Page 109 of Sweet Thing

“I love you.”

A muscle twitched in his jaw. “You don’t.”

Pain stabbed me in the heart. “Are you seriously telling me I don’t know my own mind?”

“Adeline, you once told me you wanted a great love story, something epic like your mom and dad. Now you’re saying you’d settle forthis?” He waved a hand between us, as if this was meaningless. “You have your entire life ahead of you. Why would you want to waste it on me?”

“It-it wouldn’t be a waste,” I said faintly. “It would be my choice.”

“Then you need to choose better.”

Apparently, I did. My throat felt thick with tears, my heart a ball of lead. I needed out of here, but I couldn’t just run. That would confirm to him that I was a stupid schoolgirl, crushed by my crush.

That was no longer me. I had become a different person, partly owing to him. More confident, more open. Yet he was prepared to teach me so much then throw me away?

Anger flared, hot and swift. “I never expected you to choose me over my dad. But I thought that if it came out, like it has, you wouldn’t be a chicken about it.”

That shocked the hell out of him. Cowardly Adeline Kershaw suddenly had claws.

“Hold on a sec?—”

I offered an imperious hand. “My mother confronts you with what she knows, and your first instinct is to tell her it was a one-off?”

Never mind that this was my initial reaction as well. My response came from a need to protect him, to protect his relationship with my father and the fortunes of the team. But deep down, I had hoped that he would claim me for his own, like he had that night he came to the nightclub.

“You’ve given me so much, Lars. Shone your sun on me and shown this wallflower how to bloom. Soothed my fears and stopped the nightmares. But I guess I haven’t helped you in the same way. All this time you were worried about Sven’s blueprint for shitty fatherhood imprinting on you, along with his history as a rotten partner and an abuser. You’re nothing like him, Lars, but as long as you think you’ve inherited his bad traits, then you’llneverbe ready for something real. You’ll never be ready for me.”

Shock rendered him speechless, which gave me time to kiss the top of Mabel’s head and mutter a goodbye. I loved her and would miss her so much.

“Be good, little one. Take care of your daddy for me.”

He finally found his voice. “Adeline.”

But it was too little, too late. With my heart broken, I turned and left, one tired foot in front of the other.

ChapterTwenty-Nine

Lars

Crackkk!

The sound of Kershaw’s stick striking a bench reverberated through the Edmonton visitors’ locker room. In the five years I’d played with him, I had never seen him so pissed.

Our third straight loss.

Theo and I were back on the first line together, though I had to wonder if something had broken, the Dream Defense turned nightmare. My suspension was over, his injury was healed, and MacFarlane was keeping his distance, but we were abruptly out of sync.

“Listen, guys, it didn’t go our way.” O’Malley had seen that Kershaw wasn’t in the mood for a post-game debrief, so he was stepping up to the plate. “Sometimes the other team has a better night.”

“Yeah, we’ll get ’em next time.” Cody patted my shoulder clumsily, making it clear where the blame lay, but being nice about it as was his way.

We had a plane back to Chicago to catch, so everyone made quick work of the clean-up. A subdued Kershaw sat beside me on the bus to the airport while I texted Janet to check in on Mabel. She sent me a picture of her sleeping and a thumbs up.

“Button okay?” Theo asked.

“Yeah, she’s fine.”

“And the new nanny?”

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