Page 123 of This Wild Heart

Probably not a good time to tell her there were seven hundred members of my family up in the suite, and it was entirely possible that they were all fucking watching right now.

It was almost impossible to swallow, but I managed it, and so many conflicting thoughts raced through my head. What did this mean? Was it really that simple?

I couldn’t say what I wanted to say right here. Couldn’t make this moment everything I wanted it to be with so many eyes watching and such a limited amount of time.

So I settled on a smile, and said, “I’m really glad you’re here.”

Her eyes held mine long enough that my heart jumped around in my chest.

“How’s Leo?” she asked.

I smiled. “Good. Slept seven hours last night without waking up.”

“You probably feel amazing, huh?”

“Are you kidding? I got up three times just to make sure he was still breathing.”

Anya tossed her head back and laughed.

She was the sun, her warmth seeping through the cold bones and aching muscles left in her absence.

I almost grabbed her face with both hands and kissed her. But I let the moment pass, knowing this wasn’t the time for it. God, let there be another time for it.

“How have you been?” I asked quietly.

“Good. Working at the gym since Isabel is still out. Vida’s keeping me busy too. She’s … she’s ready to take over the world.”

“That’s great.” I studied her freckles. The ones you could only see when you were really close. The dip at the top of her lip. She was a work of art, and I wondered how I’d managed not to tell her that every single day.

I should have.

Everything that felt scary for so long, the things I didn’t want, thought I didn’t need, they vanished like smoke.

She pulled in a deep breath, her smile fading as she studied my face. “And you?”

Someone barked my name from the sidelines, and I held up my hand. “Two minutes,” I yelled over my shoulder, refusing to pull my eyes from Anya. Her jaw clenched, tension tightening the skin around her mouth as she glanced down at the field. I ran a hand through my hair and blew out a harsh breath. “Trying,” I told her. Her eyes lifted. “I’m trying to be better. Make the choices I’d want Leo to make.”

Her eyes glossed with unshed tears. “That’s great, Parker.”

“I want to be the kind of man he can look up to.”

“You already are,” she said, looking over my shoulder for a moment, like the eye contact was too heavy to hold. My heart stopped beating when she finally looked at me again. “But I hope you’ll let me meet the new, improved Parker when you’re done working on him.”

There it was again: that ferocious need that only seemed to appear when Anya was around. It was an urgency that I only experienced with her.Forher.

I’d mislabeled it out of some stupid sense of self-preservation. Lust made for an easy excuse, but wasn’t it embedded so much deeper than that? Wasn’tshe?

“I’d like that,” I told her, and there was no hiding the gruff edge to my voice. Before she could respond, Coach screamed my name again, and I pinched my eyes shut, deciding to ignore him until he came over and dragged me off the fucking field. “Will you be here after the game?”

A moment alone with her was all I needed. Without the prying eyes of the entire fucking world.

She shook her head, and my heart sank. “I can stay until about halftime. Isabel had a rough day after PT yesterday, and I have to help get stuff ready for Willa’s birthday party tomorrow.” She looked up and sighed. “A dozen eleven-year-old girls at my parents’ house. My dad is thrilled.”

Disappointment sat like ice in my chest, but I managed to smile. “I bet.”

“Pray for my survival,” she said ruefully. “It’ll be touch and go for a while.”

“If anyone can handle it, it’s you,” I told her. “Where are you sitting?”

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