Page 88 of Anatomy of a Player

Saying the place aloud set off another alarm. “Did something happen to Hudson? Is he hurt? Is it his mom?”

If he was hurt, physically or emotionally, and the last thing I’d done was slap him, I’d regret it forever. Panic flooded my system, washing away all rational thought. Obviously it was bad, or they’d tell me. They’d said there wasn’t much time.

Cold filled me, the kind that couldn’t be taken care of with coats and gloves.

“Whitney. Hey.” Beck’s steady voice forced my attention back to him. “He’s okay. I mean, he’s not okay, okay. But he’s not hurt. Just… We’re almost there. You’ll see, and then it’ll all make sense.”

I glanced back at the guys for confirmation.

Dane opened his mouth, but then he clamped it shut again. Once I confirmed with my own eyes that Hudson was okay, I was going to kill the entire hockey team for doing this to me. My heart had been beat up more than enough this past week.

Instead of getting on I-90 like I’d expected, Beck turned onto the bridge that would take us across the Charles River. More confused than ever, I decided to ignore the silent soldiers and watch the river drift past outside my window.

When Beck turned onto a side road, I studied the surroundings. Lots of brick office-type buildings with rows upon rows of square windows. Even though I’d lived in Boston for a year and a half now, I didn’t venture that far from the college area, and I had no idea what was over in this one.

Thanks to yesterday’s snowstorm, clumps of snow clung to naked tree branches and shoveled piles remained here and there.

“You’re probably going to want at least the coat and gloves,” Beck said.

I slipped the coat over the lighter jacket I’d worn all day, back when the sun had been out. “Lyla’s cool with whatever this is?”

“She’s the one who told me I better get your winter gear so you wouldn’t freeze, because apparently—” He cut himself off and shook his head. “See, this is why we aren’t talking. I almost said the wrong thing. Just know that she didn’t want you to be cold.”

He parked the SUV in a small side lot and then all the guys filed out of the vehicle, hulking silent dudes who kept giving miniscule nods to each other. I felt like I was in the witness protection program or something. If it weren’t for Beck, it would feel more like I was being taken to the Godfather, after which I’d conveniently disappear and never be heard of again.

We crossed the street, and I caught flashes of twinkling lights between the branches of now-leafless bushes. As soon as we walked through the shrubbery, I saw the skating rink. The trees circling it were draped in white lights that sent a soft glow across the ice and lit up the face of the guy standing at the entrance.

Hudson.My heart squeezed as his name zinged through me, awakening every inch of me from head to toe. A crookedly erected Christmas tree stood to the right of him, one of the longer tree branches barely clearing the backward baseball cap on his head. Whereas the other trees looked like they’d been lit up for a while, this tree looked…well, the lights and ornaments were haphazardly placed, no rhyme or reason, and the huge silver star on top was flopped forward, looking like it might crash down at any moment.

Hudson took a large step toward me, his eyes locked onto mine. “I know that it’s not quite Rockefeller Center, and the star isn’t over five hundred pounds, but it was the biggest one I could find, and obviously it’s heavy enough that we couldn’t figure out how to make it stay the hell up. Someday I’ll take you to the real one, though. If you’ll let me.”

I glanced over my shoulder, only to find that my entourage had already receded into the bushes. Good. I didn’t want an audience for this. “It means a lot to me that you’d go to so much trouble, but I’m not sure that even the real Rockefeller Center would be enough to save whatever this was. I miss you, I do…”Shit.Tears were forming; air was becoming harder and harder to come by. “But you swore you wouldn’t hurt me, and you did—you hurt me worse than anyone ever has.”

The same pain that had flashed across his features the other night showed up and echoed through me.

“I know I messed up, too,” I said, before I lost the ability to talk. “I wasn’t completely honest, and I even wrote up this whole “Anatomy of a Player” thing on you—I won’t use it, but it started as a way for me to show all the reasons girls shouldn’t fall for a player, and while it’s too late to avoid that, I just don’t know how I can get past everything that’s happened. I mean, the only reason you went for me was because of that bet.”

He caught my hand. “That’s not true. You sparked my interest from the beginning, and every minute I spent with you made me want to know more. Even when you were telling me what a jerk I was, I couldn’t get enough of you. I wish I could take back that bet. That jersey used to be my most prized possession—a symbol of everything I hoped to be someday—but I can’t even look at it anymore. I don’t want it. I want you.”

My heart squeezed tighter, so tight that I didn’t think it would ever be able to function properly again. “I don’t know which parts were real.”

He placed my hand over his heart. “What I feel for you is real. Me standing here and begging you for another chance, that’s real. Those stories I told you about how I grew up, when I told you that you were perfect… I had no idea when I met you that you’d change everything. You remember how you worried about being too needy?”

I slowly nodded.

“This past week has been awful. I wanted to call you every hour and leave messages and text you when I thought of something only you’d get, and I wanted to show up wherever you were. I wanted to spy on you and find out if you were seeing anyone—and if you were, I knew I’d lose my shit and make a huge scene. All those girls I thought were crazy and clingy? Now I get it.

“What I’m saying is,I’mthe needy one here. I want to see you day and night, and when I can’t, I’ll be thinking of the next time we can be together. I realized that when you love someone, you show up when they need you, because you need them right back. And I’m in love with you, Whitney Porter. That’s the realest, truest thing I’ve ever known.” His eyes locked onto mine. “Do you love me?”

Tears lodged in my throat. “It’s more complicated than—”

“No, it’s not.” He tightened his grip on my hand. “Yes or no?” He swallowed, vulnerability showing through his features. No more player mask, the heart of gold that beat in his chest fully exposed, and he’d basically offered me the key.

I lost the battle to hold back my tears. “Yes.”

His relief was so vivid that I felt it in the air between us. “Let me start over, then. Please. We’ve got the whole rink to ourselves. I’ll take you out onto the ice, pretend it’s our first date, and when you slip, I’ll catch you.” He reached up and cupped my cheek. “Our faces will inevitably drift closer, and then I’ll kiss you, the way I’ve wanted to since the second you showed up.”

I shook my head and the worry rose back into his features. “I don’t think I can wait that long.”

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