Three messages, all from the contact I'd renamed "Do Not Answer" back when I still thought that might help.
I'm in Colorado Springs.
I need to see you.
Please.
I stared at the screen until the words blurred. I typed:Why.
The response came in seconds.
Because I can’t live like this. Because I need you, Joel. Please.
You flew across the country,I typed.
Yeah. I did.
I closed my eyes. The wine sat untouched on the coffee table, the TV frozen on Red's triumphant face, and somewhere acrosstown he was waiting for me to either let him in or shut him out for good.
He'd won. He'd gotten everything he wanted, except the one thing I'd taken from him when I left.
I opened my eyes and typed my address.
20 minutes.
Wonton disappeared into the bedroom the moment I stood up, like he could sense violence coming and wanted no part of it.
Twenty-three minutes later, someone knocked on my door.
I opened it.
Red stood in the hallway, completely soaked. Water dripped from his hair, his jacket, and the hem of his jeans.
"Hey," he said.
I let myself look at him. Really look, the way I hadn't been able to through a screen for seven months.
He was different, leaner in the face, his jaw sharper than I remembered. The playoff beard was thick and dark, and it made him look older and harder. But there were shadows under his eyes that hadn't been there in the Cup footage, and he was holding himself tight, bracing for a hit that hadn't landed yet.
"You're dripping on my floor," I said.
"Yeah." He didn't move to come in, just stood there dripping and waiting. "Can I—"
"Get inside before you flood the hallway."
He stepped past me, and I closed the door. The sound of it clicking shut was very loud in the quiet apartment.
My hands ached. I wanted to shove him back out the door and tell him he didn't get to show up like this, didn't get to win his Cup and then come crawling back to me like I'd been waiting for him.
I had been waiting for him. That was the worst part.
"You look like shit," I said instead.
It was a lie. He looked like something I wanted to take apart.
"Thanks." His mouth twitched, not quite a smile. "You look good."
"I always look good."