Page 30 of Second Chance with the Enemy CEO (Second Chance Hockey Players #1)

Chapter twenty-two

Liam

I slam the door behind me, leaning against it as my breath comes in short, ragged bursts. My thoughts are a tangled mess, swirling and choking me with each passing second.

No. No, it cannot be true. She is lying. Hazel has to be lying. It cannot be the truth.

I push off the door, pacing the length of the living room. My chest feels tight, and my hands balled into fists at my sides. The conversation plays in my head on repeat, her voice trembling with anger and hurt as she throws the truth at me like daggers.

"Your mother and your sisters threatened me. They forced it on me. I never even cashed it."

I shake my head violently as if the motion will make her words disappear. She kept the cheque. She did not take the money - and everything - the photos, the accusations - oh gosh.

Impossible. There is no way. Everything I have thought, everything I’ve believed for the past five years, can’t be a lie. It can’t.

But why? Why would they lie about something like this?

I sink onto the couch, burying my face in my hands. My eyes stare at the floor, but I am not seeing it. Instead, I see that day—the moment it all fell apart.

Flashback (5 years ago – a day after returning from his trip)

I had just got off the phone with Hazel and finished making plans to see her later tonight, and I was getting my surprise ready.

The plan is simple. Pick her up after her shift, surprise her with a dinner I have planned, and just…, be with her. Lord knows I have missed her. Seeing her yesterday after my return is not enough.

I grab my jacket, deciding to head out early and take care of a few things before picking her up. As soon as I step outside, a lady hands me a package and walks away without a word. I look at the package with my name written on it in messy handwriting.

Frowning, I toss it onto the passenger seat and start the car. But curiosity nags at me. During the drive, the weight of the package seemed to grow heavier, and its mystery was pulling at the edges of my mind.

As I could not take the need to know anymore, I parked somewhere, reached over, and ripped it open. Inside is a folded piece of paper and a smaller envelope.

The letter reads:

"Do you really know the girl you love? Hazel isn’t who you think she is. She’s been lying to you. If you want to know the truth, look inside."

My pulse quickens, my chest tightening. What the hell is this? With growing dread, I open the smaller envelope. Inside is a stack of photographs. Dozens of pictures spilled out like poison.

One by one, I flipped through them, my heart sinking lower with each one. Hazel with three different guys, Colin, Orlando, and one other guy I do not know, but very good-looking. In each picture, she is close with each of them…, too close for comfort… most of them in intimate positions.

My hands shook as I stared at the pictures, disbelief gnawing at me. No, it could not be. Hazel would not do this. She could not.

But the pictures did not lie.

I had stared at them for what felt like hours, the world blurring at the edges. I wanted to believe there was an explanation. There had to be one. But the images were damning, each one a knife to the chest.

Then my phone rang.

“Liam, sweetheart, are you sitting down?” My mother’s voice was careful and measured, the way it always is when she is delivering bad news.

“Why?” My voice had sounded hollow, distant, even to me.

“Honey, it’s about Hazel.” She sighed as if bracing herself. “She…, came to me. For money. Two million. She said she would leave you if I gave her enough.”

“What?”

“I didn’t want to tell you.” Her voice was soft, almost apologetic. “But I could not keep it from you anymore. I gave her a cheque, Liam. I begged her to let you go if she did not love you, and she took it. I have the proof.”

It felt like the floor had dropped out from under me. “She…, took it?”

“Yes.” A pause, then the final blow: “I thought she was different, but I was wrong. I just wanted to protect you, darling.”

The phone had slipped from my hand. My mother’s voice became a faint hum in the background as the pictures burned themselves into my brain.

Present

I press the heels of my palms into my eyes, trying to stop the onslaught of memories. But they keep coming, one after another, like relentless waves.

I am transported back to the night at the bar and then standing outside her empty apartment, the curtains drawn, the door locked. The landlord had told me she had left. Just like that. Gone. No note, no explanation.

For a year, I was a wreck. I could not eat, couldn’t sleep.

The betrayal consumed me and ate away at everything good I had ever felt for her.

I told myself I hated her, that I was better off without her.

And now… now I am supposed to believe that none of it was real?

That my mother, my family, orchestrated the very thing that tore us apart.

Why?

I push off the couch, pacing again. My chest tightens with a mix of anger and shame. I do not want to believe her. I do not want to believe that my mother - my family - could do something so manipulative, so cruel.

A sick feeling churns in my stomach. “Damn it,” I mutter, my voice raw.

How could I have been so blind? So, willing to believe the worst about the woman I love?

Love.

The word hits me like a punch to the gut. I still love Hazel. My mind is a battlefield, torn between anger, regret, and a flicker of something I am too afraid to name. Hope.

What do I do now? How do I even begin to fix this? Fix the fact that I might have lost the best thing that ever happened to me for nothing.