Page 62 of Trade It All

Because I don’t have an answer ready.

My throat tightens.

My eyes drop for half a second before I force them back up to his.

“It wasn’t…” I swallow, trying to steady my voice. He doesn’t interrupt. Doesn’t push. He just waits. And that somehow makes it harder to keep it in.

“I saw you,” I say finally, the words coming slower now, like I’m pulling them out piece by piece. “On the ice… and there was blood. Everywhere. And you were down and no one was getting to you fast enough and I—”

My breath catches again, the image flashing back too quickly, too vividly.

“I couldn’t get to you,” I finish, my voice breaking on the last word.

The room goes quiet. Heavy. Like everything I just said is still hanging there between us.

By the time I look up again—Addy is there.

I didn’t even hear her come in.

She’s already climbing onto the bed beside me, her arms wrapping around me from the other side, pulling me into her like she’s been doing it my entire life instead of just the last few years.

“Hey,” she murmurs softly, her hand smoothing over my hair, her voice the complete opposite of the panic that dragged me out of sleep. “Hey, you’re okay.”

Luka shifts closer too, sitting on the edge of the bed now, his hand still on my shoulder, steady, grounding, not letting me drift back into it.

“I’m fine,” he says, like he needs me to hear it, like he knows exactly what I saw without having to ask for more details. “I’m right here.”

I shake my head slightly, even as I lean into them, even as their warmth pulls me back into something real.

“There was so much blood,” I whisper, my voice small now, like I’m afraid saying it too loud will make it real again.

“You got to him,” Addy says immediately, her voice sure, unwavering. I blink, my chest tightening again, but this time it’s different.

Not panic.

Something else.

“You got there in time,” Luka adds, his tone softer now, like he’s meeting me where I am instead of pulling me out of it too fast.

I let myself lean into them fully then, my forehead pressing into Addy’s shoulder, Luka’s hand steady at my back, anchoring me there.

The images fade slowly.

The panic eases.

My breathing finally starts to settle into something normal.

Chapter 28

Dean

Nightshavebecometheworst part of my day.

It doesn’t matter how long I stay up or how hard I push myself during practice or how much film I run through before I finally shut everything down. The second I lay in bed, it hits me. The quiet. The space. The absence of something that was there just long enough to ruin me for anything less.

Her.

That one night with her in my bed—her body tucked into mine, her breathing steady against my chest—spoiled me in a way I didn’t see coming. I used to sleep fine. Used to crash the second my head hit the pillow, no second thoughts, no restlessness, no reaching for something that wasn’t there.