Page 33 of Learn Your Lesson

“I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.”

“Because I asked.”

He lifted his brows, but then fell quiet for a long time. I realized what he meant by that statement was that he wasn’t used to talking so much. Maybe not at all.

It made me giddier than it should have to know he felt like talking to me.

But the longer silence fell between us, the more I wondered if the conversation was over. I was just about to drink the last of my milk when he started talking again.

“We loved each other, but not in the traditional way. We had fun together. We had respect for one another. And we knew we’d make good parents.” He shrugged. “I was too busy with hockey to care about trying to find a partner, and she seemed content with me — at least for the moment. It didn’t make sense to anyone else but us,” he admitted. “But that was all that mattered.”

“What happened to her?”

Again, the words shot out of me, and I curled in on myself when Will’s gaze hardened and landed on me.

“She got on birth control about a month after having Ava. The doctor said she was fine.” He swallowed. “But she wasn’t. She experienced a blood clot, but the symptoms were so mild… we didn’t really know anything was going on. Not until she got really dizzy one day, and felt like she couldn’t breathe.”

I covered my lips with my trembling hand, eyes watering, heart racing.

He was saying it so matter-of-factly, but I felt the weight in every word. I felt the pain he was barely holding at bay.

“It happened so fast,” he croaked. “One moment, she was lying down because she didn’t feel well. The next… she had a pulmonary embolism.” Will swallowed. “I called 9-1-1, but it was too late.”

I closed my eyes at his words, holding back tears I felt like I didn’t have a right to shed.

“Thank you for sharing that with me,” I finally whispered, forcing my eyes open to look at him. “You didn’t have to, but I… I really appreciate that you did.”

He swallowed, nodding. “I don’t talk about it much to anyone. But… I guess you’re a good listener.” He paused. “Or I’m just exhausted enough to not fight against telling you the truth.”

My heart felt like it was being squeezed in an iron fist.

Two months.

She’d lived for less than two months with her daughter.

It was so impossible to imagine.

“What did you do?” I asked, locking mygaze on his. “After…”

Will cleared his throat and took his glass to the sink, rinsing it and tucking it in the dishwasher. “I think I’ve talked enough tonight.”

I jumped off my barstool. “Yes, of course. I’m sorry.”

“Stop apologizing.”

“Sorry.”

He pointed a glare at me, cocking a brow, though the corner of his lips tilted just a quarter inch.

I shrugged.

It was habit.

“You’re welcome to sleep in one of the guest beds, if you can’t fall asleep out there,” he said, nodding toward the pool house. But I was already stifling a yawn, and I mirrored him, taking my glass to the sink.

“I’ll be fine. See you in the morning?”

We were standing so close now, less than a foot between us, and I found my feet rooted in place as I stared up at him.