.
She scrubbed a hand over her face and didn’t fight it when her dad pulled her into a bear hug. “He must hate me.”
Her dad took a moment to respond, and she thought her words might’ve been completely muffled by his chest. But then he pressed his cheek to the crown of her head and gave her the blunt fatherly insight she’d always underappreciated. “If he does, then what you did yesterday will make him more angry than hurt. But I suspect the opposite is true.”
Hope blossomed in her chest. “Why?”
He hugged her tight. “Because I’m your father, and I can’t imagine anyone
not
loving you.”
When they finally made it to the stadium and found their seats, Tess discovered to her horror that their tickets were in the VIP section with players’ families and friends. She recognized several of the men in attendance—all players who hadn’t made it onto the England World Cup squad but who’d come out to cheer on their friends and compatriots.
Judging by the looks Tess was subjected to—ranging from disgust to loathing—they recognized her too.
She followed her father’s lead as he ignored the judgment and introduced himself to the proud parents, wives and girlfriends sitting around them. Tess should’ve been one of those, wanted desperately to say, “I’m Liam Callaghan’s...” but she didn’t know how to end that sentence. What she didn’t want to say was the truth that everyone knew anyway:
I
used to be Liam Callaghan’s secret lover
,
but now I’ve joined the ranks of women who’ve let him down.
So she said, “I’m one of Legends’ sponsors,” and let them fill in their own gaps while she and her father pretended not to notice the frosty reception.
Thousands of people created tremendous noise, even though the teams hadn’t run onto the pitch yet. The atmosphere brimmed with excitement and nervous tension. She wanted a win for Liam so badly a strange metallic tang spilled over her tongue, as if she could taste victory for him. Or maybe that was the flavor of her own defeat.
She tried to lose herself in the pre-match pageantry but was hit by a sudden longing. The players devoted their all to their sport, and their families sacrificed so much—especially time together and sometimes privacy. She wanted to support Liam, cheer louder for him than anyone else in the stands. She wanted to be able to stand up and claim him as hers. And she wanted to be worthy of him telling the world that she was his.
She wanted everything with him. To build a life with him at her side, sharing victories and helping each other along when life injured them.
She wanted Liam Callaghan—the man
and
the player. And if she had to risk rejection one more time to prove it to him, she would.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“It’s time, men!”
The din of grunts, shouts and face slaps grew louder until everyone had gathered round to hear Liam’s last-minute words of wisdom. “Lads, last time we faced Australia in the final, we lost in the closing seconds. That match was my first cap for England, and it made me puke to get so close to victory only to see it snatched from our hands in the final seconds. Make no mistake—
we
lost that match. It wasn’t stolen from us. We let nerves get the better of us, and we gave them the win.”
Somber, serious faces focused on him. They clearly hadn’t expected him to bring the haunting defeat into the changing room. He wouldn’t have, if Bailey-Boy had been in the changing room with them, since most of the country had blamed the team’s loss on him. But Spencer wasn’t here, and today Liam was speaking from the heart. This room, with these men, seemed to be the only place he could do so without being pitifully shot down.
“I don’t know how many of you have been listening to the pundits for the last six weeks. They don’t believe we’re capable of it. They said we wouldn’t make it out of the group stages, but we did. We’d get our arses handed to us in the quarter-finals, they said. Let’s be honest—we had to fight hard to secure our victory. Lads, we’ve fought our way through every single match, and the prize is in sight. Do. Not. Blink.”
None of them did. A sea of heads bobbed in agreement, every single man in the room gathering his thoughts into a single, determined line of focus.
“Concentrate, boys, and do your jobs better than you’ve ever done them before. Let’s show those motherfuckers what it means to underestimate us.”
The roar bounced off the walls and vibrated the floor. “Lean in! Lean in!” someone shouted, and they all gathered closer, arms thrown around each other’s shoulders as they yelled together, “England!”
They walked silently through the tunnel, waiting at its mouth until the announcer called them onto the pitch. When they jogged on, it was to a hero’s welcome and with the weight of the country’s expectations on their shoulders. Oddly, that weight was lighter than any Liam had carried before. He was buoyant, floating on waves of anticipation as he lined up with his team and prepared to sing the national anthem.