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Chapter Fifty-Two

“ Y ou’ve got to tell me what’s going on, Cass,” Maggie said, sitting beside me on her couch. “You can’t just show up with everything you own and then take a vow of silence.”

“I just said something a few minutes ago.”

“You saying, ‘I like this episode’ doesn’t cut it for the current situation,” Maggie deadpanned.

It was eerily similar to the last time I’d showed up at her place after fleeing Liam’s. I was teary-eyed, emotional, and absolutely did not want to talk about the chaos existing inside of me at that moment.

“I can’t talk about it,” I said. “It’s too much.”

“What’s too much? ,” she said, but then a pounding knock whipped both our heads in the direction of the door.

“Open the door, Maggie,” Liam’s panicked voice sounded from the other side.

I froze, wide-eyed and helpless. I wasn’t ready to see him yet. I didn’t know how to explain myself.

I’d run and hidden like a kid, and even knowing how wrong it was, I couldn’t bear to deal with the aftermath of my decision right now.

“Please don’t let him in,” I begged Maggie in a whisper. “ Please. ”

“What did he do to you?” Maggie’s eyes narrowed on me. “I’ll kill him.”

“No.” I shook my head quickly. “He didn’t do anything. It’s all my fault.”

“Maggie!” he called again, sounding desperate.

“Please,” I said again, and she nodded in quiet acceptance.

“Okay,” she said quietly, even though confusion flickered in her eyes. She didn’t know what was going on, but she respected my request anyway. “I’ll just tell him to leave then.”

Somehow, it sounded like it hurt her as much as it was hurting me.

She padded to the door and stepped out into the hallway, leaving the door cracked behind her.

“I can’t find , Mags,” he said breathlessly. “I can’t—I don’t know where—she was supposed to be at the game, but now I can’t get in touch with her.”

“Liam—”

“I need to see her, Mags.”

“Liam, breathe. She’s fine,” Maggie said.

“How do you know?” he asked.

“Because she’s here.”

“Thank fuck,” he muttered, relief flooding his voice. “Let me see her—”

“No.” Maggie stopped, and from the slight crack, I could see her moving in front of the door. “She doesn’t want to talk to you.”

“Don’t say that,” Liam said, breathing out as if it hurt to do so.

“Just give her a little space. I’m sure she’ll talk to you when she’s ready.”

“All her stuff is gone, Maggie!” Liam shouted. “She moved out! And you’re telling me I can’t talk to her? What happened?” His voice broke at the end.

“I don’t know, Liam,” she replied, sounding on the verge of breaking herself. “She hasn’t told me anything.”

“Please, just let me talk to her. I can fix this if I talk to her,” he pleaded, and I felt agony rip through me that I was the cause of it.

“It was always supposed to be temporary, Liam.” Maggie sighed. “Remember?”

“ No. ” Liam’s response was raw and guttural.

“No?” Maggie responded.

“It can’t be. I—” he started and stopped. “I fucking love her, Maggie. You have to let me see her.”

The breath left my lungs as a pain I’d never known settled securely around me. Did he mean that? Did he really love me, and I’d left him like that?

For a second, I thought she was going to give in and open the door for him, but a moment passed, and her voice responded so quietly I could barely hear it.

“I can’t. I’m sorry, Liam.”

I wiped the tears that were streaming down my face when I realized she was crying, too.

What had I done to the two best people in my life? I’d ruined everything, like I always do. I was so scared of rejection that I ran off before I’d give anyone the chance to deliver it.

“Just tell me she’s okay, then,” he said, and I wanted to run to him more than anything.

“She’s okay. She just needs time,” Maggie said.

“Time for what?”

“Maybe to realize that you aren’t going anywhere?” Maggie offered, and a sob came out of me.

Was that true? Did this man outside the door really love me, and I’d upped and left him because I was scared of something that hadn’t even happened?

He deserved better than me. He deserved someone who knew how to love him properly. Not me, saddled with anxiety and guilt and coping mechanisms that only hurt the people around me.

I couldn’t be what he needed. And he’d realize it sooner than later.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he said adamantly. “Tell her that.”

“I think she knows already,” Maggie said. “She just needs time to trust it.”

Before I could hear anything else that broke my heart further, I slipped into Maggie’s room and cried.

Liam

I drove to Brody’s house.

I couldn’t stomach the thought of going back home without her there. Or her stuff littering the place, even though she tried so hard to put things away.

Fuck, if I couldn’t get her to come back, I was pretty sure I’d have to just sell the place rather than be there without her. But where could I go that the pain of her absence wouldn’t follow me?

What the hell happened?

I’d tried so fucking hard to play it safe. To leave things on her terms, to wait until she was ready.

Had she realized after kissing me that I wasn’t what she wanted? That she didn’t feel the same way about me that she had about Dave? Had seeing him ruined all the progress I thought we’d been making toward each other the last few months?

Or was I just the type of guy that wasn’t worth sticking around for?

I’d learned early that people were fleeting. Even the ones who were supposed to stay. I’d realized that if you didn’t let people close to you, it wouldn’t hurt as much when they went away.

Halfway to Brody’s, I pulled over to the side of the road, convinced I was going to vomit from nerves. When I walked into my apartment earlier, it was the same feeling I had the day I’d come home from school to see that our dad had cleared the place out of everything he owned.

He hadn’t said a word to me or to Maggie, and based on the image burned into my brain of my mother sitting at the table red-faced and sobbing, I was guessing he hadn’t filled her in on his plans, either.

But ? The way this hurt was like nothing I’d experienced before. No gash, concussion, or dislocation was comparable to the pain of losing her. What made it worse was that I hadn’t seen it coming. When we kissed, I’d let myself think I’d gotten her. I’d let myself think I could keep her.

And despite everything, I wasn’t giving up. I’d thrown myself entirely into this girl, and now that her name was carved across my heart, there wasn’t any amount of time I wouldn’t wait for her on the chance that she’d change her mind.

“This might not be as bad as you think,” Brody said, cracking open a can of Coca-Cola as I stood in his kitchen.

“How the fuck do you figure that?” I shot him a look.

“I mean.” Brody sipped, considering. “Have we considered the possibility that she might’ve just been totally overwhelmed by the epicness of your perfect fairytale kiss and got freaked out?”

“Why would she get freaked out?”

“I don’t know, Liam.” Brody made a “duh” face. “Maybe because she just got out of a long-term relationship that she thought was going to be forever, and maybe she’s having a little trouble believing what’s going on between you won’t end up the same?”

“It wouldn’t,” I defended adamantly.

“But how is she supposed to know that?” Brody asked. “I’m sure the last guy told her the same thing.”

“The last guy was a dick, and I’m glad I punched him in the face.”

“Okay, let’s tone it down a notch,” Brody ordered. “I’m just saying, it sounds like this girl has been used to a lot of disappointment in her life.”

He didn’t know the half of it.

“So, just maybe, it’s harder for her to accept that something in her life might be going right as it is for you.”

Shit. Maybe he had a point.

Hadn’t everything I read about her trauma pointed to exactly that fact?

I exhaled, feeling something heavy loosen in my chest. Hope. Terrifying, stupid, idiotic hope.

“What? Are you retiring to become a therapist now?” I deflected with a laugh. “How the hell do you know all this anyway?”

“I told you before, dude. Sisters will make a guy hella self-aware.”

“Don’t say ‘hella.’ You’re twenty-five.” I shook my head with a smirk.

“Don’t nitpick all the wisdom I just bestowed on you because of word choice.” Brody winced. “So, are you going to fight for your girl or what?”

“Like hell.” I nodded in confirmation.

Because I might be a lot of things, but a quitter had never been one of them. Not in arguments, not in training, and not when it came to fighting for my spot in the NHL.

And sure as hell not when it came to winning over the love of my life.