Trade Off (22 page)

She touched his hand gently, rendering him speechless. “I spent a lot of time looking at that piece after you left, and I realized something. I left it hanging there almost as a reminder that I’d done something terrible. I didn’t think I deserved to be happy.”

He hated that she’d spent so many years punishing herself for the mistakes she’d made. “Honey, you’re only human. We all make mistakes.”

She held his hand tighter and smiled. “I think I’m starting to believe that… finally. I gave the painting to Sharon. Since it was a profile of a pregnant woman, it could just have easily been her. And unlike me, she has wonderful memories of being pregnant.” She drew a deep breath. “In fact, she came to my office just last week to tell me they’re expecting again. That’s when I decided to give her the painting. She’s always admired it…” She shrugged. “It’ll look perfect in their new nursery.”   

“Parting with that must have been difficult for you,” he said quietly, wishing he had the nerve to pull her into his arms without fearing rejection. It used to be so natural, but he knew he couldn’t take anything for granted anymore.

“Not as hard as I thought it would be.” She smiled. “I think it was time to let it go.” She looked up at him. “It’s time to let go of a lot of things, Aiden.”

He wasn’t sure if he was ready to hear what she had to say. In spite of what she’d told him the last time they were together, he pinned all of his hopes on a reconciliation, and without that hope, he didn’t know how he could go on. He had his career, but that wasn’t enough, not anymore.

“I didn’t think we could hold on to the good memories and let go of the bad ones.” She released his hand and sat back on the couch, shifting her body so they were facing each other.

“How do you feel now?”

“I’m never going to forget that time of our lives. Whether we’re together or not, it’s always going to be in the back of my mind.”

“I feel the same way.”

“I think I can learn to forgive myself… eventually. The question is whether you can forgive me and learn to trust me again?”

He’d had a lot of time to think about that since their last conversation, and he knew that Sela was the one person he would trust with his life. She would never intentionally hurt him. As misguided as she was as a teen, she tried to protect him and give him the freedom she thought he needed to pursue his dream.

“I hate that we weren’t strong enough to get through that together,” he said, bracing his arm along the back of the couch behind her head. She was close enough to touch, yet he knew once he started, he wouldn’t want to stop. They had too many issues to work through before they decided whether a physical relationship was in the cards for them. He’d lost her once and barely survived. He didn’t think he would be as lucky if it happened a second time. This time, he had to know without a doubt that she would be with him for the duration.

“I do, too.” She let her eyes drift closed as she leaned against his arm. “I wish I’d had more faith in us.”

“We were so young,” he whispered, inching closer. “Too young to know that what we had was the real deal.” His breath was a whisper above her lips when he said, “Now I have the life experience to know that you were the one, Sela. The only one for me.”

Her breath hitched as he moved in closer, settling his face in the crook of her neck. “I never stopped loving you.” The admission sounded harsh, almost as though she’d lost the internal battle and felt forced to tell him the truth. “I know I never will.”

Those were the sweetest words he’d ever heard, because for the past eight years, he lived with the fear of never hearing them again. At least a dozen times women had claimed to be in love with him, but he never reciprocated because he wasn’t the type of man who would pretend in order to spare a woman’s feelings. He could only say those words to one woman.

He cupped Sela’s face in his hands and smiled, hoping to see the panic in her eyes recede. How could she question whether he felt the same way when he felt like his love for her was tattooed across his forehead, in plain view for her and the rest of the world to see? It was a part of him and it always would be. She completed him in a way no one else ever had.

“You’re the only person who’s ever got me,” he murmured, mesmerized by the lush lips he couldn’t wait to taste again. “You know what makes me laugh, what scares me. My hopes and dreams… You’re the only person I’ve ever been able to share that with.”

“I feel the same way,” she said, wrapping her arms around his neck. “I’ve really missed my best friend, Aiden.”

He closed his eyes and tipped his forehead against hers. “That’s why it hurt so much when I lost you, baby. I wasn’t just breakin’ up with a girlfriend. I was losin’ my best friend, my… everything.”

She whimpered as though she couldn’t contain the anguish another minute. “I was so stupid to let you go.”

“I was stupid to let you let me go.” He grinned when he coaxed a smile from her. Nothing in the world, not scoring the game winning goal or hoisting the Cup over his head, had ever made him feel the way her smile did. It gave him a sense of peace, knowing that as long as she was happy and safe in his arms, all was right in his world. “Hockey’s not gonna last forever, I know that. But you and me, we could.”

She glided her hands over his face, as though she was trying to memorize the changes that had turned him from the boy she loved into the man she still loved. “Forever is a long time.”

“Does that scare you?” He knew it didn’t worry him. The promise of another chance at forever with her felt like a priceless gift he’d never dared hope to receive.

“I don’t know.” She laid her head on his shoulder as his arms came around her.

“During the darkest times in my life, you were always there.” He turned her into his arms so her back pressed against his chest. “In my heart, my mind, living in my memories.” He pressed a kiss to her cheek, hoping she could feel the depth of his love in the beat of his heart against her back. He was telling her without saying the three little words she’d said to him because he needed her to understand that he didn’t just love her, he appreciated her and what they’d almost lost.

“I think that’s the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“I was a kid when we were together, Sela. I didn’t know what loving someone meant, not really. I knew you made me feel good, that you made me happy. I wanted to be with you all the time. But until I lost you, I had no idea how much I
needed
you.”

“I know. I felt the same way. I tried to fill the void with people, things, work, but nothing filled that gaping emptiness you left in my life. It was like my heart was broken and no matter what I tried to do, nothing healed it.” She ran her hands back and forth over his forearm as she spoke. “Eventually, I just gave up trying. I thought that’s just the way it had to be, like I was being punished—”

He pressed a finger against her lips to halt her words. He couldn’t stand to listen to her beat herself up anymore, not when he deserved as much, if not more, of the blame. “Stop, please. Don’t do that to yourself, you don’t deserve it.”

She tilted her head back to look at him. “Do you really feel that way? Can you honestly forgive me?”

“On one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“That you can find a way to forgive me.”

A frown drew a line between her arched eyebrows as she said, “You didn’t do anything wrong, Aiden. What happened was my fault.”

“That’s not true. I put my career above all else, includin’ you and our relationship. I know I can’t keep beatin’ myself up about it, but I sure as hell won’t make the same mistake again. I can promise you that.”

She pressed a kiss to his arm before settling in to lean her head against his chest again.

Nothing had ever felt as right as having her in his arms, and he knew nothing ever would. She was made for him. “I mean it, baby. I’ll put you first, always. You and our family.” He felt the tension in her body as soon as he uttered the one word he now understood was off limits. “What’s wrong? You want us to try and have another baby someday, don’t you?”

“You don’t know what it was like for me after the miscarriage, Aiden. I was in a really dark place. I never thought I’d get over it.”

He hated to hear the torment in her voice, hated even more that he couldn’t let this go. “I’m sure everyone feels that way after the loss of a child, sweetheart. But you can’t let it rob you of the chance to be a mother. We always talked about havin’ kids, remember?”

“Yeah, I remember.” Her response was so soft he’d had to strain to hear her. “But I kind of gave up on that dream after the miscarriage. I had to.”

He didn’t want to ask, but he had to know. “Did you and Neil ever talk about having a family? You know, adoptin’ or…”

“Sure, but I knew bringing a child into a loveless marriage wasn’t fair. Besides, I didn’t think I could look at that child without being reminded of the baby we lost.”

“Yeah, but this would be different. We’re talkin’ about a baby that we created together. Don’t you want that?”

“Of course I do, but I’m scared. What if I had another miscarriage or the stress was too much for our relationship and you bailed—”

He grabbed her shoulders, prompting her to turn around and look at him. “You can’t be serious. After everything I’ve told you tonight, you think there’s a chance in hell that I’d leave you… not to mention our kid?” Just when he felt secure in the knowledge they’d come this far, he realized how much further they had to go. “How can you even think that?”

“I’m sorry.” She dropped her head. “I don’t want to hurt you, and I don’t want to get hurt. But I can’t tell you what you want to hear just to make you happy. I did that once before and look where we ended up. I don’t want that to happen to us again.”

He knew there was no room for anger and hurt to come between them tonight. Not when they were so close to finding their way back to each other. “You know what? Let’s table this conversation for now. I want to open my present.”

She looked at the non-descript brown wrapper. “Um, I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. Maybe we should do that another time.”

“Oh no you don’t.” He brushed his lips over hers, smiling with satisfaction when her eyes drifted closed on a sigh. “You’ve kept me waitin’ long enough.” He jumped up and carefully tore the paper off his gift. “Oh wow,” he said, staring at it. “This is incredible.” It was a picture of him, in uniform, skating down the ice with a fierce look of determination on his face. It captured his love of the game, an emotion he always thought he’d concealed from onlookers. The fact that she captured the essence of his passion proved to him, yet again, how well she knew him.

“Do you like it?” she asked, looking nervous and uncertain. “I started working on it last year…”

He turned to face her. “You did this last year?”

She seemed uncomfortable under the weight of his scrutiny. She cleared her throat, as though she was trying to find the confidence to voice her feelings. “I was at home alone one night, and I turned the TV on. There you were.” Their eyes bridged the space between them by conveying the depth of their feelings for each other. “I tried not to watch your games. It was just too painful.”

He wanted to reach out and touch her, but he needed to hear what had prompted her to invest hours capturing him on her canvas so many years after they said their final good-bye. “But…?”

“But I saw something in your eyes when I turned on the TV that night, something I didn’t want to forget.”

“What was it?”

“The look you had in your eye that night was the same look you had in your eye the last time we made love… that weekend in Vancouver. You were so fierce, so determined. You were trying to convince me that we’d find a way to make it work, that you loved me, only me, forever.”

“I remember.”

“I never thought I’d see that look again. Yet I turned on my TV and there it was. I knew I didn’t ever want to forget it.”

He looked back at the painting, awestruck by the fact that she’d managed to portray all of the facets of his personality with every brush stroke. He saw the ferocity, the determination of the professional athlete the rest of the world saw, but somehow her artist’s eye had also depicted the fear and uncertainty that always lurked just beneath the surface. There were games when the weight of the world rested on his shoulders. He was their team captain and top goal scorer. His team counted on him to come through for them and the thousands of fans who spent their hard-earned money to cheer their team to victory counted on him, and he was always afraid of letting them down.

“How did you know?” he whispered, knowing he wouldn’t have to explain the question to her. If he were being honest with himself, he’d admit that he couldn’t express in words what he didn’t understand himself. How could another person get inside of his head that way, read his expression as though he was voicing his thoughts aloud to the world?

“Because I know you.” She came up behind him, settling her hand on his shoulder. “Just like you know me. That’s never going to change, Aiden. Like you said earlier, I get you in a way no one else ever has.”

He stood up, settling his hands on her shoulders. He was almost afraid she would try to bolt when the fear of facing their future became too frightening to contemplate. She’d done it once before, and he’d let her. He’d be damned if he made the same mistake again.