Chapter 40
Dual POV
The morning sun broke over the red pines in blinding shafts of winter gold, setting the frost on the cottage windows ablaze.
Inside, the cast-iron woodstove purred with a steady, crackling warmth, throwing orange embers against the glass door. I sat on the thick braided rug by the hearth, wrapped in a heavy woolen blanket, with Chase sitting directly behind me.
His massive frame was an immovable wall at my back, his long legs framing mine, his bare chest radiating a furnace of heat through the fabric of my sweater.
He had showered, washed the soot from his skin, and shaved the rough beard from his jawline, leaving only clean stubble and the faint, jagged line of the scar through his eyebrow.
My head rested against the hollow beneath his collarbone.
For the first time in weeks, the sour nausea in my stomach had yielded, replaced by a deep, grounded calm that sat heavy and peaceful in my ribs. My breathing was slow, synced to the massive, forty-beat-per-minute thrum of his heart striking against my shoulder blade.
I reached down, taking his large, scarred right hand where it rested loosely on his thigh.
I brought his palm up, pressing it flat over the lower curve of my abdomen.
Chase’s breath hitched in a sharp, quiet catch, his thick fingers instantly splaying wide across my belly, holding the space with infinite, reverent gentleness.
I turned my head slightly, looking back into his dark, gray eyes.
"We need to set the terms, Chase," I said.
My voice was quiet, stripped of anger, but carrying the immovable weight of a mother drawing a line in stone.
Chase held my gaze, his jaw relaxed, his eyes clear of every shadow that had haunted him in Duluth. "Name them, Nola."
"No more isolation," I said, my fingers tightening over his knuckles.
"No more fighting external battles alone.
You don't get to martyr yourself for this family.
If someone threatens your career, if someone comes after our name, you don't fight them alone in a concrete tunnel.
We stand together, or we don't stand at all. "
Chase didn't hesitate for a fraction of a second.
He leaned forward, his chin resting against the curve of my shoulder, his voice a low, gravelly rasp that vibrated straight through my spine into my womb.
"Zero secrets," he whispered, his other hand coming around my waist, folding me into his bulk. "No walls. You have the final say on my contracts, my representation, and my life. Every breath I draw belongs to you and this baby. I surrender everything, sweetheart."
The last lingering knot of tension behind my breastbone dissolved into a wave of profound, soothing heat.
I tilted my chin up, pressing my lips softly to the rough edge of his jaw, knowing with absolute, unshakeable certainty that our sanctuary was finally whole.
* * *
I didn't let her walk to the bedroom.
I slid my left arm beneath her knees and my right around her back, standing up from the hearth in one clean, effortless lift.
Nola let out a soft, surprised breath, her arms looping loosely around my neck, her face settling into the warm hollow of my throat as I carried her across the sunlit floorboards.
The master bedroom was flooded with clean, brilliant daylight, the snow outside acting like a mirror for the morning sky. I laid her down in the center of the mattress with meticulous, agonizing care, as if the white linen sheets were made of fragile glass.
I pulled my black henley over my head, tossing it aside.
Her hazel-gold eyes tracked the movement of my shoulders, the pupils dark and dilated with a soft, sleepy heat that set my blood on fire. She was wearing only my faded gray practice t-shirt, the hem gathered around her hips, her pale thighs resting open on the sheets.
I moved over her.
I settled my heavy, muscular frame between her parted legs, taking my weight on my forearms on either side of her head, letting my chest press softly against hers.
The heat of our bare skin meeting was a silent explosion.
Her breath hitched in a ragged gasp, her small hands rising to grip the dense muscle of my upper arms, her fingers digging in with a fierce, possessive grip that anchored me to her body.
"Look at you," I murmured, lowering my head until my mouth hovered a millimeter from hers. My stubble grazed the sensitive skin of her cheek, trailing down to press a slow, open-mouthed kiss against the rapid pulse point jumping beneath her ear.
"Chase," she breathed, her hips rolling up against mine on pure instinct.
"I've got you, sweetheart," I rasped, my right hand sliding down from her jaw, trailing over her collarbone, down the flat plane of her ribs, until my splayed palm rested flat across the soft, warm curve of her lower stomach.
I held her there, feeling the steady heat of our child beneath my hand.
"Good girl," I growled softly against her lips, kissing her with deep, unhurried, agonizing patience. "Look at what we made. You're my whole life, Nola. All mine."
She whimpered into my mouth, her heels dragging across the sheets, pulling me down into her warmth.
I entered her with slow, reverent torque, holding myself suspended, letting my forehead rest against hers as our breathing shattered into synchronized, ragged gasps. Every movement was an act of worship, a physical sealing of the vow I had made on her floor.
My voice stayed low, thick with ruined praise against her throat, murmuring her name with every heavy stroke of my hips.
She arched beneath me, her hands knotting into my hair, her eyes locked with mine through the gold morning light until a long, cascading wave of release ripped through her frame, pulling a shattered, breathless cry from her mouth.
I followed her into the fire, my forehead burying into the crook of her neck, my body trembling with a savage, absolute surrender as I poured my soul into the woman who held my future.
* * *
Forty-eight hours later, the flashbulbs in the grand ballroom of the Minneapolis Convention Center were a blinding, relentless wall of white light.
A hundred and fifty sports journalists, television cameras, and NHL front-office executives filled the tiered rows, the room buzzing with speculation after the week's explosive arrests.
Behind the heavy curtain of the main dais, I stood adjusting the cuffs of my tailored charcoal suit.
My jaw was thoroughly relaxed, my resting pulse sitting at a steady forty-two beats a minute, heavy and unshakeable.
The black eye from the championship game was fading to faint yellow beneath my scarred brow, but the man wearing the suit was unrecognizable from the enforcer who had skated off the ice in Duluth.
Beside me, Nola smoothed the front of a structured emerald-green silk blazer dress that fell modestly to her knees, accentuating her glowing skin and the quiet, radiant certainty in her eyes.
Her hand slid into mine.
Our fingers interlocked, our knuckles locking together with an unbreakable, crushing grip that needed no words.
The stage manager gave the signal: "Thirty seconds, Captain."
I turned my head, looking down into her hazel-gold eyes.
She smiled, a brilliant, fearless curve of her lips that lit up the dim wings of the stage.
"Ready, Guzman?" she whispered.
"With you," I answered, my voice a low, steady rumble. "Always."
We stepped through the curtain together.
The room detonated with noise, reporters shouting my name, shutters firing in a deafening, continuous rattle.
I didn't look at the cameras. I didn't look at Director Miller sitting in the front row, or the representatives from Central Scouting.
I walked straight to the podium with my head held high, keeping my fingers tightly laced through Nola's, leading her to the center of the stage until she was standing flush beside my right shoulder.
I stepped up to the microphones.
The room fell dead silent.
"Thank you for coming," I said, my voice carrying through the loudspeakers with absolute, calm authority. "Before I discuss my professional future, I have an official statement regarding the compliance investigation at Vandermark University."
I looked down at the press corps, my grip on Nola’s hand tightening just enough to anchor her.
"The charges against Nola Wagner were the result of corporate extortion, wire fraud, and criminal tampering orchestrated by Carter Ross," I stated, each word landing like an iron hammer.
"The university has issued a full administrative exoneration, restored her research grant, and forwarded her fellowship credentials to Colorado Springs. "
A murmur rippled through the front row, but I cut it off before a single question could be shouted.
"As for my professional career," I continued, looking directly into the primary network camera, "I have officially signed an entry-level commitment with the Colorado Avalanche."
The reporters gasped, pens flying across pads.
"I chose Denver because it is sixty miles from Colorado Springs, where Nola will be completing her post-graduate research at the Olympic Training Center."
I turned my head, breaking eye contact with the cameras, looking down into the radiant face of the woman beside me.
"My athletic career exists for one purpose," I said into the silence of the room, my voice rough with unyielding, public devotion. "To build a life beside my partner. Nola Wagner is my future, my family, and the only victory that will ever matter to my name."
Nola looked up at me, her eyes shining with unshed tears of pure triumph, her fingers squeezing mine with unbreakable strength.
In front of the entire sports world, in the glare of a hundred flashing cameras, our hands remained locked in the light.
Unshakable. Indestructible.
Claimed forever.