Chapter 16 Lucy
Lucy
The penthouse apartment overlooks Boston's glittering skyline, and I can't stop fidgeting with my ugly Christmas sweater. Ryder's hand finds mine, steady and warm, and I realize my palms are damp despite the warmth inside.
"You okay?" he asks.
I nod, but my throat feels tight. Yesterday at the charity game, he told the world about us.
Kissed me in that corridor with reporters watching.
Made it official. But tonight feels different.
Tonight I'm meeting his teammates, his hockey family, the people who've known him for years.
And he's been nervous all day, checking his phone, adjusting his sweater, acting like he has something planned.
"There's Cade," Ryder says, nodding toward the bar. "Come on."
My fingers tighten around his. "Ready?"
"Born ready." But his thumb strokes across my knuckles, and I know he's as nervous as I am.
We weave through the crowd of players and their partners.
The apartment belongs to one of the veteran defensemen, all floor-to-ceiling windows and modern furniture.
Someone's set up a champagne tower. Music pulses from hidden speakers.
People cluster in groups, laughing and drinking, and I recognize faces from Ryder's Instagram, from sports highlights I've watched with Connor.
Cade sees us coming and his face breaks into a grin. "Lucy! Good to see you again. Enjoy the game yesterday?"
"It was amazing." I smile, remembering how he'd waved at the stands during warm-ups. "You guys raised so much money."
"All thanks to your planning." He nods at Ryder. "She's a keeper, Blackwood."
"I know." Ryder's arm slides around my waist.
More teammates drift over. Alexei wraps me in another bear hug like he did after the game yesterday.
Hayes immediately picks up where he left off teasing Ryder about finally settling down.
A parade of faces and names I'm starting to recognize, all of them welcoming, treating me like I'm already part of the family.
"They like you," Ryder murmurs in my ear during a lull.
"How can you tell?"
"Hayes only flirts with people he approves of. And Alexei hugs no one."
I lean into his side. "Your hockey family."
"Yeah." His arm tightens. "And now you've met them."
The night wears on in a blur of conversations and laughter.
People keep coming up to congratulate us, saying they saw the press conference video.
Hayes's girlfriend corners me to get details about how Ryder and I got together.
Cade pulls Ryder aside for what looks like a serious conversation, both of them glancing my way.
Around eleven, someone turns down the music. The team captain, a grizzled veteran named Reilly, climbs onto the coffee table with a champagne flute.
"Alright, listen up," he shouts. "Before we get too drunk to remember midnight, I want to say a few words." He pauses. "Actually, someone else wants to say a few words. Blackwood, get your ass up here."
My stomach drops. Ryder squeezes my hand and kisses my temple. "Be right back."
He climbs onto the table beside Reilly, who hands him the champagne flute like a microphone. The room quiets. Someone whistles. Ryder takes a breath, and I see his hands shake slightly before he steadies them.
He finds me in the crowd, and his whole face softens.
"Hi," he says, and there's laughter, warm and encouraging. "I'm not good at speeches, so bear with me."
"You got this, Blackwood," someone shouts.
Ryder's mouth tips in that crooked smile.
"Three weeks ago, I came back from injury thinking my career might be over.
I was injured, angry, and pretty sure the best part of my life was behind me.
" He pauses, and the room is so quiet I can hear my own heartbeat.
"Then I went home to Pine Hollow and reconnected with someone I'd known my whole life.
Lucy Wright. My best friend's little sister.
The girl who grew up to kick my ass at air hockey and refuse to let me feel sorry for myself. "
My vision blurs. I press my hand to my mouth.
"Lucy Wright saved my life," Ryder continues, his voice rough. "Not because she fixed me. I'm still figuring that part out. But because she reminded me that life is more than what you've lost. It's what you choose to build with what's left."
Cade's hand lands on my shoulder, steadying.
"She's stubborn and competitive and has terrible taste in reality TV.
" More laughter, but Ryder's eyes stay on mine.
"She makes me want to be better. Makes me want to stay and fight for what matters instead of running when things get hard.
And I know I'm leaving for training camp next week, but I'm coming back.
Every chance I get. Because home isn't a place anymore. It's her."
The room erupts in applause and cheers. Tears streak my cheeks, and I don't care who sees. Ryder climbs down and pushes through the crowd, and then his hands frame my face and his forehead presses to mine.
"I love you," he says, just for me. "In case that wasn't clear."
"You're an idiot," I whisper, but I'm smiling so hard my cheeks ache. "I love you too."
The countdown starts. Ten, nine, eight. The room pulses with voices, all of us shouting together. Seven, six, five. Ryder's thumb wipes away my tears. Four, three, two.
One.
He kisses me as noisemakers explode around us and champagne corks pop. The room cheers, but I barely hear them over the thunder of my pulse. His hands slide into my hair, and I grip his sweater, anchoring myself to him while the world spins away.
When we finally pull apart, breathless and grinning, Hayes is standing nearby with his phone out, definitely filming.
"That's going on Instagram," he announces.
"Let it," Ryder says, and kisses me again.
The party stretches into the early hours.
We dance badly to terrible pop music, drink too much champagne, and pose for approximately eight hundred photos with people who want to commemorate the moment.
Cade claps Ryder on the back and says something that makes Ryder laugh and look at me with so much love I feel it in my bones.
At two in the morning, we finally stumble back to Ryder's apartment, fingers linked and faces flushed from champagne. The streets are empty now, just the two of us and the echo of our footsteps on the sidewalk. Fresh snow has started to fall, dusting the parked cars and streetlights.
"Hell of a night," Ryder says.
I lean into his side. "You didn't have to do that. The speech."
"I wanted to." He stops under a streetlamp, turns to face me. Snow catches in his hair, melts on his eyelashes. "Wanted everyone to know."
"Know what?"
"That you're mine. That I'm yours." He cups my jaw, his palm warm against my frozen skin. "That I'm not going anywhere that matters."
I kiss him there in the middle of the empty street, slow and deep and full of promises.
When we finally make it upstairs, we're both shivering and laughing, shedding layers in a trail to the bedroom.
My coat lands on the floor. His scarf follows.
He backs me against the wall by the bedroom door and kisses me until my knees go weak, his hands sliding under my sweater to find bare skin.
"Cold," I gasp against his mouth.
"I'll warm you up." His voice is gravel and want, and heat floods through me despite the chill clinging to my clothes.
We stumble the last few feet to the bed, tugging at buttons and zippers. His sweater comes off, then mine. My bra. His jeans. Each piece of clothing reveals more skin, more heat, more of the man I've fallen so hard for in just three weeks.
He lays me back on the bed and hovers over me, his weight braced on his forearms. The city lights outside cast silver across his shoulders, the sharp angles of his face. He's so beautiful it makes my throat ache.
"I need to memorize this," he says, his fingers tracing the curve of my waist, the dip of my hip. "Every inch of you. So I can remember when we're apart."
"Then look." I arch into his touch, bold and wanting. "Touch me. I want to feel you everywhere."
His breath hitches. He lowers his mouth to my collarbone, pressing kisses down the center of my chest, across my ribs. His hands map my body like he's drawing a new route home, fingertips skating over sensitized skin until I'm squirming beneath him.
"Ryder." His name comes out desperate, needy.
"I know." He kisses the hollow of my hip, his stubble rough against my inner thigh. "Tell me what you want."
"You. All of you."
He groans and moves back up my body, settling between my legs. His mouth finds mine again, hungry and claiming, while his hand slides down to hook under my knee and hitch my leg around his hip. The contact makes us both gasp.
"Please," I whisper.
He reaches for the nightstand, finds what he needs. I watch him through hazy eyes, taking in the flex of muscle in his arms, the focused intensity on his face. When he finally pushes into me, we both go still, breathing hard.
"Okay?" he asks, his forehead pressed to mine.
"More than okay." I roll my hips, urging him deeper.
He moves. Slow at first, finding our rhythm, then faster when I dig my nails into his shoulders and demand it.
The bed frame creaks. My breath comes in short bursts.
He buries his face in my neck and groans my name like a prayer, and I'm lost in the feeling of him, the weight and heat and desperate connection.
"Look at me," I manage, and when he lifts his head, his eyes are dark and wild. "I love you."
"I love you too." His hand slides between us, finding where I need him most, and the pleasure spikes so sharp I cry out. "Come for me, Luce. Want to feel you."
The climax hits hard, stealing my breath and vision. I clench around him, shaking, and he follows with a broken curse, his hips stuttering as he buries himself deep and holds.