Page 163 of If You Claim Me

“For a time, yes. But it never worked for you. You hated the suits. You despised being made to look like a miniature adult when all you wanted to do was play hockey.” She shakes her head sadly.

I would endure just about anything to get on the ice, but I always hated the parties. Hated all the people, the socializing, being something I wasn’t.

“This one night you refused to get dressed. Your mother was furious. Your father was too busy to help, because God forbid he be a parent outside of the title. The staff couldn’t persuade you. And the moment you saw a chance, you bolted and hid. They had to search for you for over an hour.”

I remember that night now. I was supposed to have a hockey game, but my parents had deemed the party more important. I knew what it would look like. Hours of sitting in chairs like dolls—not being able to move, run, play, or have fun. No time on the ice. “I hid in Dad’s office.”

“And you broke your father’s favorite statue,” she adds.

My father had been enraged, red faced and livid. He’d yelled and railed and spanked me so hard it hurt to sit for days.

“You still had to sit through the party, and you lost your hockey privileges for a week.”

I remember that part, too. The boredom had nearly killed me.

“You were always mischievous, Connor. It’s one of my favorite things about you—that and the fact that you refuse to fall in line when it doesn’t suit you. But when you find yourself in trouble, you don’t look for a way out of it, you find a way to make an even bigger mess. All you had to do was tell Mildred the truth. You could have owned the way you feel about her, but instead, you’ve done everything in your power to cut her down and shut her out.”

She’s right. That’s exactly what I did.

Meems’s expression grows sad again. “Anyone who sees the way you look at her knows you’re in love. All you had to do was tell her, and she would have been yours. Now you’ll have to work ten times as hard to fix the things you’ve broken.”

“I don’t deserve her.”

“Not with the way you’re acting right now, no. This is you self-sabotaging, Connor. You do it in your career, with your family, with your teammates. The only person you hadn’t done it with wasme. Except now here we are. You married the woman of your dreams under the guise of makingmehappy. You should have owned your feelings for Mildred from the start, because if you’re honest with yourself, they existed long before you locked her into a contract.”

“I knew she was a good person.”

“And you liked her!”

“I liked her,” I reluctantly agree.

“And you fell in love with her!”

I look at my hands.

She sighs. “All you had to do was rip that contract up. That was it.”

“But then she would have left,” I whisper.

“No. That’s what you were afraid she would do. So instead of putting yourself on the line, you made sure that’s what happened.” Meems pauses for a moment, waiting for me to acknowledge this truth. Finally I nod. “You want to fix the messyou’ve made? Do something that makes you proud ofyourself, so other people can be proud of you, too.”

She pushes out of the chair and crosses over to me. Her soft, weathered hand rests against my shoulder, and she bends to press her lips to the top of my head. “Stop breaking your own heart.”

CHAPTER 46

DRED

Heartbreak gets two thumbs down from me. Moving back into my apartment feels simultaneously right and wrong. And it is mine now; I own it. It’s a wedding gift I won’t part with.

I nearly had a heart attack when the cleaning woman let herself in while I was in the shower crying my heart out an hour ago. Apparently Connor has had someone come in every other week to dust and vacuum, like he was ready for this. Like he expected me to leave eventually. Because he believed I wouldn’t want to stay. And now here I am, heart in tatters, frustrated and angry that he pushed me to make this decision because of his own fears.

There’s a knock at my door, and then it swings open because I’ve left the security latch off for Flip. He’s laden with grocery bags and a huge tub of ice cream.

I burst into tears.

He sets the groceries and ice cream on the closest surface and opens his arms. I fall into them and sob all over his shirt.

“I’m sorry.” He heaves a sigh. “I’ll kick his ass, if you want.”