Page 46 of The Summer You Were Mine

He tried to ignore the ache in his chest and focus on what Teena was saying. In less than a week, she had gotten him a twenty-minute sit-down with Kelly Jones on Good Morning America and a potential People magazine cover. At this point, he would be insane to not take her advice.

“Kelly is smart and tough but not afraid to dive into emotional stuff. She’s going to push you, but we want that.

We can’t let it look too easy. You will answer every one of her questions honestly and talk about advocacy for anti-doping and clean sport, which we know you care about for real.

Then keep apologizing until they go to commercial.

Later that week, we will get you on the cover of People with one of those sexy Paul Rudd poses and, trust me, you’re America’s sweetheart again. ”

“Even if he’s not just American?” asked Ale. Leo whacked his arm.

Cris squeezed his temples. Teena was handing him the perfect package to get the media off him and his name back in everyone’s good graces.

After it was over, he’d be a clean slate.

He would be able to do whatever he wanted without anyone hounding him.

Why couldn’t he have just done this from the beginning?

He’d taken one look at Ellie and lost his mind.

Did he not trust himself to find a way to get her to spend time with him if there wasn’t a business deal involved?

Did it matter now? He swore he could still smell her on his skin, and he was about to make a decision that would crush her.

Even if he could ignore his screaming heart, he couldn’t ignore that he would be at fault for forcing her to lose the show that she believed she needed so badly.

It didn’t matter that he was trying to protect her.

She would never believe him. And he would lose her.

“I don’t want to do this. I just need to say that. But… I trust you.” Cris’s voice cracked.

“You know you are doing the right thing,” she said, her face softening.

“I don’t know what I know.”

Ale stood up the second Cris ended the call. “I’m hungry,” he said, turning to Leo. “Are you hungry?”

“Starving. Famished.” Leo looked around the kitchen like he was expecting a pizzaiolo to appear with a fresh, hot pie in hand. “Guess we should get something to eat.”

“Yeah. Since there’s nothing here. Right in this house.” Ale looked at Cris, still sitting motionless. “So we would have to go. Unless…” He trailed off.

“Go, you guys. I’m fine.”

“If you’re sure,” said Leo.

“I’ll catch up with you later.”

He didn’t blame them for getting away from him.

He only wished he could get away from himself.

He sat at the kitchen table after his brothers filed out, unable to click off the iPad and stand up.

He wished he had a copy of the email. He could text Teena and ask her to forward it, but then he’d probably waste an hour reading it over and over again.

In truth, he didn’t need to see it with his own eyes to know why she’d said those things.

That was the worst part. He knew exactly why she’d written everything she did, and he also knew there was no way he would ever be able to explain that to the press.

What was he going to say? Yes, you see, to understand Dr. Beltrami’s comment, you must understand that it all comes from one night when we were eighteen and kissed under a table.

He shook his head, thinking about her face, her smile, her laugh.

They had come so far in only a few days—on top of all of the years, despite everything.

Coming back together felt like coming back to everything good about his life that might have been lost. He needed to tell her immediately—he at least owed her that.

His chest squeezed in an ache that ran straight up through the top of his head.

Part of him believed he deserved the pain that was coming.

He took a gulp of water from the bottle on the table, stood up, and began to put away the pasta boxes. It had to be now.

Ellie stood on the terrace of the Delfino in the afternoon light weaving silk roses through a trellis archway, humming.

The song “ O Forse Sei Tu ” was playing over the speakers, and although she remembered the words perfectly, she thought it would be considered slightly out of character for her to belt out a love song in plain view of the entire universe.

Then again, since she was decorating for a wedding, it wouldn’t be so suspicious.

Humming was probably a good way to split the difference.

Meanwhile, her insides were lit up like a strobe light factory, and every single line of the song brought another surge of emotion.

She didn’t want to name the feeling lurking along the edges of her thoughts trying to get her attention.

So she focused on tucking the roses into the wooden slats and securing them with a staple gun so they wouldn’t blow out of place in the breeze.

Moving to the back side of the archway, she faced the entrance to the beach club and caught sight of the reason those lyrics were lighting her up.

A slow smile spread across her face, and her cheeks pinked when she saw Cris walking toward her, but it all faded when his face remained stone.

“What’s going on?” she asked, her face darkening to match his. Something was wrong, very wrong, and she wanted to know what it was. Immediately.

“We need to talk about something. Can we go down to the beach?”

“Why do we need to go down to the beach?” she asked, the red-alert sensors in her head overloading.

“I need to talk to you alone,” he said, looking around at the terrace behind her.

“This is going to be bad, isn’t it?” she asked, looking up at him.

Her eyes burned. She knew this feeling so well and hated it with a passion.

A mistake was made, and if history was any reference, it was probably something she did.

Hot panic flushed over her skin as she tried desperately to recall what, if anything, she had done that could make Cris look at her the way he was looking at her—or not looking at her—right now.

It was useless. She stood up straight, ready to take whatever it was, and rolled down her armor like a steel door closing.

“Whatever it is, I need to hear it now. I am not going down to the beach. Hit me with it.”

“I just got off a call with Teena,” he said, clearing his throat. He took his sunglasses off, placed them on the table, and stared into her eyes. “I can’t do the show.”

“You—what? Why?”

“Look, I don’t know exactly how to tell you this, but some people have been doing some digging and found some old emails of yours that suggested your opinion of me is not exactly favorable.”

“What are you talking about? When? I don’t remember ever writing anything about you! That’s impossible!”

“Teena got ahold of them and read them to me,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m sure it was a long time ago, I’ll give you that. By the way, based on recent conversations, I’d say you had every reason to write what you did.”

“Whatever that might be, because I don’t remember!”

“It’s not just the emails. And it’s not just about me,” he said, maneuvering her closer to two chairs so they could sit.

Ellie sat reluctantly and folded her arms, leaning back in the chair.

Cris grabbed the front two legs of her chair and dragged it closer to him so their knees almost touched.

He leaned forward with his elbows on his thighs, directly in her personal space.

“I want you to listen to me. I don’t care about what you thought or wrote.

I am more concerned with protecting you.

Teena told me that some of those players are not happy with certain things about their appearances on Games Over, and they are prepared to make things difficult for you. ”

“I don’t need you to protect me. We’ve had critics for years. I will remind you of the time that everyone was calling me Brutal Beltrami after my Tiger Woods episode.”

“This is not about internet trolls. This is bigger. These people went to Magniv to end the show—and they will come after you personally to guarantee it.”

“Let me get this straight. You don’t want to do my show, is what I am understanding, right?

But, it’s because of some secret coalition that wants to get Games Over shut down?

And you’re going to protect me? Why can’t you just tell me that you don’t want to do my show because you don’t trust me? Why don’t you just tell me the truth?”

“ Sai che sei impossibile, vero? You really are impossible! These people are going to expose the fact that you’re not a clinician and make a goddamned circus out of it.

So we’ll either have an interview on a show that is discredited entirely or we’ll have to sit back and watch them rip our relationship to shreds once they find out that we’re—” He shook his head.

“It doesn’t matter if I trust you. We do not matter here! That is the truth!”

Ellie could hear his tense words and see his worried face, but was he concerned about her? Or only trying to save himself? She didn’t know the answer—didn’t know if she wanted the answer. Only one thought pushed her to speak. Shut it down.

“You know what I think? I think you got a better deal somewhere else. I think you caved last-minute because some bigger fish with a cleaner track record swam along to help you get what you want, friction free.”

“That’s bullshit. That’s not what happened. I had nothing to do with this.”

“Oh, you’re just following someone else’s directions, right? Makes it easier, I guess.”

“It’s not like that. It’s not like that at all.”

“Then tell me you don’t already have another deal set up.”

Cris opened his mouth, but closed it again. He shook his head and looked down.

“That’s what I figured,” she said.

“I did not want this to happen. We should have kept things separate. I didn’t think.”