Chapter 40
Dual POV
The morning sun rose over the Gulf of Maine in a flood of blinding, clean gold.
It cut through the bay window of the Kennebunkport saltbox cottage, washing across the dark pine floorboards and setting the frost along the window frame ablaze.
Outside, forty-foot scrub pines bowed under the weight of fresh snow, the Atlantic surf churning in a steady, calming rhythm against the rocks below the bluff.
Twenty days remained until the ECAC Championship in Lake Placid.
I sat on the braided wool rug before the cast-iron woodstove, sharing the heavy navy blanket with Justin. The fire crackled with split birch, the air smelling of resin, hot peppermint tea, and the sweet, clean heat radiating from his skin.
He was washed, wearing dry gray sweatpants and a dark waffle-knit shirt. His dark hair was combed back with his fingers, the dark hollows under his eyes softened by his first full night of rest in two weeks.
He sat with his long legs folded, his shoulder pressed against mine, his massive left arm locked around my waist, his broad palm resting flat over the lower curve of my abdomen.
The morning sickness had subsided into a faint, gentle warmth beneath my navel.
I set my ceramic mug on the floorboards, turned my torso toward him, and looked straight into his dark, clear eyes.
"Here are the ground rules, Justin," I said, my voice level, steady, and chilled with absolute certainty.
His masseter muscle didn't twitch. He didn't blink. He sat with his jaw relaxed, waiting for my terms with the unhesitating obedience of a man who had already laid his throat beneath the blade.
"No more martyrs," I said, my hand coming down over his broad knuckles where they rested against my stomach.
"No more running into loading bays to take hits alone.
No more forged compliance memos, and zero lies.
You don't shield me by shutting me in the dark, and you don't fight battles without telling me where the blood is coming from. "
Justin’s thumb stroked slowly across the cotton of my sweater, his fingers splaying wide over our baby.
"I am not a prize waiting at the end of your season, Number Four," I whispered, the gold flecks in my hazel eyes holding his gaze captive.
"And I will not raise this child with a ghost who bleeds in secret.
If we do this, we are equal partners. We carry the debt together.
We carry the contract together. Every single truth. "
Justin didn't hesitate for a fraction of a second.
His hand tightened over mine, pressing our joined palms firmly against my womb, his other hand rising to cup the back of my neck, his rough fingers tangling in my dark curls.
"Every single word, Penny," he rumbled, his voice a deep, gravel-edged vow that vibrated straight through my sternum into the floorboards. "I surrender. My contract, my future, my name—it's all yours. You are the only authority in my life."
The profound, heavy wave of peace that settled over my nervous system was an anchor dropping into the bedrock.
My pulse slowed to match his, the synchronized rhythm of our breathing filling the warm room as my forehead leaned against the hard plane of his collarbone, knowing the war was finally won.
* * *
Justin POV
I didn't let her walk to the bedroom.
I gathered her hundred and twenty-two pounds into my arms, standing smoothly from the braided rug, holding her against my chest as if she were made of spun gold.
Penny’s arms looped around my neck, her small hands resting in the dark hair at my nape, her hazel eyes heavy with a soft, sleepy surrender that knocked the remaining breath from my lungs.
I carried her into the sunlit bedroom, where the white linen sheets were washed in gold morning light.
I laid her in the center of the bed, my movements agonizingly slow and deliberate.
I stripped off my black thermal shirt, tossing it onto the chair, letting the cool morning air hit my scarred torso before I followed her down.
I didn't drop my full two hundred and twenty-eight pounds onto her frame. I braced my weight on my forearms, bracketing her shoulders with my elbows, hovering inches above her face, letting her feel the solid, protective furnace of my body without pressing into her middle.
Penny’s hands flattened against my chest, her fingers tracing the pale scar along my ribs, her lips parting as her breath hitched in a shallow gasp.
"Justin," she breathed.
"Look at me, sweetheart," I rasped, my voice dropping into that dark, ruined register reserved only for her.
She looked. Her hazel eyes were wide, dark pupils swallowing the gold, swimming with an unvarnished devotion that shattered the last remnant of my athletic arrogance.
My mouth settled over hers, slow, warm, and reverent.
There was no violence in the kiss. No frantic desperation born of fear.
It was a sacred claiming. My tongue moved over hers with heavy, rhythmic patience, tasting the sweet mint of her tea, mapping the soft slickness of her lips, while my right hand slid beneath the oversized cardigan she wore.
My calloused palm found the bare, warm skin of her lower belly.
My breath caught in my throat as my fingers splayed wide across the gentle, smooth curve of her womb.
Under my palm, her skin was fever-hot, rising and falling with the soft cadence of her respiration.
Our baby.
A violent, sweet tremor rippled through the corded muscle of my neck.
I broke the kiss, trailing my mouth down the sharp angle of her jaw to the hollow of her throat, pressing a lingering, bruising mark against the racing pulse point beneath her ear.
"Good girl," I murmured, the praise rumbling straight into her collarbone, my voice thick with gravel. "Look at what we made, Penny... look at how good you're taking care of my family."
Penny let out a broken, shuddering gasp, her head arching back into the down pillow, her fingers digging through the bunched muscle of my shoulders.
I shifted my hips, settling between her parted thighs with slow, agonizing friction, holding her anchored to the mattress with the heavy, measured pressure of my body.
Every stroke was a worship of her skin, a physical vow delivered through the heat of our joined bodies, sealing our reclamation in the clean Atlantic light.
"You're my whole life, Penny," I rasped against her lips as she rose to meet my rhythm, her breath breaking into soft, breathless whimpers against my cheek. "Every single piece of me belongs to you."
"All mine," she sobbed into my mouth, her heels resting against the backs of my thighs, pulling me closer until there wasn't a millimeter of air between us.
I held her through the crest, my forehead pressed against hers, our bodies shaking together in long, slow waves of release that left us tangled in the white linen, whole and unbroken under the sun.
* * *
Dual POV
The flashbulbs in the 1980 Rink Herb Brooks Arena press auditorium in Lake Placid exploded in a continuous, blinding wall of white light.
It was 2:15 PM on Friday in Term Week 16. February 20.
Zero days remained until the ECAC Championship game.
Sixty sports reporters from ESPN, the Boston Globe, and regional networks packed the wooden risers, microphones bristling across the long linen-covered dais like an iron hedge.
At the side table sat Raymond Cole in his black Bruins suit, Coach Bradley Hauer holding the lineup card, and Dean Arthur Sterling with a stack of verified compliance clearances.
The side double doors opened.
Justin walked onto the raised platform.
He wore a tailored charcoal three-piece suit, the black wool molded to his six-foot-four frame, his crisp white dress shirt buttoned to the collar beneath a dark green silk tie.
His dark hair was neatly styled, his jaw smooth, the jagged white scar through his left eyebrow standing out like a badge of honor against his bronze skin.
He didn't walk out alone.
His large, scarred left hand was tightly interlocked with Penny’s right hand.
Penny walked beside him onto the stage, her posture straight as rebar, radiant and untouchable.
She wore an elegant, midnight-blue wrap dress that fell past her knees, the silk draping softly over the subtle, blossoming curve of her lower abdomen.
Her dark curls framed her high cheekbones, her chin tilted high in pure, unbending pride.
A collective murmur rippled through the press corps, shutter speeds doubling into a deafening roar.
A reporter from Burlington leaped to his feet, shouting over the noise: "Ibarra! Rumors are circulating about the compliance investigation and Garrett Shaw’s expulsion! Are you signing the Bruins Entry-Level Contract before tonight's championship game?"
Justin stopped at the center lectern.
He didn't release Penny’s hand.
He gathered her knuckles in his, resting their joined hands flat on the wooden surface directly beside the microphones, his thumb smoothing over her silver signet ring with steady, unshakeable authority.
He leaned into the microphone, his deep, gravel-scraped baritone cutting cleanly through the noise of the room.
"Garrett Shaw’s expulsion was an administrative matter handled by university legal counsel regarding criminal fraud," Justin said, his voice flat, level, and lethal in its clarity. "The compliance files have been certified by the NCAA. My record is clean."
He looked across the room at Raymond Cole, who gave a single, firm nod from the side table.
"As of twelve o'clock today," Justin continued, his eyes scanning the national cameras, "I have executed my three-year Entry-Level Contract with the Boston Bruins.
Nine hundred and fifty thousand dollars base salary, ninety-five thousand signing bonus.
The development rider has been formalized: my training and off-season assignments remain exclusively in Massachusetts. "
He paused, turning his head slowly to look down at Penny.
The hardness in his stone-carved jaw melted, replaced by a fierce, reverent tenderness that held the entire auditorium captive.
"And wherever I skate, Dr. Penny Correa is with me," Justin rumbled, the words broadcast live across North American sports networks. "She has officially accepted the forty-five-thousand-dollar Vanderveer Clinical Fellowship, and she will be directing her high-load kinematic research in Boston."
Justin lifted their joined hands, bringing Penny’s knuckles to his lips in front of fifty flashing lenses, kissing her skin with absolute, unyielding possession.
"She is my partner," Justin said, looking directly down the center camera lens. "She is my home. And she is my future."
Penny looked up into his dark, smiling eyes, her chest expanding with a deep, boundless breath, her fingers tightening around his scarred palm.
The noise of the media, the pressure of the championship, the ghosts of their pasts—all of it faded into meaningless dust.
The fortress was built.
And they were stepping into the light together, forged in iron, and entirely indestructible.