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  I hugged her to me.

  "But, first ..." she said.

  "I know." I needed to get things straight with Noah.

  I slid out of bed. It was two a.m. I changed into a pair of black leggings and one of Noah's sweatshirts. I grabbed Nip's leash.

  "You can leave him here."

  "No, if this goes bad, I'll need my big guy here to protect me." I smiled and kissed Dani on the cheek. "Can I borrow your car?"

  She nodded.

  I followed her through the house into the garage. I slid into the driver side of her S Class Mercedes. Nip sat in the floor of the passenger seat.

  "We'll be back."

  Noah

  When I returned to the room at precisely twelve ten, the smell of roses assaulted my nose, but something was wrong.

  The room was dark.

  I flipped on the light and the red blinded me. On every surface of the suite sat a vase with a dozen roses. It looked like a floral shop. On the table near the balcony sat two champagne flutes and a bucket with champagne chilling. No doubt they picked an expensive brand. I check the label. Ace of Spades, I did say, no matter what the cost. Everything was here and everything was perfect.

  Only one thing was missing.

  Where was Callie?

  I paced the floor for the first fifteen minutes thinking she would come back. Maybe she saw the surprise and went down to the party looking for me. When she didn't return, I called her cell. It went straight to voice mail.

  I texted her.

  Noah: Callie, call me. <3 u!

  No response.

  I took another look around the room. Her suitcase was gone. Another fifteen minutes passed and I left the room. I had to find out what happened to her. The elevator opened and I groaned when I saw who was inside.

  "There's my best guy," Preston yelled, grabbed me, and pulled me into a bear hug. Kate stood off to the side, giggling and smoothing her hair down. "Sh." Preston held his finger up to his lips and stumbled back.

  "Easy big guy." I held him up and made sure he was steady before letting go.

  "We had to take a break and consummate this thing."

  Kate shook her head.

  "I don't think I'll be in any position to do so at a later time."

  "Later tonight, Babe," Kate said. "Not ever." She laughed and slapped her hand over her mouth.

  "Oh, baby," Preston said and fell into Kate. She attempted to catch him, but he outweighed her by 100 pounds. I helped her out.

  "Where are y'all going?" I asked.

  "He wanted to say goodbye to his guests before he passed out."

  "Did Callie come back?" Preston asked.

  I pushed him up against the wall and held a hand on his chest to keep him there.

  "What do you mean?" I dropped my hand and he slipped, but righted himself. "How did you know she left?"

  "Oh, man. She told me not to tell you."

  "Tell me what?"

  "She went to her sister’s house." Preston grabbed a hold of my chest. "She needed some space man, but I made her promise to come back."

  "You just let her leave," I yelled.

  "Man, you've been messin with that girl's mind since you arrived in LA, she needed a break."

  "That's not for you to decide." I turned my back on him. He stepped around me, his eyes clearer than a minute ago.

  "You're right. I should have told you, but she'll come back." He placed his hands on my chest. "Right?" He looked over to Kate. She nodded.

  I dropped my head.

  "What if she doesn't?"

  Seventeen

  Noah

  It took me an hour to get Preston and his bride back up to their suite. I left them making out on the bed.

  As I left, I heard him yell, "She'll come back man. She promised she would."

  I returned to our room, no Callie.

  Sitting alone in the room with the fucking rose garden from the White House mocking me, I never felt more alone. I shuffled in the room. I pulled the bottle out of the bucket and unwrapped the cork. I pointed it across the room and let it rip. The cork bounced off the wall, ricocheted off one of the rose vases and disappeared. I took a sip. It was good. I took another sip and it tasted bitter.

  "Nothing taste good without Callie," I said aloud. I dropped the bottle in the bucket of ice. It sloshed out on my new fancy leather wedding shoes.

  I am so pathetic.

  I shuffled over to the bed and dropped down. My brain was a mess. My chest literally ached. It felt like a 100-pound weight tied to a two hundred pound elephant were doing squats on it.

  I clutched my chest. Maybe I was having a heart attack. I collapsed onto my back.

  I lay like that; my feet flat on the ground, rubbing my chest. Willing the pain to go away.

  I drifted off.

  Callie

  It was almost three am when I made it back to the hotel. It was quiet, a stark contrast to the chaos from before. The wedding of the century was over. I rode the elevator up. Nip bolted out once we stopped on our floor. He ran down the hall and stopped in front of the suite door.

  How he knew, I had no clue. Maybe he smelled his Daddy. Dogs were mysterious creatures.

  I let us in.

  Nip ran into the suite, I stopped inside the door. The smell of roses overwhelmed my senses. My hand flew up to my nose to stifle a sneeze.

  I flipped on the light and gasped.

  Red roses in an assortment of vases stood on every surface.

  I took a few more steps into the suite and notice the opened champagne bottle, chilling near the balcony.

  Yip, Yip.

  I turned and found Nip standing on Noah's chest. He had passed out on the bed.

  "What the ..." Noah swiped his arms across his chest. Nip barked in earnest before jumping out of the way.

  Noah

  Now the elephant had tiny Chihuahua feet. They stomped all over my heart. A loud roar pulled me out of my dream, but when I opened my eyes, it was Nip and his yippy bark unleashing in my face. I sat up. He squeaked and jumped off before I sent him flying to the ground.

  The little guy has some good reflexes.

  I reached for him and he growled and reared back.

  "Nip," Callie said. He laid down and whimpered. He kept his eyes on me from a safe distance.

  I rubbed my hand over my face. Pushing the confusion out of my brain.

  "What time is it?" I asked.

  "Three am."

  "I thought you left me."

  "I didn't leave you, I just left the hotel."

  "But you took Nip."

  "He's my dog."

  That hurt.

  "I didn't mean that." She said as she took a few steps towards me. "How do you feel?"

  "I'm ..." she peeked over towards the open bottle. "I'm fine. I didn't drink the whole bottle."

  Callie walked over to the bed and sat next to me.

  "You're still in your tuxedo."

  I looked down. My shirt was half untucked and wrinkled. I pulled the coat off and dropped it to the ground.

  "I passed out, but not from drinking."

  "Then from what?" she asked. She reached out and touched the crease in my pants.

  My thigh flexed under her touch.

  She pulled her hand away.

  "Over the thought of losing you. It was too much for my brain to take." I grinned and reached up and touched her face. "You told Preston not to tell me where you were going."

  "But, he told you anyway." She shook her head.

  "Not until after I ordered all of this for you." I gestured to the roses. My hand stopped in mid air. It hit me how ridiculous it was.

  Last time I rely on the advice from an ex-girlfriend on how to make-up with my present girlfriend.

  "It wasn't necessary."

  "I know."

  "But," She scooted closer. "It was a nice thought. Thank you."

  "You're welcome." I leaned in, but she turned her head away.

  That hurt, too.

&n
bsp; "Noah, we need to talk."

  "I'm sorry."

  "I don't need you to be sorry. I need to understand what's going on with you." She stood up. "Is this too much?" She gestured to herself.

  "No. I want you. I want to be with you. You are my life."

  She narrowed her eyes and knelt down in front of me.

  "Noah. I need you to hear me." She placed her hand on my thigh. "I love you. I love our life. I am so proud to be your girlfriend and I love living your life, but you have to live mine, too.

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean. I'm not going to just be your girlfriend."

  "Well, some day ..." I said, wrinkled my eyebrows, and grinned.

  "One step at a time." She patted my leg. "I mean. While I've been obsessed with a version of you for most of my adult life, I'm clearly entrenched in the reality of being with you."

  I nodded.

  "You don't have to live up to some perfect version of you I created in my brain. It's way too much for anyone to live up to. Give yourself a break."

  "I know how you see me. I don't want to disappoint you."

  "You're not doing a very good job of not disappointing me."

  "Callie." I had blown it. I'd showed her an ugly side of me and she didn't like it. I lowered my head and tried to remain calm. "This isn't me. I'm not possessive. I'm not obsessive and I hate how cruel I've been to you. I didn't want this place to change you. You are my beautiful Callie. You're perfect."

  "I'm not perfect. I don't even try to be. I'm just me." She stood up and slid onto my lap. "You know when I was talking about how LA changes people. I wasn't talking about me. I was talking about you."

  I narrowed my eyes.

  "You left this place for a reason. It wasn't because of what happened with Maria."

  I pushed her off my lap and stood up.

  "I left because I hated being taken advantage of at every turn. There's too many variables. In New York, it's just you and me and I like it like that."

  "But, that's not fair to me. It's not going to just be you and me. I'm going to have a life. I'm going to want to pursue stuff I'm interested in. I've been all about you for a long time, but I think I can still love you and be who I want to be." She reached her hand out. "I guess the question is, are you okay with that?”

  I took it.

  "No matter what. I will always be your most loyal fan, but you have to be loyal to me, too."

  "I am." I knelt down in front of her.

  "You trust me?"

  "Of course."

  "And if a slick talking attractive journalist wants to work with me, you'll support me."

  "Well ..."

  "Nothing is going to happen between Garret and I, but I have to do this."

  "Why? With this guy?"

  "What do you think is going to happen?" She asked. "You think I'm going to reveal all your dirty secrets."

  "And, sleep with Garret and the two of you are going to laugh at me while naked."

  "Noah."

  I shook my head.

  "I'm kidding. I don't really think that."

  "I'm not Maria."

  "I know."

  "Then what is it? What scares you?"

  "That seen through the filter of someone else's eyes, I will be further away from that fantasy."

  "I'm not caught up with some fantasy of us. I am firmly planted in the reality of what it means to be with you. You don't have to be your best around me. I can take your bad side, too." She placed her hand on my chest and the pain lifted a little. "It scares me more that you try and hide it from me."

  "Why?"

  "It makes me think you don't have faith in us."

  "I have faith." I ran my hand over her hip. "I have faith that you deserve better."

  "Well, I don't want better. I want you." She ran her hand through my head. "All of you. The real you."

  I pulled her close as I smelled her hair and kissed her neck. She leaned into my touch.

  Callie

  I wrapped my arms around his neck. He pulled me close to him, stood up and laid me down on the bed. He lay down next to me. His hand cupped my face and he kissed me. He reaffirmed his pledge with a life-affirming kiss.

  I sank into the comfort I always felt in Noah's arms.

  I believed him. Nothing he could show me would make me not want him.

  He's the only man I'd ever loved and I found that notion romantic and it meant something to me.

  Noah shifted, but I stopped him with a hand on his chest.

  "I wrote a sample blog post for the new column. I want you to read it."

  "I don't have to read it. I trust you."

  "Well, it's kind of your Valentine's Day present," I said.

  He rolled onto his back.

  "Okay."

  I jumped up and fished my computer out of my bag.

  I opened, adjusted the screen, and read it out loud.

  Whether you use the term groupie, hound, puck bunny, or jersey chaser. No matter what you call it, you are talking about a person whose main goal in life is to get next to a professional athlete. In what ever form and fashion and it’s different for each person.

  That was me.

  I was a groupie from a far. I didn't follow the object of my obsession around stadium to stadium. I didn't hang outside locker room doors and I didn't lose sleep waiting up all night for him to acknowledge me. No. I was a groupie and my athlete of choice moved into my house.

  He found me.

  Let me put that out there again.

  He found me.

  With no knowledge of me or my preoccupation with him and his life.

  And, it worked out because we are still together, but how and why?

  I did nothing to bring my athlete into my life. I thought if we ever met, I wouldn't be good enough for him.

  We are the true manifestation of that saying, right place, right time. Getting him took no effort on my part. Heck, when I had him, I almost ruined it because of my groupie past. He was better then my dreams.

  As a friend of mine said, my story should give stalking groupies hope.

  So why was I so lucky?

  Nothing I did as a groupie helped me in my relationship with him.

  My obsession had him as the perfect man. He wasn't... No man is.

  My fascination had me as the perfect girlfriend. That's even more laughable.

  My fixation taught me nothing of how he was in real life.

  Basically, groupie should be synonymous with fantasy.

  It's not real and I’ve spent a year being confronted with that and working around it in order to build something real, not with my professional athlete but with my man.

  He won't be a professional athlete forever, but my dream, my fantasy and my new obsession is to make him my friend, my support, and the love of my life for as long as he will have me.

  And that's what's real.

  Noah closed down the computer. He calmly set it on the floor. Turned to me and attacked me. He ran his hand up my side and captured my mouth with his lips. He kissed me with urgency and passion. He kissed me like he did in our first kiss, like if he didn't do it right, I'd slip away.

  His kiss, his touch, his caress connected us the way nothing else could and the way no one could come between.

  Yip, Yip!

  Except for Nip.

  Noah groaned as he broke off the kiss. He reached up, grabbed Nip and cradled him in his arms. He rubbed between his ears and Noah yelped in appreciation.

  "You liked it?" I asked.

  "I love it. You are so talented."

  "You felt my sleazy groupieness?"

  "Yep." He grinned.

  "Thank you."

  "Do you like it?" he asked.

  "It needs some work, but it was fun to write." I shifted on my back. "Not all the articles are going to be about us. I thought it would be cool to interview other woman as well. The world needs to know not all of us are gold digging, low self esteem, party girls with daddy issues."

>   "Some of you are regular, plain old ordinary women."

  "Was that supposed to be a compliment?"

  Noah laughed. He sat Nip to the side and cradled me in his arms.

  "No. If I was going to compliment you, I say something like you are the most beautiful, sexiest, sweetest woman with the tastiest ..." Noah licked his lips, "freckles in the world. I love you so much."

  I leaned in and puckered my lips. He leaned back.

  "One second," he said.

  "Ugh, I look the same as I always do."

  "I know. That's why I can't get enough of looking at you."

  I patiently waited for him to finish taking me in, soaking him in, too.

  When I was done, I whispered against his lips, "I love you, too."

  "You guys want your real Valentine's Day present?" Noah said as he attempted to catch his breath.

  "Don't you think we've had enough surprises?" I covered myself with the sheet and sat up. "You mean the rose forest wasn't enough?"

  "Well, I got you something for real, but it's back home." Noah grabbed his iPad off the nightstand and placed it in my hand.

  "Unlock it."

  I typed in his number, eighty-nine eight-nine.

  I know, not very original.

  On the screen popped up a tiny black and white Chihuahua with a felt heart pendant around her neck. She had the pointy end of the heart in her mouth. The phone was on video mode. I tapped the play button and a tiny growl amplified in the room.

  Nip, who had excused himself while we had sex, came running and jumped up on the bed.

  The little dog in the picture yelped and tore the little heart off her neck. She wobbled off the pink blanket and tripped before falling on the slippery tile.

  I recognized the tile from our laundry room.

  She yelped again and scurried back to the blanket.

  "That's in our house."

  "I thought Nip would like a little playmate." Noah smiled. "Even out the male/female ratio in our household."

  I tapped the video and played it again. She was adorable.

  "Thank you. I love her already."

  Nip let out a loud irritated yelp.

  "What's her name?"

  "She doesn't have one, yet." Noah said. "We could call her Beyoncé."