Page 53

Adair Swim Club has never been this packed, and it sends a thrill through me.

The meet is nothing major, but it’s the first in the season.

And, more importantly, for some of my swimmers, it’s the first time they’ll get on a block.

It could go about a hundred different ways because a swimmer never knows how a race is going to turn out until they get in the water and swim it.

I pull my gaze from the warm-up pool to scan the crowd for familiar faces. Both Carter and Bryce are helping me out by keeping the kids organized and motivated, making sure they get to their lane on time. It’s a single day meet, and I can already see some of them starting to drag.

The rest of the Adair Swim support is out in full swing, and almost everyone is wearing the shirts Mia designed.

My eyes land on the section with my girlfriend in it and immediately find her.

She’s grinning brightly, talking to Josie about something, and her dark hair is flowing with every movement of her head.

Kat is next to them, with Liam at her side, who looks like he might throw up.

I bite back a grin. If Emmie goes as far as I think she can go, Liam has a lot more nauseating moments ahead of him. He should pace himself .

Emmie’s final is up next, she has the top time going into the final.

I remember when I raced at her age, desperate to pull out a fast time to impress my parents.

Emmie, though, is relaxed as she shakes her muscles out.

A cool confidence about her that comes from trusting in herself, in her training, and in knowing she won’t lose love if she doesn’t win.

It’s her first final she’s ever swam. The hundred-yard freestyle.

I might be feeling as sick to my stomach as Liam is. I don’t have favorite swimmers, but there are definitely ones closer to my heart.

“You ready?” I ask her. She’s fixing the braid her hair is in before she puts on her cap. She nods. “This is your first final ever, Emmie. No one is expecting fireworks, but if you trust yourself and everything we’ve been working on—”

“I could have fireworks?” She grins cheekily.

“Let’s start with sparklers and work up to fireworks,” I offer with a laugh.

The swimmers are called for the race. Emmie flashes me one last grin and I move to stand next to Bryce, crossing my arms over my chest and training my eyes on the blocks.

I don’t know why I have this nervous energy in me, why I feel the need to jump up and down to try and work it out.

I feel like we’re on the edge of something, but I don’t know if it’s good or bad.

Maybe I should have had Mia do a tarot reading for the outcome of this meet.

No, that would be a bad idea.

“Dude, you need to chill,” Bryce mutters, the coach of the high school standing on his other side. “She’s going to do fine.”

“I know,” I reply. But do I know? “This is her first final, and she’s been working so hard. Plus, her reaction time isn’t exactly where we want to see it and—”

“And all that can be fixed in practice later. Let’s focus on the now. ”

Take your marks.

My gaze jumps to the starting blocks, zeroing in on Emmie, my only swimmer, to make the final. The buzzer sounds, and they’re off.

It’s fireworks.

Not sparklers, not sparks from a fire starting—it’s fireworks.

Emmie gets a National Age Group record in the 100-yard freestyle in her first ever meet.

Not only does she break the record, she smashes it by almost two full seconds.

The sound in the pool is silent as we wait for the results to be official, and then it’s just an explosion of noise.

Emmie’s screaming as she jumps up and down, surrounded by her team who immediately congratulate her.

When she launches herself at me for a hug, on her way to get to her brother, she whispers two small words with so much meaning behind them. “ Thank you .”

And I couldn’t be prouder.

“So, what’s the plan now?” Bryce asks. “Is she wanting to work toward Trials? See if she can make the team?”

I laugh lightly. “If you ask her brother, the first priority is graduating from high school and getting into a good college.”

“But…” he presses.

“But if a trip to Los Angeles for the Olympics is part of that, I think he’d be okay with it.”

He chuckles. “You’re gonna have your hands full, O’Brien. Which is why I’m almost hesitant to ask, do you think you could take on another one? ”

My brow furrows. “What are you talking about? Is there another kid you want me to… Holy shit .”

When I look at Bryce, he’s not looking at me. He’s staring out at the pool, a look of longing in his eyes. All those early morning swims, the long sessions in the gym, the few times he’s had me time him…it was all starting to click into place.

“Are you fucking kidding me, Clark?”

“I want to go out on my own terms,” he comments. “My shoulder is feeling better than it has in years and I miss it.”

“Have you talked to Josie about this?”

“Not yet, but I know she’ll be excited,” he assures me. The last thing I need is his fiancée thinking I talked him into this somehow. “Now all I need is a coach, and there is no one better.”

“Don’t let Carter hear you say that.” It’s a joke, but my mind is spinning a hundred miles a minute.

Bryce is giving me yet another reason to stick around. I don’t think that’s his intent in asking me, but it’s there. Plus, I’d seen it in his gaze. There has been a wistfulness there for the last few months; I was just waiting for him to say something.

“Carter’s my best friend and I wouldn’t have accomplished any of the things I have without him, but this is different. I don’t need someone in my corner; I need someone who’s not afraid to kick my ass,” Bryce says.

I remember watching the Tokyo Games, watching how Bryce could barely pull himself out of the water.

There’s a difference between being able to see that someone is in pain and knowing firsthand what that pain feels like.

I hated watching that, especially when he’d given his all to that race.

He got the gold, but I knew it might have been at the cost of the rest of his career.

“You weren’t done. ”

It’s not a question, nor is it a statement that needs an answer. It’s the truth and we both know it. I’ve heard about how he coached Carter through his final year, stressing how important it is to make sure you’re done. To make sure you’re not leaving this sport behind with regrets.

God, I have so many regrets.

“I’m not done. So, man, what do you say? You want to stick around long enough to help a washed-up Olympian make a comeback?”

My brow arches. “Are we calling it a comeback?”

He laughs. “Hell no.”

“Then I’m in.” I turn enough to shake his hand, which he accepts. “Looks like I’m planning to send two swimmers to the Olympics.”

The irony that one of them will be thirty-four while the other won’t even be twenty isn’t lost on either one of us.

“I guess I should probably go tell my fiancée,” he declares, standing. “Seriously, man, Carter and I brought you on for a reason. A reason you just proved. We’re happy you’re sticking around.”

Involuntarily, my gaze drifts past him to where Mia is making her way toward me, stopping to chat with some parents and other swimmers along the way. A warm comfort settles in the pit of my stomach.

I look back toward Bryce, standing as I do so. “I can’t thank you enough for giving me this opportunity. I never thought I’d find somewhere I want to stay.”

“It’s not the somewhere, dude,” he replies. “It’s the someone.”

He means Mia. I know he does, but there’s more to it than that.

It’s this group of people who somehow found one another and came together to create something wonderful.

Something full of love, support, and genuine joy in being themselves.

Some of our biological families are amazing, some of them suck, but what we’ve found in one another is bigger than that.

We are a family that comes together when biology fails or can’t be here.

“You’re right,” I agree, “but it’s still not something I thought I’d ever find.”

“It’s always been here. Always will be.”

Not knowing what else to say, I clap him on his shoulder and let him head toward Josie. With Mia heading my way, I keep standing, waiting for her to reach me.

I will always feel some resentment over what was taken from me, but at least my friends will all get to go out on their own terms. It took me a long time to realize I spent so much time holding on after that accident because I was too afraid it’d be taken from me.

I didn’t want to repeat history again; I knew where I stood in the public eye, knew where I stood in my family’s eye, and I no longer cared about living my own life.

“What are you thinking about?” A hand winds around my bicep, giving it a gentle squeeze. I look down into the eyes that make my stomach swoop, hoping this feeling never goes away. “You didn’t hear me talking to you?”

I lean down, pressing a kiss against her cheek, winding my arm around her shoulder. “Sorry about that, beautiful. I’ve been taking a minute…you know, soaking it all in, and thinking about what’s coming next.”

For a fraction of a second, her shoulders tense beneath my arm. I hate that I’m part of the reason she has this fear; a knee-jerk reaction to someone else bringing up the future and the possibility that it might not include her. I hate that someone, including me, ever put that thought in her head.

I silently vow to myself that she’ll never have to worry about something like this again. At least, not from me. My plans include sticking around until she’s so sick of me, she begs me to leave. But even then, I doubt I’d go far.

Her arms wind around my middle, resting her head against my shoulder, which gives me the perfect opportunity to press a kiss against her forehead.

“So, what does the future look like for you now, Ronan O’Brien?”

I grin at the familiar tone. It’s the same one she used in every interview she ever conducted for the blog, calm and approachable, but clearly all business.

It’s been a long time since I’ve heard that tone.

Part of me missed it. “Nothing too extravagant, Miss Sheridan,” I tease back.

“I want to make my house into a home, take two swimmers to the Los Angeles Olympics, at least, and fall more and more in love…you know, the basics.”

Her intense gaze snaps up to mine, a frown creasing her forehead. “What do you mean, take two swimmers to the Olympics?”

“That’s the part you picked up on?” I ask, brow raised. “Not the falling more and more in love part?”

“Of course not,” she scoffs. “If I’m involved, there will be plenty more falling in love. I’m multi-faceted.”

My laugh echoes through the emptying pool, bouncing off the walls, and causing a couple of people to turn our way.

My entire focus, though, is on Mia. The woman who has so many beautiful sides to her that I can’t wait to discover.

Even her prickly sides are alluring to me (although, I think I can go a while without having them directed at me again).

“Ronan O’Brien, you better tell me what other swimmer you’re going to take to the Olympics!” She pulls away enough to glare at me.

“Well, obviously, I want all the kids on my team to at least make it to Trials. While they can’t all make the team, there are two who I think have a good shot at making it.” Her glare darkens. “One of them is a new kid who has a lot to prove. And the other—”

I’m cut off by the sound of a shrill squeal that sends everyone’s attention swiveling to find the source.

And the source of that sound is a very excited Josie Martin, who’s being spun around in Bryce’s arms. While most might wonder if a proposal has happened, that ring has been sitting on her finger for weeks now, so those closest to her know it’s something else.

“Oh, my god,” Mia breathes, turning to focus on me. Her eyes are wide, foggy with tears. “Is Bryce?”

“Yeah,” I confirm with a nod. Her hand flies up to cover her mouth, a few tears managing to escape. “He’s not done, and if I learned anything from my own experience, it’s the importance of not letting someone else take your dream away from you.”

“And he asked you to coach him?”

My grin grows. “Yeah, but we’re not calling it a comeback. For either one of us.”

With Emmie and Bryce, this would be the first time I’m officially putting my name out there as a coach.

I’ve helped hundreds of kids through Operation Fly, coached them myself, but their success was always tied to the organization rather than me as an individual.

Bryce’s request gives me a different opportunity in this sport.

I have an opportunity to help shape champions, to take the hardest lessons I learned and use them to make athletes stronger.