Page 171 of Slapshot Bride

Mason’s watching me with an unfamiliar expression. His lack of words leaves me frustrated. And I decide to tell him the other thing I’ve been hiding.

“There’s something else.” My hands are shaking, and so is my voice. “I… I-I’m p-pregnant.”

He stumbles backwards, and my heart shatters.

Mason sits down on the low garden wall like his legs quit. Tears spring to my eyes.

“It’s his,” I say before he can ask. “I haven’t told him. I haven’t told anyone. You’re the first.”

He puts his face in his hands.

And it’s wrong, all of it, because I braced for shock. For the scolding. To tell me I’m being silly, and have made a huge mistake, but it doesn’t come. He stares at me, bleak.

“M-Mason?”

“He came to see me a few days ago.”

My heart stops.

He lifts his head. His eyes are red at the edges, a pained expression etched on his face.

“Easton called me, said he had to come by.” Mason’s voice is calm and quiet, barely audible, but I hear every word.

“And he told me all of it. That he fell for you the first afternoon. That he’d been carrying the Maya thing the whole time and never once put it on you. That he was going to end things with you, because I asked him to, because I’d told him to let you go, and then you flew to Chicago, and he couldn’t do it.”

I can’t breathe. My chest is tight. I move backwards, till I find a bench and sit on it. Mason is watching me with worry. He looks so apologetic, like it’s all his fault.

“He said he’d decided on the flight home he was going to call me. Tell me the truth and ask for my blessing. And then he got home, and you were gone, and the next morning there was the photo of you and Preston, and he decided he’d been right that he wasn’t good enough for you.”

He came for me.

He went to my brother. He did the hard, honorable thing.

My heart is racing now.

“W-what did you tell him?” I can barely get it out.

Mason looks at me, and I watch the shame move through him.

“I told him to wait.”

“You—”

“I told him you’d just gotten out of a relationship, and you’ll need time to heal and settle into your life. I thought… I thought it was for the best, Riley. I would never intentionally hurt you.”

He drags a hand down his face. “I believed I was protecting you. He agreed with me, Riley. He walked out, agreeing to stay away from you for as long as it took, because he thought it was the right thing to do.”

My heart breaks even more.

Even when he wants something different, he still puts me first. He still chooses what's best for me.

I need to see him.

I’m more convinced now than I’ve ever been that I’m in love with Easton Blake, and I need to see him and tell him to his face.

If I don’t, he’ll keep his distance. He’ll do it forever, if nobody tells him differently. He thinks that’s what love is supposed to look like now.

“Mase…” I rise to my feet. “I don’t want space. I want him. And I’m done letting all of you decide for me. I can make my own decisions.”