“Hey.”
Em crossed her arms to hide the trembling in her hands. “Hi.”
“I, uh…” His eyes went to his feet.
“You played a great game tonight.”
He looked up and gave her a sad smile. “Thanks.”
“That goal was amazing.”
His smile grew. “I was trying to impress a girl.”
An ache filled her chest. “Don’t say that. Not now.”
He shook his head. “You’re right. I just...how are you doing?”
How was she doing? Not great, and he was the last person she wanted to talk to about it. “Grant…”
“I’m sorry. I know this is tough. But I want you to know that I’m sorry for how things ended between us. I didn’t want them to end, but I was already feeling stressed with my injury and the fact that I was breaking Finn’s rule by talking to you.” His eyes went wide. “What I mean is—”
“Finn’s rule?” What was Grant talking about? Em had a rule. She’d made no secret of her rule when she talked to Grant. But this was the first time she’d heard of one from her brother.
Grant rubbed the back of his neck. “You should know that I always thought it was crap. But he made it abundantly clear that it wasn’t up for debate.”
Abundantly clear with his fist?
Grant had been quick to brush her off when she’d asked about his black eye last week. He hadn’t wanted to say how he got it. Even now, Grant wasn’t saying that Finn had hit him. But Em knew her brother well enough to know his preferred method of getting his way.
Or, at least, she thought she knew her brother. But since when did he lie to her about his relationships and set down edicts about her own? That wasn’t the Finn she’d grown up with, and it made her question everything.
She put her hands on the board and leaned forward. “What’s the rule, Grant?”
Grant’s head briefly turned to where the players were standing and then back to Em. He lifted his hands to make air-quotes. “He has a strict ‘no-dating-my-sister’ rule.”
“He what?” Her voice was high-pitched. “I have the no-dating-athletes rule.”
Grant shrugged. “Well, he decided to take it one step further. No one on the team is allowed to even talk to you.”
So that was why so many of the guys kept a safe distance when they talked to her. They didn’t want a broken nose or a black eye. Though there was someone who got neither. “Do you know what happened with Damien?”
He shook his head and backed away. “Oh, no. That’s something you’ll have to ask Finn about.”
Her hands clenched into fists. She was going to kill her brother for all the secrets he’d been keeping behind her back. “Anything else you think I should know?” she asked through clenched teeth.
He reached out like he wanted to touch her but let his hand drop to his side. “Just that I’m sorry that I hurt you. I never meant for things to end like that. I wish I could go back and have a do-over.”
Grant’s admission softened her anger, but it was quickly replaced with pain. She hadn’t wanted things to end at all. She shook her head. “But we can’t. What’s done is done.”
Grant’s lips turned down into a frown.
The sight broke her heart. She turned her eyes away and saw the rest of the players were making their way off the field toward the locker rooms. Em jerked her head toward them. “You should probably get going.”
Grant took a deep breath. “Yeah, okay.”
Then he turned and walked off.
Em stayed in the stands during the autograph session. She was too angry to pretend like everything was okay and knew if she tried to talk to Finn, she was going to lose it. Talking about how Finn had been scaring away guys was not a conversation she wanted to have in front of all of his teammates, though it sounded like they all knew about his stupid rule.
It was difficult to watch him smile and laugh with fans, and she was thankful when the crowd started to thin. When the last fan left the field, Finn looked around the arena. He spotted Em and waved.
She kept her face blank.
His brow crinkled, and he stood up. He said something to Silas and started walking toward her. When he made it up the stairs to where she sat, he smiled. “What are you doing way up here?”
Her eyes narrowed.
“What’s going on? I thought you weren’t mad about me dating Frida anymore.”
“I’m not mad about that. I’m mad about the other secrets you’ve been keeping from me.”
His brows lowered. “What are you talking about?”
“The little rule you have for all your teammates.” She smiled tightly. “The one that says they’re not allowed to date me.”
He shifted on his feet.
“So, it’s true. You’ve been telling guys to stay away from me.”
“I—”
“Did you tell Grant to stay away?”
He nodded.
“Did you say it with your fist?”
He lowered his gaze.
She shook her head. “Why did you do that?”
He lifted his hands. “To protect you. I couldn’t stand to see another guy hurt you. First Travis broke up with you. Then Mark did the same thing. I couldn’t bear the thought of it happening again.”
“People break up with other people all the time.”
“Those people aren’t my sister though.”
She shook her head. “What about Damien? He wasn’t exactly a great date, and I heard you had something to do with it.”
He plopped down next to her and rubbed his hands over his face. “I didn’t like the way some of the guys were looking at you—like you were a woman. Even after I broke Parrera’s nose, there were a few that didn’t care. So I told Damien to take you out and show you a bad time. I figured it would push you over the edge and you’d stop dating athletes altogether. Then I
