Chapter 26
Chapter
Twenty-Six
By the time I made it to Shar and Rob’s front step, my jeans were soaked halfway up my shins, and my eyelashes had tiny ice crystals clinging to them.
The snowstorm had rolled in fast. One of those Alberta specials where the sky went from normal to end of days in an hour.
The wind clawed at my scarf as I hunched against it, one gloved hand clamped around a Tupperware of cookies I’d brought for them.
Jenna made them. She’d picked me up from Logan’s, but I insisted on walking to Shar’s since Jenna had a paper due in the morning and I wasn’t ready to leave right away.
I regretted everything.
I knocked, and Shar opened the door, hair in a messy bun, wearing leggings and one of Rob’s oversized hoodies. Warm air spilled out, smelling like fresh bread and oregano.
“What are you doing out in this?” she demanded, grabbing my sleeve and hauling me inside. “You’re going to freeze to death.”
“To be fair, I didn’t know it was going to dump.” I held the door open and kicked snow off my shoes. “Also, hi.”
I handed her the cookies and got my shoes off, then took off my toque and unwrapped my scarf, avoiding her eyes. When I finally looked up, every emotion inside me rushed forward like the tide.
I clamped my jaw, trying to fight it back, but my eyes still watered, making my nose tingle so bad, I coughed.
Shar dropped the cookies on the side table and pulled me into a hug. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“I call bullshit. What’s going on?” She held me while I sobbed into her shoulder, and when I finally pulled back, I didn’t have to say anything.
Shar’s face fell. “Oh, Crys . . .”
“I didn’t mean for it to happen!”
Shar grabbed my hand and pulled me to the couch. We sank onto the cushions, and she handed me a tissue box. Baby toys were scattered on the rug, there was a stack of music scores on the coffee table, and a half-finished mug of tea on the end table, now accompanied by the cookies I brought.
Shar tucked her legs under her. “Okay. Start talking.”
So I did. I told her about the late-night phone calls. The reception at the Palliser. Started with the weekend at the Banff Springs hotel and then struggled to explain what had happened that night in our hotel room.
“He said what?” Shar’s eyes flashed, and I had to talk her down.
Logan hadn’t pressured me into anything. He’d never made me feel unsafe or like he wouldn’t respect whatever boundaries I set. I wasn’t angry with him. I was angry with myself.
“I don’t know how I let this happen. I knew from the beginning this was fake. We never pretended it was anything different, but now it’s going to end, and I don’t think I want it to—” My voice caught, and Shar pulled me into another hug.
She held me for a long moment, until I had to blow my nose so I wouldn’t snot all over Rob’s sweatshirt.
Shar was quiet. When I finished adding to my pile of tissues on the coffee table, she said, “I’m honestly a little shocked.”
“I know. I don’t know what I was thinking—”
“No, about Logan.”
I wiped my cheeks. “What?”
She looked down at her hands. “Those conversations you’re having? He never talked like that with me.”
“Shar—”
“No, I’m not upset about it, I’m just surprised. I didn’t think he was capable of being that open with someone.”
I dropped my head back on the cushions. “It’s probably because he knows there’s no risk. What am I going to do? Tell everyone? Admit that I forced him into dating me so I could get a job?”
“Okay, that’s not fair. You gave him the chance to say no, and I don’t think that’s what’s happening here.
The Logan I knew wouldn’t have admitted he was bad at sex, ever.
I’m not sure it even once crossed his mind.
” Shar’s mouth quirked, and she lowered her voice even though Rob hadn’t made an appearance. “You’re saying he’s good at it now?”
I twisted my head to look at her without lifting it. “Um, yeah. He’s good.” Good didn’t begin to cover it. I dreamed about him. He monopolized my thoughts from the time I woke up until I saw his truck pull up outside my apartment.
Shar’s eyes widened. “Well, you must be an excellent teacher.”
I half-laughed, half-groaned. “I’ve created a monster.” It was me. The Logan-addicted, Kemp-craving monster was me.
Shar new exactly what I was getting at. “But how do you know he doesn’t want the same thing you do?”
I didn’t, not specifically. But what was I supposed to do? Tell him I decided I didn’t want to honour our end date? We had an agreement, and he’d never said a word to indicate he wasn’t planning to abide by it.
“If he did, wouldn’t he tell me?” I asked.
Shar considered that. “If you asked me that question a month ago, I would’ve said absolutely not. But . . . I don’t think I know Logan anymore. Not really.”
I drew a deep breath and exhaled. “I don’t know. He’s so open about some things, but then with others, he’s completely closed.”
“Like what?”
“Like his mom’s affair.”
Shar’s jaw dropped. Oops. Guess I’d left that part out. I filled her in, telling her more details than I’d given Logan since I knew she wouldn’t flip her lid.
“Oh, damn.”
I nodded. “Yeah. He still hasn’t said a word. I see his mom at the gallery, and she just walks around with Norman like everything is completely normal.”
Shar sighed. “Okay, see, that Logan I do get.”
I waited for Shar to continue.
“I’ve thought about this a lot, actually,” she said, “about what he admitted to me when he came back to the apartment. He said he only knew how to love hockey, and I’m not going to pretend that I know his family well, but from what I’ve seen, I get it.”
I nodded. I thought I knew what she was getting at, but I wanted to hear her explanation. “They seem like they have high expectations.”
Shar made a face. “Most parents have high expectations. The problem comes if they don’t accept you unless you meet them.”
“But Logan has met all of their expectations.”
“Yeah, I know. And do his parents feel loving to you? Have you met them?”
I let out a breath. “I’ve only met his dad once. I’ve seen Alice a few times.”
“Well, she’s the more warm and fuzzy of the two of them.”
Yikes. I thought back to the interactions I'd observed between Logan and Alice. It wasn’t that they were bad, but they felt almost transactional.
Like they were work colleagues or associates.
When they talked about Logan at the Palliser, it didn’t feel loving.
Maybe a little like pride, but mostly it felt like they were putting things in order.
“Logan told me they were pretty strict growing up.”
“That’s one way to put it.” Shar scoffed. “Did he tell you what they said to me the first time we met?”
I shook my head.
“His mom said that he had high potential, and if he was going to have God’s help getting to the NHL, he needed to keep himself pure.”
I nearly choked on my spit.
Shar held up a hand. “And here’s the thing, I have no problem with their religious beliefs.
What I have a problem with is that she was telling me as if it was my responsibility to make sure he didn’t screw up.
” She reached up and tightened her bun. “It’s like they don’t see Logan as a real person.
He’s their action figure. They can pick him up and put him wherever they want, and he’ll do what he’s told.
They don’t want anyone else touching him. ”
I remembered Logan in our hotel room, how he’d responded when I teased him about his parents’ approval. “I don’t think he wants to play their games anymore.”
Shar pursed her lips. “Then why hasn’t he called his mom out for cheating?”
I turned to the side, curling into myself on the couch. I’d been asking myself that for the last couple of weeks. “I don’t know.”
Shar’s expression softened. “Crys, Logan’s a great guy. He’s funny. He’s an incredibly hard worker. He’s beyond generous. You saw what he did for Rob, letting him live in that apartment rent-free. He’s got a good heart. But you know why I think he loves hockey so much?”
I wet my lips. “Because it’s in his control.”
She nodded. “That’s all he’s ever been shown. Love doesn’t mean letting go or sacrifice. It means something he’s good at, something he can predict, something he can check the boxes for and get the exact result he was promised. That’s all that’s been modelled in the Kemp household.”
My throat thickened. “I get that. I do. I’ve seen it.
I know exactly what you’re saying. But I think he wants something different.
Maybe he just doesn’t know how to do it.
” She studied me. I went on, “Did you know, after you broke up with him, he called his exes?” Her eyes widened.
“Yeah. He asked them what he did wrong and how he could fix it.”
“But that’s exactly it. He’s trying to be good at a relationship, trying to understand it so he can excel.”
My cheeks flamed. That was almost exactly what he’d said to me in the hotel room.
“But when it comes down to it,” Sharla continued, “is he going to be willing to take the leap? Put himself on the line? Because you don’t want a partner who you can’t trust to do the hard things.”
She motioned to the hallway. “I thought getting married was scary, but having kids? I’m already messing everything up.
Both of us are. Carter’s only a month old, and we can’t control whether he eats or sleeps.
Loving Rob is scary, but loving Carter?” Her voice went soft.
“It’s like my heart is living outside of my chest. And if Rob wasn’t willing to be all in with me? I don’t know, Crys.”
Tears filled my eyes. Her words wouldn’t be making me cry if I didn’t know they were true. “So what do I do? Because I think my heart is—” I couldn’t finish the sentence.
Shar teared up, reaching for my hand. “I wish I could tell you that it’ll all be fine . . . but I walked away because I knew it wouldn’t be.”
“What would it have taken for you to stay?”
She shook her head. “So many things. But the biggest one? I would’ve needed to see that he wasn’t just worried about making life go smoothly for himself. That when something really mattered, he was willing to take the hit.”
“But what would that look like? How would I be able to tell?”
Shar squeezed my hand. “There’s a hit he’s not willing to take right now, isn’t there?”