Chapter 38
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
EMMETT
What’s left of my heart urges me to take a left out of the parking lot and head straight to Billie and Blake. Even if Scott wouldn’t allow me on the premises, I know my girl wouldn’t let her dad call the shots and prohibit his only daughter from seeing me.
She’s twenty-one, for fuck’s sake.
With my Aston Martin idling and my brain spinning out, a sharp knock on my passenger window jumps me back to reality.
Sawyer motions for me to lower my window.
“That’s the second time I’ve scared the shit out of you.” He chuckles, face immediately turning serious when he takes me in.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, absentmindedly staring out of the windshield.
Sawyer hesitates before confirming, “Felt like a skate and knew the practice rink had a free slot.”
“Maria outed me and Billie to Scott.”
When I turn to look at him fully, he practically falls backward as he takes in my face, blood still seeping from the cut on my cheek.
He tries the door handle, but I don’t bother to unlock it. Other than Billie, there’s only one person I want to talk to right now.
“Talk to me, Emmett,” he pleads, trying the handle once more.
I shake my head, back to staring out of the windshield. “I love you, man, and I always come to you when I need advice. But on this occasion, even your wisdom can’t repair the fucked-up situation.”
Dropping his head between his shoulders, Sawyer exhales a slow breath into the morning air. “Have you tried to call Billie?”
“Yeah,” I reply, the taste of acid still burning my mouth. “Picked up a voicemail she sent a half hour ago and tried to call her back. I’m not getting an answer right now.”
Sawyer’s brows knit together. “Why isn’t she picking up?”
I slam my hand into the steering wheel. “How the fuck should I know?!”
He doesn’t deserve my wrath. Truthfully, I should be pointing all the blame internally. If I hadn’t taken so long to tell Scott and Freya, then Maria never would’ve gotten the chance to fuck everything up. Billie and I were already battling the odds.
Offering my friend an apologetic glance, I shrug my shoulders, hopelessness settling over me.
“The last thing Scott told me before he sped off was that he was moving her and Blake out of the apartment and, I assume, back home. My best guess is, he’s confiscated her phone, thinking that he’s doing her a favor and protecting her from me. ”
My former captain only looks more confused. “Listen, I get why Scott is mad over all of this, but …” He swipes a thoughtful hand across his jaw. “Why would he see you as a danger to Billie and Blake? You’ve been close friends for years.”
The rain begins to fall again, and I open the passenger door, allowing Sawyer to climb in.
Squeezing his huge frame and training bag into the seat, he makes an appreciative face at the classic car he’s never ridden in before.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve driven this car way more than I normally would; each time I sit in it, the smell of nutmeg and the image of Billie’s happy face as we drove the country roads fill my senses.
I haven’t had the chance to see her and Blake nearly as much as I want, and if Scott has his way, I’ll never set eyes on them again.
My stomach roils at the thought, but Sawyer’s calm voice helps it to settle.
“Talk to me, Emmett. There’s got to be a way to make the guy see reason. He’s clearly overreact—”
“I gifted him money to help settle Billie’s student finances and then to get her and Blake set up in their own place.”
Sawyer’s head whips to me, jaw agape. “Y-you w-what?”
My forehead finds the steering wheel as we sit in the entrance to the practice rink parking lot. No one has tried to enter or leave so far, which is just as well because I don’t think I’m capable of driving right now.
“It’s not how it looks,” I grind out. “You need to trust me on that.”
Sawyer doesn’t initially respond, and I turn my face to look at him.
Like he’s connecting the dots, he slowly nods his head.
“Scott thinks that you basically bought his daughter or at least took advantage of a situation.” He winces.
“It’s like the perfect storm—your divorce from Maria, leaving you single and out looking for someone else to boost your ego, Tucker and his family pulling financial support, Scott’s accident resulting in Freya needing to work all hours.
I can see how this looks bad to him. Manipulated even. ”
“I haven’t manipulated shit,” I declare, voice commanding, frustration threatening to bubble over.
Sawyer exhales into my car. “Yeah, I know you haven’t. I guess the question is, what are you going to do about it?”
“That’s what I was deciding when you showed up. If I take a left, then I can be at Scott and Freya’s place in ten minutes, which is likely where Billie and Blake are.”
“And right?”
I crush the steering wheel in my grip as anger over Maria’s audacity ripples through every muscle. “A right turn will take me to the house I haven’t set foot inside since I moved out last year.”
Deep in thought, Sawyer chews on the inside of his cheek. “Hear me out with this.”
I’m already sighing, knowing I won’t like whatever he’s going to suggest.
He holds up a hand in surrender. “Go to Maria’s and get all of the facts before you fly off the deep end.”
Jack’s statement to Scott about facts rings true, and once again, I’m resenting my perceptive teammates.
“And then?” I press.
Sawyer’s smile is the perfect blend of determined and alpha. “And then it’s simple … go get your girl and don’t walk away until you have her safely back in your arms.”
Maria’s white BMW sits in the driveway of where we spent night after night arguing.
Most of our fights are a blur to me, each one feeling as trivial and inaccurate as the next.
As I ring the smart doorbell and take a step back, I wish I could say the same about today and the conversation we’re about to have.
Maria overstepped and let her jealousy and need to control get the better of her, and I’m not about to leave my former home without setting the record straight.
For years, I let my ex-wife get her own way, whether it was to do with my hockey career, heading out after games, or general shit like how we would redecorate the living room.
Not anymore.
Everyone has their limits, and I reached mine the second she decided to interfere in my dating life, pretending like she cared about my girlfriend’s well-being when all she really wanted was to drive a wedge between us, convinced that I’d never be able to move on from our marriage.
News flash, Maria: I moved on years ago and then—after our divorce—fell in love with the woman of my goddamn dreams.
“Emmett.” Maria’s face is rosy and all smiles when she swings the door open, acting like she was expecting to see me.
Taking in her perfect makeup, hair, and outfit, I thumb over my shoulder. “Are you headed out?”
She tips her head to the side, broad fake-ass smile still plastered to her face.
Yes, I’m bitter and really fucking angry right now.
“Why would you think that?” She shimmies in the doorway. “Or did you forget that this is how I look on the daily?”
I swear to God, when I married this woman, she didn’t resemble any part of who she is today.
“I came to talk.” My voice is cold and cutting, and it wipes the smile clean from her face, a stony expression materializing in its place.
“Jesus, Emmett.” She blows out a breath. “You are, aren’t you?”
“I’m what?”
“Sleeping with Scott and Freya’s daughter.”
Molars grinding, I’d be in awe of her acting skills if she wasn’t so transparent.
“You mean Billie?” I clarify, determined that she’ll refer to my girlfriend by name and not infantilize a fully grown woman who acts more maturely than my thirty-five-year-old ex-wife.
“Cut the crap, Maria,” I scold. “I’m here to find out why you think that you still have some kind of control over my life, including who I do and don’t date. ”
When she steps to one side, I go to enter the house that I always hated from the day she insisted that we buy it when a manicured hand lands on my upper arm.
“Have you had sex with her?”
I stare straight down the hallway, freaked out to see portraits of our wedding day lining the walls.
“Did you fuck her?” Maria bites at me again.
Shrugging off her grasp, I step farther inside, and she closes the front door behind her before drawing a deep breath into her lungs.
With her back still to me, Maria punctuates each word of her next statement, not waiting for me to answer her previous question. “You slept with a twenty-one-year-old right after we dissolved our marriage.”
“Turn around, Maria,” I demand, done with the way she’s making this all about her.
Spinning on her heel, she pauses for a second before she dives right for me, slapping her palm across my injured cheek. “YOU FUCKED BILLIE QUINN!”
“I’m dating Billie Quinn,” I correct her, rocking forward onto the balls of my feet, cheek stinging like a motherfucker. “She’s my girlfriend, and I’m her boyfriend.”
Holy hell, that felt good.
Maria scoffs, rearing back to slap me once again. I catch her forearm before she connects with my face.
“Stop hitting me, or this conversation will go a whole lot further than these four walls.”
Dropping her hand, she knows I’m deadly serious in my threat to report her for assault. Maria’s late father was an absolute bastard to her mother, and too many times have I seen the same traits in my former wife. Although this is the first—and final—time she’s hit me.
“I can’t believe you did this to me,” she whispers, slumping against the wall, a photo of us standing outside a Vegas chapel hung next to her head. “I thought that, in time, you would see reason and come back to me.”
“Why, Maria?” I ask. “It sure as shit isn’t because you want me. We were through a very long time ago.”
I can tell she agrees, even if her body language denies it.
“How can you choose someone so young and immature over me?”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I counter, taking the opportunity to put some distance between us. “Billie is …” I struggle to find the words to describe my incredible girl. “She’s fucking amazing and everything I want.”
Tears fill Maria’s eyes. Before today, I’d have felt genuine empathy for her. But not after what she did this morning.
“Are you in love with her?”
I nod once, and my broken heart from the exchange with Scott finds a steady rhythm. “Yes, I am. And you just went and destroyed what we had.”
Truthfully, I don’t know if she did. All I know is that Billie still hasn’t returned my calls, and I’ve got multiple bruises and lacerations, courtesy of my former best friend.
“What you told Scott—about me being a predator and trying to take advantage—that isn’t right.
” I push a hand through my hair and take another step back.
“You can believe or convince yourself of whatever you want, but the honest truth is that I started to fall for Billie when she returned from Austin. And after Blake was born, I spent even more time with her. I’m in awe of so much more than you give her credit for.
Her strength, brains, courage. The way she cares for people unconditionally. ”
Maria remains silent.
“How did you find out about us?” I ask, already knowing the truth from Billie but wanting to hear the full story from Maria. We were always so careful not to be caught.
She just shrugs. “I saw her getting into your G-Wagon in your parking lot. Billie had a suitcase, and you were clipping Blake into the back seat. It looked suspicious at best, although I didn’t hang around to see anything more.
What I saw made me sick to my stomach. When I questioned Billie this morning at breakfast, I knew I’d made the right call to express my concerns to Scott.
Her mortified face told the whole story of what’s been going on between you both. ”
I decide not to ask why Maria was outside my apartment building. If she planned to visit me, I’m glad she never got the chance.
“What did you say to my girl?” My voice is dark, so low that it’s almost nonexistent.
“I confronted her about you and then pointed out that she was, in fact, a rebound.”
“It’s a good thing you’re a woman, Maria. Because if you were a guy, you’d be through the fucking wall by now.”
She squares up to me, loving the toxicity brewing between us.
This is where my ex-wife flourishes—playing psychological games, engaging in verbal wars. I’m so fucking done with her bullshit.
“Stay away from me. Stay away from Billie.” I bite the inside of my cheek. “And definitely stay away from Blake.”
I’m halfway out the door when the mask completely falls, Maria’s true narcissism rearing its ugly head. I’ve never heard an insidious tone like it, and I hope I’ll never hear it again.
“I fucked my way through a whole roster of male flight attendants while we were still married.” She chuckles as she moves toward me. “Sometimes two at a time.”
If she was hoping to land the final punch with her admission, she should know that the slap stung more.
“But I guess there’s nothing you can do about that now, you know”—she glides her fingernails down my sweatshirt—“since the divorce has already been finalized.”
I’d laugh if this woman wasn’t so evil.
Dropping my face down to hers, I let her see the kind of smile I only ever wear when I think about my girl. “Incorrect. There’s nothing I can do about it because I simply don’t give a fuck anymore. I guess that’s what happens when you fall in love for real.”
Reaching up, I pluck a framed wedding photo from the wall, open the back, and pull out the print. I tear it straight down the center as Maria watches on in horror. Not that this photograph carries any sentiment for her. It was only ever an image in its truest form.
I hand the empty frame to her, and she looks down at it and then back up at me.
A smug grin plays on my lips. “Now you have the space to hang your next victim.”