Page 107 of Second-Rate Superstar

He shrugged. “I’m only trying to help.”

“That much is clear,” I muttered. “Trust me when I say my performance was not the issue. Well, not thewholeissue.”

“I’m listening . . .”

Gritting my teeth, I forced myself to confide in my big brother for the first time in my entire life. “She didn’t tell me she was a virgin.” Jaxon sucked in a sharp breath at my admission. “I didn’t find out until we were in the act, and I realized I’d hurt her.”

“Yikes.”

“I mean, I didn’t know what to do. It’s not like I have much experience in deflowering women.”

Jaxon’s dark eyebrows raised. “Not even she-who-must-not-be-named?” Maybe if I hadn’t felt like the world was crashing down around me, I might’ve laughed at his reference to Lacey.

“Nope.” I shook my head.

A sound resembling a snort flew from my brother’s nose. “That should’ve been your first clue. You two were together at sixteen, and she already had experience?”

Leveling him with a glare, I said, “Can we focus on my current girlfriend? Not the ghost of the past one that took four years to shake?”

“Right,” he agreed. “So, what would you have done if she’d told you beforehand? Let some other man do it for you?”

“Hell no!” I slammed my glass down on the arm of the chair, liquor sloshing over the edge.

“Then what’s the problem, Braxton? Why is she in the house while you’re out here?”

My flash of anger was replaced with regret. “I can’t stop seeing her face. Knowing I was the cause of her pain. It kills me.”

“So, you thought that after she trusted you with a piece of herself she can’t give to any other man, it was a good idea to cut and run? How do you thinkthatmade her feel? Physical pain fades away into a distant memory. Emotional pain lingers and is not so easy to overcome.”

Tell me something I don’t already know.

“You love her.” It was a statement, not a question. If there was one thing Jaxon knew better than hockey, it was love. Standing, he gripped my shoulder. “You know what you need to do. Don’t waste your last night before we report to the team tomorrow sitting out here alone. Have the tough conversation. Let her know how you feel. I promise the sky is never falling quite the way it seems in your mind.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” I mused, but he was already gone.

Taking a moment, I sipped the rest of the scotch in my glass. Jaxon was right. Nothing would be solved by avoiding Dakota. I was only hurting her more.

Filling my lungs with a last deep breath of frosty air, I was about to head inside when a soft voice asked, “Did you mean what you said?”

Turning my head, I found Dakota a few steps behind the chairs, a blanket wrapped around her.

“Yes.”

She tilted her head, stepping closer. “You’re not going to ask me to qualify which statement?”

“No.” I shook my head. “Everything I’ve said since I met you has been the truth.”

Standing beside my chair, the fire illuminated the sadness in her eyes. “You said that once you found your way into my bed that you would never leave.” Her gaze dropped to the ground, and her voice lowered to a whisper. “I woke up alone.”

“I’m sorry, Dakota.” For so many things.

“Is it—is it because I was a virgin?”

“God, no.” I pushed off the armrests to stand before her, pulling Dakota into my arms. She burrowed her face into my chest, and I squeezed her tighter. Kissing the top of her head, I confessed, “It’s because I failed you.”

Lifting her eyes to meet mine, confusion filtered into her blue eyes. “You gave me an incredible night, Braxton. One I will never forget. How can you think you failed me?”

“I hurt you, baby.” I closed my eyes against the fresh wave of pain that rolled over me at that truth.

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