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  Catching Love

  A Football Novella

  Harper Lauren

  Copyright 2017 by Harper Lauren.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechan ical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review

  Author Contact

  Email: [email protected]

  Facebook: AuthorHarperLauren

  Will you be there for me this time?

  I thought I had it all: Football and Rosie.

  Until reality slapped me in my face.

  I had to go. Broken heart or not, I had to go.

  My future started. But Rosie wasn't in it.

  Karma has a way of putting Rosie and me back together the second time.

  But there is just one problem:

  I will be leaving soon, just like the last time.

  Is she going to change her mind this time ...?

  Or is she going to break my heart all over again

  *This is a standalone novella with an HEA and no cheating/cliffhanger.*

  Table of Content

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Alex

  I looked at the clock on my rental car and thought that if I had made my flight on time, I would have arrived back in my hometown hours earlier and actually been on time. But instead of making it to the airport and taking a nice, quick ride to Burchnell, I had overslept after a little too much partying the night before, and had to rent a car and make the tedious drive instead. Of course, none of that would have happened if Grandma had just agreed to let me fly the whole family into the city to visit me for a nice weekend away and a fancy eightieth birthday dinner instead of insisting I come home to celebrate.

  My family wasn’t about the city living and since I had made a name for myself playing professional football, they had only been there to visit me a couple of times in the years since I’d left, all at the complete insistence from myself. The city was too bustling, too crowded, too lively for my country family. They preferred tress to buildings and local coffee shops to the big chains.

  I, on the other hand, had not been back home to visit once. There was nothing for me in my small hometown. I was lucky to have even been noticed by the college scouts and then halfway through my college years, the professionals. The city had a pulse, a life to it, one where they knew my name because of the touchdowns I could throw, not because of the produce they needed to buy from my family. I’d had no need to go home in five years and if it wasn’t for Granny insisting that the party be held there in town, I don’t know when I ever would have gone back.

  But I was getting closer to home, the highway had ended and the rural roads began. Big supermarket chains had been replaced with mom and pop shops and it was only a couple of miles until I pulled into the dirt driveway of my parents’ house. I’d offered to pay for them to pave it many times but they liked it that way. Time practically stood still back home while in the city minutes flew by. But when I saw the white farm house, with its colorful flowerbeds and tree swing swaying in the country breeze, I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of nostalgia that I didn’t expect to feel. I took in the scene for a moment while memories came back to me in waves.

  First they were pleasant thoughts of sunny days and playing catch with my dad. Summers spent cutting grass and lazing about in a hammock. Fall football on crisp Friday nights under the bright lights with the whole town gathered to cheer on the hometown and winters spent warming up by the fireside after shoveling our long driveway. As those thoughts swarmed me, I suddenly missed the simplicity and calm of home. I realized that I shouldn’t keep myself away from where I was from, no matter how strong the pulse of the city was. Maybe there was a place in my life for both of the city and the country.

  But as if like a switch, those memories changed and I was no longer alone in those pictures. Instead, I was pushing a girl on that same tree swing, her long blonde hair flowing back as she giggled wildly. I wasn’t sitting alone by the fireplace but instead with the same girl nestled against my body as we warmed ourselves, her vanilla scent mixing intoxicatingly with the scent of smoke. She was the only one I could see up in those stands cheering on the wild Friday nights.

  The light from the memories faded and all I could see was shadows. It had slipped my mind only for a moment. The whole reason I didn’t need Burchnell anymore. But there she was floating back into my daydreams.

  Suddenly a loud bark echoed out into the late afternoon and I startled inside of my car. A white dog came barreling out of the house and I flung open my door in greeting to the fluffy guy. I hadn’t met the shaggy dog yet but I knew my parents had gotten him when I moved out. He was a way to fill the silence that lingered when I moved away.

  He was barking but was wagging his tail in greeting and I got out of my car and bent down to pet the guy.

  “Hey there, Gus,” I said and scratched behind the dog’s ears.

  He wagged his body wildly in excitement and was not going to let me move away from the car anytime soon so long as I kept giving him his attention.

  “Oh Gus, come on now, let Alex get into the house at least!”

  My mother’s voice sang out from the house and the screen door slammed behind her. Gus obeyed and lopped back to the house where my mom gave him a pat and sent him into the house. I stepped away from the car and wrapped my mom in a big bear hug. She was so small underneath the bulk of me but I immediately felt at home again.

  “So, a little too much partying last night?” she asked. There was a mixture of teasing and scolding in her tone, just like a mother does.

  I rubbed the back of my head uncomfortably, feeling like a teenager caught with a beer. “Yea, well, it’s the last week before practice begins so some of us were letting loose a bit before we have to lock things down again.”

  She let me go from her hug and grabbed at my hand, giving it a squeeze.

  “Well, you’re here now and I know Granny is going to be so excited that you came all this way for her.”

  “You know I would have flown you all out to me. We could have had a nice weekend in the city,” I reminded her.

  I grabbed my bags out of the car and she pulled me toward the house. “Yes, we know and the offer was generous but Granny didn’t want a city dinner with just her family. You know the way she loves to party, she wanted a big blowout right here with all her family and friends.”

  I did know Granny and that did seem like the real eightieth birthday party she would want.

  “Well, I’m here now so let’s get this party started,” I told her with a smile.

  I did my best to avoid the memories that were dampening my mood and instead focused on the feeling of stepping into my home again for the first time in five years.

  “Everyone in town is so happy that you’re home. This is going to be such a wonderful weekend,” she said.

  If all went well then it was going to be a great weekend for Granny but I was sure she was wrong about one thing. There was at least one person in town who wasn’t going to be happy to know I was there.

  Chapter 2

  Rosie

  “Did you hear who is back in town for the weekend?”

  My best friend Jenny and I were in the kitchen of the banquet hall whe
re we worked, helping to prepare food for a party the next day. It wasn’t just any party like we do throughout the year. This one was the biggest our banquet hall had booked in years so it was all hands on deck to make it go perfectly. Especially where there was going to be a celebrity in the midst.

  “Of course I heard who is back in town, how could I not have heard? That’s all anyone is talking about, I can’t get away from it.”

  It wasn’t as if I expected that I would never have to run into Alex again. But I did think that since it had been five years since he’d even stepped foot back in our hometown, that I could possibly get lucky and go another five.

  Turns out it was Granny’s big birthday that was finally the straw that broke the camel’s back. It was finally the one thing that made him come back home. I guess nothing else had been that important to him.

  “I know, he’s all the buzz. He’s the only important person to ever come out of this town, reporters and everyone are just buzzing,” she said.

  Every blogger and newspaper writer, even every social media status had written about Alex’s major homecoming. It was all making my stomach turn.

  We were both chopping in the kitchen, her strawberries and me peppers. I did my best to focus on the knife cuts just as the sous chef had shown me but my hands were shaking just a bit, making the slices less than perfect. Jenny, however, was slicing strawberries perfectly and I supposed that was the difference between a server like myself and a chef, but she needed me to stay to help and it wasn’t like I had any wild social life to get to.

  “I keep trying to figure out how to avoid him this weekend but I fear it’s going to be impossible.”

  She threw a handful of strawberries into a large bowl and continued cutting the next batch. “Well, even if you weren’t working the party as a server, the town is far too small for anyone to hide in. Especially when he’s larger than life around here and no one has forgotten the two of you,” she answered.

  I cut silently for a few moments, pretending that peppers were tricky, when I was simply trying to blink away the memories of a past that felt so vivid. The two of us together were our own little brand of celebrity, everyone believed we were the “it” couple that was going to be together forever. I could still feel his football jacket, bulky and warm in the nip of his football games, the cinnamon taste of his kiss, the long lashes that lined his cool blue eyes.

  It all felt like a lifetime ago, yet the dust still lingered gritty in my mouth from when his rusty truck drove down the gravel road to his new life; away from me.

  “Rosie?”

  Jenny’s voice snapped me out of the past and instead of being in the middle of the gravel road I was back in the steel kitchen of the banquet hall.

  “I’m sorry, did you say something?”

  “I asked what you were going to say the first time you saw him.”

  Jenny was the one who had brought me ice cream and let my salty tears melt the tub as I cried the night he left. She took me out to bars when he didn’t come back. And when I was finally feeling better she set me up on my first blind date. Firsthand, she knew how my life had been ripped apart, especially as I watched from a distance as his soared without me.

  Recruited while still in college, drafted to a major team, hero of his new city and an already noteworthy quarterback, he had it all. Fame, money, luxury, a whole life, and I was nothing more than a blip in his past.

  “I have no idea what I’m going to say to him, I’m hoping that the party will be so big that I won’t do anything more than see his across the room.”

  “You’re not going to try to make him jealous even a little bit?” she asked playfully.

  I snorted a laugh. “What do I have to make him jealous of? He can have any girl he wants and has a major contract with more money in one year then I’ll ever see in a lifetime. How could I possibly make him jealous?”

  “Because first of all you’re drop dead gorgeous, even more than you were in high school, and you’ve got so much going for you. Your horses are stunning and the camp is getting so big.”

  I appreciated the way she was trying to boost me up and make me feel better. She was right that my farm full of soft, beautiful horses was taking off better than I had ever dreamed, but that still didn’t even put me in the same league as Alex.

  Before I could argue with her, the kitchen phone rang and Jenny wiped her hand on a towel to answer the call.

  I kept chopping my pepper but I could hear the change in tone of her voice. Normally a call for anything about the banquet wouldn’t really matter for me, but the moment she hung up the phone I had a feeling that the call had more to do with me than usual.

  “Looks like you’re going to have to deal with the Alex problem sooner than you thought,” she said.

  My heart began to race faster as a bad feeling sank into my stomach.

  “Why is that exactly?”

  Jenny looked me in the eye and gave me a small smirk, the one that she often gave me when she was up to no good.

  “Because that was Granny on the phone. She’s on her way to work on party details. And Alex is the one bringing her.”

  Chapter 3

  Alex

  The welcome when I walked into the front door of the house was even more enthusiastic than Gus’ tail-wagging greeting. There were hugs and laughs, everyone talking over each other, scrambling to get the first word in, and the smell of a chicken roasting in the oven to top it off. I could practically smell the butter dripping in the pan as my mother would have it perfectly basted and my mouth began to water almost instantly. I did have to admit, as much as I loved the fine dining in the city, nothing beat my mom’s home cooking.

  My stomach growled loud enough for the room of family to hear. “I’m starving,” I confessed. “When can we eat?”

  Just then Granny came out from the den and wrapped me in a tight hug with her small bird-like arms. She was a tiny woman but the biggest person I’d ever known. “No time for that,” she answered. “I’ve got to go to the banquet hall and finalize some details for the party.”

  “Shouldn’t that all be set by now? The party is tomorrow.”

  “This party is going to be a big one! Come, drive me down there so I can catch up with you,” she told me. “Dinner will wait for us.”

  It wasn’t a request but a command and if there was one thing you didn’t do it was argue with Granny.

  “Yea, alright. Might be nice to drive through the town a bit.”

  Being in my old home and surrounded by family, it was easy to forget why I stayed away for so long. Life came so easily at home, where everyone knows everyone and neighbors are always willing to lend a helping hand. There was a sudden pep in my step, a feel good thought that maybe I’d be able to forget all about my past and finally return home more often.

  We walked outside toward my rental, Granny as lively and young as ever. But she stopped before we got to my rental. “Why don’t we take that old truck of yours?” she asked.

  “Is that thing even still running? I figured dad would have scrapped it for parts as soon as he dropped me off at the airport in it.”

  Granny made a tsk noise. “Not only is that truck still here but it’s running like a dream. Well, maybe not like your fancy cars but it still is a beauty, a classic.”

  She began to head toward the garage where my dad had been storing my old beat-up truck. For a second I hesitated but I decided to indulge the thought of feeling like I was home again and climbed into the driver side. The engine started with a cough, then a rumble as it chugged to get the truck in motion.

  “Runs like a dream huh?” I teased.

  “Oh hush,” she scolded. “Now, tell me everything that’s going on, I want to hear all about your fancy life.”

  We talked as I drove the beast of the truck into town and I could tell how much she felt in awe of my life. In truth, I knew most people I had known in my early life would feel in awe of the things I had. The money, the fame, the cars, sometimes I
felt in awe myself, unable to believe that a small town boy had made it into professional football. But as much as I painted a picture of my perfect life to impress everyone, there was one piece of life that wasn’t perfect.

  “So, how are the ladies?” she asked bluntly.

  And there it was, the one area of my life that was far from perfect. It was easy to play a ladies’ man for the papers and for entertainment purposes, but since I’d moved away from home, I hadn’t dated a single girl for more than a matter of weeks. Anytime I would begin to get close to a girl, Rosie’s memory would come barreling down on me like a train and that would be the end of that.

  It was easier to just stay away from the dating scene altogether. Girls were nothing but a distraction until they broke your heart.

  Granny didn’t say much as I spoke about my life and it wasn’t until I pulled into the banquet hall that I realized how odd that was. Granny always had a thought or opinion for every occasion, no matter what anyone was doing. It was one of the reasons she was so popular. People loved that she didn’t bite her tongue; that she spoke her mind and held strong to her beliefs. It wasn’t unusual for anyone to call her up to ask for advice or just to vent their problems, knowing that she’d have something to offer after telling her their troubles.

  But she hadn’t said a word to me about coming home or my life choices or my mistakes. Something was up.