Chapter 31 – Knox
thirty-one
Knox
I walk out of her apartment, slamming the door behind me. The anger soars through me as I press the elevator button once, twice, three times, until all I’m doing is pressing the fucking button. My eyes go down to my hand instead of turning to look at her door.
The elevator comes and I press the lobby button. The minute the doors close, it sounds like what prison doors sound like when they are sealed shut. I walk out of her apartment building and get into my car, my body feeling numb.
I don’t even know how I make it home. When I step into my bedroom and collapse on top of my bed, I look up at the ceiling.
The pain I feel is something I don’t think I’ve ever felt before.
When I found Josephine in bed with Jeremy I was pissed and hurt, but it didn’t feel like my world was shattered, or rather I thought it was shattered at the time.
But now, now that I’m here, I am having a hard time even breathing, let alone being able to do anything.
I thought I was brokenhearted before, but that was a lie.
I don’t think my body can move, it feels as if I went in the middle of the road and played chicken with a truck and lost. I just let him run me fucking over.
I turn on my side and sigh as I hear her words play over in my head, over and over again.
“What I know is, I’m telling you I’m not interested in this or in you, and you have to let it go. ”
I replay every fucking memory I have of the two of us, from the first fucking time I met her until the last time I kissed her.
I replay the whole trip and all I see is her smiling face and her holding my hand.
I see her asleep beside me. I see her fucking everywhere.
If I knew it was the last time I was going to kiss her, I would have kissed her longer.
I would have savored it more. If I knew the last time I was in bed with her was our last, I would have held onto her tighter.
I wouldn’t have let her go. All I keep thinking is this can’t be happening. This can’t be happening.
I don’t sleep a fucking wink and when the alarm rings the next day, I shut it off. Then I make the mistake of going to my texts to see if she texted me that she was wrong. But all that’s there is my last text to her.
Me:
Landing at four. Want to have dinner with me?
I get up and head to the bathroom, washing my face before walking down the stairs and heading out to the rink. We have a mandatory practice today and I can’t miss it. I feel like death, and I’m pretty sure I look even worse.
I shut the door of the SUV after I park and pull open the door, heading to the locker room. I give a couple of the guys the chin up and I see one of the rookies look at me with wide eyes, but he doesn’t say anything to me.
I toss my phone on the shelf before walking back out and heading to the kitchen.
I don’t want to eat anything, but I’m not stupid enough to get on the ice without fueling my body.
I’m sitting down when Kirby and Jaxon both come into the room, Jaxon with a takeout coffee cup in his hand.
“You look like shit, man,” he remarks and I nod my head.
“Good,” I say, “feel like shit, so it’s fitting.”
Kirby pulls out the chair across from me and sits down, his eyes on me. “What happened?” he asks me as Jaxon sits in the chair beside him.
“Nothing,” I sigh, my chest feeling like it’s being crushed by a ten-ton weight. They stare at me like they know I’m lying. “I fell in love with her,” I share and Kirby’s face says it all, “and she broke up with me before we were even officially together.”
Kirby’s head falls down and he avoids looking at me. “Wait, Kylie?” Jaxon asks and I nod my head.
“Yup,” I confirm.
“Dude,” he says,” I didn’t know it was that serious.”
“It’s fine.” I hold up my hand. “It’s not fine,” I admit after two seconds, “it’s the opposite of fucking fine. I’m—” I exhale, breathing deeply out of my mouth. “I don’t even know what to say.”
“Do you want me to talk to her?” Kirby asks me and all I can do is shake my head.
“No, she made it pretty clear to me that she’s not interested.”
“Fuck, man,” Jaxon says. “I’m sorry, Knox. I can’t even imagine.”
“You know,” I lean back in my chair, “I walked in on my wife fucking someone else who wasn’t me, and I wasn’t even this devastated.”
I hear Kirby hiss. “I don’t know when it happened or how it happened, but I fucking fell so in love with her that I didn’t even know it was happening.” I shake my head. “And it’s over. Even before it fucking started.”
“Did you tell her how you felt?” Kirby asks me and I again shake my head.
“I’m pretty sure when she said I’m not interested in this or you”—Jaxon looks down, avoiding looking at me—“whatever I have to say isn’t going to change her mind.
” I toss my fork down. “So that’s that.” I push away from the table, grabbing my tray and heading over to toss out the food. “I’ll see you guys out there.”
I walk back into the locker room and get ready to head to the ice, where I know I have to shut it out. I’m the first one who knows once you lace up those skates, nothing else matters.
Practice is mind-numbing and when I get off the ice, I avoid talking to anyone. I shower and get the fuck out of there. I get back home and avoid going to my bedroom, instead opting to sit on the couch until I have to go get the kids.
I don’t even have the energy to cook them dinner, instead I order us pizza and we sit watching a movie. Well, they sit watching a movie. I sit contemplating when it changed. When I felt the shift in us. That night I get maybe three hours of sleep, maybe four.
I’m having coffee in the kitchen the next morning as I open my photos and see the pictures we took of the hike.
Even though we had no service and no phones were allowed.
They allowed us to bring our phones to take pictures.
She’s looking straight into the camera, laughing because I said if I saw a cow I would probably eat it raw with how hungry I was.
The minute after the picture was taken, she came to me, put her hands on my stomach, over my T-shirt, and kissed my lips.
“I would help you,” she whispered to me.
“Daddy,” Nora calls, walking into the kitchen, “you left me alone in your bed.”
“Sorry,” I say, turning and holding out my arms for her. She walks into them, and I pick her up as she sits in my lap and I rub her back, her head on my chest. “What did you want to eat for breakfast?”
“Pancake tacos,” she says and I nod my head.
“Okay.” I kiss the top of her head. “I’ll start that right away.”
The kids must feel my mood, because they are abnormally calm.
Westley and Vincent don’t even have one fight over what to watch on television.
When Tessa gets here, I walk up the stairs and get dressed.
I step in my closet and I see her standing here, wearing just my shirt after I fucked her and she helped me pack.
Her hair was all over the place from my hands, and I think that was when I started to fall in love with her.
I get dressed, pushing the memory away, as I slide on my black suit with a white dress shirt. Grabbing a black-and-white tie before sliding my jacket on, I head downstairs. “Okay, I’ll see you guys tonight,” I tell them and they all kiss me goodbye.
I’m on the bike, watching I don’t even know what on television, when Kirby comes up to me. “Hey, man, about tonight.”
I hold up my hand and shake my head. “I don’t want to talk about it. It’ll be fine.”
“Yeah, but—”
“I’ll be fine on the ice,” I assure him. “It’s fine.”
He doesn’t say anything more to me, he just nods his head as he steps away.
I get dressed, the locker room is buzzing as it usually is for a Saturday night home game.
We play during the week also, but Saturday games just hit differently.
I put on my chest protector, tying the sides before sitting and lacing up my skates.
“Going on the five-game winning streak,” Jaxon says to the room, “let’s not fuck it up. ”
I grab my jersey, putting it on over my head and fixing the sleeves as I walk out of the room and head to the ice for the pregame skate.
I grab my stick and see that some of the guys are already on the ice.
I skate on and look around the boards to see if the kids are here when I see her first. She is standing two rows behind my kids, her head to the side as she talks to Lexi beside her.
Her hand is in front of her mouth so no one can see what she is saying.
I don’t even know how I skate up to the glass.
“Daddy!” Nora shouts, jumping up and down, and I look over her head to catch Kylie’s eyes.
She avoids looking my way, even when Vincent goes up to her, holding up a puck that Kirby shot over the glass. She smiles at him and laughs at whatever he says as he holds up his hand, and the two of them do their handshake. I swallow down the lump, feeling rage now course through me.
I toss a puck over the glass and see Nora get it, and then I skate off the ice.
I should be able to shut it off. I should be able to come out here and do my fucking job.
After warmups, the minute I skate back onto the ice, I go to center ice and look at the guy in front of me.
“Hey.” He motions with his chin and I do the same.
I avoid looking up into the suite, where I know they are watching, instead I get down and look over at the referee, who holds the puck in his hand.
“Nothing better than Saturday night hockey,” he says. “Let’s keep it clean.”
He drops the puck and my stick comes out to knock it back, but I lose the face-off and have to follow them into the zone. I feel like I’m two seconds behind everyone in every single play. After the first period, Kirby sits beside me. “Head in the game.”
“Fuck off,” I tell him and he just gets up and walks back to his seat. We start the third period trailing two to one.
I’m on the bench watching the game but not watching the game.
Frustrated with myself that I can’t get my fucking mind off her.
Coach calls my name for my line, and I get up, swing over the bench, and get onto the ice.
Kirby takes the puck and passes it to Lane, who skates down the middle.
I skate with him and the whistle blows as soon as he skates into the zone.
The side referee points to me and says, “Offside.”
I put my head back as Lane swears at me, “What the fuck is up with you?”
I shake my head, going to the side for the face-off.
I’m zero for five tonight and it’s safe to say this is going to be the worst game I’ve ever played.
We backtrack to our zone and I follow behind, waiting at the blue line for them to pass me the puck.
Kirby tries to clear the puck but I’m too slow to intercept it, and the guy takes a shot on the net.
Luckily, it’s saved and the play is dead.
We do a line change and when there are three minutes to go, we pull the goalie and Coach taps my shoulder, and I get on there so we can play six on five.
I skate into the zone, my eyes on the puck.
I move to the net, watching Kirby pass the puck to Jaxon and then pass it again.
Jaxon shoots the puck and I watch it bounce off the goalie’s pad and I put my stick down and try to tip it in.
The goalie puts his glove over the puck, but I give him two more shots with my stick.
The defenseman on the other team pushes me away from him, and I don’t even know what comes over me.
I push him back and then move my hand back to punch him in the face.
The whistle blows three times, and the referees now come over to try and break up the skirmish that is happening in front of the net.
Jaxon is pushing me away from the guys while Kirby is standing, making sure no one comes for me.
The referee goes to the middle of the ice.
“Number six” he says my name, “two minutes for roughing.” I shake my head and head to the penalty box, slamming the door and sitting down.
I look up and see there are two minutes and forty seconds left.
I take off my gloves, placing them on the side as I watch my team go out there and play five on four. Now that the goalie is back in the net.
It takes the other team forty-five seconds before they score the goal, and I grab my gloves and skate out of the box, past the celebration of the other team and straight to the bench.
I don’t even bother sitting, I just head to the back, where I whip my stick against the wall.
No one says a word in the locker room. No one fucking needs to, I know I let my whole fucking team down.
I get dressed and head up to the suite, my heart beating faster when I know I’m going to see her.
I open the door and step in, my eyes doing a sweep of the room and spotting my kids with Tessa on the side of the room. “Daddy,” Nora says, coming over to me, “you went into the bad boy box,” I nod at her, “and then you lost.”
“I did,” I say, looking around again. Spotting Lexi in the corner with Ariella, I know if Kylie were here that is where she would be. “Let’s get out of here,” I urge, my heart broken yet again.