The ferry pulled away from the dock, and Annabeth didn’t know whether it was the bobbing of the boat or the potent effect of the man beside her, but she needed to sit.
“Okay.” She settled on the bench, and Hank sat down beside her. “If we’re getting to know each other, tell me about your wife. Elizabeth.”
Hank paused in pulling a bottled water out of the picnic basket. “Ex-wife. Elizabeth and I haven’t been married for over ten years.”
She shook her head when he offered the bottle. “What ended the marriage?”
“Wow, now I see where Will gets it. You pull no punches.” He took a swallow of water before capping the bottle and returning it to the basket. “The usual, I guess. I wasn’t a very attentive husband, and Elizabeth needed more than I was giving her. So she found it somewhere else.”
Annabeth wasn’t sure what shocked her more, that Hank would admit to being a neglectful husband or that his wife would cheat on him.
“She cheated on you?”
Hank smiled at her incredulousness. “I wasn’t exactly faithful to her, either.”
It suddenly felt like a balloon had deflated inside Annabeth. Despite her attempts not to throw her heart into this relationship, she realized that his admission stung. A lot. She pulled her legs up on the bench, resting her chin on her knees to try to keep the disappointment from seeping into her heart.
Hank sighed. “Not in the way you’re thinking. It wasn’t another woman. Football was my mistress.” The boat picked up speed and he had to sit closer to her in order to be heard. “I played football at West Point. I knew I wouldn’t go pro—I wasn’t good enough—but that didn’t keep me from dreaming of being involved in the game somehow. After I finished my tour in the Army, we’d been married a year and Elizabeth was pregnant with Sophie; the plan was for me to go to Wharton and get my MBA. I’d join the family firm and Elizabeth and I would take up residence in Philadelphia society.”
The whipping wind kept blowing a strand of hair in Annabeth’s face, and she shoved it aside as she listened to Hank’s tale.
“A friend of mine who worked with the Philadelphia Eagles called one day and said they were looking for a scout, someone to travel to college campuses and assess the football talent. The job barely paid anything, but both Elizabeth and I are trust fund babies.” He shrugged unapologetically. “I didn’t even tell her. Or my dad. I just took the job because I desperately wanted to do something in the NFL.”
Hank hung his hands between his knees as the boat jumped across the choppy waters. “The job required a lot of travel. A lot, but I wanted to do it well, so I didn’t complain. I nearly missed Sophie’s birth and, well, it goes without saying that I missed pretty much all of her firsts.”
He glanced out over the ocean, and Annabeth glimpsed the pain in his eyes.
“If she really loved you,” she said, “she would have persevered through those years while you pursued a dream.”
“If I really loved her, I would have found a way to meld my dream and my marriage better. I would have made it work.”
His admission stirred something inside Annabeth: empathy, certainly. But jealousy, too. She wanted a man to love her enough to make something, anything, work.
“But thank you, Annabeth. It would have been nice to have someone on my side back then.”
“Your family sided with Elizabeth?” She didn’t know why that thought hurt her so much, but it did. Hank was a good man. To know that his family turned their backs on him when he needed it pained her greatly.
“They sided with Sophie. Elizabeth is her mother. She and Kevin were discreet in their affair, so nobody but me was the wiser.”
“But your family should know she cheated on you!”
“No, Annabeth, they shouldn’t. That would only hurt Sophie. She lives with Kevin and Elizabeth and two younger brothers who’d slay dragons for her. Despite her teenage drama, she has a comfortable, stable family life. There’s no reason to upset it with something that’s in the past.”
The boat slowed as it arrived at the island’s harbor, giving Annabeth time to study the man seated next to her. He was not what she’d first thought. She’d assumed he’d become less appealing the more she was exposed to him and the more he found out about her. Instead, she discovered that beneath his handsome exterior was a man who had a generous heart. Somehow, her heart beat a few ticks faster just knowing that.
She tilted her head, laying her cheek on her knees. “So football is your first love.”
“It was then.”