26. DECLAN #2
Protecting your image or fighting for your truth.
I’ve been protecting an image Gregory created for nine years while my truth suffocated beneath it. Playing the role of the playboy while hiding the man who raised his siblings and fell in love with a brilliant woman who saw through his bullshit.
And now I'm about to lose Ivy the same way I've lost everything else that mattered. By staying silent. By protecting myself instead of fighting.
Jake sits down, and the room slowly empties. But his words repeat again and again in my mind.
Fighting for your truth.
I head to the showers, strip off my gear, and stand under water hot enough to scald. The steam fills my lungs as I try to wash away the humiliation of tonight's performance. My muscles ache from tension more than exertion. Every mistake plays on repeat behind my closed eyes.
When I finally emerge, towel wrapped low around my waist, the locker room is empty. Water drips down my chest as I cross to my locker. I'm reaching for my jeans when heels click against the concrete floor.
"Declan."
The voice stops me cold. I turn.
What is she doing here? And how did she get in?
Sienna Hartley leans against the doorframe in a dress that's barely there.
Black, tight, strategic cutouts revealing golden skin.
Red lips curve into a knowing smile. We hooked up twice last season.
Quick, meaningless encounters that Gregory arranged for photo ops and I went along with because it was easier than fighting.
"Sienna." I grab my shirt, pulling it on quickly. "You can't be in here."
"Security let me through when I said I was your girlfriend." Her smile widens as she pushes off the doorframe, hips swaying as she approaches. "I saw the game. You looked so tense out there. So frustrated."
"Yeah. It was a rough night."
"I bet." She's standing too close now, her cloying perfume filling the space between us. "You need to blow off steam. Let me help you release all that tension."
Her hand lands on my chest, fingernails dragging slowly down over my shirt. My body responds instinctively. Heat pools low in my belly, blood rushing south. I'm sexually frustrated. And she's offering exactly the kind of uncomplicated release I've taken without question dozens of times before.
But not tonight.
"Sienna, stop."
"Remember how good we were together?" Her other hand slides up my arm, squeezing muscle. "How I made you forget everything else? You need that right now, Dec. I can see it in your eyes."
She presses closer, and I can feel the heat of her body through the thin dress. Her breasts brush against my chest as she tilts her face up, lips parted in invitation.
"Come home with me," she murmurs, her breath hot against my jaw. "Let me take care of you. No strings. No complications. Just you and me and all that gorgeous frustration I can help you work out."
Her hand slides lower, over my stomach, heading for the towel. My body is betraying me, responding to the sheer physicality of someone willing and eager.
But my mind is somewhere else entirely.
On brown eyes that look at me like I'm more than my body. On a petite frame and soft lips that somehow takes up all the space in my thoughts. On the way Ivy's hands felt in my hair, gentle and demanding at once. On how making love to her felt like coming home instead of just getting off.
On Ivy.
I grab Sienna's wrist before her hand reaches the towel.
"I'm not interested." My voice is hard as I step back, putting distance between us. "Leave."
"Come on, Dec." Her voice drops to a purr as she moves forward again, undeterred. "Don't play hard to get. I know you're wound tight. I can feel it." Her free hand trails up my bare arm. "No one needs to know. Just you and me, working out all that tension. I'll do that thing you like."
"Sienna. I said no."
She blinks, brows furrowing in surprise. "Since when do you turn down no-strings sex?"
"I'm not that guy anymore."
Her expression shifts from seductive to calculating.
"Right. You're the guy whose agent is suing him. Who is about to lose everything." She steps closer again, her voice softening into false sympathy. "That's exactly why you should come with me and forget about all of it for a few hours. Let me make you feel good."
"Get out, now!"
She stops, steps back. "You're making a mistake."
"I've made plenty of those. This isn't one of them."
She stares at me for a long moment, then huffs out a breath and turns on her heel. The sound of her heels clicking away as she leaves the locker room. The door slams behind her.
I stand there, breathing hard, my body still humming with unwanted arousal. The towel around my waist does nothing to hide my body's reaction, the evidence that part of me wanted what she offered.
But that's just biology. Physical response divorced from what I actually want.
And what I want is Ivy.
Her body, that kiss we didn’t finish in her hallway. Her sharp mind. The way she blushes when she's nervous. How she stands her ground even when she's terrified. The vulnerability she trusted me with that I destroyed. I want the woman who has ruined me for casual sex and convenient arrangements.
Even if I never get her back, I can't go back to being the man who would have followed Sienna out of this locker room without a second thought.
In the parking garage, I lean against my car, breathing hard. My body is still wound tight with frustration, but the encounter left me feeling empty rather than tempted.
Because meaningless sex can't fix what's broken, and I'd rather spend the rest of my life wanting someone I can't have than settling for someone who wants the version of me that doesn't exist anymore.
I pull out my phone and call Patricia.
"I'm holding a press conference," I say before she can speak.
"Declan, we discussed this already."
"I'm exposing everything. Gregory's theft. The manipulations. The fake relationship with Evangeline. The edited video of Ivy." My voice is steady now, certain. "All of it."
Silence.
"That's career suicide," Patricia says finally.
"Maybe. But it's the truth." I lean back against my locker. "I'm done protecting lies."
"The lawsuit will proceed. Gregory will destroy you in court. The media will crucify you."
Something fierce and reckless burns in my chest.
"Let them. I've spent nine years letting him control me. I'm done."
"I need to advise you against this in the strongest possible terms."
"Noted. Set up the press conference for tomorrow."
I hang up.
My next call is to Marcus. He answers on the second ring.
"What do you want?" he asks in a wary voice, his car engine humming in the background.
“Are you still in the facility?”
“I’m at the car park.”
“I want to tell you something.”
The sound of the car engine goes off.
“You have five minutes. Be fast.”
When I get to his car, he motions me to come in. I slide into the passenger seat.
"I'm holding a press conference tomorrow where I’ll expose Gregory and confess about Ivy."
There’s a long pause.
"You're serious?"
"Yes."
"It will destroy your career."
"Probably."
He exhales. "Do it."
The words surprise me. "What?"
"If you really love her, prove it," he says in a hard tone. "Show her… Scratch that. Show me that you love my sister or back off and stop playing games with her heart."
I sigh, shoulders deflating. "She won't take me back."
"Maybe not. But at least you'll be able to look at yourself in the mirror."
He turns on the ignition, and I step out of the car. As he drives off, I try my best not to think of how I'll destroy everything I've built tomorrow. My reputation. My career. My carefully constructed public image.
But maybe I'll finally become the man Ivy deserves.
The man who chooses truth over safety.
The man who fights instead of hiding.
I pull up Ivy's contact one last time, even though I know she's blocked me and type out a message that will never reach her:
Declan:
Tomorrow, I'm going to burn it all down. I've been letting Gregory control me while I controlled you. But that stops tomorrow. Everyone will know the truth. And whatever happens after, at least it will be real.
The message fails to deliver, but I’ve sent it anyway. Then I go back to the locker room, change, and walk out of the arena.
Tomorrow, I fight for my truth.
And if it costs me everything, at least I'll finally be free.