With her flats dangling from her fingertips, she ran forward, the spiky green blades tickling her soles.
Val kept pace, giggling.
From the loudspeaker, the voice of the Vanguard for more than thirty years, Powell Armistead intoned, “Ladies and gentlemen. May I have your attention please?”
She and Val both stopped short, five yards from their goal.
The milling crowd stared upward. It always amused Cam that when an announcer used the sound system in any stadium or theater, everyone would look toward the sky, as if the message came from heaven. “I’d like to direct your attention to the jumbotron on the scoreboard for a special announcement.”
What the...?
“Uh-oh,” Val said through huffs and puffs. “What’s going on now? Did you do this?”
Cam shook her head. Suspicion slinked up her spine. “And it better not be some stunt my mother cooked up, either.”
Like the rest of the spectators, she did as Powell directed and stared up at the scoreboard. The photo of Bertie with his name and the year of his birth and death disappeared. The Vanguard logo briefly took its place, then quickly dissolved, and Jordan’s face filled the hundred-fifty-foot screen.
“Is that...?” Val stared in wonder, her mouth agape.
Cam was just as speechless. Along with everyone else inside the stadium.
“Did he tape something?”
“I have no idea.”
She did note he wore the same suit and tie she’d seen on him since this morning. So, whatever this was, it had to be live—or at the very least, taped today. What the hell was he up to now?
“Hey, folks,” he said from the screen. “For those of you who don’t know, I’m Jordan Fawcett. A while back, I was a quarterback for the Vanguard. I had a couple of pretty good seasons here, made some great friends, and fell in love with a terrific woman. But I wanted more, more money, more playing time, more of what I thought I deserved. Mostly, I wanted more than what that terrific woman was ready to give me. I was arrogant. And greedy. So when the opportunity arose for me to sign with another team, to have a few more seasons in a place where I could help build a winning enterprise, I took it. I left my teammates, I left my friends, I left the woman I loved.”
People stirred around her, staring at her with keen interest. She couldn’t move. Her feet had embedded invisible roots in the turf. She could barely draw a breath. All she could do was stare at Jordan’s face, her chest tight with dread. What was he doing? And why now, during Bertie’s memorial service? Please, Jordan, please don’t break my heart like this. Not today. I’m trying so hard to pick up the pieces. Don’t take a sledgehammer to what I’ve had to rebuild.
“Cam,” Jordan said, and the camera zoomed closer, until all anyone could see on the screen was his face, the intensity of his expression. “You once accused me of leaving you for the first woman who could get me hard.”
Around her, murmurs of disgust and discontent rose like a foul wind. Her cheeks blazed, but she kept her head held high, her focus lasered on the screen. She would not fall. No matter what he said next, she would not fall.
“You were wrong. Lots of women have made me hard since I hit puberty.” He flashed a boyish grin. “You’re the only woman who ever made me weak: weak in the knees every time you’re near, weak in the head so I never know if I’m saying something stupid or clever when I try to talk to you. Even now, I’m probably screwing this up. Cam, I love you. I’ve always loved you. I had no idea you flew to Houston after I was injured. I should’ve realized you would. It’s one of the things I love most about you: your never-ending compassion. If I had known, I would’ve crawled downstairs in my hospital gown, bare-assed and doped-up, just to see you.”
Laughter erupted around her, and Cam couldn’t bite back a snort of amusement.
“I’m sorry I ever doubted you,” he continued, his tone dense with sincerity. “Give me a chance to be the man you need. Let me prove to you we can make it work forever—on our own terms.”
Good thing Val was there to catch her by the elbows, to keep her from falling to her knees.
INSIDE THE BROADCAST room, Jordan struggled to figure out what Cam might be thinking about his public apology. What if his declaration of love had come too late? What if she couldn’t forgive him?
Well, then, he’d do what he’d just promised in front of a thousand strangers. He’d prove to her they could make their love work forever.
Although he’d managed to get a pretty damn good speech together for the moment, the longer he went without an answer from her, the faster his confidence fled on wings of dread. His tongue grew thick, and his brain misfired. He cleared the block in his throat.
“Cam?” he said into the microphone. “Say something please?”
While his heart thundered in his chest, she strode back to the makeshift dais and, on a screech of feedback, pulled the mic at the podium closer to her mouth. She stared straight up at the windows where he sat. “Are you proud of yourself now?”
“That depends. What did you think?”
“That you used a lot of pretty words I’ve heard from you before.” She folded her arms over her chest. “Go back to Paris. I have nothing more to say, Jordan.”
“I was never involved with Paris. Not in a romantic way. Did I listen to Paris? Yes. She was my agent. Did I trust her? God help me, I did. And I realize now I shouldn’t have. She filtered my mail, Cam. She screened my visitors in the hospital, and I never knew anything about it ‘til now. She told security to keep you from me. So to any of my compatriots out there
