Page 17

Seventeen

Aiden

I know my mouth is hanging open.

But if anyone would have asked me how Luna would finish the explanation she was giving me, there is absolutely no fucking way I could have predicted it would have ended with Grams demanding she get married.

I should have—considering the whole middle of the night Let’s get married! —but I didn’t.

Hockey has addled my brain.

Or maybe the best orgasm of my life did.

Po-tay-toes. Po-tah-toes.

“I don’t think I understand,” I tell her.

“I didn’t either,” she murmurs, shoving her hair out of her face and sinking back down onto the bed. “It just…Grams had opinions and she always thought she knew what was right”—a half smile on her face—“don’t know where I got that from, am I right?”

She’s joking, so that’s something.

A hell of a lot better than the grief and betrayal and hurt from before.

“Stubborn and Maybelle go together like peanut butter and jelly,” I tell her softly, recalling a long-ago memory of something I heard Grams say.

A soft smile. “She used to look so damned proud of herself when she said that.”

I touch her cheek. “I remember.” Then wait for her to go on.

Then wait some more.

She sighs. “I’m not explaining this well.”

“I admit that there are a few key details that are missing, but I think I’m starting to put the pieces together.” I tuck her hair behind her ear. “What are the tools she didn’t give you?”

“Her stocks in Smythe,” she says. “Combined with my small sliver they would give me the controlling share.”

My eyes go wide as I realize what that means.

“I can fix the company,” she whispers. “Or at least put enough pressure on my brother, my dad, the rest of the board in order to make it better. But instead of signing them over to me, she told me that they would only be mine if I was married within twelve months.”

And she died…eight months ago.

Fuck.

That doesn’t leave Luna much time.

“I put it off.” A wince. “I admit I did. I mean, it was crazy and when my dad and brother found out what she was offering they tried to fight it. But the lawyers say it’s ironclad.

She’s not forcing me to get married, merely bestowing a gift on me if I do.

” She sighs. “It’s a mess—was, is a mess, and I spent too much time dithering about what to do.

I mean, at first I was so busy with arrangements and forcing myself to just get up and out of bed that I didn’t even consider it.

Then I did, but—of course—I couldn’t get married .

That would be insane. So, I resolved that I just needed to content myself with helping in other ways—my work at the nonprofit, selling my shares and donating to the proceeds to charity.

Plus, I have this place. I have my job. That’s so much more than so many other people. ”

“So what changed?”

She pushes off the bed, moves to the stack of boxes shoved into the corner and pulls out a battered blue-floral-printed box. “I found this.” She comes back over, sets the container next to me and opens the lid.

My heart pulses as I recognize my teenage boy handwriting scrawled all over the long notes we used to write each other.

She had a locker at the rink, gave me the combination to her lock.

I’d leave the notes in her left skate.

And she’d put ones for me in the right one.

“God,” I whisper, pulling out one of the intricately folded papers. “I forgot about these.”

“Me too,” she says. “At least until I moved back in here and started to unpack.”

“Unpack?” I tease lightly, glancing around the room filled with boxes, thinking about the row of rooms similarly adorned I walked by earlier.

She narrows her eyes at me. “I’ve been busy.”

I tug at her ponytail, wink, then I dig a little deeper—finding ribbons she won and medals, judge’s scoresheets and a CD burned with music from one of her skating programs.

And I wonder again…why did she stop skating? Why did she push me away so hard when I left for juniors?

We could have kept in touch. She could have kept competing.

Instead, it’s like she slammed the door on that chapter of her life and moved on.

I open my mouth to ask her…

But then I find the photographs.

And, Jesus, we were young. So young and I was clearly obsessed—staring at her like she hung the sun.

During that time I thought she did.

That’s why it hurt so much why she broke up with me.

And why, I suppose, if I’m thinking about it now, I closed the door on that part of my life and deliberately moved forward. If my life was hockey and only hockey, I didn’t have time to think about missing her.

Which worked…terribly at first and then reasonably well as the years went on.

But I always had that itch between my shoulder blades, that hole inside me, that well of loneliness.

Because I didn’t have Luna.

God, I’m an idiot.

I should have stayed in touch with her, should have sought her out anytime in the last decade, should have done so many damned things differently—she wouldn’t have been alone when Grams passed, wouldn’t have dealt with her brother and dad alone, wouldn’t have?—

“Aiden?” she asks quietly and I shove down the turmoil, the regret.

There’s no going back.

But I can go forward, can make sure to not waste any more time.

Just thinking those words eases the hold on my lungs, fills in that gap deep in my heart. I can do things differently from here on out.

“I remember this day,” I say, pointing to a shot of us sitting at a table in the rink with our textbooks open, a pair of hot chocolates in front of us.

“Yeah,” she murmurs, stroking a finger over our smiling faces. “That day was the first time I kissed you.”

I feel my cheeks heat, thinking about her taking my hand, drawing me around to a shadowy corner of the rink, and surprising me—like usual—with a kiss. “I wasn’t very good at it, was I?” I say, lifting her hand and pressing my lips to her palm.

“I don’t think either of us were.” She sighs then rests her head on my shoulder. “Though, I’m happy to say I think we got better at it.”

“A lot better,” I agree. Then, even though I hate to, I gently tug us back into the future. “So, you found this and the contract was inside?”

A long pause. Then she nods without lifting her head.

“Yeah. I found the paper, the notes, our pictures…and I was just so lonely.” A shaky breath.

“And admittedly desperate because time was running out and I’d lose my chance at Grams’s shares, at fulfilling all those dreams for Smythe.

But was I really just going to go out and marry a stranger? ”

I don’t like that.

Not at fucking all.

Though, before I can say something stupid—like no fucking way are you going to be with someone else—she keeps talking.

“Then I saw a highlight of a Grizzlies game, couldn’t believe it was you on the screen, that you were close after all this time, back here in California, same as me.

” She lifts her head, mouth gently curved.

“And I remembered the time in the rink, the kisses, the boy you were. So…I admit that I did some unscrupulous things to track down your address?—”

My eyebrows fly up and I make a mental note to get her to expand on that later.

Right now, there are more important things to focus on.

“I drank a little wine for courage, picked up that cupcake, and came to your house.”

I hold my breath.

“And you were you ,” she murmurs. “My Aiden of old, except all grown up. Beautiful, sweet, and still with that yummy ass?—”

My laughter bursts out of me.

Then I sober when she touches my cheek. “And I knew if I told you everything you’d find a way to fix it.

But I also knew within a few minutes with you that I couldn’t ask that of you.

Jesus, Aiden.” She groans, shoves a hand through her hair.

“You’re living your dream! You made it to the NHL.

You freaking did it. And what the hell am I doing?

Popping back into your life, trailing bullshit in my wake. ”

“You’re right,” I say.

Her head flies up, eyes going wide.

Hurt dancing through the gray depths.

I cup her cheek.

Press my lips to her forehead, feeling my next words with absolutely certainty.

“Because I am going to fix it, Luns.”

“Wh-what?”

“We’re getting married, sweetheart.”