Rebound (Seattle Steelheads #1)(78)

“By?”

He slid one hand behind his head, and the other stayed in the middle of his chest, gently grasping mine. For a moment, he stared at the bedroom ceiling, and I wondered if he was going to answer my question at all. Finally, he said, “While you were on the road, I had a little…encounter.” He swallowed. “With my ex.”

“Oh.” My brain was instantly going ninety miles an hour as I tried to figure out what exactly ‘encounter’ meant in this context. I had to remind myself this was Geoff, not Nathan, and I could trust him. That I shouldn’t immediately assume the worst and let my hackles go up because he might have done something I wouldn’t like. For all I knew, they’d just exchanged silent glares while passing each other in the grocery store’s cereal aisle. Just because Nathan had used my relentless schedule as an excuse for the odd threesome with his ex and the guy’s new boyfriend didn’t mean there was anything I should worry about with Geoff. Keeping my voice as even as I could, I said, “What kind of encounter?”

Geoff sighed, chest sinking under our hands. He suddenly seemed even more tired than before. “I seriously thought I wouldn’t have to see him again. Ever. If we ran into each other on the street, well, shit happens. But…” He scowled.

“So what happened?”

“He contacted my kids.” Geoff sounded so affronted, and I couldn’t say I blamed him. “Tried to put poison in their ears about why I left him, and tell them you were just my mid-life crisis.” Bitterness laced his tone as he added, “Or my upgrade to someone with more money than him.”

I blinked. “What the fuck?”

Geoff brought my hand up and kissed the backs of my fingers. “When I moved out, he told me I’d regret it and I’d eventually come crawling back. Or try to, at least. He made it very clear that he wouldn’t take me back, just that I’d want to and I’d be sorry for leaving.”

“Wow,” I said dryly. “What a charmer.”

“I know, right?” He sighed, letting our hands settle in the middle of his chest again. “I guess when he heard about us, he realized I’d moved on. In his mind, I moved on to someone who had something he didn’t—more money.” He tsked and rolled his eyes. “Couldn’t possibly be that you don’t treat me like shit or try to use your money to control me.”

“Ugh, no. No way.” I squeezed his hand. “I’d never do that.”

“I know.” He lifted his head and pressed a soft kiss to my lips. Settling back on the pillow, he stared upward again. “But he saw you as a threat to me bowing and scraping the way he expected me to.”

“A threat? Did he actually think you wanted to go back to him?”

“Are you kidding? He can’t get his head around why anyone would leave him in the first place” Geoff scowled. “He’s got a new guy, anyway. Not sure how new he really is, though.”

“What do you mean?” I paused. “Do you think he cheated on you?”

“Maybe. I always had a bad feeling about him and this one coworker, but I never caught them. Never tried to. I told myself it was nothing. But then when I went to confront Marcus, that guy was there, and he obviously wasn’t just hanging out.”

“Oh. Ouch.”

“Eh.” Geoff half-shrugged. “At this point, I’m just so glad to be out from under his thumb, I don’t even care about anything he did that I didn’t know about. I mean, it still hurts, and I’m kicking myself that I blew it off as nothing, but it’s not like it would have changed anything if I’d known. Aside from maybe leaving sooner.”

“I’m sorry.” It sounded useless, but I didn’t know what else to say.

Geoff held me a little closer and kissed me softly. “Well, he’s in the past now, and he’s staying there.”

“Good. Sounds like you’re better off without him.”

“Oh yeah.”

He didn’t elaborate, and I had a funny feeling he wasn’t telling me the whole story. Not that he was leaving out some incriminating detail that would cause a fight between us, but that there was something he didn’t want to talk about. Something that was still bothering him. Like how the actual confrontation had gone down. What had either of them said?

I didn’t press, though. If he didn’t want to talk about it, then he didn’t want to talk about it. But now it was bothering me. What else had his ex said to him?

Beside me, Geoff sighed as he stroked my hair. “We should get some sleep. I have to work early, and you’ve got a game tomorrow.”

I groaned. I loved my job, but the regular season schedule was nothing if not grueling. “Good idea. I’m beat.”

“Me too.” He kissed my forehead and started settle back on the pillows, but hesitated. “Uh, fair warning, though? The last couple of days have been rough, and when I’m stressed, the nightmares can get…”

I forced myself not to shudder. “They get worse?”

Geoff nodded without meeting my eyes. “Yeah. Sometimes a lot worse. If you’d rather I didn’t sleep here, I can—”

“No, no.” I squeezed his hand. “I want you to stay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” I lifted my chin and kissed him softly. “We’ll deal with them if they come. Doesn’t mean I want to chase you out.”