hate that you have to drive all the way back to Tampa tonight.” Guilt niggled at my heart. “I should have sent you home hours ago.”
“Nah, I’ll be okay.” He took another swig of his beer.
“I guess one of the first additions I’ll put onto the cabin is a guest room.” I eased off one sneaker and then the other, groaning a little at how good it felt to free my feet. “That way, you’ll have a home away from home.”
“Will you call it the Noah Spencer Room for Lonely Football Players?” He smiled slightly and peeled away some of the label from the bottle of beer. “Maybe there could be a plaque.”
“Good idea. I’ll get right on it.” I wiggled my toes. “You know, you could always just crash right here on the sofa. It’s super comfy.”
The gaze Noah aimed at me was a mix of pity and patient disbelief. “Emma. This couch is the bomb for watching movies, hanging out, shooting the shit and enjoying a beer. But it’s not a bed. And it sure as hell isn’t a bed for a guy like me. I’d end up with a stiff back or cramped legs or broken shoulder when I landed on the floor halfway through the night.”
“Okay, okay.” I rolled my eyes. “It was just an idea. Excuse me.”
“I know your heart’s in the right place.” He finished the beer and rolled the bottle between his hands. “But besides the obvious limitations of your sofa, it’s probably not a good idea for me to spend the night under the same roof as you—especially when we’re alone.”
The air between us shifted suddenly, an unfamiliar charge making me hyper aware of every inch of my skin. I knew I should just agree and move on, finish my damn beer and let Noah say good night and leave. But I heard myself asking the question anyway.
“Why isn’t a good idea?”
His eyes lifted to mine and held for a long moment. They seemed to be searching for an answer that I wasn’t sure I was ready to supply, daring me to admit things I couldn’t even acknowledge to myself. Then he glanced away, drawing in a long, even breath and blowing it out.
“The media. Even out here in the sticks, people notice things. We’ve been pretty lucky so far that nobody has taken pictures of us hanging out together or eating in restaurants or anything, but that can’t last forever. Sooner or later, someone’s going to notice that I’m spending a lot of time here in Harper Springs, and they’re going to wonder why.” He waited a beat. “And I don’t want you to get any fallout from what people could think. And say.”
My mouth dropped open. “I never even thought about that. Does the press really care about who you see and what you do? I mean, does it matter to them who your friends are?”
Noah shifted uneasily on his end of the sofa. “On a typical daily basis, no. If I’m behaving myself, doing my job, not showing up in drunk selfies on social media or getting DUIs or domestic calls, no one’s going to pay me any attention. And I like that.” His mouth twisted a little. “But as shitty as it sounds, Ang’s illness and death raised my profile. In Tampa, especially, when I play, the commentators always have to bring it up, to talk about how brave I supposedly am in the aftermath of losing my high school sweetheart. They’re turning me into some kind of ridiculous martyr figure, and even though I hate it, what can I do? Tell them not to feel sorry for me? Then it just sounds like I don’t care that my wife died. There’s no way to win at this. Trust me, you may not have thought about it, but I have. A lot.”
His mouth set in a grim line, and I felt an enormous swell of sympathy for him. Wasn’t it enough that he’d had to live through the agony of watching his wife fight cancer and then die? Did he have to worry now about how that was playing in the living rooms of people he’d never met and in the minds of those who didn’t even know him?
I ran my tongue over my bottom lip. “Noah, if you need to stay away from Harper Springs—from me—for a while, I’ll understand. You’ve been a wonderful friend to me, and I can’t imagine what I’d do without you, but