I’m distracted when I open it and it takes a second for me to believe what I’m seeing. The top of the iMessage screen says Dad, but there’s no way in hell the messages on this phone could be from his father.
In just the static screen in front of me, there’s word after word of negativity. Comment after comment of cruelty.
“Dekk? What is it?” Hunter asks, but when I’m so abhorred by what I see, I just look at him and hold out his phone.
“I didn’t mean to. It was there when I opened it,” I fumble. “What the hell?”
His sigh sounds like resignation and defeat as he takes his phone and tosses it right back to where I found it.
“I’ll never be good enough for my dad.” It’s all he says. It’s pained and raw and it rips my heart out.
“You play in the goddamn NHL, Hunter. You’re the captain and have records and . . .”
“And I’m not Jonah.”
Our eyes meet and hold, and so much is exchanged. So many emotions I think he’s afraid to show come through loud and clear.
“Is it like that after every game?”
He nods. “I don’t care. It doesn’t affect me.”
That has to be the biggest lie I’ve ever heard, because how can you play at the top of your game and your father, the man he probably craves approval from, not approve?
“You never respond to him. There’s nothing from you back to him.” At least not on the screen that I see.
“I did one time. I didn’t get the satisfaction I thought I would from it, so I don’t anymore.”
I hate this. I hate seeing this the night before he’s leaving for his first finals game. I hate that this is even a thing in his life when he deserves so much better . . . so much more.
“Why don’t you block his number?” I ask, knowing it’s much more complex than that. His parents are his lifeline to Jonah. If he cuts them off, he’s cut off from his other half. It’s complicated to say the least, but even harder is listening to his stoic tone when I know the words on these texts have to wreck him inside.
He chuckles. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
He shakes his head, but I know he’s going to tell me. “You know how you get used to something and it becomes a habit?”
“Yeah,” I say, but I don’t know how that can play into anything that’s healthy for him.
“It’s kind of become that thing I do. After I play a game, I walk in the locker room and look at my texts before I do anything else.”
“But the comments are brutal. I mean, you played one hell of a game the other night and that’s what he said to you?” My voice is rising as I realize so much of the turmoil inside him, of his long-term mental health, has to be affected by this. “My blood is boiling just thinking of it.”
“But he’s watching.” And there’s something in the way he says it that stops the next comment on my tongue. It’s sadness mixed with resolve, but it’s something so much more. “It’s sick and it’s twisted and it makes no sense to anyone but me, but those texts at least tell me he’s following me. It’s not much.” He stops when his voice breaks and another piece of me dies inside. “But it tells me he’s still watching.”
A scrap.
That’s all Hunter wants from his dad. A scrap of love, of praise, of attention . . . anything from a father still hung up on a life that can no longer be lived the same.
I hate seeing him like this. I hate seeing him accept so much less than he deserves.
I tighten my ponytail and try to follow Hunter’s logic, but God knows it’s not normal. “He’s watching but he’s tearing you down. He’s watching because he’s trying to see if you measure up to your brother who hasn’t played in fifteen-plus years.” I get up from the bed and move from one side of the room and back, unable to shake the anger that’s eating at me. “This is bullshit. You need to tell him that. But you don’t need to because he can see it on his precious TV when he watches his son, the goddamn hockey star, score goal after goal.”
But somewhere during my rant, the distress in his expression morphs to a soft smile. He’s standing there with his shoulder against the wall of his armoire with amusement in his eyes, and it stops me in my tracks.
“What?” I ask.
“You’re more mad at him than I am.”
“Mad is an understatement. Mad is me wanting to pick up your phone, call him, and tell him he can take his texts and shove them squarely up his ass. Fury is—”
“Dekker.” That smile. Those eyes.
“What?” I ask again.
“I love that you’re so worked up about this on my behalf, but it’s not going to change.”
“Why not? Why can’t he see you for you? Why can’t he see the hours you put in studying film and the shot practice and the charity work and the way you love your brother and . . . Christ, Hunter, there are a million things that are incredible about you and a million more that I love about you . . .” My voice fades as my confession floats into the room before I have the courage to meet his eyes. This time when I speak, my voice is barely audible. A soft phrase spoken aloud, but it’s been screaming in my head for weeks. “And even more reasons why I’ve fallen in love with you.”
The tears that well in his eyes are blinked away but not before I see them. “That’s not possible.”
Months ago, he wouldn’t have believed them, but not now. Not after we’ve spent hours talking about his past and his guilt and how he deserves the whole goddamn world.
“Yeah, it is,” I say and take a step toward him. “It’s more than possible because there are so many incredible things about you that it makes it hard not to fall in love with you.”
“Dekker.” He shakes his head back and forth, but there’s a ghost of a smile on his lips that tells me he hears me. It tells me it’ll take more time for him to believe it.
I frame the sides of his face with my hands and smile. “You don’t have to say anything. Just hear me. Just know it. And while I’m sure your heart is pounding and your head is asking how this is even possible, know that mine does that every damn day I lay eyes on you. Without fail. And it feels pretty damn good.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
DEKKER
THERE’S A PALPABLE EXCITEMENT WITHIN the arena when I step into it. With home-ice advantage, it’s black and red everywhere you look—faces are painted and hair is sprayed to match. Instead of going straight to the manager’s box, I take my time walking through the arena to soak it all in.
I think of last night with Hunter. My confession that I don’t want to take back. Of how we spent the night making love before falling asleep in each other’s arms. How a man who swears he doesn’t deserve love sure knows how to give it.
I think of this morning—when he found out that Jonah had come down with another chest infection and wasn’t cleared to make the flight here. The fact that it was Hunter’s medical staff that made the decision and not his mother added validity to the outcome, but I know it still distressed him. But the calm I saw in his expression outweighed his disappointment. It’s what I saw years ago in him, an inner strength not many have. But the difference was his lack of anger. In the past few months, his temper would have ignited. Yet he accepted the news about Jonah calmly, and my heart only grew deeper in love with him because of it.