Jonah (Chicago Blaze 7)

Jonah and I spend the next couple hours laughing, eating and drinking with his friends. After he’s had a couple beers, he pulls me into his lap, which I don’t mind a bit. He’s impossible not to like, and the more I get to know him, the more attractive he becomes to me. These kisses and cuddles may not be real, but that doesn’t mean I can’t still enjoy them.

“Renee, I hope you’ll convince Jonah to come to the charity auction we bought a table for in a couple weeks. It’s always fun to get dressed up and go out for the evening, and it’s for a good cause.”

I look at Jonah and he shrugs. “We can go if you want to.”

One of the guys imitates the sound of a whip from the other side of our table, and Jonah tosses a cardboard drink coaster his way, hitting him in the face without even looking.

“I’d love to go,” I say.

“I guess we’re in, then,” Jonah says to Mia. “And on that note, I think we’re gonna head out.”

“Your place or mine?” I ask.

“Mine.”

His eyes are warm as he kisses me, cupping my cheek in his hand. I feel the same stir I did at the end of our date the other day—for more. I suddenly wish we really were a couple who decided whether to stay at his place or mine.

He pulls away and we say goodbye to everyone. Once we get back to his car, I hold my hand out to him.

“What?” he asks.

“Keys.”

“I only had…three beers.”

“You had four and I’m driving.”

He passes me the keys. We both get into the car and he says, “I really do want you to stay at my place.”

“You do?” Hope blooms like a tropical flower inside my chest.

“Yeah. I’ll sleep on the couch.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

He waves a hand. “I fall asleep there half the time, anyway. I want you to take my bed.”

“Okay, thanks.”

The freshly formed flower wilts, shrivels and dies. Jonah is only playing a part. I couldn’t be more different than the woman he loved. I have to accept that and stay focused on my assignment.Chapter TwelveJonah

I stuff my hands in the pockets of my jacket to warm them as I walk near Lake Michigan. I take them back out immediately, though. The cold breeze on my skin seems fitting. If only the wind could reach my heart and send it back into hibernation.

Since Lily died, I’ve only felt a few things. Angry, sad and lonely. Sometimes those emotions hit me one at a time. Sometimes I feel them all at once, but usually it comes in a cycle.

The anger either slowly creeps up or it hits like a freight train in a fog—utterly invisible until all of a sudden it’s there, bearing down on me with a fury. My beautiful, vibrant wife was alive when I left her that morning with a quick kiss. And then she just collapsed that day in her parents’ home, the victim of an undiagnosed heart condition.

Fate ripped her away from me. Ripped them away from me—her and our unborn child, still growing inside her. We’d been trying for so long and faced several losses and disappointments, and then it finally happened, and I’d never seen her happier. The unfairness of it all feeds the anger, though it’s not nearly as strong as it was three years ago.

The first year was the worst. Not only was I grieving, I was doing so in the public eye. Fucking sports analysts on TV would chat about how my wife’s death was affecting my game. Photos would show up online with articles and headlines that were all total bullshit.

One day, I was out walking while reading an article on my phone about a guy on another hockey team getting suspended. I looked up to make sure I was still going the right way and a photographer caught my look of disgust, from reading the article, and captioned it “West still forlorn over wife’s death.”

Fuck that guy. Only my teammates truly saw what I went through then. In the weeks after burying Lily, I’d be sitting in the locker room with my elbows on my knees, silently crying, and I’d feel a hand on my back, followed by another on my shoulder.

I kept going, though. Eventually, the anger gave way to sadness. I mourned for Lily and our child, feeling like my heart had been hollowed out and would never be full again. That sense that a part of me is missing has been there for the past three years. To not feel it would be to forget Lily.

But last night, when I was out with Rey and my teammates, I lost that haunted feeling. I smiled a lot. I laughed. I loved the feeling of her near me, and the sparkle in her eye. Every touch between us and every kiss was real. At least on my end. Maybe Rey is a great actress and this is all part of the game for her.