PERMANENTLY STUCK

KAI~

I drove around for almost an hour after I left her place.

Not because I was lost. I knew every street in this city better than most locals. I just couldn’t go home yet. Sitting in my apartment staring at the ceiling while her voice still echoed in my head felt like a special kind of torture I wasn’t ready for.

*You need to go.*

Yeah. I’d heard her. Loud and clear. And I’d still wanted to turn around, walk back up those steps, and kiss the careful look right off her face until she forgot every single reason she kept listing.

I pulled into an empty overlook near the water and killed the engine. The city lights stretched out below, Vancouver looking soft and far away. I leaned my head back against the seat and let out a long breath.

Thirty-two.

She was thirty-two and I was twenty-two and she still looked at me sometimes like I was the same scrawny kid who used to steal extra cookies from her plate at family dinners. Like she was supposed to be the responsible one and I was supposed to keep my feelings to myself because they were inconvenient.

I’d been in love with Sienna Vale since I was sixteen years old and she walked into my sister’s living room in a soft gray sweater and laughed at something Maya said. That was it. One laugh. One look. And something in my chest had stuck itself permanently.

I never told anyone. Not even Maya, and I told Maya almost everything. I just watched from a distance while Sienna married the wrong guy, while she smiled through a marriage that slowly drained the light out of her eyes, while she got divorced and built herself back up piece by careful piece. I watched and I waited and I told myself that one day I’d be enough. Not the little brother. Not the rookie. Just a man she could look at without immediately calculating the fallout.

Tonight I’d almost gotten there. Almost.

I scrubbed both hands over my face and laughed under my breath. God, I was so far gone it was almost embarrassing. The way she’d stood in her doorway with her arms crossed, trying so hard to look unmoved. The way she’d let me inside for those five minutes even though every instinct she had was screaming at her to shut the door. The way Bear had greeted me like I belonged there.

I wanted to belong there.

My phone lit up in the cupholder. For one stupid second I hoped it was her. It wasn’t. Just a message from one of the other rookies about tomorrow’s optional skate. I ignored it.

I kept seeing the look on her face when I told her I’d almost turned down the call-up. That had been true. Last year, when the Vipers offered me the contract, my first thought hadn’t been about the money or the ice time. It had been about her. About walking into that facility every day and having to pretend she was just the nutritionist while every cell in my body knew better.

I’d taken the deal anyway. Because staying away hadn’t fixed anything. It had just made the wanting her worse.

A car passed on the road behind me, headlights sweeping across the dashboard. I sat up straighter and started the truck again. Sitting here replaying every second of the last hour wasn’t going to change the fact that she was still scared. Of the age gap. Of Maya. Of her ex using Bear like a weapon. Of the team finding out and deciding their shiny new rookie was a distraction instead of an asset.

I understood all of it.

I just didn’t accept that any of those reasons were bigger than what I felt when she looked at me.

By the time I pulled into my building’s underground parking it was almost midnight. The apartment felt too quiet when I stepped inside. I dropped my keys on the counter and stood there for a minute, staring at nothing.

Then I pulled out my phone and opened the thread with her name.

I typed three different messages and deleted every one.

Finally I settled on something simple.

**Me:**

*I meant everything I said.*

*Sleep well, Sienna.*

I hit send before I could second-guess it, tossed the phone onto the couch, and walked to the bathroom to shower. The water was hot enough to sting. I braced both hands against the tile and let it run over the back of my neck, trying to burn off the restless energy still crawling under my skin.

She thought I saw her as some kind of forbidden older-sister fantasy.

She had no idea.

I saw the woman who had quietly fixed my meal plan last month when she noticed I was under-eating during a rough stretch. The woman who still carried the weight of a marriage that had tried to make her small, and who somehow came out the other side sharper and stronger and more beautiful than she had any right to be.

I wanted that woman.

Not the idea of her. Not the version that lived in my head when I was a teenager. The real one. The one who looked at me tonight like she was one second away from kicking me out for good.

I turned the water off, dried off, and pulled on a pair of sweatpants. My phone was still dark when I checked it. No reply.

That was fine.

I’d waited six years.

I could wait a little longer.

I dropped onto the bed, one arm flung over my eyes, and let the memory of her standing in that doorway settle over me again. The soft light from her hallway. The way her voice had gone quiet when she said my name. The exact shade of caution in her eyes when I stepped too close.

She could keep listing reasons.

I’d keep showing up until the reasons ran out.

And when they did, I was going to be right there, ready to prove that every risk she was terrified to take was worth it.

BANG! BANG! A heavy sound crashed against my door and I jerked up.

What the hell?