If Only You (Bergman Brothers, #6)(39)

“Manipulative, you mean.”

She shrugs. “I don’t know you well enough to say that, Sebastian. I don’t plan to hold against you what the world’s said about you.”

My heart thuds in my chest. “Why not?”

She’s quiet again for a moment, tugging her lip with her teeth, before she finally says, “Because I believe we all deserve the chance to be seen for who we are in our present, not for who we’ve been in our past. Because I believe that while you can’t rewrite life’s previous chapters, you have every present moment to do something new, something better, and I hold on to hope that anyone who wants to can shape their life into a story they’re proud of.”

I stare at her, knuckles grazing my mouth, panicking.

I have never wanted to believe in someone’s belief so much. I have never wanted to kiss someone so much. I want to tell her to pull the car over, drag her across the console, crush her onto my lap and learn every corner of that soft, sweet mouth. I want to soak up and breathe in whatever’s inside this woman that charges the air and makes my atrophied, frozen heart want to grow and warm and heal and fill with things it hasn’t in so long.

But that’s not what this is. That’s not what she wants or deserves, and I’ve made a promise—to myself, to her brother, and, in my own way, to her, too—that I won’t hurt her, that I’ll keep her safe.

And goddammit, for once, I’m going to keep my word. I’m going to do the right thing.

Even if it just might kill me.





13





ZIGGY





Playlist: “Over The Rainbow,” Ingrid Michaelson





“Well.” Sebastian clears his throat, knuckles grazing his mouth as he stares out the window. “I hope you don’t just believe that for other people.”

I glance his way quickly, before retraining my gaze ahead, as I make the turn into the designated parking area for players and their guests. “What do you mean?”

He shrugs, his thumb spinning a silver ring on his index finger, eyes fastened out the window. “This…project of yours, it’s all about how you’re perceived, right? Wanting to take control of that. But let me tell you this, which I’ve learned from experience. There’s only so much you can do about how others perceive you. You can’t control it. You can only be yourself and be true to that. If they can’t see what an incredible—” He clears his throat, lifting his shoulder. “If they can’t see you as you really are, that’s not your fault. They can fuck right off.”

I bite my lip as I ease into a parking space and set the car in park. “Don’t you think… I mean, aren’t relationships more complicated than that? They’re messy grayscales, not black and white.”

A noncommittal grunt leaves him. Apparently, he disagrees? I don’t know about any of Sebastian’s relationships beyond his friendship with Ren, or if he even has any. I’m starting to wonder if that’s telling. If it’s not just that we haven’t been doing this fake-friend thing for very long, but more to do with how he views relationships.

“It’s simpler with my teams,” I tell him. “National and in the city here. It’s not their fault they don’t see a person I haven’t shown them. Now’s my chance to stop acting like the girl I was and advocate for myself as the woman I’ve become. With my family, it’s complex—they’ve known the old me, loved and protected the old me. I don’t want to resent them for holding on to the idea of a person they’ve known and treasured and taken care of when I really, really needed it. I just…want to show them who I am, and I want them to embrace that. If they can’t…” I shake my head, unable to process that possibility that my family wouldn’t welcome what I show them with open arms. “I’ll deal with that then, but I won’t let it stop me from figuring out how to be and show the people who matter to me who I’ve become.”

He only glances my way for a second, but I feel its impact like a snap of bracing air—the kind during a Washington winter that hits your face and makes you gasp, fills your lungs with cold, clean peace, as you gaze out at the vastness surrounding you.

He glances back out the window, then says quietly, simply, “Good.”

I smile at him. “That was nice of you to say. Look at you, expanding your repertoire beyond snarky quips and bone-dry sarcasm.”

He swallows roughly as he glances back my way. His eyes dance between mine. “It’s your fault. You’re rubbing off on me.”

My smile deepens. “Sorry I’m such a terrible influence.”

“Not forgiven,” he mutters, back to staring out the window, his gaze traveling the rink. “We got sidetracked again. You were…explaining what it means for you, being autistic.”

I pick up his keys where they sit in the console and turn them over in my hands. A few players and their guests are leaving their cars, joining up with each other. Talking, hugging, laughing. I suppose we could join them, too, but I don’t want to get out yet. I want to tell Sebastian. I want him to know this about me, because I can’t do this anymore—judge him the way the world has and use that judgment to hold him at a distance. I have to decide for myself, based on what he shows me, how I’m going to see him. And trusting him with this part of myself will certainly be the litmus test. He’ll either be a jerk about it, or he’ll be…the way I hope he is, the way he’s shown me he can be. Curious. Kind. Caring.