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“There’s always a choice,” she says. Her voice is soft velvet, and this feels like the last time I’ll hear it in an intimate setting.

I shake my head. There just isn’t one this time.

I could give it all up. A tiny voice sneaks into the back of my mind. I could walk away from the game, break my contract, break my commitment.

I want to do those things. I want to choose Gabby. My heart is choosing Gabby.

It’s not how I was raised. It’s not who I am. I don’t break promises I’ve made…but I made promises to Gabby, too. I promised not to hurt her. I promised everything would be okay.

It’s all happening too fast. I leave in the morning, and I have to make a decision tonight.

So I’m doing what I think is the right thing for everybody, even if it means I have to suffer right now.

Nobody wins here, but I can’t just walk away from the Heat. I want it to be that simple, but it’s just not.

And there’s a lot more at play here than my commitment to the team.

There’s Gabby’s relationship with her father, and I can’t help but think about my relationship with my own father.

I care about her more than I care about the team. I’d give it all up for her in a heartbeat. But my brain keeps circling back to Troy’s words.

You’re taking advantage of her.

It’s wrong.

It’s disgusting.

You signed a contract.

You made commitments.

You may have fucked up our friendship, but you will not fuck up our team.

There was nothing wrong or disgusting about the two of us together. It was right. It was perfect. It was everlasting. But he’s her father. He’ll never see it that way.

And others won’t see it that way, either. I didn’t have to worry about that so much when we were together in secret. However, it’s not something I’m willing to subject Gabby to. She always deserved better than me, but it’s not just me she deserves more than. It’s the media frenzy that will attack her for being with me. It’s what people will say…and while I don’t give a fuck about what anyone else thinks, I know Gabby does. I know she’ll be hurt.

I know this because I know her .

I’ve gotten to know her better than I know myself in the time we’ve been together. I know all her biggest fears in life, and one of them is simply falling short—of being a failure. It’s why she has such a strong drive to succeed, something that’s worked in her favor when it comes to the potential to secure a job after she graduates, but the media won’t see it that way.

They’ll see what they want to see. They’ll create a story out of nothing. They’ll capitalize on the twenty-one-year-old little girl sniffing around the eternal bachelor twelve years her senior. They’ll see nepotism when the truth is she earned everything she has, much like some of the interns saw even though it wasn’t true. She’ll be hurt by those things. She’ll feel like a failure. Like a joke. She’ll feel taken advantage of. She’ll be punished for things out of her control. These are all things she’s been terrified of her entire life.

And so I have to protect her in whatever way I can.

The only problem is that in protecting her from all those things, I have to be the one who causes her the most pain by delivering on the two biggest fears she has courtesy of her mother: rejection and abandonment.

I have to end things with her. Boom: rejection.

I have to leave for Arizona in the morning without her. Boom: abandonment.

I’ll be breaking her heart, and in the process, I’ll be breaking my own as well.

It’s broken already. Being in this room with her and not taking her into my arms, not expressing my love for her…it’s too hard. The thought of plowing forward without her…it’s too hard. The thought of moving on, of playing ball, of ever feeling happy again…I can’t comprehend any of it.

I have nothing without her.

And yet…this is the snap decision I’ve made.

It feels wrong.

I know it’s wrong.

But even if I had time to think it through, I’m confident I’d make the same choice. Because when you love somebody, really and deeply and truly, you do what’s best for them…even if it means hurting yourself. And this is what’s best for her.

She lived her entire life without her father, and I won’t make her choose between him and me. I can’t do that to her.

And I won’t do it to Troy, either.

He may be the reason I have to do this, and our relationship may never be the same again, but what if she chooses me? I can’t be the person who rips away his daughter from him after he lived eighteen years without her.

He’s only had her three years.

But I only had her six months.

I guess he wins.

There are far too many factors at play for us to ever really be able to give this a fair shot. And so I have only one choice, and that’s to be grateful for the time we shared. It’s better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all…right?

Wrong.

In this time of total darkness and despair, nothing has ever felt more wrong than that stupid statement. The pain I’m going to endure in the hours, the days, the weeks, the months, the years going forward…I’m not sure I’ll be able to take it. I’m not sure how I’ll come out on the other side of it.

“Not this time,” I say softly. “I won’t be the person who makes you choose between a guy you’ve known six months and the man you searched for your entire life. And trust me when I say there will come a time when you’d have to make that choice. I’m bowing out. Blood is thicker than whatever this is, and if I had the chance to spend one more day with my own father, I know I’d do pretty much anything to grab onto it.”

“So that’s it?” she asks flatly.

I snag my bottom lip between my teeth and bite hard, hoping to focus on the pain there instead of the pain in my heart. My eyes burn with sadness, and I keep my gaze on the carpet. I know if I look at her, I’ll change my mind…and I can’t change my mind. Not with all the cards on the table. Not with so many pieces to this puzzle.

“That’s it,” I whisper, unable to change the volume of my voice.

“It can’t be it,” she says. Her voice breaks, and I know she’s crying.

I want to grab onto her, to pull her in my arms and hold her and promise her that this is all just a nightmare we’ll surely wake up from any minute.

But the pain slices fresh, so I know it’s real.

“I’m sorry,” I murmur. And then because I’m a fucking coward, I start for the door. “I need to go.”

“Sounds about right,” she mutters.

I freeze and turn around, my brows knit together with a question I never voice.

“Go ahead. Leave me. Everyone else does.” She folds her arms over her chest as if she’s issuing a challenge.

My chest cracks wide open as my heart throbs with an aching pain. “Believe me, Gabby, this is the last thing I want to do. But it’s what I have to do.”

And with those words, I turn and walk out the door.