Chapter 66
NOW
Bennett
I can’t sleep.
I’ve propped myself up against the headboard, eyes focused on the rise and fall of Paloma’s chest. As if her breathing controls my own breath.
It feels as if I’ve been split in two—the Before and After.
Flashes of moments from the past three years, comments she’s made, little glimpses she unwittingly offered into her past race across my mind.
I’ve always found the softness in Paloma, the pieces of her she’s hidden from everyone else.
The pieces of her that have been just mine.
Now, it’s like trying to put her back together in my mind. She is a shattered glass sculpture, and I have all the grace of a child with a glue stick and construction paper. Nothing feels like it will fit—nothing makes the pain lessen.
And the anger . . .
It’s almost overwhelming. And she didn’t offer a name—not that I’d be able to find this faceless villain anyway. And if I did? What could I even do?
Nothing. Just like you’ve done before—with her. With Rhys. With—
I shake my head. Maybe it would be easier to have something physical I could lay this rage and anger into on her behalf.
“I was ten when someone kissed me for the first time. He was . . . one of my mom’s friends.”
Her voice is a never-ending echo of torture in my head.
But I welcome it like a penance to be paid.
I’ve always known someone hurt Paloma—maybe more than just someone.
But to hear her force herself to relive those memories so I could understand what I didn’t really know .
. . the pain of the last three years feels worse.
Worse because, no matter what . . . I can’t fix it. I can’t make it better.
For the first time since the gala, I check my phone. Texts and missed calls spill across the screen—Rhys, Freddy, Anna, my dad—all in multiples, times overlapping. Seeing it all at once threatens to send my anxiety spiraling further.
Focus. Most important item first.
It doesn’t help—because my only thought is still the girl curled into my chest, using my pec and upper abdomen like a pillow.
Instead of replying or trying with any of them, I open my thread with Rhys and Freddy and type out a quick message.
BENNETT
Family breakfast in an hour. She needs routine.
Be normal and don’t ask.
Their responses are nearly instantaneous.
RHYS
Got it. Whatever you both need, just tell us.
FREDDY
Yes, Chef!
I slowly roll Paloma to her side before snapping my fingers for Seven to take my place on the bed. Still, my girl stirs and blinks bleary eyes up at me.
“Bennett . . . ?”
“Shhh, love,” I whisper, kneeling by her and tucking some of her hair back. “I’m going to go start on breakfast. Sleep as much as you can. I’m leaving Seven here with you.”
“Mmkay,” she mumbles, turning on her back and letting Seven crawl and settle half on her stomach.
I close the door to the bathroom quietly, following my routine more stringently than I usually might with her in the next room. It takes almost too long, which makes my stomach churn about breakfast not being ready before everyone is downstairs to eat.
By the time I’ve finished the pancake batter and omelets, Ro, Rhys, and Freddy have joined me, talking and laughing as the sound of family permeates the room. This is what she needs. This will show her that she’s cared for.
“Good morning, Reiny,” Freddy greets brightly, seated shirtless at the table next to a fully put-together Ro. “Food smells amazing.”
I nod. “Don’t eat anything. I’m serious, not until I get Paloma from upstairs.”
Stepping past where Rhys is making two lattes and taking his time with the artwork, I head up the stairs—only to see she’s already on her way to me, dressed from head to toe in my clothes.
“Hungry, P?” I ask, taking her face in my palms. She nods, biting down on her lip. I want to ask her a thousand questions, but she still looks exhausted from last night. It doesn’t help that my own emotions feel a little shot—all over the place all at once.
“Yeah, I think I could eat.”
“Good.” I press a kiss to her temple and bring her closer under my arm. “We’re having family breakfast.”
There’s a brighter look then in her eyes, a twinkling of excitement and hesitant wonder.
“Really?”
I think I’m only just now understanding the depth of Paloma’s loneliness.
That it’s more than how she’s been at Waterfell, strangely isolated despite her popularity and well-known name.
Her kind of loneliness goes further back.
It makes a well of regret start to form, and how much I wished she’d been here at our table for breakfasts all along. Even as a friend—somehow included.
Wrong. I’ve gotten it wrong too many times. I’m determined now to never let her suffer again.
Once she’s settled at the table, Freddy and Sadie already bickering to provide the entertainment, the doorbell rings. I hold a hand up to Rhys and offer to get it—nearly sure that Adam Reiner is about to make an unexpected appearance, if his frantic texts are anything to go off.
“It’s weird. If she wanted me here, she would’ve asked.”
The voices are muffled, but I can hear the girl clearly because she’s slightly loud. I look through the peephole to see Toren and Lily side by side, arms crossed as they stare at each other.
“She wants you here,” Toren says back quietly, his voice soft and unconcerned in sharp contrast to the almost-frantic, too-loud tone of his companion.
“You don’t know that! You don’t have friends, Tor. You don’t know—”
I pull open the door, greeted by the ridiculous picture the two of them make: my defenseman towering in his black slacks and black button-up from the night before, sleeves rolled up, tattoos on display covering almost every inch of exposed skin.
And next to him, a redhead barely half his size in brown boots, stockings, a pleated skirt, and turtleneck sweater.
“Toren.” I nod to him. “Lily.”
“Hi, Bennett,” she whispers, suddenly shy as she ducks her head to stare down at my shoes.
“Lily wanted to check on Paloma after she didn’t come home last night,” Toren offers, a hand slipping to her back and pushing her a stumbling step forward. “I figured I could drop her here and I can pick her up later, or Paloma can take her back.”
I nod, stepping to the side to let her in.
“Paloma is in the kitchen and would love to see you.”
You might be the only friend she’s ever really had. The only one she’s made on her own.
Lily scurries off toward the kitchen, arguably too fast. Toren watches her go with a softer look on his face than I’ve ever seen—something almost serene.
“You should stay,” I say, clearing my throat and gripping the doorframe. “Have breakfast with all of us.”
“No.” He smirks, but there’s nothing happy in it. “You don’t have to be nice to me, Reiner. It’s fine.”
My brow furrows. “Come inside. Eat with us. You’re a part of the team.”
A huff of a laugh blows from his lips and he shakes his head. “Right.”
“You are,” I say, more intense than the first time. My voice drops as I add, “And you look out for Paloma. You always have. I owe you for that at the very least.”
He doesn’t say anything, eyes down toward the dewy morning grass and damp concrete. He looks . . . young, and almost lost. Is this how I looked all those years ago? Is this what I’d be without Rhys? Lonely and lost and rejected by everyone who doesn’t understand me?
Lily is a lot like me, I think, and Toren sticks close to her. Takes care of her.
There is a part of me that believes Toren is like Paloma, a bleeding heart and full up with love he doesn’t know what to do with.
“I know you hit Sadie’s coach that night, defending her.
And I was there when you protected Ro from her ex-boyfriend.
And I think you’ve done more for Paloma than you’ll even share with me.
” I take in a slow breath, voice dropping.
I don’t mention the locker room, but it’s all I can see when I look at him now.
I know what people said about him, the rumors that spread. I know what his old teammates have taunted him with on the ice and off it. But I also know what I’ve seen of him, how he’s defended and protected these girls without even knowing them.
“You’re not a bad guy, Kane.”
He doesn’t look at me, eyes firm on the ground, guard still up.
“So, I think you should come inside and eat with us.”
Slowly, with a slight tremble in his hands, Toren nods and steps over the threshold to follow me inside.
· · ·
“So, Toren?” Rhys asks, helping me clean up the kitchen after everyone’s gone—Sadie to practice, Lily and Paloma back to their apartment accompanied by Kane, and Freddy and Ro to inevitably roll in the sheets upstairs.
“Yeah.” I nod, rubbing the pan with the buffer scrub, careful as I set it to soak in the warm water. “I should’ve asked you about it. How you feel about him now.”
Rhys shrugs. “I don’t like him. But . . . he did punch that asshole Kelley, not even knowing Sadie. Maybe he’s got more in him than I thought.”
I nod again, shrugging my shoulders—though it does nothing to diffuse the tension in my muscles there.
“Doesn’t make it easier to be around him,” he mumbles and my body freezes, eyes shutting at the stabbing pain that reignites.
I turn toward him almost too quickly, like running my eyes over him will erase the image of his body lying on the ice, the sound of his cry: “I can’t see. Where’s my dad? I can’t see anything—”
My stomach churns again, but I shake my head and grip the back of my neck.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I should’ve asked. He just seemed like he was struggling.”
“No kidding,” Rhys mutters. “He was a wreck last night at the gala, too, after you left.”
I should ask. But I can’t think of anything besides, “Are you okay?”
The question seems to shake my best friend, his eyebrows furrowing as he looks at me. He’s leaning against the stovetop, wearing a well-worn Berkshire sweatshirt I also own and a pair of flannel pajama bottoms, hair a mess.
“Me?” he asks, but nods. “I’m fine, Ben.”
My nostrils flare and I close my eyes tight. “I can’t tell sometimes. And it’s a fucking mind game, trying to read you. Between you and Paloma, I feel like I can’t breathe.”
It isn’t fair to put this on his shoulders—I’d argue it’s counterproductive. But I can’t help it. I still feel raw from last night, every emotion overwhelming.
“Bennett, what—”
“You didn’t tell me anything last semester.
You shut me out, and I keep trying to move on and be okay with it, but it’s like stepping on a minefield.
I don’t know if you’re actually okay or if you’re just saying that, and I don’t want to feel like I’m measuring every breath you take to make sure you aren’t hurting and just won’t tell me about it. ”
Rhys stands, arms crossed as he listens.
“And I’m sorry I didn’t say anything about Paloma when it all happened—but you have always been the best in my eyes. The best hockey player, the best friend, the best guy I know. I’m so thankful for you. But I wanted Paloma to be mine, from the first time I saw her, and so I kept her to myself.”
A bitter laugh works from my throat. “And you found each other anyway. And it doesn’t matter that it was for barely a few dates or nights or whatever, it still hurts, and it’s my fault. If I’d told either of you about each other, it never would have happened. But it did.
“What is so wrong with me that no one wants to tell me what’s happening?
Do I seem so fucked up in the head that no one wants my help?
Paloma spent three years shutting me out to punish herself, hurt herself over and over, and I didn’t see it.
And you? You did the same thing. And I’m terrified every single day that you’ll do it again, and because I can’t read your goddamn expression, I won’t know! ”
In the silence of my loud confession, there is a strange relief.
“Bennett,” he breathes, brown eyes watery as he looks at me.
“I—I’m so sorry. You are my best friend.
It had nothing to do with you. I didn’t tell my mom or my dad or anyone.
I would have never told Sadie if she hadn’t found me mid-panic attack on the ice.
” He steps closer, hands outstretched. “It had nothing to do with you, okay?”
Another step, and then he grabs me in a tight hug.
My dad, Anna Koteskiy, Rhys, and Paloma are the only ones I enjoy being touched by; I’ve missed this.
I’ve missed my best friend. It feels like I haven’t really been close to him since that hit.
But maybe the fractures started earlier, that night sitting across from him and the girl I wanted more than my next breath.
“Just don’t do it again,” I say, half into his embrace.
He laughs, shaking his head. “Never.” We break apart and he squeezes my shoulder. “Now, tell me the whole story, Ben. I wanna know how you met Paloma. Tell me everything I missed.”