Page 67 of Hot Shot
Landon is nodding but his face says he doesn’t want to see anything.
“We can wait. I have everything in storage. Some other things in a safe deposit box.”
“I...” He skates over to his stick and picks it up. Checks it for damage. “I need time to process everything.”
“I can understand that. I’ve spent a couple of years processing. It wasn’t until Blake showed up. Until Oakley dumped a bucket of water on my head.”
A short bark of laughter escapes Landon before he mutters, “A story for another day.”
“Yes.”
“We’re good. We will be. I just…”
“Need time.”
“Yeah.” He looks at me, sorrow and apology in his gaze and I want to tell him he has nothing to be sorry for, that I’m sorry. “I don’t know if I’ll be ready before I leave tomorrow night.”
“I’m okay with that. But if you could unblock my number, that would be good.”
My words get a smile, which was the aim, and I hope he doesn’t take as long as I did to process. I hope he has questions I can answer. I hope he wants me to share Laura with him. He deserves to know her even if she hadn’t really begun to show her personality yet. Even if the smiles I swore she gave me were only wind.
“This is totally fucked up.”
“Not going to argue that.” I can’t. Everything about my interactions with Celeste were fucked up. Everything except Laura.
“Can you tell them I’m okay? I don’t want them coming down here. If you can run interference for the rest of tonight.”
“I can do that. But I need to tell you one more thing before I leave you to process.”
“Yeah, what?”
“After I read Celeste’s note, the one fueled by alcohol and sleeping pills, I had Laura’s birth certificate changed.”
“To what?”
I can see the hope in his eyes, the yearning for something he’ll never really have, and I need him to understand why I did it the way I did. “I changed her name. Left mine as the father but changed hers to Laura Jean Lattimer Watts.”
I watch as Landon’s eyes fill with tears and I know he can see mine have done the same.
“There were legal reasons to keep me listed as her father, but I don’t think I could have given you that anyway, but she needed to have part of you. Shewaspart of you.”
“The best part.”
I offer him a smile. “Yeah, the best part.”
“I will want to know. To see. Just not yet. I…”
“I get it. When you’re ready, I’ll be waiting.”
“In Baton Rouge?”
I can’t stop the grin spreading across my face. “Yeah. In Baton Rouge. With your sister.” I have to add the last part. Need him to know, like I did the rest of her family upstairs, that I’m serious about being with Blake. She’s my future and I’m not talking about her being my coach.
“You deserve to find happiness. Both of you. After you got married… Blake, she…”
“We’ve talked about it. Will talk about it more I’m sure. But neither of us is putting our careers ahead of our relationship ever again. I’d never play again if it means being without Blake.”
“She’d never make you choose.”
