Chapter 20
Marry in Haste
Justin
Mia showed up the next morning with her game face on. Her smile was forced and she didn’t meet my eyes as she said hello and moved to the coffeemaker, keeping herself busy and her back to me.
It was tempting to follow her lead and pretend the kiss never happened. After a bit of awkwardness, we’d move on. It was a tried and true technique for me. But long term, it didn’t work.
More than that, I needed to make sure Mia was okay. No one else was checking on her.
“We should talk about the kiss.” My eyes stayed glued to the empty coffee cup as I forced the words out.
Mia whirled around. “Um…we don’t, not really. We were just overwhelmed by memories or pheromones or whatever and we agree nothing happened and move on.”
It would be easy to just agree but… “Unless it happens again?”
“What? It won’t—I mean, you said you shouldn’t have. You don’t want to, do you?”
Her eyes were wide and panicked. She didn’t look like a woman who wanted a repeat, which gave me another chance to opt out, but nope. Not this time.
“I shouldn’t and I don’t want to are different things.
We need to own up to still being attracted to each other.
” I’d never found scrubs sexy before, but on Mia?
Definitely. My eyes had wandered from looking at the coffee cup to admiring the way her breasts pushed against her top, and damn.
That was not what I should be doing. She might try to deny it, but she’d returned that kiss. She’d enjoyed it.
“But we’ve moved on, right?”
I leaned back, working this out as we talked. “Being attracted and having feelings are different. The chemistry might still be there between us”—and it was—“but that doesn’t mean the emotions follow. I had a huge crush on Tessa Virtue when I first started noticing girls, but it was just a crush.”
Mia crossed her arms, hip leaning on the counter. “I remember you telling me that. You’re saying it’s just a physical thing, that kiss.”
I hoped it was, because otherwise I was in deep shit. “We always had chemistry, so it’s not really a shock that it’s still there.”
“But just chemistry.”
I shrugged. “Yeah. Emotions—that’s more than attraction and sex. Right?”
Mia wasn’t tense now. She had that crease in her brow that meant she was thinking about something. Remembering that had nothing to do with chemistry and everything to do with emotion, and that was what needed to be squashed.
“You have a point. Actors and athletes you see on TV might inspire fantasies, but that’s not emotion.” She nodded, as if that would make it so.
Now I wanted to know who these men were who inspired Mia’s fantasies.
Actors and athletes—like her ex and me. Though athletes were more likely to be someone like Cooper.
I loosened my grip on the coffee cup since my knuckles were showing white.
“So we admit we’re attracted to each other, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t moved on. ”
The words felt wrong as I said them, but what the hell else was I supposed to do to get over Mia?
She twisted her lips. “Since we both got married. Unless that was just chemistry.” Her cheeks turned red. “Not that it’s any of my business! And I’m not saying that with Erik—” She covered her face with her hands.
Was it just chemistry with her ex, not real emotion?
But they got married. Had a child together.
Or maybe it was like Sharleen and me, where chemistry faked emotion.
I hadn’t realized until it was too late.
Not that I wanted to spill my guts, but perhaps this was part of the process.
Or maybe I just wanted Mia to feel better.
“I feel terrible admitting this, but I didn’t really love Sharleen.”
Mia lifted her face. “What?”
I looked at my hands, the cast covered with colorful scribbles Arne had left.
It was easier to tell my story when I wasn’t watching whoever was listening.
“I thought it was love. I wouldn’t have proposed if I didn’t think I loved her and she loved me.
But it was fast, and once we were together the incompatibilities showed.
She wanted to go out all the time. I’d only been at clubs because being alone in my place had driven me nuts.
I was ready for quiet nights at home, and she wanted to keep going out to enjoy her status as a WAG. ”
Mia cocked her head. “How did you deal with it?”
“I tried to compromise. We’d go out, just not every night.
I was pushing myself to stay on the NHL team, which was exhausting, so I was never enough fun for her.
On the nights we stayed in, she was bored and restless—she didn’t want to watch TV or read a book or any of the things I liked to do.
So eventually I just told her to go out without me.
” The peace when I was in the place on my own was nice, but I ended up as lonely married as I had been single.
Mia looked down. “It was kind of like that for Erik and me. He wanted to do things and complained all I did was work or school or take care of Arne and my family.”
I knew how much her family ate up her time.
“Erik and I were all chemistry. We met in class, and I was lonely too. Then I got pregnant and Erik insisted we get married. His parents would have been disappointed if he’d done anything else. We lived with my family, and when Arne came along I had no time or energy for anything.”
I frowned. “Wasn’t he helping with Arne? Or was he working?”
The corner of her mouth quirked. “His idea of being a father didn’t kick in until the kid was old enough to be fun. He had a more traditional division of labor in mind, like his parents had when he was growing up.”
“I’m sorry.” I knew Mia’s big heart, and how she would try to be everything for everyone. She needed a partner who would help carry the load, not leave her to do it all on her own.
To spend time with her, back then, I’d helped with her siblings, gone shopping with her—I hadn’t cared what we were doing as long as it was together. I’d been disappointed that she couldn’t come to a lot of my games, but it gave me an excuse to go straight home.
She shrugged. “Marry in haste… Erik finally got fed up. He wanted to pursue acting in LA, wanted Arne and me to come with him. I was supposed to find a job and I’m not sure what he thought would happen with our son while he was auditioning and I was working.
I couldn’t abandon Mom and the kids though, so he left and—” A long sigh. “That was it.”
“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “You didn’t deserve that.”
“I wasn’t much of a partner.”
“You were raising his kid. And there’s no way he didn’t know about your family before you got married.
He wanted you to leave that all behind so he could chase his dreams?
” Fuck. It was too much like what had happened with Mia and me.
Except I left to support my family, not a dream.
Did that make it any better? “You have every right to be pissed with him.”
Her eyes dropped. “I don’t want to damage his relationship with Arne. It already sucks that he hardly sees his dad and I’m so busy all the time.”
I held in angry words. She was busy because her family took advantage of her. Her ex did as well, getting to have a connection with his son because Mia was willing to sacrifice for her kid.
Was I any better? Looking back, our family’s financial situation wasn’t as dire as Mom and Dad had made me believe. If I’d stayed, things would have been tight but we would have survived, since Grandma provided a home for us.
But Mia’s mom would still have needed help. Bruce would have still gotten a DUI. And eventually I’d have had to leave to play hockey. Our dream of her going with me when her siblings were older was a pipe dream. Mia would sacrifice herself over and over again for them.
“I wish your family appreciated you.”
She frowned. “Does yours?”
I considered. “Jess does. Grandma did. Mom and Dad—” I shrugged. “They might have taken me for granted, but not anymore.”
“I envied you, having a sibling like Jess.”
Because Jess always had my back, and who had Mia’s? No one. “I was taking advantage of her, but I’m not going to anymore. Even if it means I pretend to be happy she’s with Alek Denbrowski.”
Mia grinned. “How did that even happen?”
I told her about Jess’s anonymous hookup who turned out to be the last guy she should have slept with, but something real had happened with them. Chemistry that led to more.
We didn’t talk about the kiss again, but I vowed I’d make Mia’s life easier, not more difficult.
There wasn’t much I could do. Anything the money I now had could provide—food, care for her mom, house cleaning and upkeep—she’d never accept.
All I could do was offer an easy job where she could set her hours and bring her kid if needed, and lend her a car.
Even if I wasn’t getting over her the way I hoped, I wasn’t going to mess things up for her by kissing her again.
In this case, emotions were going to be stronger than chemistry.