Chapter 16 Rosie #2
“She wasn’t ready for me to stop making money.
And she wasn’t ready for the attention that came with dating me to end.
She wanted me to keep playing. It was good for her brand.
And when I shared that retirement for me would mean slowing down, spending less, saving more, she said she wasn’t sure if she’d ever be ready for kids. ”
“Oh…”
He nods. “That’s when I realized our long-term goals weren’t as aligned as I thought they were.
She wasn’t ready to give up the wild schedules we had where we barely saw each other and that was fine.
I think she enjoyed the fact that our relationship was mostly spent long-distance and not together.
Anytime wedding planning came up, she’d put it off.
I respected her decision. So… I ended it. ”
“You… ended things with her?”
He nods, his gaze steady on mine. “Yeah. Media didn’t mention that part, did they?”
“Why haven’t you corrected them?”
He shrugs again, leaning back in his chair. “Why does it matter? Who cares what anyone else thinks when the people I love know the truth?”
He’s right. Sometimes it isn't worth fighting the narrative that people make up about you. Sometimes you’re better off just letting them believe whatever story they want.
“Wow.” I pause, letting that sink in. “You chose not to defend yourself and now you’re paying for it.”
He sighs. “Yeah, I guess in a way I am. Two years later and my reputation doesn’t seem to be any better. Now I’m being forced to care about it if I want this lawsuit dropped.”
“And do you still want a family someday?”
I don’t know why I ask the question, but finding out that Boone wanted to get married, retire and have kids before his ended engagement is a revelation that’s only making him more attractive to me.
His lips curl into a soft smile. “Yeah. Eleven of them. A whole hockey team. Think I might have a breeding kink.”
I burst out laughing, and he chuckles with me, the sound deep and warm. But when our gazes connect again, I realize he’s not joking.
“You’re serious,” I say, studying his face.
“Not about the eleven kids but yeah, I am. I want a family,” he says simply.
My eyes drift to the window, where snowflakes fall silently onto the frozen surface of Brookhaven Lake. It’s beautiful, peaceful, but my thoughts feel anything but. They swirl as chaotically as the remaining tequila that’s still buzzing in my veins.
Have I always wanted to be a mother? No.
But the older I get, and especially since Cain became a father, the more I’ve realized it’s okay to change your mind about the life you thought you wanted.
It’s okay to say you want to prioritize your career over having a family.
And it’s okay to admit you want kids when, once upon a time, you were sure you didn’t.
Now, watching Cain step into fatherhood with Rhiannon, seeing the joy Piper has brought into their lives and the sense of purpose he’s found outside of his career, something has stirred awake inside me.
A quiet yearning. For that kind of love.
For a family, for new traditions we never had growing up.
For the chance to mother a child the way I never was but always deserved.
It’s ridiculous that I’m having these thoughts about Boone. He’s my fake husband who I’m set to divorce in just two more months. But hearing Boone would quit his successful career to start a family gives me hope that there are more men out there like him.
“You know,” Boone says, his voice breaking through my thoughts, “something’s been bugging me about the first night that we met.”
“Hm?” I ask absently, turning back to him. “What about it?”
His grin widens, and he tilts his head, like he’s caught me red-handed. “So, you admit that it was you in that club?”
I groan and sink deeper into the couch. “Only because I’ve been drinking and you caught me off guard with your question.”
He laughs, shaking his head. “What the hell were you doing dancing there that night? That place doesn’t seem like your style.”
“One of my old law school friends works there.”
“The one you danced with?”
I nod. “That’s her. I’d been…” I trail off. God, am I about to share this with Boone? It makes me look weak when I’m not. It makes me look lost when I have direction. I just needed to do something to shake up the monotony and loneliness.
I look up again and see his eyes steady and warm, patiently waiting for me to continue.
“I don’t know. I guess I’ve been feeling uneasy lately. About the way my life’s been going.”
“What do you mean?” His tone shifts, softer now, and he leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees as his dark eyes lock onto mine. His brows draw together slightly, and those full lips—God, those lips—make it impossible to look anywhere else but at him.
It’s disarming, how he’s studying me, how he makes me feel so exposed. It’s not in a bad way. But it’s like he really wants to know me. And not just the surface stuff but the things I try to hide from everyone else.
And it’s hard not to fall just a little in love with Boone every time I’m around him.
I swear I read something like that in one of his old interviews. How the lovable forward center of the Mayhem makes you feel seen, heard, and safe and that’s why everyone on and off the ice loves him.
It’s true. Every word of it.
“My life has been so… scripted, you know?” I say, my voice quieter now. “My dad planned everything for me from the moment I was born. I’ve never done anything outside of the careful outline for my life. I’ve always stayed neatly within the lines of his plans for me.”
Boone doesn’t interrupt, just watches me with that intense, focused expression that makes me feel like I can keep going without fear of being judged.
“I’ve never taken a chance. I’ve never tried something wild or risky where I might fail. All I do is work. I hardly ever date, and when I do, my dad finds some fault in the guy and shuts it down before it even gets started. And I let him.” I laugh softly, shaking my head at myself.
“That night… it was beginners’ night, and I thought going to New Jersey, where no one would recognize me, would be my version of letting loose. I wondered how it would feel to do something uncomfortable. And though it made my skin crawl to think about failing, I wondered how it’d feel to fail.”
I draw in a deep breath. “With all the makeup and hardly any clothes, I felt like I didn’t even look like myself. I could pretend that I was this woman who did spontaneous, adventurous things like take up stripping on a Friday night.”
“You looked different, but you still looked like you,” he says, his voice steady.
I blink at him, unsure what to do with that.
“It was stupid. If a client or someone I know had been there and recognized me, I would’ve never heard the end of it from my father. I would have embarrassed him and undone years of professional work.”
“You’re a grown woman, Rosie. You can do whatever you want. Your father would have eventually gotten over it.” He pauses, his lips twitching into a small, knowing smile.
Heat rushes to my face, and I laugh nervously. “It was my first time doing anything like that.”
He nods. “So you said. But it didn’t feel like it.” He rubs at his jaw while his gaze runs like heat up my body. “That lap dance…” he trails off. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.”
I groan, burying my face in my hands for a second before dropping them. “I didn’t know what I was doing. My general lack of experience with, well, everything probably made me stiff as a board. Trust me, it wasn’t good.”
“You’re wrong. It was amazing.”
Why is he saying this? I know how it went. I haven’t ever given a professional lap dance before. I start getting angry.
“You’re just saying nice things. You don’t have to lie.”
His brows pull together, and his expression hardens as he studies me. “You don’t see yourself how I see you.”
“Oh, come on, Boone,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I googled Anastasia. She’s beautiful.”
He sits back like I slapped him. “What does she have to do with this?”
I don’t know. I don’t even know why I brought her up. My cheeks are flushed, my head’s pounding and my heart’s racing.
“Forget I said anything.”
“She’s nothing like you,” he says, shaking his head, his tone leaving no room for argument.
Um, ouch.
“Well,” I counter, crossing my arms, “That's one thing that you're right about. I’m sure she knows what she’s doing better than I do. Especially in the bedroom.”
Shut up, Rosie!
He doesn’t respond right away. Instead, he leans back, folding his hands in his lap as his eyes lock on mine. There’s a heavy, charged silence between us like I’ve dropped a grenade in the middle of the conversation and one of us must pick it up.
I sip my tea, trying to ignore the way my heart sounds like it’s headed to an early death.
Finally, he speaks. “Give me another dance.”
I choke on my tea, setting the mug down quickly. “What?”
“You heard me,” he says, his voice low and steady, his gaze pinning me in place. My stomach flips and that flush on my cheeks has to be red. Luckily, it’s dark in here.
“Boone, no,” I say with a nervous laugh, shaking my head. “Why would I do that?”
“Because you want to.”
“I don’t.” But the words feel flimsy even as I say them.
He smirks, like he can see right through me. “You do. Why else did you want me to come back here with you tonight? You were practically begging your brother to let me stay. And I wanted to too. And I want this dance.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to show you something. I want to demonstrate to you how sexy you are to me and how much you actually do know what you’re doing.”
“I can’t…” My words die in my throat because, honestly, I have no idea how to respond to that. I wet my lips. My heart is racing, and before I can talk myself out of it, I stand.
Because Rose wanted to do something wild that night in Hoboken, and somehow it led me straight to Boone.
And now Rosie deserves the chance to prove to herself that she doesn’t need a fake name, a steel pole, or the cover of dark club lights to feel a little wild. That body glitter and sheer lingerie aren’t required to capture a man like Boone’s attention.
He leans back in the chair, a slow, satisfied grin spreading across his face as his eyes roam hungrily over me. He looks like a wolf, prepared to devour his prey.
And just like that I realize I’m about to give Boone Tremblay a second lap dance. Right here. In the middle of my house. In Brookhaven, Connecticut.
And not as Rose the dancer who was looking for an outlet to try something wild, but as Rosie Prescott. The lawyer who rarely takes chances, the woman he said is sexy…
And his lawfully wedded wife.