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“It was.” She locked eyes with me. “I don’t think I need to tell you that I can’t stomach watching him go through that again.”
My own stomach dropped into my feet, and my lips parted. “What? Oh, God. No, I wouldn’t—” I shook my head. “Even if things don’t work out between us, I can’t imagine…”
Laura studied me. Then she put a hand on my arm. “I hope that’s true. I don’t think you’re malicious, or—I don’t want to make any accusations. His ex put him—all of us, honestly—through hell, and all I can ask is that if things don’t work out between you…” She swallowed. “Be gentle with him. Please?”
“Of course,” I whispered, the words coming out ragged.
Laura nodded, apparently satisfied with my answer, and she gave my arm a squeeze before she let it go. “Thank you. Because the second thing I’ve seen that worries me so much?” She pulled in a deep breath, and I thought her eyes might’ve welled up a little as she said, “The way my son looks at you.”
I didn’t think it was possible for a single sentence to simultaneously make me giddy and send my heart into the pit of my stomach. So I hadn’t been imagining those looks? And… his mom thought I was going to break his heart?
She patted my arm again and softly repeated, “Be gentle with him.”
All I could do was nod and somehow choke out, “I will.”
“That’s all I ask.” She gestured toward the house. “I need to get breakfast going.”
I nodded again, my tongue sticking to the roof of my mouth. I was dizzy from all the thoughts crashing around inside my head, and not to mention all the emotions. I wanted to go to the guest room, wrap my arms around Isaiah, and make sure he knew I wasn’t going anywhere. I also wanted to find his asshole ex so we could drop gloves. Who the fuck did that to someone?
Who the fuck does it to Isaiah?
Just before Laura reached the sliding glass door, I pulled myself together enough to speak, and I called after her, “Laura?”
She turned around and met my gaze, and I almost lost my nerve, but I pushed through anyway.
“Between you and me?” I swallowed. “I think I loved him before I even met him in person. I’d never seen him, didn’t really know that much about him, but… There was something, you know?” My throat tried to close around my breath, but I managed to choke out, “You don’t have to worry about me. I love him too much to hurt him.”
She smiled faintly, gave me a little nod, and then continued into the house.
Alone on the deck, I pushed out a breath, turned toward the railing, and stared out at the trees as I tried to collect myself. I’d said it. Out loud. Admitted I loved Isaiah. It might not have meant much to Laura—she might’ve still been skeptical of me because she was protecting her son—but it left my heart pounding and my knees shaking.
I wasn’t ready to tell him. Wasn’t sure I could actually say it without choking up completely. And God knew if he was ready to hear it.
But I knew it. And I hoped Laura believed it.
Because I was absolutely in love with Isaiah.
The conversation gnawedat me all day. I hid it as best I could through breakfast, a visit with some of Isaiah’s relatives, and most of the afternoon, but it was a struggle. It was like trying to get through a shift on the ice when my skate wasn’t laced as tightly as it should’ve been. Or like getting through the wholegamewithout stopping to relace it. I could play. I could fake it. I could pretend everything wasfucking fine, and I could do it well enough that no one was the wiser—not my teammates, not the fans, and not even the eagle-eyed commentators who always caught when I’d missed a spot shaving or something. But it was distracting. It sucked the whole time. It made the game that was second nature a hundred times harder to play.
Today, socializing took more work than it usually did. I could charm cameras, reporters, fans—it was part of my job. All damn day, though, I struggled to follow, never mind contribute, to conversations.
Every time my gaze landed on Laura, the conversation echoed through my brain like an opposing team’s goal horn. And every time I looked at Isaiah…
How could anyone think I’d hurt you?
Needless to say, I was relieved as all hell when we were invited to dinner and Isaiah bowed out for us. I wasn’t sure I could keep the mask up any longer. Maybe he needed a break, too.
But I wasn’t ready when, as soon as the door had shut behind his parents, he turned to me, concern written all over his face. “Hey. You okay?”
I blinked, my throat suddenly constricting. “What? Why?” I forced a laugh. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
His brow furrowed. “You tell me.”
Oh. Hell. The truth wanted to come pouring out of me, but I remembered too clearly how stressed he’d been yesterday after the conversation with his sister. He’d had that same faraway look he got when he went up into his own head sometimes. Those moments when I knew—I fuckingknewfrom all the conversations we’d had over the years—that his ex was whispering poison in his ear. Telling him all the reasons he wasn’t good enough.
The reasons he wasn’t good enough forme.
Fuck that.
