Taking Shots (Assassins, #1)(76)
For the hundredth, millionth time, Grace was right.
When Shea pulled into Elli’s driveway, he noticed her house was dark. He glanced down at the clock; it was only nine, and he knew Elli wasn’t asleep. He got out of the truck, taking off his jacket and undoing his tie before shutting them inside his truck and walking up the drive. He was undoing the top buttons of his shirt when he noticed the buckets of fall color flowers that aligned her walk way. Elli must have just put them out because they weren’t here last time he was here. He bent down, picking a purple one, and continued up the walk way. Adler was sitting in the window watching and started barking when Shea reached the porch, but no lights came on.
Shea was worried for about two seconds before the door open and Adler came running out, leaving Elli standing in a bright purple robe that had the team logo on her breast, and a 6 above it. Her hair was wet, going down her shoulders, and her face was splotchy. She had obviously been crying. She looked everywhere but at him as she stood in the doorway.
Shea didn’t know what to say, so he just stuck his hand out, offering her the flower. She looked at it, and then up at him as a huge tear rolled down her cheek. She reached her hand out taking the flower, than pushed the door open, before calling Adler.
“Come on, Adler,” The dog came running up the stairs at speeds Shea was sure a forty pound pug shouldn’t be going and Elli turned to look at him. “Are you coming in?”
Shea nodded as he walked past her, waiting in the foyer for her to close the door and hit the lights. When she did, his eyes adjusted and went wide when he saw his self looking back at him. His jersey that he had signed was hanging right beside an action shot of him shooting a puck. He looked around the room, taking in all the pictures of him and the rest of his teammates. There were pictures of them playing, celebrating and then the best one, the one of him with the cup above his head, tears going down his cheeks as he kissed the cup.
“God, Elli, this picture is amazing; I need a copy of it.”
“Sure.”
“Make that two, my mom would want one, too,” he said with a grin as he turned to look at her. She looked down, nervously messing with the tie at her waist.
“Alright,” she swallowed and looked up at him, “This is why I didn’t want you to come in my house, I thought you would think I am a crazy stalker fan.” He chuckled, looking around the room.
“Baby, I’ve seen worst, this is awesome, I love it.” She smiled weakly and started for the hall.
“Do you want the tour?”
He nodded as he followed her through the hall. The left wall was of the kids and the right was a time line of Harper and Elli. “I didn’t know you and Harper had known each other since childhood.”
“Yeah, since we were five.”
“Wow,” was all he said as they reached the end of the hall that went into a large beautiful yellow living room. She had black couches with glass tables with big black vases full of yellow flowers on them. Her walls were line with black and white photos of Adler, then random things like a butterfly, a tree, and a brick wall that had a heart drawn on it. When Shea turned to the south wall and saw a TV that was as big as his, he just grinned, it had to be for the away games. Under the TV was picture of the kids along with others of her friends, he guessed, but none of her family, well, except her dad.
He turned to see her waiting by a open door that’s frame was painted black, it looked so good with the yellow, “This is the kitchen and dining room,” she said as he peeked his head into the purple kitchen, he could see that the dining room was a soft purple, more a lavender with a big white vases of lavender on a large black table.
“You’re color scheme is bright.”
“Yeah,” she said as she walked past him to the other side of the living room, he followed her down a hall as she opened doors, showing him her office, done in pink, the bathroom, done in a very soft green, and the playroom for the kids, done in red. Then came her bedroom.
Elli’s bed sat about five feet off the ground, the headboard consisted of four huge squares, two baby pink squares and two hot pink ones. The bedding was a mixture of all kinds of pink swirls, and she had to have about nine hundred pillows. Frilly little lamps hung from the ceiling and glass night stand sat beside the bed. One stand had a big bouquet of sweet peas, while the other had a pink alarm clock, along with her pink iHome, which was playing Adele, if he was correct, and a photo frame. When he got closer, he saw it was a picture of him looking as if he was about to kill someone.
“Out of all the pictures you can put beside you bed, the one you chose is the one of me mean mugging someone?”
Elli laughed, picking the frame up, “This was at one of the playoff games last season. I can’t remember who was in front of me, but you looked up at him with this look and I got this shot right before you plastered him into the glass in front of me. When I printed it out and put it beside my bed, Harper asked why. I told her it was for you to scare all my bad dreams away” She let out an empty laugh, “Stupid, huh? Wanna run?”
He smiled, taking the picture out of her hand, putting it back on the night stand before wrapping his arms around her waist, “I’m not going anywhere,” He pressed his forehead against hers, “I’m sorry Elli for freaking out on you”
“You had every right,” she whispered. He watched as a tear fell over her cheek. The sight of it made it hard for him to swallow. “I’m so sorry Shea. I mean all of it, I should have told you a long time ago, but I was so embarrassed of my failures.”