Page 46

I wake up to an empty bed and the sound of movement in the kitchen.

For a moment, I just lie there, savoring the lingering scent of her on my sheets, the memory of how she fell apart in my arms last night.

These past few days have been a fucking revelation like finally coming up for air after drowning for years.

The morning wood is immediate and demanding as I walk to the kitchen, drawn by the sight of her in my shirt. Her bare legs make my mouth water. She’s standing at the counter with her back to me, motionless, but all I can think about is getting my hands on her.

I slide up behind her, pressing my erection against her ass as I wrap my arms around her waist.

“Morning, beautiful,” I murmur against her neck, expecting her to melt into me the way she has every morning for the past week.

Instead, she goes rigid. Pushes against my arms with just enough force to create space between us.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, confusion cutting through the haze of desire.

She doesn’t answer. Doesn’t even look at me. Just stands there staring at the counter, her shoulders tense enough to snap.

I glance at the counter. A small plastic bag sits on the granite surface. My pills. Oxycodone. The sight hits me like a punch to the gut because I have no fucking memory of where it came from.

“Where’d you find that?” The words come out defensive like instincts kicking in before I can stop them. My mind races, trying to remember all the places I stashed pills over the years. Was this one in the kitchen? Behind the coffee maker? In the junk drawer?

“It doesn’t matter where the fuck I found them,” she declares, her voice deadly quiet. “The question is why you have these. I thought you gave me your stash.”

“I don’t know where you found those, but...” I run a hand through my hair, the words feeling like broken glass in my throat. “I have bags hidden throughout the house.”

Those words hang between us like a live grenade. She whirls around, and the look in her eyes of betrayal, rage, disappointment makes me want to put my fist through the wall.

She grabs the bag, holding it up like evidence she’s caught me red-handed. “Are you on them right now?”

“Are you fucking serious right now, Sage? No.”

Fucking hell. She sounds like every other person in my goddamn life, accusing me of being high.

“Are you fucking sure?” She steps closer, close enough that I can see the fury blazing in her dark eyes.

“Yes, I’m fucking sure, Sage,” I grind out.

Those words fly right over her head.

She doesn’t believe me.

“Where else are you hiding your drugs?” she asks.

“What?” I gasp, unable to process that this isn’t a simple conversation. She could have just asked, and I would tell her the truth, and this would be done. But by the look in her eyes, she’s pissed.

Her voice rises, cracking like a whip. “Where the fuck else are your pills, Slater?”

“I don’t fucking know!” The words explode out of me. “That’s why I asked where you found those!”

She storms past me, her face a mask of disgust. “You are such a fucking liar!”

Fuck!

She’s right.

I do know where I’ve hid them, but now that I’m being confronted, my brain won’t fucking remember.

I chase her down the hallway, my heart pounding with a mixture of panic and rage. “Sage, wait—”

But she’s already in my bedroom, yanking open dresser drawers. Unfolding my shorts, checking pockets, dumping out contents like she’s conducting a drug raid.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I demand as she destroys my space like she’s a crackhead searching for drugs. “I told you that I’m not using! You don’t believe me?”

“How can I fucking believe anything that comes out of your mouth?” She whirls around, a pair of my boxer briefs in her hands. “You told me you gave me all your shit and I find this bag of fucking pills!”

The accusation hits sharply. Because she’s right, I know I didn’t give her all my shit.

But I wasn’t saving it around for later.

I didn’t tell her because I didn’t want to look like a total fucking addict.

I already have every accusation in the book thrown at me, and I didn’t want her to judge me because I care what she thinks.

She’s been my high, my escape, my fucking salvation and hope.

I can’t lose her over something this stupid.

“I forget where I’m hiding all my shit,” I mutter, hearing the blatant lie in my voice.

“You forget?” Her laugh is harsh, bitter. “You forgot about a bag of oxy’s? Jesus Christ, Slater, do you hear yourself?”

“I’m clean, Sage!” I’m shouting now, my voice echoing off the walls. “I’m not fucking high! I have shit hidden throughout the house. I don’t fucking know where. It’s just everywhere!”

“Oh, am I supposed to believe that you’re telling me the truth?”

“I want you to trust me!”

“Trust you?” She throws the boxer briefs back in the drawer. “You’re lying to me! You promised me you gave me everything, and now I find out you’ve got a fucking pharmacy hidden throughout your house!”

I grab her wrists, desperate to make her understand. “I’m not taking them. It’s been on and off for years. I swear to God, I’m not—”

“Let go of me.” Her voice is ice cold, and when I don’t immediately release her, she jerks away hard enough to stumble backward. “Don’t you fucking touch me when you’re lying to my face.”

I’m spiraling now, grasping for anything that might convince her. “Buy a fucking drug test. Piss test, blood test, hair test whatever you want. I’ll pay for it. I’ll take it right fucking now!”

“A drug test?” She stares at me like I’ve lost my mind. “You think you can manipulate me into buying fucking drug tests? No. This is about trust, Slater. This is about you promising me something and then me finding out it was bullshit.”

“It wasn’t bullshit! I gave you what I remembered—”

“What you remembered?” Her voice rises to a near-shriek. “These aren’t car keys, Slater! These are drugs! Addictive fucking substances that you apparently scatter around your house like Easter eggs!”

“I know how this looks—”

“Do you? Do you really?” She’s pacing now, her hands shaking with fury. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you played me. Made me think you were actually falling for me while you kept your backup stash for when things got hard.”

“That’s not—”

“What the fuck is it then!” She stops pacing, fixing me with a stare that cuts straight through me.

“The last time you took these… it was because we got into a fight, Slater. You went and got drunk and then high as a fucking kite because I hurt your feelings. And now you want me to believe you’ve magically found the willpower to stay clean? ”

The reminder of that night—of how badly I fucked up, how close I came to losing her—makes my chest tight with shame and anger.

“I haven’t touched anything since then,” I say through gritted teeth. “Not one fucking pill. And I’m not going to, even after this fight. I just need you to calm down and talk to me.”

“Talk to you?” she mocks, laughing cynically to herself.

“You know I’d lose everything, right?” The words rip out of me raw and desperate. “Hockey, my scholarship, my entire fucking life! You! Do you think I’m stupid enough to throw that away for some fucking pills?”

“I think you’re an addict!” she screams back. “I think addicts do stupid shit all the time because that’s what addiction is!”

The word hangs between us like a curse. Addict .

She called me a fucking addict, and the worst part is she’s not wrong.

I am exactly as she says—someone who hides drugs around his house and then forgets about them, someone who pops pills when life gets overwhelming, someone who lies even when he doesn’t mean to.

“You don’t understand,” I say, my voice hoarse. “You don’t know what it’s like—”

“To be an addict? You’re right, I don’t.” Her eyes are bright with unshed tears. “This is bullshit.”

“It’s not bullshit, Sage. You’re upset about something from my fucking past, and I get it.

I’m not getting high though. I would lose everything I worked my ass off for.

I wouldn’t fucking do that. If it makes you feel any better, they have routine drug tests for me for hockey. I promise on my life I’m clean.”

She stares at me for a long moment, and then something shifts. Her shoulders drop the tension, her face softening as what I’m saying finally registers.

“Is that why you’re so on edge all the time?” she asks quietly.

I stare into her eyes across the room, shrugging because I don’t trust my voice right now.

“Is that why you’re so aggressive on the ice? Why you walk around like you hate the fucking world?”

I glance at the ground, the truth bitter in my mouth. “Yeah. Because I’m sober.”

“So, you’re not secretly taking them?”

“Baby, no.” I take a step toward her, desperate to close the distance between us, to make her understand. “I need you to trust me.”

“Where are the rest?” she asks, and I halt mid-step, running a hand through my hair.

The question hangs in the air like a loaded gun. I could lie, could minimize, could tell her that’s all there is. But she’s asking for honesty, and if I want her trust, I have to give it to her.

I exhale. “The drawer. Bathroom under the sink. Couch cushions. Car. That bedroom.” Each location feels like a confession, a piece of evidence against me.

“Jesus Christ, Slater,” she gasps, her hand flying to her forehead. “Do you have a hard time saying no to your drug dealer?”

I take a second to look at her face, really look at her. I think she finally believes that I’m not high, that I haven’t been using other than that one-off. But asking that question raises a valid point that makes my stomach twist.

I shrug, the truth scraping my throat raw. “I don’t tell him no.”

“Start telling him no!” she shouts, walking to the nightstand.