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Daughter. “Aurora.” I say the name slowly, grinning slyly. Well, isn’t this an interesting turn of events.
The shock of discovering Grayson attended Halston. That he’d known I was here.
And now Royce knows my greatest secret. He knows about Aurora.
Need to put a stop to this spiral before it escalates. Freaking out won’t do me any good. It won’t help Aurora. I need to be strong. I need to accept that there is nothing I can do to change this situation. Royce will do whatever he does. The best thing I can do now is prepare myself.
before she heads home, she leaves me with words that remain in my head for the rest of the night… If those boys want your forgiveness, Riley, then they better get on their knees and grovel.
“You’re not going to do anything more to her,” Royce snarls in my ear, sounding truly furious for the first time. His hand fists the back of my shirt and pins me to the floor. “From now on, you’re going to stay away from her.”
Leaning in until his lips hover at my ear, he whispers, “You’re forgetting I don’t have a heart. Which means I’ll have no problem removing yours from your chest if you go anywhere near her.” “Merry—What the hell is going on here?”
“I took her home,” Royce states bluntly. “You did what?” Logan cries. “Why?” “Because she doesn’t fucking belong here,” Royce practically yells at him, clearly exasperated. Logan gapes at him for a moment, before his eyes go wide. “You know. You believe her.”
“Because I want you to see what I do when I look at you. The strength and poise you wear so elegantly. The determination that burns from within like an eternal flame. You’re a fighter—a survivor. The next time you doubt yourself, look at this drawing. Remember who you are. What you’re capable of. Everything you’ve overcome.”
“It doesn’t mean anything. Your words mean nothing, Logan.” He nods decisively, pushing up from his seat and leaning across the table until his lips are at the shell of my ear. “Then I’ll just have to show you how serious I am. About you. About us. Especially, because there will be an us again, Riley. I refuse to accept a reality where there isn’t, and just so you know, there isn’t a thing on this planet that I’ve gone after and not gotten. You’re tempting a famished husky with raw meat, and rest assured, I’ll snatch it from right under your nose.”
“Sounds like you got the dream anyway,” I muse. Coach nods. “Sometimes the dream isn’t always what we think it is. If we’re lucky, it’s better than we ever hoped for.”
“I’ve waited my whole life for you. I fucked up, and I have my dues to pay; I get that. I’ll happily pay them, seeing as the alternative… losing you altogether is not an option. So
maybe you’re right. Maybe you’re not mine, but I am most certainly yours.” “Logan.” I’m honestly not entirely sure what I was going to say. My heart feels as though it’s trapped in a vice. He places a finger over my lips, that slight bit of contact sending a zing along them that leaves them tingling. It only serves to remind me how safe I always felt with him. How gentle and caring he was. Despite his size and stature, Logan always touched me as though I needed to be handled with care.
“I’m so sorry,” he murmurs against my ear. “I’m sorry that I hurt you. Sorry that I’m still hurting you. Sorry that I couldn’t see what was right in front of me. I want everything with you, Shortcake. Every. Fucking. Thing. My life without you is not an option. I know it’s hard right now, and you’re scared to trust me. One day, however, you will trust me so wholeheartedly it’ll be like we’re one person.” He pulls back only enough to look me in the eyes, searing me with the fierceness of his promise. “We just have to get through this first, just… don’t give up on me, okay? Do that one thing for
...more
your heart off from loving me. Protect it, keep it safe, but don’t shut it off. Can you do that for me?”
my focus is stuck on that one word. Daughter. She has a daughter. A kid. I’m so shocked by that admission that I don’t immediately understand the significance. Until I do. No… That can’t be. That would mean…
Unbidden images of Riley, fifteen. Scared. Alone. And fucking pregnant with her abuser’s baby, flash through my mind. How in the fucking hell did this woman not succumb to all of that?
She truly is a survivor. A fighter. The strongest fucking person ever to have faced all that and still be her—sweet, caring, understanding.
“He’s blaming himself,” Royce explains. “Grasping the full picture of what you’ve had to endure, and knowing he added to it… he’s blaming himself. That’s why he looked so distraught.” “How do you know that?” He stares down at me with an open expression. “Because it’s how I felt that day in the park.”
“He might be spiraling, but that’s more about him than you. That man is obsessed
with you. Believe me. I hear about it enough to know. He’d move heaven and earth for you if it were possible.”
“Hate is the farthest thing I feel for you.” I sag further into the wood as the alcohol courses through my system. “You’ve had all of my attention from the moment you stepped into my house all those years ago. And I wasn’t the only one who noticed you. I had to declare you off limits to the guys on the team because they’d keep saying they were going to ask you out, and I couldn’t fucking handle
it.” I sigh wearily. “You’ve always been mine, even if I could never have you.”
“Even on your knees, you wear your crown with grace, for strength isn't defined by standing tall but by rising every time you fall."
“You better fucking be right,” I half-growl, not the slightest bit happy about any of this. If it wouldn’t get me arrested, I’d drive to that bitch’s house now and just take Aurora myself. “So we play dress up, pretend to be some sick fucks who like to buy children, and get our girl’s little girl back for good.” With the same daunting expression he wears in the ring, Royce nods. “That’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
“I am so crazily in love with you,” he rasps, voice thick with emotion. “With your strength. Your resilience. Your softness and your fire. There isn’t a thing about you, Riley James, that I don’t love. I know you’re not there yet. That I haven’t earned that, yet I can’t hide how deep I am in this anymore.” My voice is choked, as more tears race down my cheeks as I cup his face. “How could I not love you, Logan? How could I not love someone who makes it his mission in life to make me smile? It hurt so bad before because I was already halfway in love with you.”
“Never again,” he vows. “You are and will always be my first priority. Nothing in the world matters as much as you do.” “I know.” My smile is shaky but firm as I close the distance and press my lips to his for the entire stadium to see. “I love you,” I whisper when we pull apart. There’s an extra shine to his smile. A warmth in the creases of his face. “I love you more, Shortcake.”
