Page 107 of Cold Feet
"Fine." His jaw tightened. "Then tell me this: Doyouwant this to be real?"
The question struck me like a physical blow, making me step back until my legs hit the edge of my desk. Did I? Did I want to risk my heart, my career, my carefully constructed life for something that could disappear at any moment? For someone who had already left me once before?
"You don't get to ask that," I whispered, my voice catching. "Not now. Not when you're still considering leaving."
"Lana," he said quietly, "I think it's time I told you the truth about what happened that night."
And just like that, my mind catapulted back a decade, the present office fading as memories washed over me – the scent of falling snow, the taste of cheap beer, the feeling of finally being seen…
“When I realized who you were…”
"Zayne's sister," I said flatly.
He nodded, shoulders slumping slightly. "Zayne was my teammate, my best friend. One of my only real friends. And he had this one absolute rule… "
"Stay away from his sister," I finished, a dull ache spreading through my chest.
"Not just stay away. He made it clear to everyone on the team that if anyone so much as looked at you, we'd regret it." Cam's face darkened with the memory. "His exact words to a teammate who commented on seeing you at a game were 'My sister comes before hockey, and I will end anyone who touches her.' The guy had a black eye for a week. And I’m like 90% sure Zayne gave him a midweek refresher."
I remembered that incident. Zayne came home with bruised knuckles, refusing to tell me why he'd fought with his teammate. I'd been embarrassed and annoyed at his overprotectiveness, but I hadn't realized the extent of his threats.
"So what?" I challenged, a spark of anger cutting through the hurt. "You were afraid of my brother?"
"It wasn't that simple." Cam's voice was strained, his eyes pleading for understanding. "The team was... everything to me then. I told you my family was a disaster – my dad was on his fourth wife, my mom on her third husband, everyone too busy with their new lives and step-kids to care about mine. Hockey was all I had. Those guys were my brothers. My onlyrealfamily."
Understanding began to dawn, unwelcome and painful. "And Zayne was part of that family," I said slowly.
"I don’t know if I ever told you how alone I felt. For most of my life. He was my closest friend on the team, the closest thing I'd ever had to a brother. I couldn't…" He broke off, swallowing hard, "...I couldn't risk losing that. Not when my own family had shown me over and over that love doesn't last, that peopleleave when something better comes along. But teammates... teammates always have your back."
The pieces were finally falling into place. All these years, I'd thought he'd left because I wasn't enough: not pretty enough, not experienced enough, not interesting enough. But the truth was both better and worse: he'd left because of who I was. Because I was a Decker.
"You chose him," I said, the realization hitting me like a physical blow. "You chose my brother over me."
"I made the wrong choice," Cam said quietly, his voice thick with regret. "I know that now. I knew it then, too, if I'm being honest. But I was twenty-one and terrified of losing the only real family I'd ever known."
"So you just... what? Decided to pretend I didn't exist? That nothing had happened between us?"
"I thought it would be easier that way. A clean break." He stepped toward me, then stopped himself. "I told myself you'd forget about me, move on to someone who deserved you. Someone who wasn't breaking his best friend's trust." His voice cracked slightly. "I told myself I was doing the right thing, the honorable thing. But the truth is, I was a coward."
I stood frozen, struggling to process everything. Ten years of wondering, of hurt, of doubting myself – all because my brother had been too protective and Cam had been too afraid of losing his surrogate family to fight for what wemighthave had.
The office suddenly felt too small, too confined for the magnitude of emotions crashing through me. I moved to the window, needing space, air, distance to think.
"When I got drafted to the Slashers, and I found out you worked there – as the PR director, no less – I thought fate was playing some cosmic joke on me," Cam continued, his voice low. "I'd spent years trying to forget you, and suddenly you were there, every day. Beautiful, brilliant, and still completely off-limits."
"So you just continued pretending nothing had happened between us? For years?" I turned back to face him, incredulity sharpening my voice.
"What choice did I have?" he asked, frustration evident. "Zayne was still my teammate, still my best friend. And you clearly hated me. I figured you'd moved on long ago."
"I didn't hate you," I said quietly, wrapping my arms around myself. "I was confused. Hurt. You made me feel like I'd imagined everything between us."
My voice caught, andI turned away again, unable to face him as years of buried emotions threatened to overwhelm me. "Do you have any idea what that did to me? I was twenty years old. I thought I'd found something special with someone who actually saw me – not as Zayne's sister or Frank Decker's daughter, just... me. And then you were gone."
"Lana, I – "
"No." I held up a hand, silencing him. "Let me finish. After that night, I questioned everything. My judgment, my worth, what I could possibly offer someone. I convinced myself it was all in my head, that connection we had. And now you're telling me it was real? That you felt it too? But you threw it away because of some... what? Hockey bro code with my brother?" The second I said it, I knew it was cruel and unfair. Loyalty to my brother was not something I should be angry about. Ever.”Sorry, I didn’t mean that. I’m…hurt.”
Cam's face was etched with remorse. "It wasn't just some code. Zayne was like the only stable thing in my life. The BU team was the closest thing to a real family I'd ever had."
