Page 46

KAYDEN

I texted Erik to tell him I was coming over.

He didn’t answer. I didn’t give a shit. He couldn’t just walk out of an argument like that.

Okay, fine, I know I’d really pushed my luck with him, but I couldn’t be left hanging like that.

I needed closure. There’s nothing criminal about that.

Add our present circumstances with game seven coming up, and I think my actions were more than understandable.

Erik’s place was in the Black Rock neighborhood, which sat on the edge of the Westside where I lived. Even still, it didn’t take me long to get there at all. When I parked my car, I checked my phone again and saw that he hadn’t answered. God, that was so Erik De Ruiter of him.

I opened the side door and headed up the stairs toward his apartment and knocked on the door. At first, he didn’t answer. Of course not. Why would he stop being a pain in the ass now?

So, I knocked again, this time a little harder. And then a little harder yet. Finally, my boyfriend opened the door.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I’m here to finish the argument you started. What do you think?”

And I marched past him into the apartment. His jaw fell open, adding to his shock.

“What the hell are you doing? This is creepy, Kayden. Don’t you get it?

“Creepy? Yeah, that’s really nice, bro. I want to settle this like men, smooth things over, move on to bigger and better things, and there you go with the name-calling.”

His eyes fell shut, and he drew a deep breath. Yeah, I was testing his patience, but he’d done plenty of the same with me.

“You don’t want to settle this?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“Haven’t you heard of letting someone blow off a little steam before picking up the topic again?”

“Yeah, I’ve heard of it, and I think it’s total bullshit. If you’ve got a problem, you lay everything down on the table. You don’t just bottle it up. You don’t put it off either. That’s not healthy.”

I sat down in the chair across from the TV and stretched out. Then I yawned deeply, making myself far too comfortable. That made my boyfriend’s eyes widen. It meant that I wasn’t going anywhere, and he would have to deal with me.

“So,” I said, “this whole thing started with you not being supportive of me and wanting to sabotage the whole team and?—”

“Out!”

He pointed to the door like a schoolteacher kicking a kid out of class. I just sat there, clapping a hand over my mouth as I fake-yawned again. Look, he didn’t really want me to leave. He just had to do something to maintain his own credibility.

“Where was I?” I asked. “Oh yeah, you weren’t supportive of me. That’s why I had to?—”

“Out!!” He shouted it louder this time. I actually felt tiny vibrations on the floor. If we could hear the neighbors having loud sex, then they could hear my boyfriend ordering me out of his apartment.

Maybe he did need a little time to cool off.

I’m not stupid, you know. But how much time would be enough?

Look, I know I’m a stubborn mule, but I’ve got a good excuse this time.

Game seven was only a few days away, and I couldn’t risk us being pissed at one another when we took the ice.

But I couldn’t let him win. I just couldn’t.

My boyfriend’s face reddened. He must’ve been seething inside. Yeah, he had a temper if you pushed him hard enough. And yeah, we’d basically come to blows before, but now we didn’t have a full complement of teammates to pull us apart. I understood how nasty this could get.

But I wasn’t going anywhere.

Though I thought I knew Erik De Ruiter inside and out, he could still surprise me once in a while. Like right now. I didn’t know where he was really coming from with this tossing-me-out-of-his-apartment crap and how far he would take it.

Again, I wasn’t going anywhere.

“Dude, what the fuck are you doing?” he asked. “You’re just sitting there.”

“I know.”

I heard the boastful note in my voice and wouldn’t take it back.

“And I told you to get out of my apartment. I wasn’t joking. I don’t want to see you. I didn’t tell you to get out for my health, you know.”

I put my hands on the armrests and pushed myself up.

Look, I didn’t know what to do. We’d reached a stalemate, and I didn’t want the problem to escalate, so I stuck to being the Kayden Preston I knew how to be.

I stood up, and shuffled closer to my boyfriend but didn’t kiss him.

I could only imagine how that would’ve gone over had I done it suddenly.

Instead, I breathed on his neck so he could enjoy the warmth. He would soon be putty in my hands.

“Out!” he said yet again, his eyebrows furrowed now.

So much for him turning to putty.

I bit my lip, not wanting to give in but understanding that I had to back off, at least for now.

“You know that if I go now, I won’t be coming back,” I said.

“That would be an answer to my prayers.”

“Fine. Then I’m leaving.”

“Great.”

“Seriously. I’m going.”

“Don’t let the door hit you in the ass.”

“I mean it, I’m going. I’m gone.”

“Then why are you still standing there?”

My boyfriend had me again.

I threw my hands up, grunted, and marched out the door. It slammed behind me almost as soon as I was out of the apartment.

I glanced over my shoulder, wishing I had something heavy to throw at it but then realized it was just as well that I didn’t. We’d both caused enough damage with words.

I did pause, figuring my boyfriend would come running out of his apartment, wanting to take back everything he’d said. Then he would beg for forgiveness, and I would at least pretend to think it over. But he didn’t. I guess that only happened in books and movies.

Finally, I pushed myself downstairs, just like I had to force myself out of the apartment. I’d tried calling his bluff, and the whole thing had blown up in my face. But I couldn’t have regrets. I could only live one way: by tackling problems head-on. And if Erik De Ruiter couldn’t handle that…

Erik might’ve won the whole thing too. That was another thing that drove me insane. Losing a battle to him was bad enough without dropping the whole damn war.

Once downstairs, I headed to my car and hopped in, but I didn’t start the engine. I couldn’t Part of me wanted to get the hell out of there and return home. Another part felt the reality of what’d just happened flood into my mind.

I put my hands over my face. No, I didn’t cry, but I couldn’t face the world yet either.

Oh my god. How could I have been so stupid?

Like, did I really have to do that? And maybe Erik really had been right .

My following him to his apartment to continue our argument really had been creepy.

I wanted to think that it wasn’t all bad.

I wanted to believe that I’d meant well but couldn’t consider all that’d happened in under ten minutes and deny how bad it was.

My hands started shaking, and I removed them from my face. I felt nauseous. Had the same happened to Erik?

Beats the hell out of me.

I mean, he’d been the one to throw me out of the apartment.

Anyway, I can admit to feeling shaky and sick because of fear and nothing else.

Normally, I didn’t understand what it meant to be afraid.

I needed to tackle things head-on because I couldn’t let fear stand in the way.

And yet, the fear became a roadblock anyway.

The worst argument I’d ever had with my boyfriend hadn’t involved fists because words had packed enough of a punch.

And we couldn’t take those words back.,

My boyfriend—could I even call Erik that anymore?

After the fight we’d just had, I found it hard to believe that I could still place him under that heading.

Not because I didn’t want to. It was just common sense.

Threatening to kick me out of his apartment to make a point was one thing.

He couldn’t actually order me out and think we could really stay together.

All the effort I’d invested over the last few weeks to ensure the rocky road we’d been traveling wouldn’t hurt the team had gone down the toilet. At least I couldn’t fault myself for that.

Fuck it. I knew what my hopes and dreams were.

I’d known it before I ever knew Erik De Ruiter existed.

All I would accomplish by worrying about this would be to let Erik stand in the way of them.

I realized right then that I should’ve trusted my instincts right from the very start: that Erik De Ruiter was a moron and not nearly as great as he thought he was.

I was better off without him. And that wasn’t me acting all butthurt about the argument.

It was the simple truth. When I thought of it that way, my hands stopped shaking.

My nausea cleared up a little but not completely.

I felt steady enough to stick my keys into the ignition and fire up the engine.

I drew a deep breath. I didn’t want to leave, but I needed to.

When I drove down Bush Street toward Grote, I understood that I could be leaving Erik De Ruiter’s apartment for the final time. And I was fine with that.

That’s what I told myself, anyway.