“Honey, I’m your mother.” Her voice is warm, a little amused. “You came home from that assignment talking about the gym and the story and Roman’s training, but every othersentence was about Dominic. What he said, what he did, how infuriating he was. You haven’t talked that much about a man in years. Actually, the last time you talked about someone this way was him, back in high school. It’s not hard to put together.”
I wipe at my eyes with the back of my hand. Of course she knew. Mothers always know, even when you think you’re hiding it.
“Well, yes. Dominic. Something happened between us in Mexico City, after the fight. And then I left, and we said goodbye like it was the end of something, and I’ve been trying to convince myself that was the right choice ever since.”
“And was it?” she asks gently. “The right choice?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper. “I thought it was. We both have these lives that don’t fit together. He’s in Dark River with his gym and his family. I’m here with my career and my friends. Three thousand miles is a lot of distance to pretend doesn’t exist.”
“But now, with you being able to have both?”
“I’m scared,” I admit after a long moment. “I’ve spent my whole life being the one who leaves. The one who puts career first, who doesn’t need anyone, who keeps moving so nothing can catch up to me. I don’t know how to do this differently.”
“You learn,” my mom says simply. “The same way you learned everything else. By being brave enough to try.” She pauses. “And Brooke? If this job means you could be in Dark River sometimes, and he’s in Dark River all the time, then maybe the geography isn’t as impossible as you think.”
“I love you, Mom,” I say, and my voice cracks a little on the words. “Thanks for always being there for me.”
“I love you too, sweetheart,” she says warmly. “Now get some sleep. It’s late in your time zone, and big decisions are always clearer in the morning. You call me if you need me in the middle of the night though, okay? I don’t care what time it is.”
“I will,” I promise, smiling through the tears. “Give Dad a kiss for me.”
“I will. Goodnight, honey.”
“Goodnight, Mom.”
We hang up, but I don’t move from the couch. I sit there in my quiet apartment, phone still warm in my hand, watching the rain streak down the windows and thinking about everything she said.
Both coasts. Both lives. My heart in New York and my heart in Dark River.
And maybe, if I’m brave enough to reach for it, my heart with Dominic too. The words we said at the airport keep running through my head.
In another life.
But the truth is, we don’t get another life. Just this one. And I don’t want to wait any longer to start living the one I want.
CHAPTER 29
Dominic
The wind cuts through the city streets, sharp enough that I pull my jacket tighter as I walk. Manhattan is gray today, the sky heavy with clouds, but I don’t mind. I actually missed this city, the noise and the crowds and the way everyone moves like they’ve got somewhere important to be. The energy and possibility of this place.
Andshe’shere. Somewhere in this city of eight million people, Brooke is going about her day, maybe sitting at her desk atThe Sporting Standardor grabbing coffee at whatever place she likes, or curled up in her apartment with a glass of wine and her laptop.
I shift my bag on my shoulder and check the map on my phone to make sure I’m still heading the right way to the hotel, and notice a text from Sarah back in Dark River.
Sarah:I know you just landed, so just wanted to let you know all is good here. Roman’s in the gym, morning classes went smoothly, nothing on fire. Now go sign those papers and make us bicoastal!
I shake my head, smiling. The question of how to manage the Dark River gym while splitting my time with New York was one of the first things I’d had to figure out when this deal started coming together, and the answer had been so obvious I felt like an idiot for not seeing it sooner. Sarah has been helping run the place for years, more competent than anyone else I’ve ever worked with.
So I’d offered her a promotion to general manager with a significant raise, and she’d accepted without hesitation. There’s no one else I’d trust to keep Midnight Boxing running the way it should be run, which means I can split my time between Dark River and New York without worrying that everything will fall apart the moment I’m not there.
I’ve got a few hours before the meeting at the lawyer’s office to finalize the paperwork for the gym space. A few weeks of negotiations and due diligence and back-and-forth with Castellanos’s people, and today it all becomes real. My signature on a lease. My name on a building.Midnight Boxing NYC, rising from the bones of the Lower East Side gym where my father first learned to fight.
It’s terrifying and exhilarating and I’m not entirely sure how it will all work out, but my gut tells me this is right. I’ve always been practical, cautious, the kind of person who needs a plan before he takes a step. But some things are worth the leap. The gym where my dad threw his first punches, the dream I’ve carried since he first brought me here as a teenager, it’s all finally within reach. And with it comes the possibility of a life with the woman I love.
The building stands in front of me, solid and real and completely mine.
I stare at the faded KOWALSKI’S GYM sign, at the cracked windows and the peeling paint, and I still can’t quite believe it. That same broken window Brooke and I climbed through months ago is boarded up now, secured by the property management company that handled the sale. The door that hasn’t changed since my dad first brought me here when I was sixteen, the one that was rusted shut when I tried it that night with Brooke, now has a fresh lock with a key that belongs to me.
