27 #3
Bliss’s expression tightened, but I kept going because I couldn’t be the person watching Charm anymore. Someone needed to understand what I’d seen.
“She gets shaky and panicked when she thinks she ate too much. She acts like being hungry means she accomplished something, then hates herself for being weak if she eats. That isn’t stress over one bad weekend. That is an eating disorder, and I don’t know whether she understands how sick she is.”
Bliss nodded slowly. “Aura and I have been talking about it.”
“Then stop talking and get in her ass. Don’t let her turn this breakup into another excuse to disappear. Make sure she eats, and make sure she gets real help from someone who knows what the fuck they’re doing.”
“We will.”
The contradiction inside me burned through every word.
I didn’t want to hear Charm, see her, or feel her mouth beneath mine again, yet I needed to know someone would make sure she survived me leaving.
That wasn’t reconciliation. It was the remains of love refusing to understand that it no longer had a job.
Bliss moved from the couch and crouched in front of my chair without touching me. “I’m not choosing her over you.”
I nodded, ready for the conversation to end.
“And the guys aren’t choosing you over her.”
“They are today.”
“Today,” she agreed. “Because today you need them more.”
My throat tightened.
“But she is still my best friend,” Bliss said. “I’m going to stand beside her while she faces what she did and what she needs to heal from. I need to know you won’t keep finding new ways to cut her because you’re angry that she still loves you.”
I looked down at her. “I can stay away.”
“That’s enough.”
“I’m not apologizing today.”
“I know.”
“I’m not talking to her at the game.”
Bliss nodded.
“I don’t want her near the locker room, the tunnel, or the Frost section before I play.”
“We’ll make sure she stays away.”
“If one of those teams offers me a contract—” The words caught, and every person in the room became still.
“When one of them offers,” Rider corrected.
I looked at him, and he lifted his coffee.
“Your negativity is bringing down breakfast.”
The corner of my mouth almost moved before I returned my attention to Bliss.
“When an offer comes and I leave, I’m not saying goodbye.”
Her face broke again. “That is your choice.”
“It isn’t punishment.”
“I know.”
“I won’t survive another goodbye with her.”
Bliss sat back on her heels. For the first time since the conversation began, I let the cold ease enough to give her the truth without using it as a weapon.
“I’ll talk to her one day.”
Hope flickered across Bliss’s face, but I stopped it before it became dangerous.
“When it doesn’t kill me,” I said. “That could be months or years, and it may never happen.”
“But if the day comes?”
“If I can look at her without wanting to kiss her or make her hurt, I’ll hear whatever she needs to say.”
Bliss searched my face for something more, but there wasn’t anything else I could give her.
“No promises about what happens afterward,” I said. “No expectation that talking means forgiveness or friendship. It sure as fuck doesn’t mean we get back together.”
“I understand.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.” She wiped her cheeks. “You’ll talk to her one day if it doesn’t kill you.”
I nodded. “Deal?”
Bliss released a shaky breath. “Deal.”
She stood and held out her hand. I stared at it until she raised her eyebrows.
“Friends?” she asked.
“You threatened me before coffee.”
“You deserved it.”
I took her hand and let her pull me up. Bliss wrapped her arms around my waist before I could stop her. My bruised ribs protested, but I didn’t push her away. I rested one hand against the back of her head and let her hug me while Cade watched from the couch.
“No more weaponized kissing,” she murmured against my chest.
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
“And no more calling yourself gutter-born.”
“That one might stay.”
She pulled back and glared at me until I relented.
“Fine.”
Cade rose and drew Bliss against his side the second she released me. The sight still hurt, but the pain had lost enough of its edge that I didn’t need the sunglasses to survive it. I kept them on anyway.
Rider looked at the clock. “We need to leave in forty.”
Briggs clapped his hands once. “Time to kill Minnesota.”
Easton checked his phone, and I nodded toward it. “Aura?”
He read the message and exhaled. “She said good luck, don’t die, and we’re still fighting.”
“Progress,” Cade said.
“It has a heart at the end.”
Bliss leaned over to inspect the screen. “That’s an angry heart.”
Easton frowned. “There are angry hearts?”
“There are now.”
I picked up my coffee and raised it toward Briggs. “Big day.”
He lifted his mug. “The biggest.”
The pain followed me upstairs while I collected my gear. It waited inside the master suite and behind the closed closet door, then followed my thoughts across the snow to the smaller cabin where Charm was preparing to watch me play the game that might carry me out of her life for good.
I didn’t feel better, but I felt capable.
For now, that was enough.