Page 32 of Price of Victory
“Your father is a visionary, Aiden. He sees opportunities that other people miss, and he’s not afraid to pursue them. That’s how he built everything we have.”
“And look where it got him.”
The words came out sharper than I’d intended, and I immediately regretted them. There was a moment of shocked silence on the other end of the line.
“Aiden William Whitmore,” my mother said, her voice going cold in a way that took me right back to childhood. “Show some respect.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant…maybe there are ways to be successful without taking on so much stress.”
“Perhaps. But that’s a conversation for you and your father to have. When you’re ready to have it.”
The conversation continued for another ten minutes, and every minute felt like walking through quicksand. My mother dropped hints about business meetings I should attend, mentioned that my father was reviewing acquisition targets that would be “perfect learning opportunities” for me, and made several pointed remarks about hockey being “a nice hobby” but not something to build a career around.
I gave weak promises about catching up with the business, deflected her questions about my course load and future plans, and somehow managed to avoid committing to anything concrete. When she started talking about holiday plans and family obligations, I felt the familiar tightness in my chest that always came with extended conversations with my parents.
It was the weight of expectations I’d never asked for, responsibilities I’d been running from since I was old enough to understand what my last name meant. The assumption was that I would naturally want to follow in my father’s footsteps, that I would be grateful for the opportunity to inherit his empire.
But what if I wasn’t grateful? What if I wanted something different?
“I should let you go, dear,” my mother said finally. “I know you have classes today.”
“Yeah, I do. Tell Dad I love him, okay? And that I’ll call him soon.”
“I will. And Aiden? I love you, too.”
The words felt automatic, a ritual we went through because it was expected rather than because either of us particularly felt it in the moment. When the call ended, I sat in my expensive kitchen in my expensive apartment, surrounded by all the trappings of wealth and privilege, and felt absolutely empty.
Nothing about the conversation had been resolved. I’d avoided making any real commitments, she’d avoided addressing the underlying tension between us, and my father remained this looming figure who controlled both our lives, even when he wasn’t physically present.
I looked at my phone again, thumb hovering over the screen. Part of me wanted to call my father directly, to have the conversation my mother had been hinting at. But I wasn’t ready for that, wasn’t prepared to deal with whatever expectations and demands he would place on me.
Instead, I noticed the notification I’d been fearing all morning. A text message from Rhett.
My heart jumped, and I had to take a deep breath before opening it. This was it, the potentially awkward morning-after communication that would determine how we moved forward from here. Would he pretend nothing had happened? Would he regret what we’d done? Would he want to talk about what it meant?
But when I read the message, I found myself laughing out loud for the first time all day.
“Good morning, sunshine. Hope you slept better than I did. Kept thinking about last night. Also, you definitely ruined my sheets with that cologne of yours.” The text was followed bya winking emoji and another message: “Seriously though, that was…yeah. Hope you’re having a good morning.”
The casualness of it, the humor mixed with just enough sincerity to be genuine, was so perfectly Rhett that I felt some of the tension in my chest ease. He wasn’t freaking out, wasn’t demanding explanations or promises I wasn’t ready to make. He was just…being himself.
I stared at the messages for a long moment, trying to figure out how to respond. Part of me wanted to match his casual tone, to pretend that last night had been just another hookup. But that felt wrong, dishonest in a way that made my stomach twist. Instead, I typed: “Sorry for keeping you up thinking about me. Can’t help that I’m unforgettable. And my cologne is expensive. You should be honored your sheets smell like success now.”
I sent it before I could second-guess myself, then immediately worried it was too much. Too flirtatious, too presumptuous, too something. But my phone buzzed with his response almost immediately.
“Smooth, Whitmore. See you at practice.”
Three little words that shouldn’t have meant anything significant but somehow made everything feel manageable again.See you at practice. Like we were going to be okay, like last night hadn’t made everything more complicated between us.
I finished my cereal, which suddenly tasted better than it had all morning, and started getting ready for the day. Classes, practice, normal college student activities that felt surreal after the emotional whiplash of the morning.
But as I showered and dressed, I found myself thinking about Rhett’s text messages, about the easy humor and underlying warmth. About the way he’d handled the morning after with grace and intelligence, giving us both space to figure out what came next without making it weird or complicated.
Maybe this didn’t have to be the disaster I’d been imagining. Maybe we could figure out how to navigate whatever this was between us, how to balance the attraction and the family complications and all the other messy realities that came with crossing the line we’d crossed last night.
Or maybe I was being naive, and everything was about to get infinitely more complicated.
Either way, I was going to see him at practice in a few hours, and I had no idea what that was going to be like. Would things be awkward between us anyway? Would I be able to focus on hockey when all I could think about was the way he’d looked underneath me, the sounds he’d made, the way he’d said my name, or the way his eyes widened in the moment he came?
