Page 317 of Power Play

“I know.”

“Stop saying that!”

My voice tore through the rink, but Briggs didn’t flinch.

I shoved him again, although the strength had started leaving my arms. “She knew what walking away from her would do to me.”

“I know.”

“I stood there and let him say every fucking thing because I thought she would finally hear it. I wanted her to hear what he does. I wanted her to see him tear me apart and realize he would do the same thing to anybody she loved if they didn’t fit inside the life he picked for her.”

Briggs’s hands remained locked around my arms.

“I didn’t back down.”

“No.”

“I didn’t make myself smaller.”

“No.”

“I didn’t let him make me ashamed.”

“No,” Briggs repeated quietly.

My grip tightened around his shirt. “Then I looked at her.”

He said nothing.

The memory entered me whole.

Charm stood beneath the light in her father’s study with her hands clasped so tightly that her knuckles had gone white. Lance’s desk remained between us, and her mother hovered near the doorway while I demanded one thing from the woman I had given everything.

Tell him I matter.

“I watched her choose him.”

Briggs’s jaw flexed.

“She looked at the floor.”

“I know.”

“No.” My voice cracked. “You don’t.”

He didn’t argue.

“She looked at the fucking floor.”

The strength left my arms all at once. My forehead struck Briggs’s shoulder, and for half a second, I didn’t understand why. My hands remained twisted in his shirt, but they no longer had enough power to hold him against anything.

A sound tore out of me from somewhere beneath the anger. It dragged through my chest so violently that my entire body folded around the pain.

I tried to swallow it, but another followed. Then another.

Briggs released my arms. He didn’t hug me. He planted his skates, braced one hand against the glass behind him, and let me use his body to stay upright while mine forgot how.

“I begged her.” The admission broke apart against his shoulder.