“But that was three days ago. Why didn’t either of you tel me?” Okay, so Sam wasn’t speaking to her but, “Why didn’t you tel me?”
“Sam doesn’t want you to know. I think he loves you and doesn’t want you to worry about me.”
She wasn’t so sure Sam loved her. Not after their last conversation. She wasn’t sure like her brother seemed to be.
“I don’t want you to worry about me either.”
She looked at him standing there, her big hard-nosed brother. The back of her throat hurt, and her eyes watered. Again. She didn’t want to make his life hard for him. Harder than it already was. “What wil I do without my big brother?”
“Don’t cry.” He enfolded her in his big arms. “I’m not leaving forever.” He leaned back and looked into her face. “Maybe Sam isn’t as big an idiot these days.” He wiped her cheeks with his thumbs. “He’l look out for you and Conner.”
She was confused and scared for Vince. “You like Sam now?”
“Hel no, but the bigger question is, do you like him?”
Of course she liked Sam. She loved him. She couldn’t help it. She loved the sound of his voice and the smel of him on her pil ow. She loved that under al that muscle and enormous ego, there was a kind man with a giving heart. She nodded.
“Then you have to think about forgiving him, because sometimes a person needs to hear you forgive them so they can start to forgive themselves.”
She looked into her brother’s troubled green eyes and wondered if he was talking about Sam or himself. Sam walked into his loft and knew something was different before he turned on the lights. It was 3:00 A.M., and Conner’s jacket was tossed across a barstool, and his door was ajar. He looked inside at his son curled up in his bed, asleep.
Sam was exhausted, and sore as hel . He’d played the shittiest games of his career consecutively because he hadn’t been able to clear his head of Autumn. He was living in a gray fog, but he was fairly certain it wasn’t his night to have Conner. Not unless Autumn needed someone to watch their son. Natalie’s door was shut, and he moved into his room and flipped on the light. In the middle of his dark blue quilt, Autumn lay curled up in his bed. Her red hair fanned out across his pil ow. If he hadn’t been standing up, with his duffel in his hand, he might think he was dreaming the whole thing.
“Autumn?”
She stirred, and her green eyes fluttered open. A smile tilted up the corners of her mouth.
The duffel hit the floor. “What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for you.”
“Why? What’s wrong? What happened?”
“Nothing’s wrong. I just wanted to see you, and you’re obviously avoiding me.”
He looked around. “How did you get in here?”
“You have your ways. I have mine.” She stretched her arms, and it looked like she was wearing a white hockey jersey. “And aren’t you glad you didn’t come home with some other woman?”
“There is no other woman.”
“I know.” She sat up, and the quilt fel to her lap. She was wearing that damn Pittsburgh jersey. “Vince left town.”
He shrugged out of his blazer. “Why?”
“He said he had something to do. I’m very worried about him.”
“He’s a big boy.” Were they real y talking about Vince? “He’l be okay.”
“Why did you bail him out?” She swung her bare legs over the side of the bed. “You hate Vince.”
“But I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
His chest felt like he’d cracked a few ribs. Sore like someone caught him in the corner and punched the wind out of him. He pointed at her. “Then why are you wearing Crosby’s jersey?”
“ ’Cause the last time I wore it, you threatened to tear it off me if you ever saw it again.”
He smiled. “Is that what you want?”
She nodded and wrapped her arms around his neck.
“What else do you want, Autumn?”
“Me and you and Conner. I want us to be a family.” He sucked in a breath as she unbuttoned his shirt. “I want to always be here when you get home. I want to hear about your day. I want that for the rest of my life.” She kissed the hol ow of his throat.
“If you want that for the rest of your life, you have it.” He grabbed her hand and kissed the inside of her wrist. “I want you to always be here when I get home. I want to hear about your day. I love you and I wil love you for the rest of my life.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He didn’t want to choke up. He didn’t want the woman he loved to see him cry like a girl. “You and Conner, that’s al I’l ever need.”
“No, that isn’t al .” She brushed his hair from his forehead. “I love you, Sam. I fel in love with you five years ago, and you broke my heart. For a long time, I couldn’t get past that, but I’ve fal en in love with you again. Only harder and deeper and more maturely this time. You don’t need my forgiveness for the past. Like you said, we were different people then, but if that’s what you want, if that’s what you need, then I forgive you.”
He lowered his face to her neck and breathed in the scent of her warm skin. He hadn’t realized how long he’d waited to hear those words. Didn’t know how much he wanted to hear them until she’d spoken them. He ran his hands down the back of her jersey and grabbed two bare cheeks. “You seem to have lost your panties again.”
“Oops. I bet that happens around you a lot.”
“Not anymore.” He slid his hands up her smooth back. “You’re the only woman I want around. The only woman I want to see drop her panties. The only woman I’ve ever real y wanted.”
She leaned back and looked up at him. Her green eyes smiling with laughter. “Up until a few months ago, I wasn’t even the kind of woman you dated.”
“No.” He pressed his forehead into hers and brushed his mouth across her lips. “But you’re the kind of woman I marry. If I’m real y lucky, you’re the kind of woman who wil marry me twice.”
Epilogue
The setting sun hung just above the white sands of Lahaina Beach in Maui. Orange and red beams caught in the curls of Autumn’s hair and touched the side of Sam’s square jaw. Dressed in a simple oyster silk sheath, Autumn wore a lei of white orchids that Sam had given her that day. She’d pinned roses in her hair, and a slight breeze ruffled the veil attached to the back of her head. Sam and Conner wore matching black tuxedos with white orchids in their lapels and white bow ties.
When it came to planning her own wedding, Autumn had opted for smal and intimate. Sam’s mother and Vince stood within the wedding party to the bride’s right. The Ross twins and their husbands just back from their respective honeymoons and Ty and Faith Savage, their baby girl asleep on her daddy’s big shoulder, watched Sam take Autumn’s hand and raise it to his lips. He kissed the backs of her knuckles and smiled just before he said the vows he’d written.
“I’m a hockey player,” he began. “I’m not romantic, so I asked Conner what I should say to you today. He suggested a few knock-knock jokes.” He laughed. “Mostly, he wanted me to tel you that you’re the best mommy in the world. And that’s true, but that is only one reason why I love you so much. I love the way you make me feel when you walk into a room. You fil my life with light.” He paused and looked into her face. “Autumn, I love you because I can’t imagine my life without you. I don’t want to even try.”
Autumn gazed into Sam’s eyes as the sinking sun streaked his cheeks with smears of orange and lavender. “I love you Sam. You healed my heart and taught me that forgiveness is about love. I used to think that any man of mine had to live up to a list of my expectations.” She shook her head and her veil brushed her bare shoulders. “I
