“No need to cover up my account,” I drawled.
She rolled her eyes but smiled. “I do need to cover up. I’m too tired to go another round. I’m afraid if I expose even a kneecap, you’ll get started again.”
I chuckled at that. That probably wasn’t much of a stretch. I wasthatattracted to her.
We’d started up again on the couch after round one and eventually made it to the bed. We had dinner afterward because we were famished from expending so much energy. I forgot who started the flirting and sexual innuendos first as we chatted, but that led to another round in the shower. I’d had to do it all with one arm to avoid getting my bandage wet. Ava was impressed with my ability to carry her one-armed. I smiled at the memory. We had way too much fun together.
The somber look that came over her made my smile fade.
“Something wrong?” I asked.
Throwing the towel onto a chair, she climbed into bed. “No. I just want to clear the air about Derek. I think I should.”
“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.” While I was curious, I didn’t want to dredge up something painful for her.
“I want to. I should… with you.” Her eyes skated away from me, and her cheeks became infused with pink. “When I met Derek, he was… normal. Or at least, he pretended to be. There was no big spark or anything, no overwhelming, consuming passion like I wanted.”
Like what had been between us. Back then, the spark had definitely been consuming and overwhelming. It still was.
“But I grew to like Derek and…” She sighed heavily and then finally made eye contact again. “The red flags were there before we got engaged. He’d become obsessive, overly possessive, and controlling. But I said yes to his proposal to prove that I was over you.” She dashed away a single tear that spilled down her cheek. “Because I was so annoyed with myself for failing to get over the past after so long. I felt pathetic, thinking that you’d moved on and forgotten about me. So, I almost got married for the wrong reasons. Maybe I deserve?—”
“Don’t you dare say it.” If she thought she deserved to be terrorized by that man… I had to shut that down immediately. “You don’t deserve any of it.”
She blew out a breath and played with the tie of her robe. I waited for her to gather her thoughts. “I was embarrassed,” she said quietly. “That’s why I didn’t tell you about Derek. About how bad it got.” Her voice was steady, but her eyes shimmered with unshed tears. “He’d monitor my phone. Question every male contact. He hated it when I went out without him, even towork events. He’d show up unannounced, pick fights in public, accuse me of cheating if I so much as smiled at someone.”
Her voice cracked. “I ended things because I was afraid—no, because Iknewthings would escalate to something tragic. Even after I did what I had to do and got away. He kept harassing me. I was too ashamed to tell anyone how much I was suffering. I really thought he’d get tired and just… stop.”
I reached for her hand, when what I wanted to do was pull her into my arms and somehow magically make everything she’d gone through disappear.
She stared at our connected hands. “There you have it. The messy details of my nightmare relationship.”
I didn’t want her to feel bad about having an imperfect relationship, so I felt the need to make my own confession. It was time to completely clear the air between us. If we wanted to make things work now, we had to put everything on the table, even the embarrassing stuff.
“When I heard about your engagement, I…” I cleared my throat. “I spiraled. I was depressed for months. I then dragged all my friends to Hawaii on a fool's mission to win back my ex without finding out if that was what she wanted. It was a disaster. She fell for my best friend, and Jamie fell for her. But because I was acting so crazy, they were afraid to tell me.”
Ava listened wide-eyed as I recounted the rest of the story. Her shocked expression sent a spark of amusement through me.
“Wow, that doesn’t sound like you at all, Lincoln,” she said.
Yeah, I was typically a logical guy. “No, but I crashed out because I was still in love with you. It was wrong of me to pursue someone just to prove that I could move past you, pastus. So, don’t be embarrassed about getting engaged for the wrong reasons. I never stopped loving you, Ava.”
As her eyebrows snapped together, she pulled her hand out of mine. “But you said you didn’t love me when you ended things.”
“I lied. How could you not see that?”
She shrugged. “Those were your words, Lincoln. Why would I not believe them?” Her expression twisted with confusion. “I know we talked about this, and we agreed to move past it, but if you really loved me, why did you break things off? Why say those awful things?”
I hesitated. But like I said. We had to geteverythingout. “Your brother…” I couldn’t bring myself to look her in the eyes as I admitted how stupid I’d been. “He found out about us. He told me to walk away because you deserved more. He didn’t think you should have to wait around for a guy chasing his dreams so far away from you. There was no certainty that I’d make it as an athlete. Anything could happen. One injury could have ended my entire career. He painted all kinds of scenarios, like me failing to achieve my dream and coming home bitter to make you miserable…”
I combed my fingers through my hair. “Honestly, Ava, he was so fucking convincing that I became scaredforyou. He was right. You did deserve the best. You still do. Ethan made it clear that if I loved you, I’d let you go.”
Ava stared at me, stunned. “You let him decide that?”
“I thought I was doing the right thing,” I said. “I thought I was protecting you.”
Her voice rose, trembling with fury. “You weren’t protecting me, Lincoln. You were abandoning me. You didn’t even give me a choice. You let me believe I wasn’t enough for you.”
“I know…” I rubbed my nape, desperate now. This conversation wasn’t going as I’d hoped. Ava was getting angrier by the second. “I really thought I was doing the right thing.”
