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Chapter twenty-five

Katarina

I can’t stop touching my lips.

It’s pathetic, really. Standing here in my bathroom at seven in the morning, fingertips tracing the same mouth that had him falling apart twelve hours ago.

They’re still swollen. Still tender. Still tingling with the memory of how he felt—thick and desperate and so close to losing control that his voice cracked when he said my name.

Right before he decided I wasn’t worth it.

The mirror shows exactly what giving everything to someone looks like when they hand it back. Hollow cheeks. Shadows under my eyes that makeup can’t fix. The kind of exhaustion that comes from lying awake all night, replaying every second of having him in my mouth, wondering what I did wrong.

Because it had to be something I did, right? Men don’t pull away from blow jobs unless the woman giving them screws up somehow.

Maybe I was too eager. Too desperate. Maybe he could taste how badly I wanted him, and it disgusted him. Maybe the way I moaned around him was too much, too honest about how wrecked I was just from having him on my tongue.

I remember the exact moment everything changed. How his breathing got ragged, how his grip tightened in my hair, how he whispered “Fuck, Kat” like I was killing him in the best way. Then nothing. Just cold air and the sound of him fixing his pants while I knelt there feeling like an idiot.

My phone starts buzzing on the counter, Riley’s name flashing like a warning signal.

“We have a problem,” she says the second I answer.

Of course we do. Because apparently my life is one giant problem wrapped in designer dresses and fake smiles.

“What now?”

“You’re viral. Those photos from dinner last night? The internet thinks you two are the next great hockey romance. Aurora’s already posted them on all the team accounts with some caption about soulmates, and the engagement is insane.”

My stomach drops. Aurora. Sweet, well-meaning Aurora who thinks everyone deserves their fairy tale ending. She has no idea she’s promoting a relationship that imploded the moment I got on my knees.

“People are calling you Canyon Bay’s power couple,” Riley continues, her voice getting more excited. “There’s already merchandise. Someone made t-shirts with your faces on them. The hashtag has over fifty thousand posts.”

Fifty thousand. Jesus.

“The charity gala got moved to tomorrow night. Last-minute sponsor drama, but they want you and Liam as the featured couple. Think red carpet interviews. Think relationship goals content for every sports blog in North America.”

I sink onto the edge of my bathtub, suddenly dizzy. “Riley, I don’t think—”

“The foundation specifically requested you two. They want interviews about young love, about supporting each other’s careers, about being role models for healthy relationships. You’re their golden couple now.”

Role models. If they only knew their golden couple consisted of a man who thinks I’m a career-ending distraction and a woman who can’t stop replaying the taste of his cock.

“I’m not sure we—”

“Whatever happened between you two, fix it.”

“Tonight.”

“Because tomorrow you’re selling true love to half of Canyon Bay, and if you screw this up, it doesn’t just hurt Liam’s image. It hurts the entire organization. The Limo will be there at six.”

The line goes dead, leaving me staring at my phone.

Fix it. Like there’s anything to fix. Like you can repair something that was never real in the first place.

I scroll through the notifications flooding my screen. #LiamKat is trending. There are fan accounts already.

Comment after comment about how ‘perfect’ we look together, how ‘lucky’ I am, how they’re ‘shipping us so hard.’

One comment stops me cold: ‘ The way he looks at her like she’s his whole world! Goals AF!’

His whole world. I want to laugh, but it comes out more like a sob. The only thing I am to Liam is an inconvenience he can’t shake.

If only they knew that their perfect couple can’t even look at each other without remembering how spectacularly we crashed and burned.

The limo feels like a confession booth—dark, intimate, designed for secrets you can’t take back.

I’ve been dreading this moment since Riley’s call. Sixteen hours of silence from Liam. Sixteen hours of wondering if he’s as wrecked as I am, or if walking away from me was just another Tuesday for him.

He’s already inside when I slide across the leather seat, and I hate how my body responds. Pulse jumping. Breath catching. Like it hasn’t gotten the memo that we’re over before we started.

“Hey.”

The word squeaks out . Fragile. Like I’m asking permission to speak to him.

God, when did I become this person? This woman who shrinks herself down for a man who doesn’t even want her?

“Kat.” He says my name like it hurts. Like it costs him something just to acknowledge my existence.

I want to ask him if he’s thought about last night. If he can still taste me the way I still taste him. If walking away felt as brutal for him as it did for me. If he jerked off thinking about my mouth wrapped around him, or if he’s already moved on forgetting I ever existed.

Instead, I stare out the window and try to pretend my heart isn’t breaking all over again.

“You look beautiful,” he says suddenly, his voice rough.

I turn to look at him, startled. “What?”

“Your dress. It’s...” He runs a hand through his hair, looking everywhere but at me. “You’re beautiful.”

The compliment should make me happy. Instead, it makes everything worse. Because now I’m remembering how he looked at me last night before everything went to hell. How his eyes went dark when I sank to my knees. How he whispered my name like a prayer.

“Thank you.” My voice comes out flat, lifeless.

The silence stretches between us, heavy with everything we’re not saying. I can feel him stealing glances at me, quick looks that he thinks I don’t notice.

But I notice everything about him now.

The way his jaw ticks when he’s thinking. How his hands clench when he’s trying not to reach for something he wants.

How he won’t quite meet my eyes, like looking at me directly might shatter whatever control he’s built since last night.

“About what happened—”he starts.

“Don’t.” The word tears out of me cold and harsh. “Please. Just don’t.”

Because I can’t handle another rejection. Can’t sit here and listen to him explain why touching me was a mistake, why I’m not worth the risk, why his career matters more than whatever this thing between us could have been.

I’m barely holding myself together as it is.

“We need to talk about it eventually.”

“No, we really don’t. You made everything perfectly clear when you walked away.”

His reflection in the window shows me the exact moment something breaks in his expression. “Kat, you don’t understand—”

“I understand enough.” I smooth my dress with hands that won’t stop shaking. “I understand that I threw myself at you like some desperate groupie, and you were decent enough to stop me before I embarrassed myself completely.”

“That’s not what happened.”

“Isn’t it?” I finally look at him directly, and the pain in his eyes nearly destroys me. “Then what was it, Liam? Because from where I was kneeling, it looked like you got what you wanted and then remembered you had better things to do.”

He flinches like I slapped him. “Christ, Kat. You think that’s what last night was?”

“What else am I supposed to think? You let me get on my knees, you let me take you in my mouth, and the second you got close to coming, you pulled away like I was contaminated.”

“I was trying to protect you.”

“From what? From giving you a blow job? From wanting you?” My voice breaks on the last word. “Too late for that.

“The car slows, camera flashes strobing through the tinted windows like lightning. I can see the red carpet stretching ahead of us, photographers lined up to capture every fake smile and staged touch.

Liam runs a hand through his hair, smooths his tie, transforms into the charming persona the world expects.

“Ready?”

No.

Not even close.

I’m still choking on the sound of my own voice breaking. Still trying to hold together what’s left of my dignity after offering myself to him like it didn’t mean something.

Like it wasn’t real.

I want to scream. I want to crawl out of my skin. I want to go back and undo every breath I wasted thinking he wanted me the way I wanted him.

But mostly—I want to not care.

So I swallow all of it. The ache. The humiliation. The twisted little hope that refuses to die.

“Let’s go convince them we’re madly in love.”

I reach for the lie like it’s a second skin.

Because that’s the game, right?

Make the cameras believe. Smile just wide enough. Lean just close enough. Sell the fantasy while everything inside me burns.

I can feel it already—the sting behind my eyes, the pressure in my throat, the tightness in my chest like a scream waiting to claw its way out.

But I don’t let it.

I walk the walk.

Smile on cue.

Hand in his.

Because that’s what this night demands.

But when he offers me his hand—the same hand that shook in my hair while I worshipped him—my heart cracks a little more.

Because right now, I have to pretend that touching him doesn’t destroy me.

And he gets to pretend I never mattered at all.