I glanced at Shaun again and noticed him looking down at his feet. He’d obviously heard reactions like mine before and was used to it, but that didn’t make my question any less inappropriate. The poor kid looked haunted by something and I was acting like he wasn’t there.
“Yes,” Oliver responded.
Maisie looked a little taken aback as well, although in typical fashion, she came right out and asked the obvious question. “Unless my biology teacher made a mess of the genetics lessons,” Maisie said, “I’m going to assume you’re adopted, Shaun?”
Shaun nodded and smiled at Maisie. She’d managed to put him at ease whereas I’d had the opposite effect. What was it about being around Oliver that turned me into such a bad person?
“I didn’t know you’d adopted anyone,” I said, stating the obvious.
“It happened after you left in 2007,” Oliver said. “Shaun’s dad was a friend of mine. He… passed away, so Shaun came to live with me. I officially adopted him a few years later.”
“I’m sorry, Shaun,” I said, although he still wouldn’t look at me.
“Do you want to go wait in the car?” Oliver asked Shaun. Shaun quickly nodded and took the keys from Oliver. No doubt he was eager to get away from me and my stupid comments.
“He doesn’t speak a lot,” Oliver said, once Shaun was out of earshot.
“He doesn’t have to when he looks that good,” Maisie said. “Sometimes the body can communicate everything it needs to.”
I went to scold Maisie, but Oliver laughed and I couldn’t help but join in.
“He’s cute,” she added. “That’s all.”
“Well, you’ll be seeing plenty more of him over the summer,” Oliver said.
How could Oliver have a son? And how could I not know about it? I know I’d been out of his life for eight years, but I just assumed that kind of news would get out. I guess they made an effort to keep it out of the press, and Oliver hadn’t told Maisie either judging by her reaction.
Oliver having a son was going to make it so much harder to hate him. It had been hard enough not to look at him every ten seconds today, while he stood there in full view wearing those tight shorts and crossing his arms to reveal his toned biceps. Now I had to factor in that he was a father to a kid whose parents had died. Oliver wasn’t making it easy on me.
Perhaps he really had changed? He’d only been eighteen when I last saw him. He was old enough to play for England, but still immature enough to take his mistakes out on me. But Oliver was twenty-six now and he looked every bit the grownup he hadn’t been before.
“We should be going,” I said. “It’s hard enough driving on the wrong side of the road. I don’t want to be tired while I’m doing it.”
“I can drive you to the hotel,” Oliver offered. “Or you can stay at my place.”
Maisie looked at me excitedly. I didn’t need to be fully awake to figure out what she wanted to do and why, but I rejected the offer anyway.
“My team’s playing at the weekend,” Oliver said, just as I was about to turn and head back to the car. “It’s a top of the table clash, so the game’s sold out, but I can get you VIP tickets if you want them.”
“That’s really not—” I began, before Oliver interrupted.
“You’ve already rejected dinner and a ride home. I do hope you’re not going to reject this offer as well. Maisie, tell your sister it’s rude to reject a polite invitation.”
“Okay, okay,” I said quickly, not wanting Maisie on my case as well. “Thank you Oliver, we’d love to watch you play.”
“Excellent. I’ll give you all the details tomorrow.”
Oliver walked off and Maisie and I headed back to the car, although we both walked to the wrong door on the first attempt.
“You’re in a weird mood,” Maisie said once the engine was running. “Why don’t you want to hang out with Oliver more?”
Because I don’t trust myself around him, I thought. Because if I see him playing rugby there’s a good chance I will want to run onto the pitch and let him tackle me to the floor.
“I’m just tired,” I replied. “It’s been a long day. And an eventful one at that.”
“I know,” Maisie agreed. “I can’t believe Oliver adopted Shaun. Although, I guess it’s not that different to you and me.”
“Of course it’s different.”
“Not really,” Maisie insisted. “You look after me more than Mom for the most part. And you’re insanely protective of me, because you still blame yourself for the attack.”
“You’re making me feel really old right now.”
“Well, you act it sometimes. You need to chill out a bit.”
“I agreed to go to Oliver’s rugby game,” I said. “I’ll be better once I’ve gotten over the jet lag.”
“You don’t need to watch me play all day either. I noticed Oliver is finished with his work just after lunch. Why don’t the two of you hang out and do fun things instead of just watching me training?”
I wanted nothing more than to spend the afternoon doing “fun things” with Oliver, but that couldn’t happen. I used to hang out with him all the time eight years ago, and that ended in my heartbreak. I couldn’t go through all that again.
The summer would be over before I knew it, and then I’d be back in Virginia working two jobs and volunteering at the center, while Oliver made millions playing rugby.
Oliver might have changed, but perhaps the problem was with me. I hadn’t changed. I’d never moved on from what happened eight years ago. How could I when I was reminded of it every time I looked at my sister?
I’d have to move past it. I couldn’t spend the entire summer avoiding Oliver, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure I wanted to. He looked every bit as delicious as he had eight years ago, and now he might not be a complete asshole. That made him the perfect package, except for one thing—he was my stepbrother.
That should have cooled my desires, but it hadn’t eight years ago, and it didn’t now. If anything, it made me want him more. What would Maisie say if she knew how I looked at our stepbrother? If she knew I thought about him at night and in… intimate moments, both when I was with other men and when I was alone?
“Am I Shaun’s auntie?” Maisie asked after a rare few minutes of silence.
“No,” I replied instantly. I didn’t want to be an auntie to Oliver’s adopted son. Things were weird enough as it was.
“Good,” Maisie said. “That’s a relief.”
“Why don’t you want… Actually, never mind.” I knew full well why she didn’t want to be Shaun’s auntie and I was hardly in a position to judge. In many ways, Maisie and I couldn’t have been more different, but when it came to men, we clearly had some things in common.
I kept expecting Michelle to cancel on me, right up until I saw her and Maisie pull up in their rental car outside the stadium. Maisie popped out of the car the second it stopped moving and looked up in awe at the stadium.
I loved the ground, but I was biased. Compared to the stadiums they were used to in the US, this one should have looked insignificant: old, small, and likely in violation of safety codes.
I didn’t know a lot about US sports, but I did know that their university teams often played in front of over one hundred thousand people. West London R.F.C. was a popular team, but we considered ourselves lucky to get thirty thousand.
Fortunately, those thirty thousand people were the best thirty thousand rugby fans in the world as far as I was concerned. They made a noise that reverberated around the small ground and intimidated every opposition team that visited, even those who were used to playing in front of much larger crowds.
The fans were the reason I chose West London over the other clubs that had come in for me after my disastrous performance in the 2007 World Cup Final. After that debacle, what I needed more than anything was the support of a loyal fan base. I got all that here and a lot more. The only thing that could make the crowd better was having Michelle in it and today that dream was coming true.