Page 119 of Unravel Me

Carter licks at the icing on a new cookie. “’Cause he’s not gettin’ any right now.”

“He smashed through all of my condoms in one night and now he hasn’t had sex in three weeks,” Jaxon adds unnecessarily.

Emmett pats my shoulder. “It’d make the best of us grumpy.”

“Holy fuck.” I tuck my book away; clearly reading’s not happening anymore. With my MacBook and AirPods, I stand and point to an empty seat down the row. “I’m gonna watch a movie.”

“Have fun looking at pictures of Rosie,” Garrett calls as I walk away.

We’ve been on the road for three days for our first two preseason games in Edmonton and Calgary, and Garrett’s been my unlucky roommate.

No, wait.I’mthe unlucky roommate. He came back to the room one night and found me looking at all the pictures Rosie’s been sending me of her and Bear while he’s been recovering from surgery at the school clinic, and I came back to the room one night to him furiously scrubbing amessoff the carpet while Jennie was cackling at him over FaceTime. He screamed at the both of us that he’d scored a goal and deserved to let loose, even though it was only an exhibition game. Which scene would you rather come home to?

Popping my headphones in, I open my laptop and pull up my message thread with Rosie. Our preseason started the day after Bear’s surgery, but knowing Rosie would be there every day to give him lots of love made it easier to get on the plane. The pictures and videos she’s been diligently sending don’t hurt either.

I pull up my favorite one, sent this morning.

Rosie smiles at the camera, bright and happy. “Let’s go see if Bear is up.”

She pushes through a set of swinging doors, and his head pops up from his bed. Slowly, he gets to his feet, tail whipping back and forth, thudding against the wall of the oversized kennel.

“Look at you, big boy,” Rosie coos, propping her phone up as she gets down on her knees, burying her fingers in his fur. Bear wastes no time covering her face in kisses, and she giggles, hugging him close. “Do you wanna tell Daddy how much you miss him?” She points at the camera as Bear gives a little woof. “Say, ‘I love you, Daddy.’” He barks again. “That’s my handsome boy.”

A text cuts across my screen, and I sigh at the interruption from my publicist.

Angie

She’s called me three times today, Adam.

There’s no name, because Angie knows we don’t say it when we can avoid it.

You’d think blocking her number not once, but twice, and telling her to never call me again would do the trick, but after Courtney called me that night at Rosie’s, in the middle of all the chaos, she resorted to calling Angie.

The woman hasn’t been in my life since I tossed her—and the guy she was fucking—out of my bed over a year ago, and suddenly she wants to chat. I don’t have the time of day for her, and I certainly can’t be bothered to see her again. I still cringe at the thought of her in my kitchen that morning in July, wearing nothing but my T-shirt, acting like she belonged there, claiming she’d been at my party the night before.

Drunk Adam doesn’t always make the brightest decisions, but Drunk Adam has never made an oopsie that size.

Me

I don’t want to talk to her.

And I’ve told her that. Approximately 25,000x. Honestly, Adam, how you were ever with this woman is beyond me. No offense.

I could swear up and down that Courtney was nothing like this at seventeen, but the more reflecting I do, the more signs I see that I didn’t before. Still, on my bad days, I sometimes wonder if I’m responsible, if I didn’t love her the way she needed to be loved, if the hockey made me too absent. All the same fears that led to my downfall, to the lies I never should’ve told Rosie.

I think you should meet with her. Hear me out.

Abso-fucking-lutely not.

I know, I know. But she says she’s got something you’d want to hear.

That’s bullshit. What could she possibly have to say that I’d want to hear?

I agree, but I also know you like to stay out of the media when it’s not hockey or fundraising related, and I wouldn’t put it past her to drag you into something if she wants your attention that badly. So I say we meet her somewhere public, I do the talking, and we give her five minutes, nothing more.

Courtney has embarrassed me enough in the media, but nothing is worse than the hurt it causes, knowing that after all we’ve been through, all the years I gave her, she cares so little for me that she would go to such great lengths to tear me down in whatever way she can. Like all she wants to do is wreck everything I’ve worked so hard for, take away this life I’ve earned.

So I agree to five minutes, not a single second more, this Saturday. I just want this over with.

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