Chapter Sixteen
IAN
I close Lila’s bedroom door behind me quietly, not wanting to wake her. She dozed off in my arms after round two, and while watching her sleep like a creep is tempting, I imagine she’ll be hungry when she wakes up. We did technically skip dinner, after all. Not that I’m complaining in the slightest.
I can feel a smile etched onto my mouth as fresh images of her above me and beneath me flit through my thoughts, half tempted to go back the way I came and wake her up for more. Now that I’ve had her, it feels like I might never get enough, and sure, that’s a little scary, but it also feels…right, somehow. That’s the part that is the most jarring about all of this, how not weird it is. I guess part of me thought that with our history, with the progression of what we were and what we’re becoming—that it might be awkward. But I feel none of that. Honestly, for the first time in a long time, I feel…settled. Happy, even.
And I know it’s all because of the gorgeous woman snoring softly in her bed.
I keep my steps quiet as I move toward Lila’s kitchen, pausing for only a second to laugh at the glass display case just off the living room that does in fact house the Porcelain Pride with, well, pride—moving on after a few seconds so as not to rob Lila the pleasure of showing me her newest additions. I open up a few of her cabinets instead; I’m nowhere near Lila’s level of culinary prowess, but surely I can whip up something that she’ll eat, her constant worries of me burning something be damned.
I’m currently ignoring a text from Jack that’s sitting unread on my phone, which is tucked in the rear pocket of the jeans I slipped back into; I don’t want to lie to him by any means, but telling him about Lila and me should be a joint effort. She should have even more say about how it happens, I think, given that it’s her brother. I want to believe that Jack wouldn’t actually disown me for this, not with the way I care about Lila, but I can’t pretend there isn’t a niggling worry at the back of my mind, however small. I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.
I’m pulling a box of spaghetti out of Lila’s pantry—there was some sort of leftover meat sauce in the fridge, and even I can use a microwave—when I feel my phone start buzzing with a call in my pocket. I dig it out and check the display before answering.
“Mei?”
“Hey, Ginger Giant.”
I roll my eyes, amending, “Bella.”
“What’s up? My wife wants you over for dinner, for some reason.”
“Maybe she misses me,” I taunt. It’s harmless, since Bella and I both know that Mei is head over heels for her, but it’s still fun. “Maybe she’s already tired of you.”
“Hardly,” Bella scoffs. “She’d miss that thing I do with my t—”
“Bella,” my ex-wife hisses after what sounds like a small scuffle. I hear Mei sigh heavily, and then her voice is coming through the speaker. “For fuck’s sake. Is it too early for divorce?”
“You love me!” Bella yells from the background. “No take-backsies!”
Another labored sigh before, “We just got back yesterday. I wanted to see how you were doing.”
“I’m…” My mouth quirks on its own, thinking about the woman in the other room. “I’m great, actually.”
“Huh.”
“What?”
“You actually sound…happy,” Bella chimes in, suspicion in her tone. “What’s going on?”
“Am I on speaker?”
“Duh,” Bella says, at the same time as Mei’s, “Of course not.”
“Wow,” I laugh. “Smooth.”
“Shut up and spill,” Bella tuts. “Why do you sound so happy?”
“I can’t sound happy?”
“Normally you sound like someone ate your puppy in front of you.”
“That’s a horrifying image,” Mei says.
Bella snorts. “But am I wrong?”
“You do sound…” Mei trails off, as if thinking. “You sound different.”
I pause after filling one of Lila’s pots with water, weighing my response. “I’ve just had an…interesting month.”
“Does that interesting month have anything to do with a hot baker?” Bella singsongs.
“Bella,” Mei hisses. “We said we wouldn’t pry.”
“You said,” Bella corrects. “I said no such thing.”
“We’re supposed to be a united front,” Mei argues.
Bella’s voice turns coy. “I can give you a united front if you want, baby.”
“Ladies,” I interrupt, not needing to hear their foreplay. “Focus.”
“Right,” Mei says. “Okay. So we are curious.”
“I told you it was just a PR thing.” It’s not a lie, per se, but it’s definitely not the truth. Not anymore. I’m just not sure how much I should say, given that Lila and I haven’t discussed what we might tell people. If we’re even telling people at all. “Our publicists put it together.”
“Those pictures I saw looked downright saucy,” Bella points out.
I frown. “Who says saucy anymore?”
“Me, motherfucker,” Bella says, blowing a raspberry. “Don’t deflect.”
“I don’t have anything to tell you,” I say carefully. “At least…not right now.”
“Hmm.” Mei sounds thoughtful. “How about you invite your friend to dinner with us? I’d love to officially meet her.”
My nose scrunches as I watch little bubbles start to form in the pot of water. “That won’t be weird?”
“Only if there’s something going on,” Bella answers in an accusing tone.
Mei clucks her tongue. “No, not even then. It wouldn’t be weird at all, because Ian would totally be honest about what we were to each other to anyone he cared about, right?”
“Right,” I say immediately. I wince before adding, “If there was someone.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Bella huffs. “Bring the baker to dinner. Ha, baker. Get it? Because she’s a baker, and her name is Baker…”
Mei sighs wearily. “Honestly, I love you, but sometimes I do question it.”
“Sure you do.” I hear the sound of Bella smacking a kiss on Mei. “Keep telling yourself that.”
I hear Mei’s voice more clearly, and it seems like maybe she’s taken me off speakerphone. “We would love to see you,” she stresses. “And any of your…friends. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, I know,” I tell her. “I just need to make sure it’s okay with my…friend. Before confirming anything, yeah?”
“I get it,” she assures me. “Whenever you confirm things, let us know, okay?”
“You’ll be the first,” I say, which is probably true, outside of Jack. We’ll have to play it by ear. “I gotta go, okay? I’ll text you about dinner.”
“Okay. Love you.”
“Love you too.”
I set my phone on the counter after hanging up, mulling over the conversation, wondering if Lila will want to tell people about us. Realizing that I do. I want everyone to know she’s mine. I want to make sure that there’s zero chance of anyone snatching her away. I’ve never been possessive before, but something about Lila fills me with an almost caveman-like feeling, one that has me wanting to wrap her up in my arms and stow her away somewhere.
Which I know Lila would one thousand percent kick my ass for, if I ever dared to try.
I shake off the thought as I dump the dry spaghetti into the now-boiling water, flicking my eyes to the counter when my phone starts buzzing again. I answer without looking this time—mostly because I’m busy looking for the salt container for the pasta, and I assume it’s Mei calling again to tell me something she forgot the first time, which she has a habit of—absently clicking the speaker button to give her a taste of her own medicine.
“What did you forget this time?”
“Ian?”
I pause, my hand suspended in midair in front of one of Lila’s cabinets as I jerk my head toward the phone. I purse my lips, half considering pretending I’m too busy to talk. I don’t exactly want anything spoiling my good mood, and this conversation definitely has the potential to do so. Which almost makes me feel guilty for even thinking it.
“Abby,” I say finally. “What’s up?”
“Nothing much,” she answers quietly, but I know that’s not the case.
She never calls me unless there is something, and I have often wondered if that’s my fault.
I frown as I continue what I was doing, grabbing the salt and sprinkling some into the boiling water and giving the pasta a stir. “Sure about that?”
“I…” She blows out a frustrated breath. “I just talked to him.”
“Never a good idea, in my experience,” I mutter.
“Yeah, well.” She really is too young to sound so weary. “I guess I’m a glutton for punishment.”
“What did he say?”
“More of the same old shit,” she says. “I just…I don’t know why I keep wanting it to be different.”
“Abby…” I pause, frowning. I know what she’s feeling, but I don’t want to be the one to completely snuff out her hope. “You’re not going to find what you’re looking for. Not with him. He’s just not wired that way.”
“I know that, I do, but—” I can hear her puff air from her nostrils. “It just sucks, you know? I didn’t ask for any of this.”
“I know you didn’t,” I tell her quietly. “This isn’t your fault.”
“And I’m sorry for dumping my problems on you,” she barrels on. “I know it isn’t your fault, either, and I know you definitely didn’t ask for this any more than I did, but I—”
“Abby,” I interrupt calmly. “Listen. You don’t have to apologize to me, okay? I’m here for you. I’ll always be here for you, got it? I care about you, and that means I want to help you when you need it. I know I haven’t been very good about being there, but it’s not because I don’t—”
“Ian?”
I turn to look behind me with my mouth parted midsentence—a sleepy-looking Lila blinking at me from the attached living room with her arms wrapped around her middle and a puzzled expression on her face.
“Lila,” I breathe.
Abby’s voice sounds from the speaker on my phone. “Who’s that?”
“Abby,” I say, clearing my throat. “Can I call you back?”
“Oh. Um. Sure.”
I probably seem like a dick leaving her hanging like this, but I don’t know how much Lila heard, and the idea of her misconstruing whatever it was that she heard makes my stomach clench.
“Thanks,” I tell Abby. “We’ll talk soon.”
“Okay.”
I don’t move even after Abby hangs up, still watching Lila as she eyes me curiously.
“Hey,” I offer quietly. “Sleep well?”
“I slept okay,” she says, her brow wrinkling. “You were gone when I got up.”
“Yeah, I…” I gesture at the pot in front of me. “I found some sauce in the fridge, and there was pasta in the pantry, and I thought…”
Lila’s mouth quirks. “Really pulling out all the stops for me, huh, Cupcake?”
“Right,” I manage, relief flooding through me. Her joking is a good sign. “Only the best food that you mostly cooked yourself.”
She bites back a grin, but there’s still an uncertainty to her gaze. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“You didn’t,” I tell her immediately. “You really didn’t. That was…” I frown, wondering where to even begin to explain. “You see, that was actually—”
“Ian,” she interrupts, holding up a hand. “You don’t owe me an explanation. Seriously. I trust you.”
A knot I hadn’t even realized had been bundling up in my chest starts to loosen, a warm feeling flooding in its wake that feels too big for the short span of time since Lila has come back into my life. I nod slowly back at her, my tongue feeling too thick all of a sudden.
“Thank you,” I manage hoarsely. “I’m glad that you trust me.” I shift my weight from one foot to the other, realizing that I want her to know. She deserves that. “I’d still like to explain, if you don’t mind. I think…” I nod to myself. “I think I’d feel better if I did.”
“Okay,” she says quietly, stepping across the living room and into the kitchen. She doesn’t stop until she reaches me, pressing up on her toes and leaving a kiss at my cheek. “Finish the food, and we’ll talk about it, okay?”
I wrap an arm around her waist, pulling her tight against me and pressing my nose to her hair just to breathe her in. “Okay,” I murmur. “Sounds good.”
She’s smiling when she pulls away, saying something about freshening up in the bathroom, and I watch her the entire time she goes, trying to piece together how to lay all my secrets bare to the one person I worry about disappointing the most. But she deserves to know, I resolve. Especially if there’s any hope to ensure this thing between us is lasting.
And I want it to be, I realize all at once.
Desperately.
Dinner is a quiet affair. I’m aware the entire time that Lila is giving me space, letting me approach on my own terms the subject of the phone call she heard; she’s always so careful with other people. It has always felt like Lila can sense what others need more than they know themselves. When we were kids, it was as simple as a cookie after a hard test, or maybe even a dumb joke after a bad day—I don’t think I ever fully realized the extent of how good she’s always been at reading people, most of all me.
It just makes me appreciate her more.
“That was good,” she says, dropping her fork onto her plate.
I can’t help but laugh. “It was your sauce. I just reheated it.”
“Hey, you didn’t burn it.”
I roll my eyes. “I rarely burn my food; you realize that, right?”
“Pics or it didn’t happen.”
“Right,” I snort. I push the last bite I’m avoiding around my own plate, my jaw working as I try to figure out just how to broach the conversation I’m mostly sure I need to have with her. I want to have it, even. “So, about that call…”
“If it’s difficult, we really don’t have to talk about it.”
She reaches across the table to place her hand over mine, and in that moment, I have a distant thought that it was inevitable that I end up here with her. How could I not, when she’s always been so sure in her blind faith in me? Has anyone in my life ever had that for me?
“I want to,” I say with confidence. “I do. It’s just…I don’t know where to start.”
“Wherever you want,” she tells me in a soothing tone. “I’ll listen to whatever you want to tell me.”
“Well, you know why I left for Canada.”
“I know…as much as I can,” she says carefully.
“Meaning you know what you read.”
“I told you, I never believed that.”
“And I believe that,” I assure her. “But I know that you had nothing else to go on.”
“But they had it wrong, right? You didn’t cheat on Mei.”
There’s a certainty in her voice, but there’s a question there too. Like some part of her is desperate for confirmation that her rock-solid surety of who I am isn’t wrong. It’s that soft question in her tone that makes me more determined to tell her everything.
“I didn’t.” My tone is quiet, mostly because I’m realizing this is the first time in years I’ve talked about this with anyone who wasn’t directly involved. “Mei and I were already separated when those pictures came out. We had already figured out we didn’t love each other like that.”
“So that woman…” I watch her soft throat work with a swallow, her lips pressing together briefly. “Was that the same woman you were talking to on the phone?”
Even now, when her voice wavers, I don’t see any hint in her eyes that she doesn’t trust me. It makes me feel…whole. It makes me want to give her every bit of trust in return.
“It was,” I say honestly. And when her eyes dip to the table, her head bobbing with a soft nod, I feel the words I’ve been keeping from the world tumbling out right after in a rush. “She’s my sister.”
Lila’s gaze snaps up to meet mine, her mouth parting in surprise. “Your sister?”
“Half,” I correct.
“So…” Her brow furrows, trying to puzzle it out. “So who—”
“My dad. My dad cheated on my mom when I was eight. Abigail is the result.”
“Oh my God.” Her hand squeezes mine. Like she wants to comfort me. Like I’m the victim. “How long have you known?”
“I found out that week,” I tell her. “The week those pictures were taken. That was the first time I met her.”
“Ian…” Her expression falls, and she looks almost pained. “Why didn’t you tell someone? Why would you let everyone say those awful things about you all these years?”
A bitter laugh escapes me, and I shrug in defeat. “The same reason I do anything in life that doesn’t feel right. My fucking father.”
“Bradley?”
“My mother doesn’t know,” I explain. “I can’t…I know that I should have told her, but I can’t do that to her, you know? She’s always…loved my dad. I don’t know what it is she fucking sees in him, but it would break her heart if she found out. I can’t be the one to do that to her.”
“So you kept it a secret to protect your mom?”
“He told me she’d lose the team if she left him,” I say quietly. “Apparently, my grandfather wrote stipulations into his will.” My lip curls. “He wanted to be sure the team stays with someone that ‘knows what they’re doing.’ I guess he was just as much of an asshole as my father is.”
“That’s not fair,” she says, outraged.
“It isn’t,” I agree. “My mother loves that team. It would kill her to lose it. She’s been a part of it since she was a kid. I can’t believe her father would do that to her. I’m not even sure she knows about it, honestly. Or maybe she does, but she’s so sure about my dad that she’s never worried about it? I just…I don’t know. It kills me thinking that I could be the reason she loses everything. She would hate me.”
“She wouldn’t hate you,” Lila stresses. “She’s your mother.”
“And Bradley is my father,” I remind her. “It’s never stopped him.”
“So your dad used your mom as leverage, essentially.”
“Among other things. He has ways of protecting himself. He’s paying for Abby’s education. Her mom was a waitress when they met, and she died when Abby was a senior in high school. That’s the year I found out. My dad came to my apartment and basically told me, ‘This is your sister, she’s going to be staying with you until I can figure out what to do with her.’?” I shake my head. “She was only eighteen, and she was so fucking scared. He just dumped her on me, Lila. This guy she didn’t even know. She’d just lost her mother, and then she got dropped on my doorstep, and both of us had his threats hanging over our heads…I don’t know. I couldn’t risk having him ruin her life any further, so I…did what he said. I kept my mouth shut.”
“Even when it ended up hurting you,” Lila says quietly.
“I could have paid for her school, I know that, and I would have been happy to, but…” I breathe out a sigh. “Abby still wants him to be her dad. I know that if we don’t keep in line, he’ll cut us both out of his life. I can live with that, but…I can’t take away this hope she’s clinging to that he’ll come around and be the guy she needs him to be. I can’t take away the only person she has left.”
Lila’s hand squeezes mine again, and she ducks her head until I’m forced to meet her eyes, and she gives me a determined look. “She would still have you.”
“I know that, but I’m not her father. I’m just some guy whose doorstep she was dropped onto once who ended up leaving her behind like everyone else.”
“You didn’t leave because you wanted to,” Lila says firmly. “Not really. You didn’t want to leave her behind. You just protected her the only way you knew how. Didn’t you. If you hadn’t left, the press would have kept digging into her. They would have figured it out. You just wanted to protect her.”
“How can you know that?”
Her smile is slow, sweet. “Because that’s who you are, Ian. That’s who you’ve always been. You make people feel safe.” Her hand lifts from mine to cup my face, her thumb stroking the skin just above my beard softly. “It’s how you always made me feel too.”
I can’t help but stare at her, at this woman who seems to see me as something better than I’ve ever seen myself—having to take a heavy inhale just to keep the emotions that threaten to overtake me at bay.
“He told me to take the trade,” I whisper.
“What?”
“My father,” I clarify. “He pushed me into the trade.”
“He sent you away?”
“More or less,” I say. “Told me that the team was better off without my drama. That everyone was better off.”
“You should have told him to go fuck himself,” Lila seethes. “The absolute nerve of that fuckhead.”
Her cheeks are flush with indignant anger on my behalf, and weirdly, that makes some of my melancholy dissipate. “Maybe I should have,” I muse. “But I guess I thought he was right.”
“What do you mean?”
“Everything that was happening felt like my fault, somehow. I guess some part of me thought that maybe everyone really would be better off without me.”
“That’s bullshit,” she practically spits.
I rear back. “What?”
“None of what happened was your fault, Ian. I mean, Christ. Your jackass dad has an affair, completely fucks off from the kid’s life, dumps her on his other kid’s doorstep to care for when it’s convenient for him, then blames you when it all goes to shit?” She shakes her head. “Absolutely not. There’s a villain in this story, Ian, but it isn’t fucking you.”
“Wow,” I say thickly, emotion still clogging my throat. “I’m not sure I deserve the faith you have in me.”
“I just know you,” she says with a slight shake of her head. “I’ve known you since I was six years old. You met me before Jack. Do you remember?” I nod, watching her expression turn wistful. “I was crying at the bus stop because Jack was sick, and I was scared to get on by myself.”
“You were so fucking little,” I murmur. “Just this tiny little thing.”
“You came right up to me, this huge kid with flaming-red hair and freckles looking like some sort of giant, and you squatted right down to my level…and you smiled at me.”
I feel myself smiling now as I remember. “I asked you why you were crying.”
“I told you it was because my brother was sick, and I was scared to sit by myself.” Her smile widens, bright, like it’s shining a light on all the dark parts of me. “Do you remember what you said?”
“I…I told you that there’s no reason to be scared, because you have me now, and I wouldn’t let you sit alone.”
“I know you met Jack when you walked me home, and I know that you became best friends and all that…but I…It always felt like you were mine first. I guess it still does.”
“Lila, I—”
“But from that moment on, I felt better when you were around. I always knew that as long as you were, nothing bad would ever happen to me. Because that’s who you are. For me, for Jack, and for Abby, too, it seems. You spend so much time making sure that everyone else is okay, you don’t take the time to make sure you’re okay. The world won’t end if you’re okay, Ian. You know that, right?”
The warmth in my chest feels stifling; like the kind of heat that steals your breath, that makes it feel a little like dying slowly. I feel so many things, things that seem impossible, that seem too quick, and all of them begin and end with the overwhelming urge to hold her, so I give in to that feeling, I pull her from her chair and over into mine, letting her crawl into my lap as I wrap my arms around her like she’s tethering me—and in a way, it feels like she is.
“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” I manage thickly. “It feels like I’m trapped. Like no matter what I do, someone will eventually end up being hurt.”
“You can’t put that on yourself,” Lila soothes. “You love hard, Ian. You always have. Anyone who knows you will know that you would never hurt someone you care about on purpose. You have to try and give yourself the same care you give everyone else.”
I consider that, trying to remember a time in my life where I did what she’s saying. When I worried more about myself than those around me. I realize I can’t think of one. I’ve spent so long carrying different weights, holding them on my shoulders until it felt like I might be crushed…I don’t even know what putting myself first would look like.
“I’ve never told anyone else but Jack about my dad’s part in my leaving,” I admit quietly.
She runs her fingers through my hair. “I’m glad you told me.”
We’re quiet for a moment; I’m letting her words marinate and she seems content to let me, and when she finally speaks, it’s with a soft kiss to my temple. “Not sure my kitchen chairs are built for me and an NHL player.”
“I’ll get you stronger chairs,” I mumble into her hair.
“Wow, we had sex one time and he’s already trying to buy me chairs,” she tuts. “You’re smothering me.”
“Two times,” I huff against her throat.
“Mm. Two is the magic number for chair sugar daddies?”
I laugh as I give her ass a light swat. “Brat.”
“You like it.” She pulls back, her arms still looped around my neck and her eyes glittering with amusement. “Thank you,” she says sincerely. “For telling me.”
“I wanted to,” I assert. “I…I trust you too.”
“I’m glad,” she whispers.
I pull her in until her lips meet mine, feeling that same sensation of being settled, happy—swelling inside to the point of bursting.
“So what would you get me if there was a third time?” she teases, nipping at my lower lip.
My lips curl, elation bubbling inside to have her here. That I finally saw her.
Too soon, my brain says, just as my heart whispers back, Too late.