Page 76 of Only for Tonight

I press my lips to the top of Ella’s head.

“Your mom loves you so much, baby girl,” I whisper. “Don’t you ever forget that.”

Ella babbles something that sounds almost like a word, and I hold her tighter and walk down the hallway toward the elevator, toward the parking garage, toward Alexei, who will be waiting in the car, who will take one look at my face and know, who will pull me close and not say anything because sometimes there’s nothing to say.

I don’t look back.

Not because I don’t want to.

Because Andi asked me to be happy, and looking back isn’t how you do that.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Ryleigh

Two Months Later

I’m going to throw up.

Not from nerves, though those are present. Not from the wine I had at halftime, though that’s sloshing around too. I’m going to throw up because the man I love just got hit by someone the size of a refrigerator, and he’s still on the ground, and nobody seems concerned about this except me.

“He’s fine,” Tracey says without looking away from the field. She’s got a beer in one hand and the railing in a death grip with the other. “He gets up. He always gets up.”

“He’s not getting up.”

“Give him a second.”

I count. One Mississippi. Two Mississippi. Three—

Alexei rolls to his knees, shakes his head once, and stands. Pats the guy next to him on the shoulder. Jogs back to formation like nothing happened.

“See?” Tracey takes a sip of her beer. “Fine.”

Nothing about that was fine.

I’m gripping the seat in front of me so hard my knuckles have gone white. I’m wearing the jersey Alexei bought me—navy and gold, his number on the back—and I’ve sweated through it twice already. Most of the wives and girlfriends in the suite are dressed similarly. A few have WIFEY printed across the back. The sight of it makes my stomach do something I’m not ready to examine.

I almost brought Ella tonight, but Tracey talked me out of it. She’s with Irina, who I’m sure is absolutely glued to the TV right now, probably yelling at it in Russian.

“What just happened?” I ask as the teams reset. Something changed—the energy in the stadium shifted, and everyone around me tensed at the same time.

Valerie leans over. “We’re down by three. Two minutes left. If we score, we win. If we don’t, the season’s over.”

“That’s it? That’s how this works? Just—one play, a few tense seconds, and it’s done?”

“Welcome to football, babe.”

I take a breath that doesn’t quite fill my lungs. This is the championship game. The actual, real, nationally televised championship game, and fifty thousand people are watching, and millions more at home, and my boyfriend is in the middle of it, and I am going to be sick.

Alexei’s sisters are on their feet. Tracey is screaming things that are either very specific football terminology or Russian profanity — possibly both. I don’t know enough to know. Valerie’s got her hands laced behind her head, pacing the tiny space behind the seats. Even Ana, the quietest of the three, is muttering under her breath with her eyes closed. Either she’s praying or she’s casting a spell. Both seem equally plausible. Whatever will help, honestly.

“Get your head out of your ass, Lex!” Tracey yells toward the field, as if he can hear her through a glass suite thirty rows up.

I stare at the field and find him. Even from up here, he’s unmistakable—the biggest person in a line of enormous people, the way he holds himself, the slight roll of his shoulders before the snap that I’ve learned means he’s locked in.

The stadium goes quiet. Not silent—fifty thousand people can’t be silent—but the roar drops to a hum, everyone holding the same breath. Including me.

Come on. Come on, come on, come on.