Losing Game: A Winning Ace Novel (Book 2) Read online

  He sat on the sofa and leaned forward to warm his hands on the log fire. “This is a nice room.”

  Natalia let out a deep sigh. “Just say what you’ve come to say, Cash.”

  “Don’t you love me anymore?” The words spilled out before he’d had the chance to filter them, and her eyes sparked in defiance as she gave a disbelieving shake of her head.

  “Starting with the low blows, Cash? And if I remember rightly, I never said I loved you.”

  He exhaled on a gasp as though he’d been punched in the back, and his lungs burned in protest. “Wow.” He looked away and stared out of the window, unwilling to let her see his pain.

  “You destroyed any love I had for you with your secrets and lies and cheating.”

  Once again, he opened his mouth to deny he’d cheated on her, but it wouldn’t do any good. “I’ll tell you everything, and I ask only two things in return.”

  “What?” Natalia chewed on the skin around her thumb.

  “Try not to judge me, at least until you’ve heard it all. Afterwards, if you choose to throw me out, well…” He shrugged. “There’s not much more I can do.”

  “Okay. And the second?”

  “Sit with me.” He patted the spare seat next to his. “This is going to be the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I need you beside me.”

  Natalia hesitated, and for a minute, he thought she was going to refuse. But then she rose from her chair and sat alongside him.

  He took a deep breath and wiped clammy hands on his jeans. This was going to be fucking painful.

  3

  Cash forced a swallow past his dry, sore throat. He took a sip of water, keeping the glass in his hand. If he didn’t start talking soon, he’d lose his nerve. But where to begin? He wanted to reach for Natalia’s hand, but her body language was stiff and awkward. The last thing he needed was to feel the bite of rejection if she snatched it away.

  His eyes flickered towards hers, but he decided staring at the floor was preferable.

  “My father was a clever man, even touted as a genius in his field. He set up his own software company before he was twenty. As the business began to take off, he met my mother. She was only seventeen, and they married as soon as she turned eighteen. Three years later, my father’s company was already competing with the big boys.

  “My mother had been an up-and-coming athlete. Track and field. She would have turned professional if she hadn’t married my father, but he insisted he needed her full attention to support him and the growth of his business.” He gave a wry smile. “So she gave up on her dreams and became the dutiful wife instead.

  “I came along about eighteen months after they married, and my mother put all of her energy into me. As soon as I could walk, she got me involved in all kinds of different sports: football, cricket, athletics. I guess because she hadn’t been able to follow her own sporting dreams, she decided to live them vicariously through me. Then when I was five, she put a tennis racket in my hand for the first time, and that was it. Tennis became my one true love, and it wasn’t long before experts in the sport began to sit up and take notice.”

  He paused again to sip his water. The cool liquid did nothing to soothe his burning throat. He risked a glance at Natalia. She was leaning forwards, her gaze locked on him, and as their eyes met, she nodded encouragingly for him to continue. He placed the glass on a small side table and returned to staring at the floor.

  “Every night after school, and every weekend, my mother arranged for me to have professional coaching. However, my father wasn’t quite as keen. He thought focusing on one thing only made my life too one dimensional, and he insisted I get involved in different pursuits outside of sport. He encouraged me to play guitar although I wasn’t very good. When I turned eight, I joined the cubs, and later the scouts.”

  “I remember you telling me that on the way to Paris,” Natalia said. “Your father used to take you every Wednesday.”

  “Yeah,” he said, meeting her gaze. “And I was a complete bastard to you because you dared to ask about him.”

  She shrugged one shoulder. “Keep going.”

  He blew out a slow breath through his nose. “By the age of ten, I’d decided tennis was what I wanted to do with my life. Once I managed to convince my father, he finally gave up trying to push me into other things, although I still went to scouts for another year or so. Then when I was twelve, everything changed.”

  Cash leaned forward and rested his forearms on his knees, his fingers drumming against each other. “Sorry, give me a minute.”

  Natalia got to her feet. “Why don’t I make a cup of tea?”

  “Got any whiskey to top it up?” he said with a grimace.

  For the first time, Natalia smiled, and hope surged within him.

  “Pete may have a bottle tucked away at the back of a cupboard,” she said, disappearing into the kitchen. Cash stood to stretch his legs. A picture hanging on the wall caught his eye, and he moved in for a closer look. One of the guys was definitely Pete, although it had clearly been taken quite a few years ago. Fewer wrinkles. More hair. Pete had his arm around the shoulders of another guy, and they were holding up a huge fish, broad grins on their faces.

  “That’s my dad with Pete,” Natalia said, startling him. He hadn’t heard her come back in. She held two steaming mugs of tea in one hand and a half-empty bottle of whiskey in the other.

  “Here, let me help you,” he said, taking the mugs from her and placing them on a table.

  She put the whiskey down next to the tea and walked over to the picture. “They loved fishing. Used to be out for hours.” She let out a soft sigh, and he had to clench his fists to stop himself putting his arms around her. He sensed she wouldn’t welcome the attention, and he didn’t want to scare her away just as he might be getting somewhere.

  “You must miss him terribly.”

  “Every day,” she said, glancing sideways at him before facing the picture once more.

  Cash left her reminiscing and picked up the whiskey, adding a dash to his tea. When she came to sit beside him, he waved the bottle at her. “Want some?”

  “No, thanks.” She picked up her mug. “You were saying, about when you were twelve…?”

  He scrubbed his chin with his hand and shuddered as he recalled the painful, repressed memories. “My dad began drinking. He’d tried to expand the business, and a takeover deal had gone sour. He’d got himself into shitloads of debt, and he turned to the bottle as a way to help numb the pain of what he saw as his abject failure. We ended up having to sell the house and move somewhere smaller. Dad wanted me to give up tennis—it’s an expensive sport, you see—but Mum wouldn’t have it. She saw my potential, knew I was on the cusp of making it.

  “One night, Dad came in steaming drunk, and he and Mum began arguing, yet again, about how my tennis coaching was costing too much. I remember Mum screaming at him that if he wasn’t so greedy, always wanting more instead of being happy with what he had, they wouldn’t be in this mess. That was the first time he hit her.”

  Natalia’s hand shot to her mouth, and her eyes widened. “The first time?” she said, the sound of her voice muffled through her fingers.

  “Oh, yeah,” he said bitterly. “There were many times after that. And each one worse than the last.”

  “Did he hit you too?”

  Cash shook his head. “He would drag me out of the way when I’d stand in front of Mum to protect her, but he never hit me. She became his whole focus when he lost his temper, although I’ve never shaken the guilt that he only ever lost it because of me.”

  Natalia’s hand closed over his, and she gently squeezed. He put his other hand over the top of hers, his thumb lightly brushing her skin. It felt so good to touch her again, although when she tensed beneath his grip, he let go immediately.

  He swallowed and blinked a couple of times before continuing. “Mum took a part-time job at a local restaurant so she could keep my coaching going, but the cuts and bruises became hard
er to hide, and she had to give it up. Without that extra income, she decided to sell her jewellery to pay for my tennis lessons. When Dad found out, he went ballistic. That night, he put her in hospital.”

  Natalia closed her eyes before slowly opening them, her head moving slightly from side to side. After so many years of burying his childhood, refusing to revisit the awfulness of it all, witnessing Natalia’s horror brought the memories rushing back.

  “Oh, Cash,” she said, her eyes brimming with tears. When one spilled down her cheek, he brushed it away with his thumb.

  “Don’t cry. It kills me when you cry.”

  She pulled a tissue from a box beside her and blew her nose. “Didn’t the police do anything?”

  “The hospital called them, but Mum wouldn’t press charges. She still loved him, even after everything he’d done. He put her in hospital many nights after that as though, in his head, a line had been crossed, and now he knew she wouldn’t prosecute…” Cash shrugged.

  “Didn’t anyone else try to help?” Natalia said, a tinge of bewilderment in her tone. “Teachers, family doctor?”

  He scrubbed his face with his hand. “No one knew. Both Mum and I became experts at hiding the truth. The only person I ever told was Rupe. He kept me sane and made me believe that the horror I was living through wouldn’t last forever.”

  Natalia smiled fondly. “He’s a good friend.”

  “The best,” Cash said, nodding. “And he turned out to be right because when I was fourteen, I won a scholarship to attend a residential tennis academy in Spain. I can’t even begin to explain how relieved I was to escape home. I guess I hoped if I wasn’t around, then maybe Dad wouldn’t get as mad. After all, it had been the arguments about me that had started the physical abuse. If I wasn’t there as a constant reminder of their troubles, they might patch things up.”

  “You know it wasn’t about you, though, right?”

  Cash shrugged and ignored her comment. “I began to make quite a name for myself on the junior tour. I beat pretty much any opponent put in front of me, and I almost forgot about the nightmare going on at home.

  “Then right before my fifteenth birthday, I won the Wimbledon juniors title. I followed that up with the US Open, and the Australian the following year. I rarely went home, and when I did, after a day or so, I couldn’t wait to leave. The atmosphere was horrendous, what with Dad permanently drunk and Mum covered in bruises. I begged her to leave him and come away with me, but she wouldn’t. No matter what I said, she defended him.” He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. “This is even harder than I thought it would be.”

  “If you want to stop––”

  “No. If I don’t get this out now, I’m not sure I ever will.” He got to his feet, desperate to escape the mixture of sorrow and dismay on Natalia’s face. He dug his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans and gazed out of the window.

  “A couple of months before my sixteenth birthday, I’d travelled to Italy to play in a grade-A-listed tournament when Stone Phillips approached me. Stone was—and still is—one of the best coaches of juniors on the tour, and he agreed to take me on pro bono. With him in my corner, I knew I had a great chance of making it. Stone has a proven history of managing the transition from being a junior to successfully breaking into the seniors. The first person I wanted to tell was Mum, because if it hadn’t been for her dogged determination and many sacrifices, I wouldn’t have this amazing opportunity. I didn’t want to tell her over the phone, so as soon as the tournament was over, I flew home.”

  His head was pounding, and he pressed his fingertips to his temples, closing his eyes against the bright sunshine. He jumped when Natalia laid a hand on his arm.

  “Why don’t we take a break? Go for a walk or something.”

  “No. I’m almost done. I need to finish.”

  “Well, at least sit down before you fall over.”

  Cash did as she asked but dropped his head. He wouldn’t be able to carry on if he focused on her pity. Nausea churned in his stomach, and his heart thundered in his chest. Twelve years was a long time, and yet, as he told Natalia everything, the memories were so fresh, so painful that the events could have happened yesterday.

  “I let myself in and dumped my bags in the hallway. I could hear loud music being played in the living room, a heavy bass beat making a thudding sound, which was weird because neither of my parents were into that type of music. I called out, but there was no reply, probably because they couldn’t hear me over the noise. I made my way down the hall, and when I walked into the living room…”

  Cash covered his face. “Oh, God,” he muttered as pain flooded his chest.

  Natalia’s hand squeezed his arm. “I’m here for you.”

  Her soft voice soothed him like no other. He dropped his hands into his lap and raised his head.

  She pressed closer. “Tell me,” she whispered.

  He closed his eyes. When he opened them, he made sure his gaze was averted. “Mum was on the floor, curled into a ball, and Dad was kicking the hell out of her. The thudding noise I’d heard hadn’t been the music at all. It had been his foot striking her body and her head.”

  Natalia gasped, but Cash rushed on, anxious to get this over with. “I flew at him and grabbed him around the neck. I tried to stop him, but he was too strong, and he shoved me in the chest. I fell backwards and hit my head on the doorframe. I remember blood from a gash above my eyebrow dripping into my eyes, and the room began to spin. I managed to stagger to my feet. I ran back into the hallway with the intention of going next door to ask for help. That’s when I saw Dad’s golf clubs.”

  His voice broke, and for the first time in years, tears spilled down his cheeks. “I grabbed one out of the bag and ran back into the living room. I swung it as hard as I could. I hit my father on the side of the head, and he fell.”

  Only then did he lift his eyes to hers. “I murdered him, Natalia. I murdered my own father.”

  4

  Tally bit down hard on her lip to stop her own tears from joining his. The sight of Cash crying made her even sadder. The knowledge that someone so strong and proud had shared such a private, tragic event made her heart ache. And even though she still didn’t have a clue who Gracie was, or why he seemed convinced he hadn’t cheated, the need to comfort him overtook everything else.

  She shuffled closer and wrapped her arms around him, pulling him into her body. Tremors ran through him as he returned her embrace, his arms holding her tightly.

  “I’ve missed you so much,” he mumbled against her neck. When she didn’t push him away, he eased back, his hands cupping her face. Gently, he pressed his lips to hers, and she repressed a soft moan. Being in Cash’s arms again almost erased the constant agony she’d lived with the past few weeks, but at the back of her mind was the gnawing doubt that he still hadn’t fully explained himself. She gripped his wrists and pulled his hands away from her face.

  “Don’t,” she whispered. “Please don’t.”

  “Sorry,” he mumbled. He began to repetitively tug his bottom lip between his thumb and forefinger. It made her wish they were still kissing.

  “No, I’m sorry. I started it.”

  “I knew it was a risk telling you,” he said, refusing to look her in the eye. “How can you ever see me the same way now you know I’m capable of murder?”

  Tally’s mouth fell open, and she ducked her head until he was forced to meet her gaze. “You don’t really believe you’re a murderer? Cash, you were a child trying to protect your mother, and for all you knew, he could have turned on you next.”

  He gave a weak shrug. “I know. Doesn’t stop the guilt, though.”

  “Jesus.” She brushed a stray lock of hair off her face. “What happened next? What about your mum?”

  His shoulders dropped. “After I hit him and he fell, I called for an ambulance. I was terrified they’d put me in prison. When the ambulance crew arrived, they took one look at the scene and phoned the police. Mum was
barely alive, and I guessed Dad was dead when they covered his face with a sheet and loaded him onto a stretcher, although no one told me he’d died.”

  “Dear God,” Tally muttered, astounded at the sheer callousness of such a thoughtless act and the impact it must have had on a terrified child.

  “The police arrested me and took me to the station. They wouldn’t let me go to the hospital with Mum. I didn’t know who to call, so I phoned Rupe. His dad sorted out a solicitor and stayed with me during questioning.”

  “That was good of him.”

  “Yeah.” He stroked his scruff with his fingertips. “I was a fucking mess, barely able to string a sentence together. I kept asking the police how Mum was doing, but they wouldn’t tell me. They made me go over what had happened so many times I began to doubt myself. Eventually, they bailed me without charge until they’d carried out a full investigation. As soon as they let me out, Rupe’s dad took me straight to the hospital.”

  “Your mum?” she asked again, almost afraid to hear the answer.

  He lifted his head. His eyes were watery, his face pained. “She was alive. Barely. She had massive head injuries and internal bleeding. By the time I got there, they’d already operated and placed her in intensive care.”

  “I can’t even imagine what you must have gone through. You were fifteen.” Outrage swept through her on behalf of a teenage boy she hadn’t known then but still felt an overwhelming urge to protect.

  “It was grim,” he said. “It took the police two weeks to decide I wouldn’t be charged.”

  “But they’d have known it was self-defence, surely?”

  “It could have gone either way, but I guess I got lucky.” Cash gave a bitter laugh. “If you can call it that.”

  “Where’s your mum now?” she dared to ask.