“But I will make one thing crystal fucking clear right now, and I want you to listen to every word I’m about to say.”
I link my fingers in his and hold on to him. “I’m listening.”
“It doesn’t fucking matter who was here before. For either of us. Because there will be no one else.” I feel my jaw drop for the second time tonight, and he glances my way. “You’re mine. You’re all I see. You’re all I want. That’s never going to change.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.” He gives my hand a squeeze. “Now, what was your favorite part tonight?”
“When Sidney and Leo sang together. What about you?”
He huffs out a laugh. “Fucking you in the bathroom, sweetheart.”
Chapter Twenty
Ryker
It’s three in the morning, and I can’t sleep. Willow is warm and naked and dreaming peacefully next to me, and I don’t want to wake her, so I ease out of bed, careful not to disturb her.
I’m restless.
And my brain won’t stop moving.
So I pull on a pair of sweats and then pad down the hall to my office and step inside. The lights from the city cast a glow, guiding my way to the chair behind my desk. I sit and look around the room. There’s no computer on the desk, because I took all my electronics to Montana. So the desktop is empty.
This is the only room that I’ve designated as a hockey-career memorabilia space. Photos, trophies—anything special from the past fifteen years is displayed on the walls around me, including a photo of me with Mom, Dad, and Gideon after my first Stanley Cup win.
I fucking love that photo. That was the only Cup win that Mom got to see. She passed a month before we won the second.
She’s staring up at me in this picture, so tiny next to all of us big men, smiling so bright and proud, it makes me want to puff my chest out, even now.
Christ, I miss her.
That woman is the one who taught me that it’s okay to love people. To let them in and show affection without holding back. To trust. Aside from my biological mother, Debbie James is the first person I ever told that I love them. She was the tiniest person in stature, but she loved so big, she might as well have been eight feet tall, and she was not afraid to shower all of us with that love. She left a gaping wound behind when she departed this world.
I understand why Dad never got over it.
Because now I have a woman in my life who’s so much the same. She loves big, and the way that I love her would be terrifying if I hadn’t had Mom in my life as a young man. Because Willow deserves all of me, and everything I can give her, just the way Dad did with Mom.
And if I ever lost Willow, it would fucking kill me.
I let my gaze roam around the space, pulling out memories of a career that I’m damn proud of. It was everything that I could have ever hoped for. Being here, in the city that’s been my home away from home for so many years, has been great this week. I loved being on the ice with my guys, and showing my gratitude to my team, the coaching staff, and the city as a whole was the closure I needed.
Because although I was already considering retirement, I didn’t get to go out on my terms. I left the sport because of a tragedy.
And this week, I got to say goodbye.
I’ll keep the penthouse for now because I’ll need to come here periodically for the foster kids charity that I’m now working with, but I’ll likely eventually sell it.
It’s not home anymore.
Montana is home.
The Triple Creek Ranch is where I belong.
And wherever Willow is? Well, that’s where my heart is. Because that woman owns me, body and soul.
I’m ready to go home, with Wills and Aiden, and get back to work. Sure, this has been great, but waking up with the sun, working my land, breathing that air—that’s what I need.
