I wondered if she was losing sleep because of how we left things between us.
How fucking idiotic I was to hope to be the subject of her insomnia.
“I just have a lot on my mind, I guess,” she said with a sigh. “Do you mind if I just unpack these and check them over?” She pointed to the box of trophies. “I’d like to make sure none of them are damaged, and then I’ll get out of your hair.”
“Stay as long as you’d like,” I said, waving my hand toward the box.
Ariana silently went to work, and I sat behind the desk again, eyes on the screen as I pretended I was focusing on the game and not on her. It was torture to stay quiet when I finally had her alone again, when I had the chance to rectify what had happened between us.
After about ten minutes, I couldn’t resist.
“Ari, I’m sorry about that day on the riverwalk.”
Her hands paused where she was unpacking the box, eyes focused on the trophy in her hands.
“I know you said not to bring it up and I promise, after tonight, I won’t. But I upset you and it’s eating me alive. I shouldn’t have pushed about Nathan,” I said, turning the chair toward her. “I shouldn’t have pried into your life. It’s none of my business. I just… I miss you.”
Fuck.
The words pushed through my lips like inmates who saw an escape and refused to miss their chance.
Ariana closed her eyes, holding them shut as she let out a long breath, and maybe I should have backpedaled but I didn’t.
I meant what I said.
“I’ve missed you for decades,” I admitted softly. “And I never thought I’d see you again, not after that night I stumbled upon you in Boston. I guess I just… I look at who you are now, at the life you’re living, and I want all the missing pieces of the puzzle that I don’t have. I don’t deserve it, but I want the whole story of your life. And I… I was rude. I was assumptive and I’m sorry.”
Her eyes fluttered open, gaze still on the trophy in her hands, and she nodded. “It’s okay. I’m sorry, too. For running out like that.”
“You had every right to.”
She nodded again, and then silence fell over us, save for the soft sounds from the game.
“It still hurts,” she admitted after a while, and her eyes flitted to mine before going back to the box. “That’s why I left. Thinking about that time in my life is just… hard.”
My throat was lined in sandpaper with my next attempt at a swallow.
“You said you followed the case,” she said. “That you tried reaching out… but I don’t understand. Why?”
“Because it was over,” I said in a rush, standing. She still wouldn’t look at me, but I had to be closer to her when I said it. “The case, the trial, all of it. You were safe. Georgie was yours. Jay wasn’t able to hurt you, and I… I didn’t feel like a threat to any of that anymore. I didn’t feel like a threat to your safety.”
“You never were.”
I bit down the words I wanted to snap back because we both knew we disagreed on this point.
Her legal team, my coach, me… we all saw what Ariana refused to back then. Iwasa threat to her security in that case against her stepfather. If we’d have stayed together, she would have been flying nonstop, pulling Georgie out of school or leaving him in childcare too often. The court was looking for stability, and I would have ruined that for her. I was the most publicized rookie in the NHL at the time. I had cameras following me everywhere — and that meant she would have, too.
“When the texts I sent bounced, I tried calling you. Then, I sent a letter to your house, asking if I could see you,” I said, deciding to tell her how I’d tried to find her again instead of defending my choice to leave. “The letter was returned. I even tried reaching out to the school, Ari. I was ready to get on the next flight, but I couldn’t find you.” I swallowed, inching closer to her. “It was like you disappeared.”
“I did,” she said, her voice surprisingly calm. She checked another trophy before setting it beside the box. “That was what my legal team advised. Jay’s family was harassing us all throughthe trial, and we knew they wouldn’t stop once the verdict was reached. If anything, it would be worse.” She paused, shuttering like she was reliving those horrid years. “I changed my number. Georgie and I moved. It doesn’t surprise me that you couldn’t get my information from the school because they knew I had people after me. They were protecting me.” She shrugged. “The whole point was to disappear, and I guess it worked.”
“And you didn’t have social media,” I said. “Or at least, I couldn’t find you if you did.”
She shook her head, wrinkling her nose. “God, no. I still don’t.”
“I looked in the phone book,” I said on a laugh. “Thephone book, Ari, in fucking 2009. I spent hours on Google. I paid some scammy guy to try to find you. I even looked for Georgie.”
“We changed our name,” she said, her gaze sliding to mine. “We didn’t want Jay’s last name anymore. So, after the trial, we changed it to my mom’s maiden name.”
