Page 127 of Keep Me Close

I fist his shirt and tug him down until his mouth meets mine. His hands slide to my waist, anchoring me in place as he pulls me in, like he doesn’t want even an inch of space coming between us.

After we finally break apart, he rests his forehead against mine. “I love you, Hollywood.”

I smile through the sting in my eyes. “I love you too.”

His thumb sweeps over my cheek. “Whatever comes next, we’ll handle it together. Promise.”

For the first time in my life, my future feels wide open. And if I’m lucky, Knox McNichols will be standing right beside me for every part of it.

44

Evelyn

There’s something about the arena at night. Especially when the team is on the road. The usual rush of voices, footsteps, and ringing phones has long since faded, leaving behind a hush that settles into the bones of the building. It’s the kind of silence that makes every small sound louder than it actually is. The hum of the overhead lights. The distant groan of old pipes. The faint scratch of my pen across the paper, even though I’ve been reading the same paragraph for the last ten minutes without absorbing a single word.

I should have gone home hours ago. Instead, I’m sitting behind my desk, jacket draped over the back of my chair, heels abandoned beneath it, a half-finished glass of sparkling water on a coaster beside my laptop.

The city glows outside the tall windows, Chicago spread out in glittering ribbons of light. For once, it does nothing to soothe me.

My gaze drifts to the line of framed photographs on the credenza against the wall. Team events. Charity galas. Opening-night fundraisers. Smiling faces frozen mid-laugh, perfectly posed, every image curated to suggest a life that has unfolded exactly as intended.

It’s a lie, of course.

What I’ve learned is that most polished things are.

A muscle tightens low in my stomach. I know exactly why my thoughts refuse to settle.

Hugh.

It’s absurd how easily that man can disrupt my equilibrium even after all these years. A glance from across a room. A murmur pitched low enough for only me to hear. The weight of his stare lingering far too long at dinners, games, and meetings when he should be nothing more than another familiar face in the crowd.

And yet his presence has never felt that simple.

With an exhale, I pick up the file in front of me again, forcing my eyes to focus on the numbers.

A soft knock on the door jerks me from those thoughts. There’s only one other person who’d be in the building at nearly nine o’clock at night.

My fingers tighten around the edge of the folder. “Yes?”

The door opens, revealing the man who refuses to be evicted from my mind. One hand remains curled around the handle as the hallway light spills across one side of his face while the other remains in the shadows. He’s wearing a charcoal suit, the knot of his tie loosened ever so slightly, as though he’s tugged at it at least once before coming here. His hair is touched with silver now, and the lines at the corners of his eyes are deeper, so different than the young man I used to know.

Unfortunately, age suits him.

It makes him look less like the reckless golden boy I once loved and more like what he truly is now—a man who has lived, lost, and learned how to carry the weight of it through life.

I feel very much the same.

His gaze finds mine and holds. “May I come in?”

For one ridiculous heartbeat, I can only stare. Those four small words shouldn’t matter. But there’s something about the restraint in his tone, paired with that deliberate distance, that scrapes against a part of me that has no business still being this tender where he’s concerned.

Even a month ago, Hugh wouldn’t have bothered to ask. He would have barged in, shut the door behind him, and leaned against it with a lazy confidence that would make my pulse skitter.

This man now waits.

And I hate that I notice.

I give a slight nod. “Yes, you may.”