CHAPTER 3

ELLE

The Forge Arena is exactly how I remember it and nothing like I remember it at all.

The press box smells the same recycled air, stale coffee, the phantom scent of hot dogs from the concourse below. The angles are the same: the view of center ice sharp and unobstructed, the player benches in profile. But everything is sharper now. Colder. More real.

I clip my press badge to my blazer navy, professional, armor and try to remember how to breathe like a normal person.

This is fine. This is your job. This is what you said you would do.

I set up my laptop at one of the press stations. There are other journalists here beat reporters I recognize, a guy from ESPN, a woman whose byline I've seen on national outlets. Nobody knows me. Nobody knows that I'm here because I ran away from exactly this two hours ago and then turned around and came back.

Nobody knows that Blake Delvalle is about to destroy my entire afternoon.

He appears like he's been summoned, like I thought hard enough about him and the universe delivered him. Blake in street clothes dark jeans, a Forge quarter-zip, his hair still damp from the shower. He looks exactly like he looks in the photos Sienna sent me. Older. Harder. Like someone who's been hit repeatedly and decided to hit back harder.

He doesn't look at the other journalists. He looks directly at me.

And he walks toward me like he owns the arena.

I have maybe three seconds to consider standing up, walking away, creating distance. I don't do any of those things. My body stays frozen, laptop half-open, watching him approach like I'm watching a car accident I can't prevent.

"Elle."

My name in his mouth is different now. It's cold. It's a statement of fact. It's an accusation.

"Blake." I force my voice to stay level. "I didn't expect—"

"I know you didn't."

He leans against the desk next to my setup, and the proximity is suddenly everything. He's not touching me, but he's close enough that I can smell him—soap and cologne and something underneath that's just him, the specific biology of Blake Delvalle that my body apparently never forgot. My nervous system recognizes him before my brain can catch up.

"We need to talk," he says quietly. "Privately."

It's not a question. It's not even really a request.

"Blake, I don't think—"

"Privately, Elle. Or I can make this very public, very quickly." His eyes are cold. Completely cold. "Your choice."

Around us, I'm aware of the other journalists carefully not looking at us. They're watching peripherally, picking up on tension, not wanting to be obvious about it. This is exactly the kind of moment that becomes locker room gossip.

"Fine," I say, because I don't have a choice. Because that's what he just said: *your choice*, and he's already made clear what the only real option is.

He straightens up, gives me a smile that doesn't reach his eyes, and turns toward the tunnel that leads to the private corridors. The expectation is clear: follow.

I close my laptop. Grab my bag. Feel every eye in the press box tracking my movement as I stand up.

I follow him.

TWO YEARS BEFORE THE BREAKUP

I am twenty-five years old and completely sure I am going to marry Blake Delvalle.

The stands are full tonight—it's a rivalry game, the kind that fills The Forge Arena with electricity and people who've driven two hours because they want to be part of something. I'm in my usual spot, third row, close enough to see Blake's face, far enough back that I can see the whole game unfold around him.

He's spectacular tonight.

Blake has always been good, but tonight he's playing like a man possessed. Fast. Aggressive. He hits like he's got something to prove. And when he scores—a wrist shot from the high slot that beats the goalie clean—the crowd erupts, and Blake turns, and he looks directly at me.

He points.

That was for you.

I feel the message in my chest. My hands are shaking as I stand up, as I cheer, as I understand that in front of five thousand people, Blake Delvalle just told me that everything he's doing on that ice is mine.

Later, in his apartment after the game, after he's showered, after we've made love slow and tender and careful he takes me against the wall. Fast. Possessive. His hands on my waist hard enough to leave marks.

"You're mine," he says into my neck. "Did you see that goal? That was all you. Everything I do on that ice is for you, Elle. Everything."

I believed him.

I thought that meant forever. I thought that meant that if he was playing for me, then I mattered enough to keep. That his love was big enough to hold both hockey and me.

I was wrong about so many things.

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The private corridor is quiet.

Blake doesn't walk me to a private room or an office. Instead, he leads me to a maintenance hallway—a space that's clearly off-limits to regular traffic. It's cold down here. Colder than the arena proper. The kind of cold that comes from being underground, away from the lights and the crowd.

He turns to face me, and there's no point anymore in pretending this is professional.

"What the hell are you doing here?" His voice is quiet. Controlled. Which somehow makes it worse than if he'd yelled.

"I'm doing my job."

"Your job is to cover The Forge. Not to—" He stops himself. Resets. "Not to show up without a single word of warning. Not to waltz back into my life like the last three years didn't happen."

"Blake—"

"You didn't contact me. You didn't call. You just decided that this was something you were going to do, and you didn't even have the decency to warn me that you were coming."

His eyes are boring into mine, and I'm remembering the last time he looked at me like this with that intensity, that focus. Except now it's cold. Now it's a weapon.

"I had to get the assignment," I say quietly. "My editor didn't tell me it was going to be you."

"Bullshit." He steps closer. Not aggressively, but with enough proximity that I can feel the heat off his body, that I can see the exact shade of his eyes, the specific shade of anger that's barely contained. "You knew. You had to know. The Forge isn't some secret. My name's been in the papers."

He's right. I did know. Some part of me knew exactly where he was, what he was doing, who he was becoming. I just convinced myself I didn't care.

"I can request a different assignment," I say, and my voice is shaking. I hate that my voice is shaking.

"No." He shakes his head. "No, you're not going to do that. You're going to stay. You're going to cover this team. And you're going to understand exactly what you gave up when you walked out of my life."

"Blake, that's not fair—"

"Fair?" He laughs, and there's absolutely no humor in it. "You want to talk about fair? You want to stand here and pretend like you have any right to talk about what's fair?"

I don't say anything. There's nothing to say. He's right. He's completely right, and that's what makes this so devastating—that even through the anger, even through the coldness, I can still see the Blake who pointed at me from the ice. I can still feel the weight of *that was for you*, and understanding that he's using it against me now is like being hit.

"Here's what's going to happen," he says quietly. "You're going to do your job. You're going to write your story. And you're going to understand that being here, in my space, on my team, you're going to remember exactly why you loved me. And then you're going to have to live with the fact that you threw it away."

"Blake—"

"We're done talking." He steps back, and the loss of his proximity is almost worse than when he was standing over me. "You can go back to the press box now. Do your job. I'll do mine."

He walks away before I can respond.

I stand in the cold hallway, and my hands are shaking so badly that I have to grip the wall to keep myself upright. Because he's right. He's completely right. I *did* throw it away. I *am* going to have to live with that.

But what he doesn't understand what I don't think he can understand is that I threw it away because I was already gone. Because loving someone isn't enough when they don't know how to choose you.

I make my way back to the press box on shaking legs.

The other journalists look up as I return, trying to gauge what happened. I sit back down at my desk and open my laptop, and I don't look at Blake when he skates onto the ice for practice.

But I feel him. I feel him like I'm still that girl in the stands, watching him point, believing that everything was for me.

I feel him, and I hate myself for it.