It’s my turn to roll my eyes, but I don’t answer his question. “What do you want to talk about? The game is over. We won.”
Of course, he doesn’t allow me to move on. He seems stuck on the daughter thing. “You’re married?”
Guess he doesn’t pay attention to Kensley gossip. “Divorced. And you can have kids when you’re not married too. Just FYI.”
“In Kensley?” He sounds skeptical.
“As if Big Bend is any better,” I grumble. “Are we finished?”
“I think you need to apologize to Jackson. Maybe even the whole team for last night. They respect you. Hell, they love you. And it’s important.”
I study him carefully, really damn irritated that he’s here right now. “I don’t need you to tell me to apologize to them. And they need to be prepared for real life. No one is going to coddle them.”
“Is that it?” He crosses his arms and stares me down. “Or do you just need to win that badly?”
Shit. My throat goes dry as I try like hell to swallow and force words to come out, but all I do is just glare at him.
“You were sick before the game.”
He really doesn’t quit. I groan, then huff out an annoyed breath. “So? Maybe it was something I ate. It’s none of your damn business, Leighton. None,” I say sternly, hoping he’ll get the hint and leave me the hell alone.
I don’t want to talk about how nervous I was before the game. About the fact that I lost my meager lunch before the game started. I don’t think my divorce or LeAnn is a good enough reason to fire me, but I’m not naive.
I know the powers that be are on a witch hunt and would love to replace me. I can’t give them that reason—justified or not.
“What exactly are you accusing me of?” I ask coldly, my eyes narrowed in his direction. “Are you saying I care more about winning than those kids and their safety?”
Because I’d quit before I let anything hurt any of them. No matter what. I run a tight ship, but it’s fair.
“I don’t know. Am I?”
I glare, my nostrils flaring. “You should go.”
He drops his crossed arms in a huff and shakes his head. “Fine. Let your pride win out, but you know I’m right. They believe in you. They deserve better.”
He doesn’t say anything else as he spins on his heel and heads straight to his car, driving off furiously. I grunt before tearing open the door and heading back inside, only to run into my meddling daughter, who was apparently watching us through the window.
“Who’s the cutie?”
“You’re married,” I remind her and pad into the kitchen in my bare feet.
“Still have eyes, Dad,” she shoots back as she takes a seat at the kitchen table. I smile, thinking about how it seems like not that long ago, she was sitting at the same table, hair in pigtails and eating some sort of chocolate cereal that was more sugar than anything else.
I pour her a cup of coffee and grab creamer from the fridge, placing them and the sugar in front of her. She busies herself with doctoring her coffee, while I grab my own, which is now cooler than I like it, and sit down with her.
“You didn’t answer,” she says coyly, bringing her coffee to her mouth and taking a small sip, hissing because it’s too hot.
“He’s my new assistant coach.”
She grins, no doubt laughing to herself because my last assistant coach was pushing eighty and didn’t interfere much. The way I like it. “He’s young.”
“He is,” I grunt and take a sip of my coffee.
“And why was he here this morning?” She looks way too smug about this, but honestly, LeAnn is the only person who can get away with giving me a hard time. She’s had me wrapped around her finger since the day she was born, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
No one on this planet comes close to meaning anything more to me than my daughter.
“To bitch about the game last night.” Her eyebrow raises, and I see she’s not buying it. “About my behavior, apparently,” I add begrudgingly. It wasn’t that bad. Sure, I raised my voice a little—and that’s something I don’t usually do, to be honest.
I’m known for keeping my cool, but still, they were playing like shit, and they needed to get in line.
“What did you do?” She’s clearly amused as she tries her coffee again.
“Nothing.” She cocks her head to the side, not believing me. I can’t help but smile as I grumble, “I may have lost my temper a little.”
My daughter is delighted, just cackling away. “Not you, Dad.”
“Hey, I’m a great coach.”
She finally stops laughing and nods. “You are. But it’s the beginning of the season. It takes time to work out the kinks. You need to be patient.”
“Who’s the parent here?” I ask, not at all annoyed. I’m happy to have her home and grateful for the talk.
“I’m just saying.” She shrugs, but her expression is way too happy. “I think it’s great that someone is around to challenge you.”
“Well, since you moved away, I suppose there’s no one left to do that.”
Again she cackles. “I love it.”
“LeAnn . . .” I say, not at all sternly. “Can we talk about something else? Anything besides my pain-in-the-ass assistant coach?”
“Who’s totally hot.” She waggles her eyebrows at me, and I roll my eyes. My daughter doesn’t know that I also find him—or any men at all—hot. Part of me feels guilty about that fact. But I married her mother so young, and I loved Nancy, so there was never a reason to bring up the fact that I’m bisexual.
I was married to a woman. I loved that woman. I was a father and the high-school coach in a small town. That’s all I ever needed to let anyone know about me.
My attraction to men didn’t matter because I was in a fully committed relationship. Loyal and faithful with no regrets. But now that I’m a divorced man, there’s no denying that I’m attracted to Chance.
Despite him being a pain in the ass, I can’t get his handsome face out of my head as he lectured me. Challenged me.
No. I push it away. Not happening.
The kid likely has his bed warmed by woman after woman every damn night, for all I know. I know nothing about him.
“Dad?”
Jesus Christ, how long have I been thinking about Chance Leighton while my daughter was talking?
“Sorry, what?”
She smiles and shakes her head. “I said I’m going to go take a shower. Then maybe we can go for a walk. I miss it here.”
I smile fondly and nod, taking a drink of my coffee. “Sounds like a plan.”
She finishes her coffee and places her cup in the sink before heading toward her room.
I sit at the table and go over my conversation with Chance, trying to ignore how he looked when he was all but yelling at me about last night and think about what he was saying.
I’m a good coach. I know that. He knows that.
But last night, I let my nerves about losing my job get the best of me.
I can’t—and won’t—let that happen again.
SIX