Chapter 28 – Seth
I’m whistling. That’s right. Whistling.
Like some love-struck fool while I move around my kitchen, putting the final touches on the lasagna that I made from scratch for my dinner date with Brianna tonight.
The smell of garlic, basil, and marinara sauce fills the air, mingling with the anticipation of our first real date humming through me.
After slipping out of the supply closet earlier—when I knew the coast was clear and was certain I wouldn’t run into her dad—I met with Coach Steele to talk about our upcoming game, then hit the train, and just barely missed Bri.
She texted me a little while later, said she was back at her and Natasha’s place to shower, and that she’d be over soon.
Late dinner. Almost seven now. But I can’t wait to feed her.
I can’t wait to spend time with her. I can’t wait to take care of her all night.
Do I know exactly what we’re doing? Fuck, no.
It’s been almost two years now since my ex walked out on me and Sawyer. A year since the divorce was finalized, and I’m fumbling through this thing with Bri, no playbook, following her lead, hoping like hell she doesn’t wake up one morning and decide that I’ve got too much baggage for her.
There’s something else that Bri doesn’t know about that first night we met. And that’s that it was the last time that I broke my self-imposed celibacy after my divorce. Call it punishment for fucking up, I’m not sure, but after that night together, I haven’t slept with another woman since.
And I don’t want to sleep with another ever again. My phone buzzes in my palm. A text from Sawyer.
Sawyer: Tell Bri I finished the book if you see her tonight. It was SO good.
I text back immediately.
Seth: I will. Have fun tonight. Love you.
Yep. That’s right. I’ve started to drop clues to Sawyer that Bri isn’t just the nanny, and that we’re also friends I think back to the day she showed up at my doorstep.
She’d looked so unsure, like she didn’t belong in my world and knew I’d be pissed to find out she’d taken the job.
But now, she belongs here. Bri’s always cared about Sawyer.
She likes Sawyer. Sawyer likes her. I can’t let either of them down again.
And that includes slowly figuring out how to tell Sawyer how important Bri is to my life.
My phone buzzes again, Levi’s name flashing across the screen.
“What do you want?” I ask, swiping up.
“Wow, what a greeting. Nice to hear from you too, little brother,” Levi drawls, amusement dripping from his tone.
I shake my head, eyes sweeping over the kitchen one last time.
The place is spotless—cleaner than it’s been since we moved in.
Partially because every time Bri’s here, she tidies up like she’s getting paid to be a maid and not a nanny.
And partially because, well, because I want to impress her.
In every single aspect of my life. When I’m on the ice practicing, I hope that she’s watching me play.
When I’m talking to her, I hope she believes the words I’m saying, sees that I’m a trustworthy guy.
And when I’m between her legs, I hope she realizes I’ll always put in the effort. Because her pleasure is mine.
How did I spend so many years with someone and never feel anything close to this? How is it possible that I thought I was in love before her?
“Why are you calling?”
He bursts out a laugh. “How’s the new nanny?”
My jaw tightens. “Why are you asking about Bri?”
“Because before you got back from your little road trip, I had to dip out to Boston. And you were too tired to fill me in on everything that happened.”
“There’s nothing to tell.” I lie because what happened between Bri, and I is still private. “She drove up there. We got a hotel.” Watched porn together. She came. “In the morning, I drove her and Sawyer home.”
“So, nothing happened in that hotel room?”
“Dude. Why do you care?”
“Because” he says, exasperated now. “You know why. I’m trying to figure out if she’s going to be around for the long run.”
I stop what I was doing and press my hands into the countertop to steady myself.
“Levi.”
“Look,” Levi sighs, quieter this time. “I like Brianna. I really like her. And I think she’s good for you, but you don’t have the best record with not fucking good things up.”
I scrub a hand down my face. “I know.”
“She’s smart, kind, and from the little that I saw when I was in town,” his voice softens. “Sawyer likes her too which is big. The fact that she was willing to drive three and a half hours to Boston without you told me all I needed to know. Bri’s attached to Sawyer now.”
"Is that why you called?" My tone comes out sharp. "Because you're looking for a new mommy for Sawyer?"
"Don't you dare fucking say that, Seth." His voice drops from gentle to cold.
He's right. I know he's right. I don't mean to do this with him.
But Levi has always had this way of finding the parts of me I'd rather keep buried and triggering them.
Maybe because of who he is. The oldest out of us three.
The steady one. The one who took the straight road and never once veered off it, never failed at anything worth failing at, always positive and happy.
Never been married twice. Best grades, drafted straight out of college to the highest paying team, still the one who makes our mom's eyes go wide with pride when she talks about him.
Or maybe it's simpler than that. Maybe it's because of the history that’s between us. The thing I did that I've never stopped carrying, the hurt I put in him that I can't take back. That's the pattern, isn't it? The people who get close to me end up absorbing the damage.
I exhale slowly and pinch the bridge of my nose. "You're right. I'm sorry. That was out of line."
Silence stretches on the line.
Finally, he says, “Look… I get it.”
“Nah, I was fucked for saying that.”
“Yeah. You kinda were.” He chuckles softly. “You like her too, don’t you,” he murmurs, but there’s no teasing this time. “More than a nanny, huh?”
“Yeah, man. Too fucking much.”
And then I decide to do something I haven’t done in years.
I open up to Levi. Because if anyone deserves to know how I’m feeling, it’s him.
We used to tell each other everything. Me, Levi, and Boone.
Thick as thieves. A cord of three. Only a few years separated us, but it never felt that way.
We grew up together. We perfected our hockey playing skills together.
We shared girls. We fought. Until we got drafted Levi first to Florida, Boone to New York, me to the west coast. All of us ending up in opposite parts of the country.
And then I had Sawyer unexpectedly and life happened. Complications. Distance. And the fracture between us turned into a divide, one that couldn’t be repaired with words until Becca died, and I broke.
“There’s more to me and Bri than I’ve told you.”
“Yeah?”
I take a deep breath and start from the beginning.
The night we met a year ago, neither of us knowing who the other was.
The team dinner months later, the pull I felt the second I saw her again, the kiss I couldn't talk myself out of.
The road trip. What happened in that hotel room and what happened after, back at my house.
The way she keeps showing up for Sawyer without being asked, without keeping score, like it's just something she wants to do. The way I feel about her. The real way.
I tell him I think I'm already in love with her.
That we've only just found our way back to each other and it's too fast, and I know how it looks, and I suck at relationships, but I don’t want to hide this.
And that the thing keeping me up at night isn't the risk to my career or what her father might do.
It's the thought that she might not feel it the same way I do or might finally see how fucked my baggage is and decide it’s too much.
That I'm already this far gone and she's still deciding.
“Damn,” Levi says when I finally finish.
“I’m scared she won’t feel the same if I tell her I want to go public with this. If I tell her that I’m all in.”
“I think you need to talk to her.”
I sit with that for a moment. “And what if we do, and she leaves again? I can’t bring another woman into Sawyer’s life just for her to leave. I can’t do that again to Sawyer.”
“Rebecca didn’t leave Sawyer because of you. She had cancer, Seth. You couldn’t have stopped that, and you need to stop blaming yourself for it.”
I shake my head, eyes on the lasagna bubbling in the oven.
I know he's right. Rebecca's cancer wasn't my fault.
I'm not irrational enough to believe I caused it.
But I was her husband, and I was supposed to protect my family, and Sawyer grew up without a mother anyway.
Logic doesn't have much to do with it. The guilt doesn't care what I could or couldn't have controlled.
It just sits there and reminds me that my daughter deserved better than what she got.
“I know.” My throat feels tight. “But I still feel like I failed her.”
“Well, that’s some shit you’re gonna have to get over because you’re not God. You can’t control everything just like you can’t control if Bri leaves. You have to take a chance.”
My lips press together because I know he’s right.
“And then Elena…” I sigh, rubbing the back of my neck as the weight of that mistake settles over me. “I rushed into things, didn’t I? She really didn’t marry me to be a family. She married me for the money.”
Levi doesn’t say anything and then lets out a long sigh.
“You were dumb and heartbroken by Rebecca’s death, probably looking to fill a void.
Yeah, you made a mistake marrying her, but mistakes are a normal part of life.
You’re not the first person in the world to have been married twice.
You’ve gotta get over it, man. Sawyer’s over it.
We’re over it. You gotta let that shit go. ”
“When did you start making so much sense?”