Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
Jerry
Victory has a taste.
It doesn’t taste like champagne or expensive scotch. It tastes like cold air. It tastes like the clean, sharp oxygen at the top of a mountain after you’ve spent months clawing your way up the rock face, fingers bleeding, muscles screaming, refusing to let go.
I was standing on the balcony of The Spire, looking out at Sterling Falls. The city was glittering below me, a sprawling grid of amber and white lights. For the first time in my life, the view didn’t make me feel isolated. It made me feel like a conqueror.
The Sabers were first in the conference. My rib injury was a dull, manageable ache rather than a screaming alarm. My stats were up.
And inside the apartment, humming to herself as she watered her army of plants, was Heather.
I took a sip of water—no alcohol tonight, I wanted to be fully present—and checked my phone. I had an email from my agent.
SUBJECT: Seattle Draft Projection
Jerry, the Krakens are very interested. They’re talking a top-five pick. They like the leadership metrics. They like the grit you showed in Boston. Let’s discuss housing options next week.
Seattle.
I had never been to Seattle. But I pulled up a real estate app and typed it in.
I wasn’t looking for a bachelor pad. I wasn't looking for a glass box in the sky like this one, sterile and cold.
I typed in: 2 Bedroom, Garden, Natural Light.
I scrolled through photos of townhouses with bay windows and rain-slicked patios. I imagined Heather there. I imagined her filling the windowsills with ferns. I imagined her complaining about the rain while wearing my hoodie.
I realized, with a jolt of terrifying clarity, that I wasn't just planning my career. I was planning my life.
For years, my future had been a straight, narrow tunnel. Draft. NHL. Stanley Cup. Retirement. Boardroom. Take over Vane Industries. Die.
Now, the tunnel had collapsed. In its place was a wide, open field. And I didn't want to walk across it alone.
I put the phone in my pocket and walked back inside.
The sliding glass door hissed shut behind me, cutting off the wind. The apartment was warm. It smelled of garlic and roasting tomatoes—my second attempt at Chicken Parm, which Heather had graciously supervised from the island.
She was standing by the Fiddle Leaf Fig in the corner, wiping its leaves with a damp cloth. She was wearing leggings and one of my old practice jerseys—gray, soft, and hanging off one shoulder.
She looked up as I entered. She smiled.
But the smile didn't reach her eyes.
It stopped at her mouth, tight and slightly brittle. Her eyes were shadowed, darting toward her phone on the counter every few seconds. She looked like she was waiting for a bomb to go off.
"Hey," I said, crossing the room. "You okay? You've been quiet tonight."
"Just tired," she lied. She turned back to the plant, scrubbing a leaf a little too hard. "Midterms are coming up. And Tank keeps texting me memes about existentially depressed cats."
"Tank needs a hobby," I said. I came up behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist. I buried my face in the crook of her neck, inhaling the vanilla scent of her skin. "Leave the plant alone. You're going to rub a hole in it."
"He likes it," she murmured, leaning back against me. Her body was tense, rigid as a board. "He likes to be clean."
"Relax," I whispered against her ear. "You're safe here. The doors are locked. The world is outside."
She let out a shaky breath, her hands coming up to grip my forearms. "Is it? Sometimes it feels like the world has a key."
"I changed the locks," I joked gently. I turned her around in my arms so I could look at her.
Her face was pale. There were dark circles under her eyes that concealer couldn't quite hide. She looked like she hadn't slept in two days.
"Heather," I said, my voice dropping to a serious register. "Talk to me. Is it the investigation? Is it the hearing?"
"No," she said quickly. Too quickly. "The hearing is over. We won."
"Then what?"
She looked at me. For a second, I saw sheer terror in her hazel eyes. A panicked, trapped animal look that made my protective instincts flare violently.
Then, she blinked, and it was gone. Replaced by a fierce, sudden determination.
She reached up and grabbed my face.
"Nothing," she said. "I'm just... overwhelmed. By us. By how good this is."
"It is good," I agreed, leaning into her touch.
"Jerry," she whispered. "If... if things changed. If everything went wrong tomorrow. Would you still want this?"
"Nothing is going wrong tomorrow," I promised. "I've handled it. I've eliminated the variables."
"But if you hadn't," she pressed. "If the world crashed down. Would you regret me?"
I looked at her. I saw the fear trembling in her lips.
"Regret you?" I laughed, a low, incredulous sound. "Heather, before you, I was a machine. I was a balance sheet with a pulse. Regretting you would be like regretting learning how to breathe."
Her eyes filled with tears. "Okay. Good. That's... good."
"Come here," I said. I scooped her up into my arms. She squeaked, wrapping her legs around my waist instinctively.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"To the couch," I said. "We're going to eat the chicken before it gets cold. And then we're going to talk about Seattle."
"Seattle?"
"Just wait."
Dinner was perfect. Or as perfect as it could be when one person was clearly vibrating with anxiety and the other was blissfully, arrogantly confident.
I poured the wine—an expensive Barolo that had been gathering dust in my cellar. We sat on the floor by the coffee table, eating off plates I had actually warmed up.
"So," I said, wiping tomato sauce from the corner of her mouth with my thumb. "Seattle."
"What about it?" she asked, taking a large gulp of wine.
"The Krakens called my agent. They want me."
Heather froze. "That's... Jerry, that's amazing! That's a top pick."
"It is," I agreed. "It means a contract. A signing bonus. A future."
I reached for my phone and pulled up the photos I had saved on the balcony.
"Look at this," I said, handing her the phone.
She looked at the screen. A photo of a brick townhouse in a neighborhood called Queen Anne. It had a small garden in the front and a view of the Space Needle.
"It's pretty," she said softly. "Very... rainy."
"You like rain," I pointed out. "You say it makes reading better."
"I do," she admitted. She scrolled to the next photo. The kitchen. It was white, open, with a massive island. "This kitchen is bigger than my entire dorm room."
"It needs plants," I said. "Lots of them. Maybe a Fiddle Leaf in the corner."
She went still. She looked up at me slowly.
"Jerry," she whispered. "Why are you showing me this?"
"Because," I said, taking the phone from her and setting it aside. I took both her hands in mine. "I'm not going to Seattle alone."
"I have school," she stammered. "I have a year left."
"Transfer," I said. "University of Washington has an excellent Education program. I checked. I can pay the tuition. Or we can get married and you get in-state residency. I don't care how we do it. I just know I'm not doing it without you."
"Married?" She choked on air.
"Eventually," I said, shrugging as if I hadn't just dropped a nuclear bomb. "Logistically, it makes sense. But for now... just come with me. Live with me. Be with me."
She stared at me. Her mouth opened and closed. Tears spilled over her lashes, tracking through the makeup she hadn't bothered to fix.
"You plan everything," she sobbed, half-laughing. "You arrogant, controlling, wonderful idiot. You planned my transfer?"
"I like efficiency," I smiled. "And I love you."
The words hung in the air.
I hadn't planned to say them. Not like that. Not over chicken parm on a Tuesday. I had planned a speech. I had planned a setting.
But looking at her, with tomato sauce on her chin and fear in her eyes, it was the only thing that made sense.
"I love you, Heather," I repeated. It felt like unlocking a door I had kept barred for a decade. "I love your noise. I love your mess. I love the way you challenge me. I love you."
She launched herself at me.
She hit my chest with enough force to knock me back onto the rug. She straddled me, her hands gripping my face, her tears dripping onto my cheeks.
"I love you," she cried. "I love you so much it hurts. I love you, Jerry."
She kissed me. It was desperate. Salt and wine and frantic need.
"Make love to me," she begged against my mouth. "Right now. Here. Please."
"Heather..."
"I need to feel you," she sobbed. "I need to know you're here. Please, Jerry."
I didn't argue. I couldn't. The desperation in her voice matched the fire in my own blood.
I flipped us over, pinning her to the thick rug. I looked down at her. She was beautiful. She was mine.
"I'm here," I vowed. "I'm not going anywhere."
The making of love—because that’s what this was, not sex, not fucking—was a slow, devotional act.
I stripped her out of the jersey and leggings with reverence. I kissed every inch of skin I revealed. I worshipped the scar on her knee from when she fell off a bike at seven. I worshipped the soft curve of her hip. I worshipped the beat of her heart under her ribs.
When I entered her, she cried out, wrapping her legs around me, pulling me as deep as I could go.
We moved in a rhythm that felt like a heartbeat. Slow. Steady. Essential.
"Seattle," she whispered, her eyes locked on mine. "Yes. I'll come. I'll transfer."
"Seattle," I agreed, thrusting deep.
"A garden," she gasped.
"A jungle," I promised.
We fell apart together. It wasn't a violent explosion this time. It was a melting. A fusing of souls. I poured everything I had—my fear, my ambition, my hope—into her. And she took it all, holding me tight, anchoring me to the earth.
Afterward, we lay on the rug, tangled in the discarded jersey and a throw blanket I had pulled off the sofa.
The apartment was silent. The city lights cast long shadows across the ceiling.
I felt... complete.
The ache in my ribs was gone. The noise in my head was gone.