Page 14 of Dear Coach's Daughter
7
BROWNIE
A couple of weeks go by in a blur. I can't stay away from Hunter, and it kills me when he has to travel for an away game. He told me before he left that he wanted to discuss telling my dad about our relationship. Pretty brave, in my opinion, considering my father owns a gun. He laughed when I told him as much.
"I'm not afraid of dads with guns. I am a Texas boy, after all. But I am afraid of blindsiding a dad with a gun when it comes to his only daughter."
“So, you want to tell him everything you do to me?” I asked.
Hunter’s eyes widened, and he shook his head. “I’m in love, not suicidal.”
He also told me before he left that he loved me. But I already knew that from his fingertip message on my back. But I didn't tell him that. One day I will, but for now, I will let him think he was sneaky.
Our Saturday morning brunch with my dad finally arrived, and I think I was more nervous than Hunter. Or at least he was able to hide it better than me.
"Baby, it's going to be fine," he says, looping his fingers with mine as we wait at the table on the patio at a café near my apartment. “I think we both know that I have zero poker face skills when it comes to hiding what I feel for you. And your dad has been around us a few times.”
He’s not wrong.
“I like that you don’t have a poker face when it comes to me.”
“Anything to make my girl happy.” He kisses the top of my hand.
There is a group of women a few tables away from us watching. I can't help but notice how they keep staring at Hunter as if I'm not even here.
I feel a flutter of anxiety that I haven’t felt in a long time. Not since—
“What happened?” Hunter asks me, then looks over his shoulder into the café. “Is he here?”
He probably felt me tense. But it’s good to know that I’m not the only one who is nervous.
“I’m fine. I think I just need to splash some water on my face,” I tell him and stand up.
Hunter stands with me in that old-fashioned way that gentlemen would do when a lady left the table. If I didn't already plan to jump him later, this would have cemented my plans. I love the little things like that that he does for me. He’s an old-fashioned gentleman in a sexy as hell modern man.
I kiss him again. “I love you.”
He smiles. “I love you, too.”
I run inside and splash some water on my face. I can’t let the fact that I was cheated on ten years ago mess with what I have with Hunter. He’s not that guy.
My dad is walking into the café when I step out of the bathroom. The familiar flutter of people recognizing him starts to happen, but he doesn't notice. His eyes find me.
“Hey, kiddo."
"Good morning," I say and hug him.
“Should we get a table?”
“We already have one on the patio,” I say and lead him through the tables to the patio doors.
I stop dead in my tracks when I see the women I noticed earlier standing by our table talking to Hunter. Two of them seem to be keeping a respectable distance, but one of them keeps resting her hand on his arm. I'm about to remove that arm from her body when my dad stops with a hand on my shoulder.
“Before you go in there, guns blazing,” he says, and I turn to glare at him.
“If you two are going to keep seeing one another—”
The look of shock I give him makes him pause.
