Page 65 of A Summer of Stars

“Invalidate my feelings. Invalidate what I saw. That was more than a kiss. It wasn’t only the… the cheating either, Jeremiah.”

“Then what’s the big deal?”

“The big deal?You pushed me awayconstantly. You didn’t respect me as an athlete anymore, let alone a partner. Did you know I’d wait for you after your tournaments in your hotel room to see you? But you’d never show up. You’d never come back. I had no idea where you were. I’d fly back home and you’d never notice because you didn’t know I was there in the first place.”

“I was celebrating! I was always stressed and wanted time to have fun, okay? I have the entire world watching to see if I can maintain the number one spot, or if I’ll lose it, my success becoming this blip no one will remember. I can’t be a minute piece of this sport, one that’ll fade away, not after everything I’ve put into it.”

“You don’t think I’m shouldering the same battles? My ranking has completely collapsed, and I’ve lost the ability to function in public and social settings because every person in the world hates me because of something you said—let alone the pressure I put on myself to play well.” My sentiment wasn’t new. I had said the same thing when he started calling after the scandal. But this time he couldn’t hang up when he ran out of words.

“I told you how much I regret that decision,” he reminded me. “I wasn’t in the right head space, and it was the only thing I could think of that would get you to answer my calls.”

My skinitched. “Do you hear yourself—‘the only thing you could think of’?”

“It wasone mistake. You wanted to pretend I didn’t exist. What else was I supposed to do?”

“Let me go.You should’ve let me go.” My words were solid, but my voice was wavering.

“So you could go find another guy?” His face twisted. “Do you think Kieran Alexander lovesyou?” He completely bulldozed over my half of the conversation the way he used to. He didn’t care. His intention was to offend me. Expect me to burst into tears and tell him how right he was about the contaminated dating pool. To hear that I was secretly pining over him.

Fortunately, he didn’t know that Kieran could never love me, and that I couldn’t care less.

“This has everything to do with the public favoring you and the media printing your name and nothing to do with you getting me back.”

“Everythinghas been to get you back.”

“It’s been to get back yourimage—the way it looked to have tennis’s top star dating another athlete, one that was close to beingbetter than you but not quite. It made you look more committed to the sport. It made people idolize you more. And I think when we first got married, you did love me, but since your brother… I… I think it’s been about repairing something that’ll always be broken because you won’t take the time to work through your grief.”

“You’re just jealous that I can work through my pain, unlike you,” he snapped. “You’re the reason this marriage has failed.”

“How dare you,” I whispered, the tears building in my throat. “I can’t believe I thought this was going to be any different.”

His shoulders wilted under my hand as he registered my emotion. Yet all he had to say was: “I love you, Luna.”

Far, in the back caverns of my heart, there was an earsplitting crack.

Helovedme?He loved me?

I stared at him in disbelief. At this person who was my idol before he was my husband. How childish it felt to hold that thought so close for so many months like a worn-out teddy bear. It made my stomach roll to hear him say those words.

For months, every night before I fell asleep, I wondered if he regretted what he did when he looked at the space I left in our bed.

Were my coffee mugs in our cabinets off limits? Did he still order our shared dishes from the Italian restaurant down the street? Did he miss the smell of my perfume on our pillow or the feeling of our chests colliding as we fell asleep or the weight of my gaze when I watched him across the court?

I was still getting used to sleeping in the middle of the bed. Sharing a space for one.

I couldn’t bring myself to imagine any of it, because every time I played back a happy memory, a heartbreaking one replaced it.

In all the time that had passed, I never imagined him loving me.He said he wanted me back. That he deserved me. But he never said helovedme.

Hearing that he loved me threatened to refill the portion of my heart that had a glaring gap in it.

This was his fault, wasn’t it? The cracks in my heart and signature on our divorce paper. If so, why was I the one suffering for it?

Maybe I should have been thankful for Kieran’s interruption. But in that moment, I wanted to know more. I wanted an explanation—Ineededan explanation so that I wouldn’t stay up tonight questioning everything Jeremiah had done, wasting all my months of progress separating myself from him.

Yet, here I was, like some conflicted romance character running circles in a nineteenth-century bedroom beside a four-poster bed, changing into white linen pajamas, wondering what I was supposed to do about my ex-husband and the man I hated but kissed.

I heaved the window shut before the rain could soak any more of the carpet. As the edge of the window fitted into its slot, the doorknob clicked. I turned abruptly.