Chapter Twenty-Two
As soon as I pull out of Mom and Dad’s driveway, I drive a few houses down the road in their exclusive gated community and slam on the brakes.
I stop in front of a sprawling modern mansion decked out for Christmas, edged completely in white lights, along with the palm trees.
If I weren’t furious, I’d actually admire the professional lighting as another example of Christmas beauty in Miami.
But I’m pissed.
And Ethan is about to feel my rage right now.
He turns and looks at me in confusion. “What are you doing?”
“Start your lecture now,” I snap angrily. “Because I’m not going to listen to it the whole ride back to your hotel.”
Ever since Ethan’s warning to me at the dishwasher, I’ve been stewing in my own thoughts.
First, I was upset. Then ashamed. I’m the good girl.
I’ve never caused any problems for my family—ever.
So to hear my dad saying things like “Scarlett knows better” and Ethan telling me I need to “knock off” my behavior hurt.
Really, really hurt.
But as we sat around with Mom and Dad in the living room, with the tree twinkling in the background, and eating sugar cookies with sprinkles, I grew angrier.
What have I ever done to deserve this complete distrust?
Why is my dad’s coaching reputation hanging in the balance of who I want to date?
Will people really assume he’d give Aiden preferential treatment just because he’s dating me? That’s idiotic.
So I’m doing something I’ve never done. I’m going to tell Ethan where to stick his lecture.
He exhales loudly. “I thought we could have this conversation back at your place before you take me to the hotel.”
“No. We’re going to have the conversation right now. Not that what I do is any of your business, Ethan.”
His eyes flash. “Oh? I think it is my business when we share the same last name and I’m wearing it on my back—and worse yet, it’s the last name of the Manatees’ head coach.”
This is where I’d begin to waver in the past. I wanted to please everyone, especially my close-knit family. I would follow rules and make concessions for them, to make them happy—or at least that’s what I thought at the time.
But as I sit here, with the Christmas lights of the mansion reflecting into my car, my pulse quickens and my heart thumps against my rib cage as I realize I liked to please people for myself, too.
I liked being the responsible person everyone could count on and turn to, I liked doing the right thing. It made me feel good.
But right now, pleasing Ethan—and my parents—isn’t possible. Losing Aiden isn’t an option, no matter how politically correct it would be and how happy it would make all of them.
It’s time to stand up for myself, and do what is right for me instead of everyone else. It’s called being an adult, and Ethan is going to have to get used to it.
Starting right now.
Ethan folds his muscular arms across his chest, defiance practically radiating from him. “Which Wentworth brother are you hooking up with?” he asks bluntly.
“Neither,” I say, my voice shaking.
A sarcastic laugh bursts through his lips. “I know you are. It was written all over your face. So which one, Scarlett? Want me to find out by chirping them on the ice tomorrow night?”
“You wouldn’t dare,” I spit.
But honestly, I’m not sure. Where Jamie is the romantic, Ethan is hard-edged. And he can be a stubborn ass when he thinks he’s right about something.
“Oh, I would dare,” he threatens.
“It’s not hooking up. We’re dating.”
Recognition lights in his eyes. “Aiden.”
I shift my gaze straight ahead, to the different colors of twinkling Christmas lights farther down the street, and nod.
“I don’t know what kind of alternate captain sneaks around with his coach’s daughter, but that’s a bullshit move.”
I whip my head around to face him. “Do you honestly think Aiden would take this kind of risk to date me if I didn’t matter to him?”
“I don’t know. Depends on what head he’s thinking with.”
Anger bubbles up in my chest. But unlike teenage Scarlett—or even college Scarlett—I don’t repress my feelings or try to brush them off as my family being protective because they love me so much.
This is about my family seeing me through that same lens, even though I’ve grown up. This is my brother overstepping where he’s not welcome.
Or needed.
“You’re suggesting the only reason Aiden would want to date me would be to screw me?
Not that he sees something wonderful in me, or that I can make him laugh, or that I know he loves Cuban coffee, or that his heart was ripped out once before, but he sees something so wonderful in me that the bigger risk for him is not being torn apart by my family, but getting his heart broken all over again? ”
The words fly past my lips, tumbling out in a heated rush, and when I finish, I can feel my chest rising and falling rapidly. Ethan’s blue eyes are wide, and even in the darkness, I can see his shock.
“How dare you insult me like this,” I continue, my confidence in myself—and my feelings for Aiden—bursting through.
“I have found something wonderful and sincere with Aiden. He is kind. Thoughtful. The day I spilled my matcha on the sidewalk? He had the exact order I liked waiting in the cup holder for me later that night because he felt bad I lost mine. He sees me and wants the best for me—”
“Right, he wants the best for you, so he’s putting you in a horrible position with your own dad,” Ethan snaps.
“Oh my God, you don’t even see it!” I respond.
“I’m not the one in a horrible position!
It’s Aiden who is taking all the risks. He is the one who will not only have to face disappointing a coach he admires, but also Dad’s wrath and whatever consequences will follow.
Aiden has worked so hard to be a leader on this team.
He’s given everything to this sport. Aiden loves hockey.
Hockey cost him his first love. She hated the distance, and she didn’t want to do it with him. It nearly broke him open, Ethan.
“But despite that, despite everything he could lose—the respect of Dad, the A on his chest, even his own damn heart—Aiden is taking this chance,” I continue.
“If Dad decides to punish him, he’s the one who is going to suffer.
Not me. Aiden knows this, but here he is, putting everything on the line, because of what he feels.
And I don’t know of many men who would do that. But Aiden is.”
Silence fills the car. Ethan continues to stare, his eyes still wide, at the sister he thought he knew until this very moment.
I hold his gaze, my chin tilted up, adrenaline pumping through my veins as I wait for him to respond.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t trust any man who would break code like this,” he says, his voice no longer harsh, but matter of fact. “Who would deceive his coach like this? Especially when Dad has put so much faith in him. Put that A on his chest when he’s just come to the team.”
My confidence pops as if Ethan took a pin and shoved it into a balloon. Heaviness weighs over me, deflating me, sinking into my heart.
Ethan is just like Dad. Not just in appearance, but in the way he thinks, in the way he acts.
In my heart of hearts, I imagined an ugly scene between Dad and Aiden and me when the truth came out, but I also envisioned him hearing Aiden’s heartfelt words about his feelings.
My stories of how Aiden has changed me. Cared for me.
Loved me, if Aiden tells me that before we go to my parents and tell them we’re dating.
But staring at Ethan is a reality check.
He heard my story. Let me speak until I had no further words to say. He took a few minutes to digest it, and it didn’t matter.
Tears prick my eyes.
It didn’t matter, my brain repeats. And Aiden is going to be torn apart.
“If you were Dad,” I ask, my voice thick, “would you trade Aiden for something like this?”
Ethan doesn’t hesitate. “Yes. After I stripped the A off his chest. This is unforgivable, Scarlett. You’re off-limits to that entire team.
Aiden knows this. And you don’t think this will make his reputation trash around the league?
Because it will get out. All this respect he’s worked so hard for? Gone.”
I’m going to be sick. I knew this could be the reality, I knew it, but I somehow thought I could make my family see differently. Or I told myself Aiden could, with time, move past this. Win my dad over with how he loved me.
Dad will humiliate him and trade him, I think, panic clawing at my chest. Not because my dad is a horrible man, but because of stupid hockey code. Pride. This vision that I’m this little girl who needs to be protected.
If I couldn’t make Ethan see me as an adult, there’s no way Mom and Dad will.
If I stay with Aiden, I’m going to ruin him. We’ll be separated. Aiden will be shipped off to a new city, and when he’s on that new team, with no respect, no alternate captaincy, will I be worth it?
No, I think, my heart wrenching. He will hate me for what I did to him.
“Well,” I say, my voice shaking, “thank you for your honesty.”
Ethan winces. I shift my gaze straight ahead, the Christmas lights of the neighborhood blurring in my eyes as I try to blink the tears away.
“Scarlett, I’m really sorry,” he says, and I hear the pain in his voice. “But I’ve always been honest with you, even when it hurts.”
I nod, not trusting my voice to speak. Silence fills the car once again.
I force the tears away and swallow hard. Then I clear my throat. “I’d better get you back to the hotel,” I say abruptly. “You do have a game tomorrow.”
“Are you okay?”
No. I’m not okay. I’m falling in love with Aiden, and it’s all slipping through my fingers now.
I don’t answer him. I pull away from the curb, going on autopilot back to the Hotel Fredrico, where professional teams always stay when they play a Miami team.
I swing through the circular drive, pulling right up to the front doors, where a lavish Christmas display of evergreens and twinkling white lights welcomes those coming to the property.
“Scar, I’m—”
“I think it’s best if you just go,” I say simply.
“What are you going to do?”
I turn and stare at Ethan, and see his face is etched with concern. “I think you know what I’m going to do,” I say, my voice strained and strangely quiet to my own ears.
“I’m sorry.”
I don’t say anything.
Ethan exhales loudly and gets out of the car.
I don’t even wait to watch him enter the hotel.
I swing my car around, gripping the steering wheel as I navigate my way out of the circular drive, as if I can squeeze it tight enough to gather up the strength and courage to do what I need to do right now.
I need to see Aiden.
And I need to let him go.