I gently take my hand out from under his. “Just wondering how tomorrow’s going to go.”
“It’s going to go just fine,” he assures me. “There was so much hype around this book, there’ll be people lined up for blocks just to meet you.”
“What if they think I’m boring?”
“Impossible,” he says.
“What if they hate my signature?”
“Have you been practicing?” he asks.
I exhale, pressing my forehead against the sun-warmed glass of the passenger window.
“Do you not like New York?” he asks. “I love New York, but I can only handle it in small doses. Too much and it’s just ... too intense. Everyone’s so serious there. Always wearing black and walking around like they’re somebody important when they’re nobody anybody’s every heard of.”
I chuckle through my nose. He’s right. New York is intense.
“I have no qualms with New York,” I tell him, staring ahead and letting my mind wander like it always does ... going to him. “New York was good to me once upon a time.”
I’d like to think there’s a version of Rhett and Ayla dashing around New York together, catching midnight movies and walking the city hand in hand late at night like the whole place belongs only to them. Maybe they moved in together by now? Maybe they took a trip together? Maybe they’re starting to think about the future because they’re just as inseparable as ever.
Regardless, the spirit of what we had, be it ever so brief, is still there. The second I step off the plane, I’ll feel it. It’ll sink into me, heavy at first, then it’ll wrap me up in a bittersweet embrace, kiss me gently on the cheek, and fade away, carried by a summer breeze.
Last I heard, Rhett left the Spartans. They let him out of his contract due to “interpersonal issues,” which I think was just code for everything that happened between him and Bryce and the decline of Rhett’s morale. I read on ESPN shortly after that that the Philadelphia Iron Kings signed him on. Other than that, I have absolutely no idea what he’s been up to.
I don’t know if he’s with anyone.
I don’t know if he’s happier now.
I don’t know if he moved on or if he ever thinks about me.
All I know is my life can be divided into two broken little pieces: life before I knew him—and life after.
33
Ayla
“You want to catch a Spartans game while we’re here?” Seth asks as he pays for dinner. We landed three hours ago, checked into the hotel, cleaned up, then made a beeline for one of his favorite restaurants, Gramercy Tavern.
I wrinkle my nose. “Not really.”
Seth’s smile fades and he clears his throat. I’ve told him about Bryce, and he knows the story there. I haven’t told him about Rhett. Or that I can’t so much as look at an ice rink without feeling this gaping void in my chest where something beautiful used to reside.
“We can’t just do, like, one game?” he asks, lifting a dark brow. “I love hockey.”
He does. It’s true. And somehow over the duration of our budding friendship, I’ve managed to avoid watching a single game with him.
“Don’t you have the hook up? I bet you could get some rink side seats if you asked. You think I could meet some of the guys? Shane McDermott? John Wisecup?” Seth’s face is lit with childlike enthusiasm when he talks about them. This would make his entire year. And given the fact that he took time off work to join me in New York, I should probably repay him with kindness.
“Yeah.” I exhale. I’ll put on my big girl pants and make a phone call. “Only for you.”
34
Ayla
“So glad you guys could make it.” Coach Harris stands outside the locker rooms a couple of hours before the game starts. I made one phone call last night, and he wasted no time getting us the best seats in the arena for Saturday’s game. He was even thrilled when I asked if my friend could meet some of the players. “It’s good to see you again, Ayla.”
“You as well.” I give him a hug because he looks like a hugging kind of guy, and he squeezes me tight. His hair has more gray than it did last time, but his ageless smile hasn’t changed a bit.
“I’m going to grab a beer; you want one?” Seth offers.
“Please,” I say, watching him leave.
“You doing okay?” Coach asks.
“I am.” My hand tightens around the strap of my shoulder bag. From the moment we walked in here tonight, every player that catches my periphery sends my heart into a freefall. I expect them all to be him, even if they aren’t—even if they can’t be.
I look for Rhett in places he couldn’t possibly be, and yet somehow, he’s always there.
But tonight’s different…
Because tonight the Spartans play the Iron Kings.
And that means he’s here.
“Was a little worried. You kind of dropped off the face of the earth for a while,” Coach says, adjusting his Spartans cap.
“Just busy working,” I say. “And running the foundation.”
“That’s good, that’s good. We got the check you sent for the youth camp last spring. Thank you. You put a lot of little smiles on those kids’ faces. Wish you could’ve been here to see.”
I offer an apologetic smile, tucking my chin. “Me too. I’ll try to make the next one, okay?”
A player passes us, wielding a walk like a steely-eyed man on a mission, and for a second, I’m sure it’s him.
But it isn’t.
Seth returns with two overflowing draft beers in clear plastic cups. He hands one to me and then asks Coach Harris some random question about some random player I’ve never heard of.
They’re deep into their conversation when I feel the warmth of Seth’s palm on my lower back. He placed it there so calmly, so casually.
If anyone were to walk by right now, it would look like we’re together. But what am I supposed to do? Interrupt Coach Harris and ask Seth to kindly take his hand off me?
I suck in a deep breath, mustering all the patience I have to get through this conversation, and the second there’s a lull, I’m going to suggest to Seth that we go find Shane so he can get a picture.
“No kidding, eh?” Coach laughs at something Seth said. I’m completely tuned out, watching my six.
Rhett’s here.
I can feel it.
There’s a weight in the air and a dampness in my palms. My pulse is going a hundred miles per hour.
The sound of heavy footsteps from the hallway pull my attention in that direction. I hold my breath and brace myself, not fully expecting it to be him because it never is.
Only this time, it is him.
My body’s frozen, my eyes glued. He looks bigger, more ripped than before, his shoulders bursting out of his cotton shirt, and his expression is stone cold and laser focused. The second his eyes land on mine, I catch a glimpse of something. Shock? Surprise? Anger?
His harsh stare moves lower, assessing Seth’s hand on my back, and then he rips his attention away from us. The closer he gets, the harder my heart pounds. But when he keeps trudging forward without so much as an acknowledgement, that’s when my heart stops beating altogether.
35
Ayla
Rhett’s team won.
I’d watched highlight reels of Rhett on the ice dozens of times, but I’d never seen him like this before. It was almost as if he was fueled by a cocktail of rage and adrenaline. He was the fastest man out there, his shots more aggressive and more accurate than anyone else’s. At one point, he got in a fight with a Spartan and they were both placed in the penalty box for a bit.
But in true Spartans tradition, I’m told, we’re celebrating a game well-played at Shotsky’s.
Seth is in heaven, surrounded by most of the team, and we just finished off our second round of Jäger bombs ten minutes ago. Everyone’s amazed at Seth’s knowledge of the game because he comes off as more of a Proust scholar than a diehard hockey enthusiast, but that’s Seth.<
br />
A walking contradiction with a heart of gold.
“You doing okay?” Shane asks, taking the empty seat beside me.
“Why does everyone keep asking me that?” I ask, laughing.
He shrugs. “You just, like, disappeared after Bryce died. We had that meeting and you got the check and you were gone. I even went by Bryce’s place a couple weeks after that to check on you because you weren’t answering my texts, but the landlord said you’d left for good.”
“I’m sorry.” I take a sip of my old fashioned. “That was a really... weird time for me.”
“Rhett?” His question catches me off guard, and I almost spit out my drink. Our eyes convene, and immediately I know he knows.
“Why do you say that?”
“One of the guys saw you two slipping into a hotel one night,” he says. “After you left, Rhett kind of got … colder … if that makes sense. We put it all together.”
“Am I a bad person, Shane? Be honest.” My words slur slightly, but I need to know. I need an objective opinion from someone who knew them both.
“You’re not a bad person,” he says, and I release a sequestered breath. “But I get why Rhett reacted the way he did. He liked you. And you betrayed him. And so soon after Damiana.”
Shane winces, shakes his head, and then takes a swig of beer.
“He was never the same after that,” he says. “I don’t know how a man can recover from two of those, back to back.”
“Do you still keep in touch?” I ask, brows raised. “How’s he doing? Is he happy? Did he meet someone?”
Shane’s eyes shift around the room, and I can tell he wants to tell me something, but he doesn’t know how.
“We keep in touch,” he says, taking another drink.
“And?”
“You’ve got to let him go,” he delivers his words with care before slipping his hand on my shoulder and giving it a friendly squeeze. “It’s been well over a year. Don’t you think it’s time to move on?”
“Has he?”
“Does it matter?” Shane’s brows meet. “You can’t change what happened, but I don’t think it’s fair for you to expect him to want to give you a second chance. Do you?”
My eyes well up, and I blink away the tears before they have a chance to fall. In all my daydreamed delusions, I never once thought about what was fair because love, in its very essence, isn’t fair. It takes victims. It’s a two-sided coin that sometimes lands on joy and other times lands on pain, and you never know which way it’s going to fall.
Fairness and love have nothing to do with one another.
“I should probably tell you,” Shane says, leaning closer, “One of the guys invited him out for drinks tonight, for old times’ sake.”
My eyes widen.
“I don’t know if he’ll show. He might be with the Iron Kings. They might be doing their own thing, I don’t know. But I just thought you should know he was invited,” he says.
I glance around the room, searching like I always do, but I don’t see him. Taking a generous sip of my drink, I spot Seth in the corner with the guys having the time of his freaking life. He’s not going to want to bounce anytime soon.
Grabbing my phone, I text Bostyn. It’s late on a Saturday night, and I’m sure she’s a woman about town and two sheets to the wind by now. She came to my signing yesterday, working as my “assistant” and helping calm some overzealous fans who were fangirling so hard they could barely contain themselves, bless their hearts.
She doesn’t reply.
Shane excuses himself, heading back to the bar, and I find myself suddenly alone, which feels like a metaphor for my life right now.
Tracing the rim of my glass with my pointer finger, I zone out for a bit. The noisy bar fades into the background, and I’m lost in thought until a moment later, when a man stumbles into me, dousing the front of my blouse with a freshly poured pint of beer.
“Oh, shit, I’m sorry.” He’s drunk out of his fucking mind, and I know it was an accident, but I’m still annoyed. He laughs and carries on, disappearing into the bar crowd, and I climb off my seat, making my way to the ladies’ room in the back. If I’m lucky, there’ll be a dryer. If there’s not, I’m screwed.
There’s a line of three women waiting ahead of me, and judging by the looks of the bathroom every time the door swings open, it’s a single stall.
Who puts a single stall ladies’ room in a bar in a city of millions?!
I check my phone—still no response from Bostyn—and then I cross my arms along my chest, hating feel of the fabric as it clings to my damp skin.
“I fucking hate that you’re his sister.”
That voice.
I turn, finding myself face to face with him.
“Rhett,” I say, drinking him in. He’s maybe two feet from me, and the familiar spicy notes of his Viktor & Rolf cologne brings back a flood of memories that feel so good I could cry.
He hands me a gray t-shirt with Shotsky’s logo across the front. He must have seen what happened and purchased it at the bar, a simple act of kindness that gives me more hope than I’d like to admit.
“It’s not something I can change, Rhett,” I finally say. “It’s not something I chose either.”
Hundreds of times I’ve imagined running into him, each scenario slightly different from the one before. None of them could have prepared me for the way I feel right now: like I could fall to my knees, wrap my arms around his legs, beg for his forgiveness, and swear to do whatever it takes to win his trust. I’m not above doing any of that.
The line moves ahead, and two girls enter the bathroom together.
His presence penetrates the small space we share, and his stare bores into me.
“I’ve missed you,” I say, lips numb and trembling as I smile. I’ve wanted to tell him that a hundred times, even if he already knew. “So much.”
Rhett says nothing.
“So you’re in Philly now?” Ugh. I’m horrible at small talk, but he’s not giving me anything to work with.
The girls leave the restroom and the woman before me goes in.
His eyes search mine, and I’d give anything to know what he’s thinking about. I can’t read him. His stoic, indifferent expression puts me on edge, and the room has suddenly grown twenty degrees hotter.
The restroom door opens a few moments later, and I’m next.
“Thank you for this.” I lift the t-shirt and head in, only I’m not expecting him to join me, locking the door behind us.
“What are you doing?” I release a nervous laugh, my fingers working the buttons of my top. He’s seen me naked before, but that was then. Changing in front of him now, with his unrelenting gaze, sends a hitch to my breath and a swarm of anxious butterflies to my stomach. When I unhook the final button, I toss the blouse in the trashcan and slip my arms through the sleeves of the t-shirt in record time, but Rhett grabs the shirt, tugging it away and taking a good look at me.
I’ve never felt more vulnerable.
He stares me up and down, taking in my body like it’s the first time all over again, eyes lingering on my breasts for a beat longer. His breath is heavy, his chest rising and falling. Rhett’s chest and shoulders are massive, bigger than they were before, and veins protrude from his arms when he flexes.
I wish he’d say something.
“Are you happy, Rhett?” I ask the question I’ve wanted to know the answer to for the longest time.
“Do I look happy?” he answers. His gaze falls to my mouth, and suddenly I can’t breathe.
I want him to kiss me.
I want him to kiss me more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my entire life.
“Did you miss me?” I ask, delivering it with a casual smirk. If I pretend like I’m teasing, it won’t hurt so bad if he says “no.”
Rhett drags his teeth along his bottom lip for a half second.
“Yes? No?” I tease. We need to lighten the mood here because this is way too intense.
> “Is that your boyfriend out there?” he asks.
My brows meet. “Who? Seth? No, no, no. We’re just friends.”
He gives a single nod, studying me. “Why was he touching you?”
I laugh. “Did you follow me in here just so you could interrogate me?”
“Your personal life is none of my concern, Ayla. It was a simple question.”
“Then wh—”
His lips crash onto mine in a frenzied rush that sucks the air from my lungs. Rhett’s hands slick down my outer thighs, cupping my ass and lifting me to the wall, where he presses his body against mine and I hook my legs around his sides.
I don’t know what this means or why he’s doing it, but I’ll be damned if I ask because I don’t want him to stop.
My fingers interlace at the nape of his neck, and his kiss hurts, but I don’t mind because a kiss that hurts is better than a kiss that doesn’t exist at all. His tongue grazes mine as our lips dance, and I smile when I realize he tastes exactly the same.
Someone’s pounding on the door, but we don’t stop.
“Hurry up! I gotta piss,” a woman shouts from the other side. “If you don’t wrap it up, you’ll be stepping in it on your way out!”
Got to love New York.
Rhett groans and loosens his grip on me, letting me slide down the wall before tossing me the t-shirt. I tug it over my head, and before I realize what’s happening, his hand is clamped around my wrist and we’re ducking out a back door, dashing across an alley, and sprinting through a crosswalk toward the Hotel du Glace across the street.
It’s only when we’re in the elevator and his brute body is pinning mine into the wall so hard I can’t breathe and he’s dragging my lip between his teeth and the taste of blood hits my tongue …
… that I realize he didn’t miss me at all.
He wants to punish me.
Cold Hearted Page 15
