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Dakota put down the wire cutters, the copper thread and got up from the table, happy to have a moment of distraction to stretch her aching muscles. Her hand had started to cramp up because she had been working for hours without a break. She bent at the waist, touched her toes with one hand and then reached for the ceiling, her gaze going to the designs she’d pinned on the wall before she started work this morning. Beside it sat the candid shot she loved of her with her three sisters last Christmas just after her accident. Thank goodness she’d had them backing her up. They were all close and she missed Bella and April. She must remember to call them, fill them in on how she’d settled in and maybe, just maybe, tell them about Adam.
Dakota walked out into the kitchen and opened the back door. Tiny ran out and rolled on her back in the grass. Dakota poured herself a glass of water, followed and stood in the patch of winter sunshine. Being locked inside didn’t give her much of a chance to catch up on her vitamin D allocation and she’d take any spare minute she could. Besides the fresh air was so much nicer than the smoldering fumes from the copper wires she was using to hold her angels together.
So far things were going well with her decorations. Orders were coming in on her website and she’d had to limit the number she would release otherwise there wouldn’t be enough time for her to work on the ones she needed for the tree. Dakota desperately wanted to win the competition one day and the next she didn’t care so long as she got to show off her designs.
Tiny wandered through the bushes. “Tiny, come back here.” The little black dog came back, her head down. “You can’t keep wandering off like that. Let’s go back to work.”
Head down, Dakota got back into soldering her angels together. Tiny lay by the doorway as if sitting there would make her owner notice how desperately she wished to be somewhere else.
“I’ll owe you if you do this for me.”
“I know exactly how you can repay me too if there’s any way you can make it happen.” Ryan went on to explain what he wanted in return for ditching his wife and children for a weekend to help Adam out.
Adam leaned back in his chair and stared at the passing traffic outside the office. “I’ll do the best I can but please, I beg of you, don’t tell anyone else I’ve done it. Dakota is under the pump trying to get her own inventory done for the gala night. I hate to put more pressure on her than I have to.”
“Totally understandable but I know how much the wife loves her stuff. She was so upset when Glitterz went quiet. If she knew what you’ve just told me about her starting up again, she’d be over the moon.” Ryan chuckled. “Look, do your best but don’t worry if you can’t. We can work it out somehow. Maybe later when Dakota has had time to catch up she might have time to make the wife something special. I hate to put pressure on anyone.”
“So that means you’ll come then?” Things were working out better than he hoped.
“Sure. The kids will survive if I opt out of one organized campout. Who knows, I might like Cherry Lake so much I can bring them there for a holiday? I’ll tell them I’m doing a discovery tour for next off season.”
“Appreciate it, Ryan. It’s going to be such a great day with you there. I can feel it.” Adam hung up the phone and ticked the goalie off his list. Now if he could only get at least one more player to promise to join them, it would be a fantastic day.
By the time he’d spoken to all of his teammates and caught up on news, Adam felt as though he’d talked himself hoarse. It’d only been a few weeks since he’d come home but it seemed like so much had happened with the other members of his team. They all wanted to hear how his father was doing and couldn’t wait for him to return.
He rocked back and forward in his chair, thinking about what he’d said to Buzz last night about retiring. After his years of being in the limelight, would it be enough for him to only work part time reporting on the sport rather than playing it? He was a far different person now to the boy who first started playing professional soccer.
Somehow he’d imagined doing something with the media that involved sports after retirement. Plenty of elite sports people did. But would that give him the thrill that discovering new talent would? Was it possible to do both? He wondered if he should have kept his idea to himself and thought over the idea of retiring once he’d seen the doctors. Nothing like jumping the gun with his career and his love life but it felt right at the time.
