“Someone with a huge bankroll. The Venom is certainly unique in that regard,” Remy deadpans.
“The thing is, they’re all great guys. I’ve met them.” Good fathers. Good husbands. Men people wanted to become instead of escape. “And then there’s you, with your father. I’m not making light of your loss, but if I’d ended up with only my dad?” I roll my lips together. “He was a piece of shit.”
The words come out flat from overuse, worn smooth from years of trying to make peace with them.
Remy doesn’t make a sound. In the glass, her reflection stares up at mine, but I don’t dare turn my head to meet her eyes.
“When I was a kid, he’d beat the hell out of my mom. Then he’d be nice for a while, and things would be good, until they weren’t.” My own hands clench into fists at the memory. “When I was a kid, I couldn’t do anything. But when I got old enough, when I got strong enough, I could be the wall. I could put myself between her and his fists and stop them from getting through. Goalie instincts.”
Even now, I still measure my size by whether I could stop him. At this, Remy lets out a tiny sound, so small I almost miss it.
“So, yeah. All these guys are here because everybody loved their dadssomuch they couldn’t get enough. And then there’s me.” The outlier. The cautionary tale. The guy nobody’s quite sure what to do with. I shrug off anything else I want to get off my chest. Talking like this is exhausting.
I stand there staring at the photo of Noah Abbott, my current goalie coach. Remy still hasn’t responded, and every muscle in my body is tensed, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“Well,” she says at last, her voice rough with some repressed emotion. “It sounds like your mom is really lucky to have you.”
I finally let myself look at her. She’s so close, I could wrap her in my arms without taking a step. I want to, desperately. I want to bury my face in her hair and breathe in the clean floral scent of her shampoo.
“Do you want to go down to the film room?” she asks.
Bless her for giving me an off-ramp from this conversation. “Sure. Sounds like a good use of our time.”
Based on how far apart we sat the other day, I expect her to maximize the distance between us. Instead, she sits on the next cushion over, with just enough room between our thighs so that they don’t accidentally touch. Which somehow feels more intimate than touching her outright.
We watch clips from a few recent games in silence until boisterous shouting in the hall clues me in to the fact that practice must start soon. I turn off the TV and start to get up.
Remy’s curled up against one of the cushions, eyes closed, lips slightly parted. The sight of her relaxed around me does something dangerous to my nervous system. The insomnia caught up with her after all. I should wake her up and let her know that it’s time to get out there, but she looks so peaceful that I can’t bring myself to do it. Before I can overthink it, I lean down and press a soft kiss to her forehead.
The gesture feels weirdly intimate. Domestic in a way that makes something tight and nervous shift in my chest.
Shrugging out of my jacket, I drape it over her, tucking it around her chin so that it won’t slide off. Taking care of her feels frighteningly natural.
Remy’s lips move in her sleep. I know that she isn’t saying my name. That’s dangerous, delusional thinking. I know better.
But it’s nice to pretend.
Nice enough that I’m starting to worry pretending isn’t going to be enough anymore.
Chapter Twenty
Remy
I wake in near-darkness, with a crick in my neck, to the sound of buzzing.
“What?” I mumble as I flop around. I’m so groggy that it takes me a minute to figure out where my phone is, much less where I am. I locate my phone first and pull it up to my face in the dark. It’s a FaceTime from Cara.
“’S goin’ on?” I ask through the fog of my interrupted nap. The screen is too bright. “Cara? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, I was going to ask you—wait.Wait.” Cara peers at me at a weird angle, giving me a view right up her nostrils. “Are you wearing his clothes?”
“What?”
“Holy shit,you are!You’re wearing his clothes in the dark. What did I interrupt?”
My brain finally comes back online. “I’m at work, Cara. I fell asleep in the film room.”
“That doesn’t explain why you’re wearing his jacket!”
