I know I won’t be able to concentrate on the games unless you’re there.
And by the time I got to Seattle, all I’d been able to afford was a few nights’ stay in the most godawful fleabag hotel. But it had all been worth it, I’d thought, because he’d started to break out that trip, ease into his post-college play.
But now that hecouldtravel in style, could put me up in a hotel where I wouldn’t get bedbugs, suddenlyIsimply couldn’t handle it.
What else was he planning to upgrade?
“Are you cheating on me?” I asked directly.
Jesse’s eyes bugged out, and I saw a muscle twitch in his jaw. His hands gripped the restaurant table tightly.
“No.No.”
I didn’twantto know, but Ihadto know.
“Is there someone else then?”
His eyes flicked away from me then, and I knew.
Jesse never could lie to me.
“I never cheated on you,” he said, like that was supposed to make me feel better, I guess. “But thereissomeone else. She just—I think she fits with my lifestyle better.”
I felt anger grow under my skin, flood my face with bright painful heat.
“Yourlifestyle?” I shot at him. “And I don’t? Even though I went to every single one of your games in college, traveled to all those games in the minor leagues, watched you practice for hours?”
It was a stupid thing to say, because it was over, and it had been over even before I arrived.
Jesse shifted in his chair, but he looked a little surer, cocky again.
“The NHL is different,” he said. “It’s more high-profile. More demanding. I don’t think you’d enjoy it or fit in. I’m doing you a favor.”
I said nothing.
What a fool I had been to think this meant an engagement.
It meant an upgrade for him. A rite of passage for pro athletes. Time to shed the girl he’d gone to college with for the beautiful model who was more attractive, exciting, probably way better in bed, and loaded to boot.
I was a teacher with loans and she was a hot model with 4 million Instagram followers.
“I care about you, Josie,” Jesse said, but there was nothing in his eyes as he looked at me. “Take all the time you need to move out of the apartment. If you want, I can give you some money for a down payment for a new one. And you don’t have to pay it back or anything. Just a gift.”
He waited, those big tanned hands folded in front of him. The hands that had held mine, comforted and caressed me for so long it seemed like a sick joke that they wouldn’t anymore.
I didn’t see anything in his ice-blue eyes but pity. Just pure neutral pity for me.
Forcing my shaking legs to move, I slid out of the bench and stood up, my stomach plummeting to the floor realizing that this would be the last time I’d get to be so close to him. From now on, he’d have security at the games, go to entirely different restaurants and bars. Our paths wouldn’t cross.
“Keep your goddamn money,” I said. “I don’t want it.”
Chapter Two
The weeks moved one after the other, each more painful than the last.
The very first day I knew Jesse was at an away game, I moved out of the apartment and back home with my parents in old Philly.
I felt like I was dying without him at first, my bed so empty without his reassuringly warm body, the way he had always pulled me tight against him.
