Page 45 of Goal Line (Boston Rebels #4)

I know my reputation, and she obviously does too.

However, I’ve never felt the need to make any kind of a statement, publicly or privately, about my sex life.

If there are women out there who want to say they slept with me, that’s kind of bizarre, but it’s also not a conversation I want to engage in.

As far as I’m concerned, people can believe what they want about my sex life.

“Why?” she asks simply, searching my eyes.

I wish I could read her emotions at this moment, because I’m more nervous than I’ve ever been before. Telling the truth is either going to freak her the fuck out, or it’s going to put her mind at ease—and I have no idea which. But I’m also determined to stop hiding my feelings for my wife.

“I told myself a long time ago that I’d have sex with the first person I liked more than I liked you.”

Her mouth parts, but no words come out. We stand there, staring at each other, for at least a full minute.

“What? Why?” she finally whispers, dumbfounded, like the shock of this revelation is making it impossible for her to speak.

“Because, Evie...” I bring my hands to either side of her neck, making sure her eyes are on mine as I say, “It’s always been you.”

Her ragged breathing fills the space, but her face doesn’t change—it’s still a mask of surprise.

“I’m not even your type,” she whispers as her eyes fill with tears.

I shake my head. “You are exactly my type.”

“But every girl I’ve ever seen you with is tall and blonde.”

“And why do you think that is?”

“I don’t … I don’t know.” The words are barely audible as they squeak out of her.

I lean down and press my lips to her hairline, letting myself breathe in her peach scent. “Yes, you do.”

If it wasn’t obvious before why I only dated women who were her polar opposite, by now, she has to realize it was so that I wouldn’t grow attached.

She leans her head forward, pressing her face against my chest, and I rest my chin on top of her head while wrapping my arms around her back. I’ve held her like this so many times—through disappointment and anger and sadness—at various points in her life .

But something about this is different. I’m not comforting her, I’m reassuring her. And I get the sense that she’s going to need answers to all the questions she’s never asked.

“How...” She sighs. “How long have you had feelings for me?”

I’m so relieved she didn’t ask if I have feelings for her, because if she had to ask that, then I’ve failed her.

Instead, it’s like she’s connecting the dots—all the times I dropped everything for her, all the visits to see her in LA, all the times I stayed on the phone with her half the night when she’d had her heart broken, the way I came home for a month every summer when she was going to be back in Newbury Falls, the way I suggested we get married.

Everything.

“Forever.”

“But . . . like, since when ? High school?”

“At least.” I honestly don’t remember a time when I could imagine my life with anyone but her.

In middle school, when all my guy friends started getting interested in girls, she was still the only girl I liked.

By high school, I was full-on infatuated with her.

“But you always told everyone that we were just friends, so I did the same because that’s what you needed to believe about me so our friendship wouldn’t change. ”

“No, that’s what you told everyone,” she says, tilting her head up so I can see the trail of tears streaking down her face. “But if you had feelings for me, why did you want to go to prom with Sadie Fucking Montgomery?”

I bring my hands to her face, brushing my thumbs across her cheeks to wipe away her tears. I wonder if she realizes that the reason I call her skating partner Christopher Fucking Steele is because she once referred to Sadie the same way.

“I didn’t. I wanted to go with you .”

“Then why did you ask Sadie?” she asks. Beneath my palms, her pulse kicks up a notch.

“Because you were going with Warner.”

“No...before Warner and I decided to go together, Reese told me you had this whole big plan to ask Sadie.”

The way the anger flashes through my body can’t possibly be healthy or normal. Fucking Reese. I knew he had feelings for her, but he always said he didn’t. I wouldn’t put it past that asshole to have told her I was asking Sadie so he’d have a shot of going with Eva.

“I told Reese about my plans to ask someone . I never said it was Sadie.”

“You were going to ask me ?”

“I was,” I say with a nod. “And you should have known that.”

She closes her eyes, tilting her head back, and I catch the back of her head with my fingertips. “I’m such an idiot. I was the one who asked Warner.”

Well, this is new information.

“Did you ask him because you thought I was going to ask Sadie?” What I’m really asking is whether she was jealous. Did she have feelings for me back then, too?

She opens her eyes, and in the low light of the kitchen, it’s hard not to get lost in the way the shades of brown in her eyes swirl together, like dark and milk chocolate melting into each other.

“Yeah.” She gulps. “When I heard you were asking Sadie, I needed it to seem like I didn’t care—like I hadn’t been hoping you’d ask me.”

The weight of the missed opportunity hangs heavy in the air. But so does the promise of our future together.

“Maybe it’s better that we didn’t get together back then?

” I say. It’s something I’ve had years to think about.

“If something had happened between us in high school, and then I went off to college and you went to LA, we wouldn’t have lasted.

Especially not once I was drafted and living in Canada.

There was no way we could each have achieved our dreams, and still made a relationship work, not for all these years.

It’s probably better that we stayed friends instead, so we could end up here, now. ”

“I wish it had been you,” she says, and the sigh that follows is edged with sadness.

“You wish what had been me?”

“I don’t know . . . my prom date. My first . . . everything.”

“I’m your first husband,” I say with a sly smile.

“About that...” As she trails off, my stomach fucking drops like a pit of dread has opened up and swallowed my insides. I’m not sure what she sees on my face, but her eyes widen, and she laughs, saying, “Oh my god, I’m just teasing, Luke!”

“Not something to fucking joke about, Wife ,” I practically growl at her as I pull her closer, erasing the distance between us.

“Sorry,” she whispers, right before my lips meet hers. “It . . . was . . . funny . . . in . . . my . . . head.” Each word escapes between kisses until I smother them out, because I’m done talking for now.