Page 245 of Steeling Her
I remember one input she had for me.
“You should smile,” she said and it definitely rang true to me. When my face appeared on the screen, she would race over and point at my mouth to try pushing up the corners and make me smile. I do smile, I just find it hard when I’m not wholeheartedly happy right now. How do you tell a child that? So, I smile at her and she points at me. “Like that.” She grinned back.
She’s a great kid.
Like all kids her age, she’s a little energetic and a little sassy, which she no doubt gets it from Danielle.
I had a good night, even when most of it was spent with a kid. It was refreshing, to be honest. I feel like she felt a little closer to me too.
When she sees me in the lobby, she immediately walks over to me and holds on to my hand as we were getting ready to leave to go back to LA. A swarm of cameras catch the moment. No doubt, my face will be everywhere in the media with Chris protecting his daughter as best as he could.
I was the only one in the entire team that was fresh-faced today. The rest were hungover or extremely exhausted. There were a lot of grouchy faces getting on the flight back to LAX this morning.
There were a lot of grunts from the players who had kids on the flight. They just didn’t want to deal with them. Chris was no exception, so who did Taylor spend the time with during the flight?
Yeah, me.
She was showing me how she played her games on her iPad while sitting on my lap. Danielle would come and check in every so often and thank me for taking care of her.
I gave her parents the break they were in need of, especially after drinking so much. She was energy incarnate for the entire morning.
They needed some down time, and more importantly, some quiet time.
***
Carter
I begrudgingly wake up to my alarm telling me it’s time to get my ass to work today so I can make it on time. I groan and fish for my phone so I can switch it off and slide out of my comfy bed.
I roll on my side and wipe my eyes to open them up. I yawn while doing a very much needed stretch.
I kick my duvet off my body and roll the other way so I can put a foot down and begin to wash my face with cold water.
My morning routine is simple, I wash my face and brush my teeth, then I put sunscreen on my skin for protection. I usually have my breakfast made the night before and then I’d bring it to work so I can eat with Candice before we begin.
Muesli, banana chips, fresh berries and oat milk is what I’ll be eating this morning. It’s a good way to start the day.
An hour later, we’re sitting at the table together.The first ones to arrive, as usual, I comment to myself. We always have a good catch up in the morning because I trust her. She doesn’t say a word to other people in the office because we don’t hang out with them. We just gravitated towards one another and nothing has changed since.
“Carter?” she asks me. I was lost in my own thoughts. She reaches over to the remote sitting on the other table and turns on the morning news. Instead of regular news, the gossip columns come on because the other girls left it at that channel in the office. Candice decides to leave it on.
“Hm?” I look at her.
“You okay? You seem to be lost in your own thoughts there.” She chuckles as she opens her yogurt and pours it in her bowl.
“Oh, yeah, sorry. I just have a lot on my mind right now. It’s hard to keep focus, you know?” I wave it off with a soft smile.
“You want to talk about it?” she offers me her time.
“I don’t think you’d want to listen—”
“Oh, sure I do. That’s what friends are for, right?” She winks. “But only if you’re comfortable telling me. We can talk about something else if you’d like?” She takes a bite out of her cereal with yogurt on top.
I sigh to my bowl and twirl the spoon around to mix my oats.
“I ended it with Ted.” I can hear her coughing after I said that. She is striking her chest and reaching for her freshly squeezed orange juice sans pulp.
“Oh my God!” She breathes harshly. “I don’t know what I’m more shocked about, that you guys broke up or that I saw my life flash before my eyes because of the cereal.” She never fails to make me laugh in the morning. “What happened?” she asks.
