Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
DECLAN
The house feels wrong this morning.
Too still, the kind of quiet that presses in instead of settling.
Even the coffeemaker sounds too loud.
Sophie sits at the table, spoon barely moving through her cereal. She’s not angry. Just… off. Careful. The kind of quiet kids get when they’ve seen something they don’t understand yet.
I can’t blame her. She came home expecting normal. Instead, she walked into something I wasn’t ready for her to see.
“Got everything for school?” I ask, keeping my tone light.
She nods without looking up. “Yeah.”
No talk about the musical. No questions. Just the scrape of her spoon and the hum of the fridge.
Last night keeps replaying in flashes: the doorbell, Erin’s face, Sophie in the doorway.
The confusion.
The way she blinked like she wasn’t sure if what she saw was real.
I should’ve checked my phone. Should’ve thought ahead. Should’ve known this would happen eventually—just not like that.
Not with Sophie standing there, seeing me with another woman for the first time since her mom and I divorced.
Her mom left holes I’ve spent years trying to patch over. Now I feel like I’ve gone and torn a new one.
When she finally gets up, she rinses her bowl and pulls on her backpack. “Bye, Dad.”
“Love you,” I say.
“Love you too.” The words are soft, automatic—but not the same.
The door clicks shut, and the quiet expands.
I stare at the counter—two wineglasses still in the sink, one smudge of lipstick on the rim. I should wipe it off. I don’t.
My thoughts turn to David.
Christ. If Erin tells him, word spreads fast. One dinner turns into gossip, and suddenly she’s the headline instead of the professional.
And it would be my fault.
My phone buzzes on the island with a text from Charlotte:
How’s Sophie?
I stare at it for a second too long, thumb hovering.
She shouldn’t have to carry this. None of this is on her.
She’ll be okay. I’ll talk to her more after school.
I’m tempted to add “I miss you,” but that would only make things harder right now.
I hit send, then exhale. The truth is, I don’t regret being with Charlotte—just the timing of how it came out.
I’ve played countless games under pressure, but none prepared me for this—being the reason Sophie and Charlotte are both hurting in different ways.
The training room’s quiet when I get there. Usually the hum of the cooling units fades into background noise, but today it fills the whole room.
The sharp scent of eucalyptus and disinfectant hits as soon as I walk in, clean and sterile, nothing like the chaos in my head.
Charlotte’s at the counter, restocking tape rolls. When she looks up, something flickers across her face—tension, then relief, then a quiet kind of resolve.
“Morning,” she says.
“Hey.”
Her shoulders ease a little. “You’re early.”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
She gives a small nod. “Me neither.”
For a second we just stand there, the quiet thick with everything we didn’t say over text. Then she gestures to the bike. “Let’s get started.”
I swing my leg over and settle onto the seat, brace stiff against my leg.
“Any pain today?” she asks.
“No.”
“Good.”
She adjusts the brace strap again, slower this time. “Declan… we should talk about last night.”
“I know.”
Her eyes stay on the brace. “If anyone finds out—”
Her voice drops, like she’s afraid saying it out loud will make it real.
“We’ll make sure they won’t.”
That stops her. She looks up, jaw tight.
“You make it sound easy.”
“It’s not,” I say. “But panicking won’t help either.”
Her mouth presses into a line, then softens. “I’m sorry I left so fast.”
“You were giving me space to talk to Sophie,” I say. “That’s never the wrong call.”
Her eyes hold mine, the air thickening again. She nods, clears her throat, and switches to the next exercise.
After the bike, we move through the drills—resistance, controlled extension, balance work—but every small touch hums louder than it should. Her hand at my knee, my fingers brushing the band she passes me. The silence between us says the rest.
When we finish, she jots down some notes. Then she straightens, professionalism sliding back into place.
“You’re good for today,” she says softly.
I nod, grabbing my brace strap and crutch. “See you tomorrow.”
“Yeah.” She hesitates, voice lower. “And… thank you. For not making this harder.”
“This isn’t easy,” I admit. “But I’m not walking away.”
Her breath catches, eyes lifting to mine. For a second, the whole world narrows.
“You’re impossible,” she murmurs, but she’s smiling now, cheeks flushed.
“I have a feeling you like impossible,” I say.
She laughs under her breath, shaking her head.
“Get out of here,” she says, waving me off with that grin that makes it way too hard to leave.
I grab my brace strap, adjust the crutch, and step out before I can change my mind.
The hallway air hits cooler, sharper. I need that. A reset.
I make it halfway down the corridor before I spot David leaning against the far wall, arms crossed.
His expression isn’t angry—just tight, unreadable in the way that makes my gut knot faster than any post-game loss ever could.
“Got a minute?” he asks. His tone’s level, but there’s no mistaking the edge beneath it.
“Yeah,” I say, steadying myself on the crutch. “What’s up?”
He jerks his chin toward the nearest office — the small video-review room off the main hall. Empty, door cracked open.
Inside, the lights are dim, monitors dark. He closes the door behind us and flicks the light on.
He studies me for a beat too long. “You want to tell me why Maya said Sophie told her you and my sister had dinner last night?”
I go still. There’s no point pretending, no version of this that doesn’t sound bad.
“Sophie’s sleepover got cut short,” I say carefully. “Erin stopped by on her way to the pharmacy.”
“Yeah, I got that part,” David says. “What I don’t get is the rest.”
There’s a long pause—just the hum of the fluorescent lights and the distant clang of weights from the gym. I meet his eyes.
“We’re seeing each other,” I say finally. “Quietly. It’s new.”
He exhales through his nose, pacing once. “Christ, Declan.”
“I know.”
“She’s the team PT. You’re her patient. Do you have any idea how bad that looks?”
“That’s why we’re keeping it quiet until I’m medically cleared and I’m not her patient anymore. Then we disclose it and do it clean. And if I ever need PT again after that, it won’t be her.”
His jaw works, the muscle twitching there like he’s biting back a dozen things at once.
“I’m not saying you’re the bad guy here. It’s just—she’s my sister. You’re my captain. And if this goes sideways, you both get crushed.”
“I won’t let that happen,” I tell him, voice low.
He shakes his head, half-laughing under his breath. “You can’t control that, man.”
He’s right. But I still try.
“I’ll protect her any way I can.”
David studies me for a long moment, the muscle in his jaw ticking. “Protecting her is one thing,” he says finally. “But you can’t fix how it looks if this leaks. She could lose her job, Declan.”
“I know. And last night proved we weren’t careful enough.”
“Then you need to start acting like it.” His tone sharpens, clipped. “I’m just trying to wrap my head around this. You and her? Of all people?”
“Believe me,” I say quietly, “I didn’t see it coming either.”
Something in his face flickers—disbelief giving way to something closer to resignation.
He studies me like he’s trying to reconcile a lifetime of friendship with what he’s seeing now.
“Wow,” he mutters, dragging a hand over his face. “You really care about her.”
“Yeah,” I admit. “I do.”
He exhales, pacing a few steps. “Alright. Then here’s the deal. You keep this quiet. No locker-room whispers, no staff slipups. You keep it quiet until you’re cleared.”
He stops, still uneasy, and looks back at me. “Then you do what you told me you’d do. Stick to your plan. But until then? Don’t give anyone a reason to start talking.”
“Understood.”
He nods, eyes still searching mine like he’s weighing whether to trust me.
“I’m still processing this,” he says finally. “But she’s my sister. If you hurt her…”
“You won’t get the chance. I’d wreck myself before I ever did that to her,” I interrupt.
His mouth twitches, not quite a smile, but something close. “You always were a pain in the ass.”
“And you still put up with me.”
He huffs out a breath, shaking his head. “Go ice that leg before I change my mind about liking you.”
“Noted.”
When he leaves, I exhale and lean back against the wall.
Crisis contained, for now.