Page 61 of Full Coverage (Boys of Fall)

“You’re quiet and distant. What happened? I thought the trip was good.”

He looked back at his laptop. “I just have a lot of work to do.”

“That’s fine. I get it. But I don’t love the silent treatment. Why not just say that?”

“I just have a lot on my mind.”

She put a hand on top of his on the keyboard. “Talk to me. What happened at the party?”

He looked up, finally meeting her eyes. “I messed up the book. I didn’t do the job. So I’m heading back to San Antonio tonight. I need to put my head down and work my ass off.”

She frowned. He was leaving? Going back to San Antonio?

Of course he was. She’d known he would eventually. But she’d…yeah, maybe she’d been hoping that he would stick around awhile longer. He could write in Quinn. He had been. He’d told her he’d gotten a lot done.

“I thought you were almost done with it,” she said.

“I thought so too.”

“Nolan, what happened?”

He sighed. “The book’s not what they want.”

“They don’t want a book about Coach?”

“They want a book about Coach and football. What I gave them was a sappy book about a small town obsessed with football.”

Randi felt the cold from earlier intensify. All the stories she’d told him. That’s what they didn’t like. “Oh. And staying in Quinn—”

“Will make it worse.”

Her throat tightened. “Oh.”

“Clearly,” he said with a frustrated sigh. “I let myself get all wrapped up in everything there, everything you told me about—in you—and I started to do my own thing and…” He shook his head. “I need to go home and get focused and get this done.”

Randi felt her heart squeeze painfully. “Right. Sorry. I guess that was kind of my fault. I didn’t stay on topic. Let me know if you need any help with the stuff you rewrite.”

“Yeah.” He looked like he was about to say more, but in the end he just said, “Okay.”

“I’m—” She stopped and swallowed, rethinking her words for a moment. But then she went on. “I’m sorry that I distracted you from your work these past couple of weeks. You’d be a lot further ahead if you hadn’t come home.”

She’d said it to hear him deny it. She knew that. She also knew, looking into his eyes after she said it, that she should have kept her mouth shut. Because if he didn’t deny it, it was going to hurt.

“Yeah, I would have.”

Ouch.

“But It’s my own fault. I didn’t come to Quinn to work on the book. And I should have left it alone. I should have gone home after a few days. I was the one who stuck around and started rewriting.”

“You didn’t come to Quinn to work on the book?” she asked with a frown.

He gave yet another heavy sigh and shut his computer. “No, Randi, I came to Quinn for you.”

That sounded like something that should make her feel good. But it didn’t. Everything about the way Nolan said that indicated he regretted it all.

She had nothing more to say. She nodded and stood. “I’m going to get some coffee.”

She didn’t come back to the gate until it was time to board. Nolan was typing furiously and he stopped only long enough to get on the plane. Randi took the window seat and stared out at the clouds, listening to the sound of Nolan’s fingers on his keyboard all the way back to San Antonio.

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