“Excuse me?” Lo’s face wears full-coverage indignation. “What’s that sombitch got to do with anything?”

“He hates August. Hell, August hates Caleb, too.” I plow a nervous hand through my hair. “You know it was Caleb’s dirty play that broke August’s leg two seasons ago, right? He did that on purpose, Lo. And he told me he’d do worse if I got involved with August.”

“He can’t do a thing to either of you now.”

“That’s easy to say when it’s not you,” I say bitterly. “You have no idea.”

“So now we gonna compare rape stories?” Lo asks softly. “Is that it?”

“Oh, God. No.” I rush to the couch to sit and grab her hand. “I didn’t mean it that way. I know you know how it feels to be violated. I just meant . . .” How do I make her understand the depths to which Caleb sank to control me?

“Caleb is crazy. Like truly crazy.” I close my eyes against a torrent of nightmarish memories. “The things I’m holding over him only work if he cares about his career and his endorsements and everything else more than he cares about . . .” I don’t want to make my fears more real by voicing them.

“More than he cares about you?” Lo finishes for me.

“Yeah.” I hesitate before going on. “He was obsessed with me. I know that sounds self-absorbed or conceited or something, but it’s true.”

“I’ve seen his crazy, Bo. You don’t have to convince me.”

“He threatened to hurt August again if I didn’t stay away from him. He threatened to hurt you, too.”

“Me?” Lo touches her chest. “The hell. I’d like to see him try.”

“I told you before he knew your address by heart. Knew your schedule and where you worked in New York. I didn’t even know that.”

“I know.” Lo’s thick brows converge above the outrage in her eyes. “I just hate that he used me against you.

The walls feel like they’re closing in on me even discussing the invisible but very real chains Caleb used to hold onto me.

“Everyone who meant anything to me, he used against me, and he’d do it again and worse if he got the chance.” I shake my head. “Seeing me and August together—I just hope it doesn’t push him over the edge. That’s part of my hesitation, too.”

“You can’t live your life in fear of him, though.”

“Sometimes it’s the fear that keeps you alive, Lo. I learned a lot from this experience. I learned that people are really cavalier with other people’s lives.”

“What’s that mean?”

“They tell women to ‘just leave’, and they say ‘you’re so weak to stay.’” My words tumble out of me faster than I can process. “Yes, there are women who stay too long. Yes, there are women who accept abuse, confused that somehow it’s still love. That wasn’t me, but I knew that if I tried to leave and failed, he would kill me.”

Lo stares at me in silence for a few moments. I can tell she thinks I’m being melodramatic, and I have to make her understand.

“Seventy percent of domestic-abuse homicides occur when the woman tries to leave. That means that when a lot of these motherfuckers say ‘I’ll kill you if you leave me,’ they mean it.” A sob catches in my throat, but I shove it back down, determined to have my say with a strong, unwavering voice. “Imagine if I’d left and he got partial custody of Sarai. That monster having my daughter on the weekends? Never.”

“That wouldn’t have happened,” Lo says, but she sounds less certain than she did when we first began.

“Oh, yes, it would have. He’s rich, famous, has the best lawyers money can buy, and no prior offenses. Sports, especially at his level, is so insular, and they protect their own. I’ve seen it for myself. Behind every woman who comes out telling her story, there’s a line of officers, staff, coaches, and people who should have helped, who knew and did nothing.”

Hurt, outrage, and fury throw a tantrum inside of me. I pause to draw a calming breath before going on. “He wouldn’t have gotten more than a slap on the wrist, and that’s if anyone believed me.”

I gather my hair back from my face and link my hands behind my neck. It’s an impractical justice, a woman having to share custody with the man who tried to kill her because his parental rights should be protected.

“People have no idea what some women go through behind closed doors or what keeps them there.” I shake my head. “That was me, living a lie and getting beaten up by the truth until I found my way out. And I don’t know if I’ll ever really get over it.”

“You will.” Lo tucks a lock of hair behind my ear, and I flinch.

“See?” My laugh comes out slightly hysterical. “He used to do that. He’d push my hair behind my ear so gently, but with his gun.”

“Shit, Bo,” Lo says, anger and horror taking up arms in her expression.

“You know I still sleep curled at the edge of the bed because it’s the only way I can. I didn’t want our bodies touching while we slept.” Tears clog my throat, and a few escape my eyes no matter how much I will myself not to cry. “I didn’t want him that close when I was asleep, but he wouldn’t let me sleep anywhere else.”

“You need to talk to someone, babe,” Lo says.

“I am, actually. I do. I’ve been talking to a counselor at a women’s shelter here in the city, but can a therapist strip my mind of the memories? Of the nightmares? Sometimes I wake up thinking there’s a gun between my legs.”

“What the hell?”

“Yeah, he liked to put a gun to my vagina and make me choose between that and his dick.”

“That bastard.” Lo’s eyes harden, and her full lips thin. “Don’t worry. His is coming. His days are numbered.”

Lo has removed her braids and wears her hair’s natural texture in a close cap of curls dyed platinum that contrasts starkly with her complexion. She looks so different, but the same light that burned in her eyes when she confronted Caleb ignites now.

“Lo, what does that—”

“Mommy, potty,” Sarai says. She stands and crosses one little foot over the other.

God, she’s adorable. I’m not biased.

“Potty training,” I mutter, standing and taking Sarai by the hand and heading for the bathroom. “We’ll be back.”

Sarai’s all done and washing her hands when Lo yells from the front room. “Bo, you said August’s number thirty-three, right?”

The concern in her voice propels my heartbeat, and I rush back into the living room just in time to see a replay in slow-motion.

August and his teammate Kenan, the one they call Glad, go up for the rebound at the same time. Kenan is huge, a little taller than August. He’s several inches wider and thicker.

His elbow slams into August’s forehead at full force. With dread building in my belly, I watch August fall to the hardwood and stay there unconscious for several seconds.

“Oh my God, get up.” My insides knot. “Please, baby, get up.”

I don’t even question the endearment when it slips naturally out of my heart and past my lips. I’ve been fooling myself, guarding my heart with a porous shield, and August slipped right in.

His eyes open groggily and he tries to sit up, but his hand starts shaking violently, and he collapses back to the floor.

I cover my mouth and ball my fist up over my heart.

“He’s gonna be okay,” Lo assures me. “Look. He’s getting up.”

Correction. Kenan is pulling him up, and someone is walking him off the floor. He gives a little wave to the crowd and stumbles into the tunnel.

They show the play over and over again, and every time, I hurt a little more. I think about everything I told Lo, and it’s all true. I am afraid of how Caleb will respond when he finds out about August and me. The fears I hoped to leave behind still wake me at night drenched in a cold sweat. Seeing August go down like that, though, and not knowing how bad it is puts everything in perspective. Every day that we’re living, breathing, and in good health is a blessing, not promised. Understanding that, seeing him get hurt, makes me realize that I don’t want to go slow after all.

Not anymore.

41

August

Damn, my head hurts.

That’s what happens when Jolly the Big Ass Giant elbows you in the head.

My own teammate sidelined me. Not that it was Kenan’s fault. We were both going after the rebound and collided. He feels like shit and will probably come by as soon as the game is over. I’d love to be gone before then, but it’s not happening. “Concussion” is never anybody’s favorite word. I don’t need to be in the hospital, but I get it. When your whole body’s insured and a team pays you millions, they tend to take precautions. That doesn’t mean I’m not ready to go home.

I check my phone. No calls from Iris. Maybe she doesn’t know. Maybe she wasn’t watching the game. Or maybe she and Lotus, who’s visiting from New York, took Sarai to that park up the street. My finger is poised over her contact when the nurse pokes her head in.

“Sorry to disturb you, Mr. West.”

“No problem.” I force a smile. “What’s up?”

“You have a visitor,” she says with a grin. “A pretty brunette.”

My heartbeat picks up, but I try not to look all overeager and shit. “Please send her in.”

I adjust the bed to a sitting position as the door eases open and a dark head peeks in. But the hair isn’t long and hanging in thick coils. It’s a bone-straight bob, and her golden skin glows from her afternoon tennis practice.

“Pippa,” I say, my tone flat and disappointed even to my own ears. “Come on in.”

“Don’t sound so happy to see me.” Pippa walks in and sits on the bed beside me.