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“I’ll take a glass of wine.”

Mabel races into the room, now wearing her green tutu over her yellow leggings. The absurdity of my daughter is beautiful, and I laugh. Holt does, too. I’m grateful for the way she’s washed away the moment of awkwardness.

“Can we go for a bike ride?”

“We have company, little miss. I can’t just leave Holt here alone. That would be rude.”

“He can ride daddy’s bike,” she offers innocently.

I think I flinch. I think it’s visible.

When my eyes lift from my daughter and I see my son’s expression, I no longer think it. I know. And I know he saw it.

“I’ll go for a bike ride with you, Mabel,” Owen says easily. The smile he gives me is filled with hurt he tries to hide. “Come on.”

I say nothing as I watch them go. I listen to them put shoes on and hear the rumble as the garage door lifts open.

My hands shake as I pour Holt his wine.

“He’s a really good kid.” Holt takes the glass I offer.

I nod, but manage thickly, “He is.”

“How long do you figure they’ll be gone?”

I pull in a big breath. “Mabel has a solid half hour in her.”

“You want to sit outside?” Hold asks, and I nod.

Holt follows me onto the front porch, and we sit in the wooden Adirondak chairs I bought from a yard sale a couple years back. I painted them a pretty teal blue and stained the little wood table that sits between them the same stain I slather on the porch every second spring. I fold my legs under me, and Holt spreads his mass out. Everything he does, all the space he claims, only reminds me how big he’s grown.

Tate was a big man, but Holt has an easy few inches on him in both height and width.

I hate that I compare the two men. But it’s next to impossible not to.

For so long, Holt has lived in my mind as the boy he was when I knew him last. When I had him and loved him.

He’s so different now—and yet so many of the same feelings are rushing back in—the collision course set for complete destruction.

I wish I could stop it. But it feels hopeless.

Just like he stole pieces of me back then, I can feel the hook of him digging deep into the remnants of my heart. He’s reeling me in, and he isn’t even trying.

“Did you love him?”

I think my heart stops in my chest. It’s beating one moment and then it’s just—well, it’s not.

I take a sip of my wine. My eyes drift to the house across the street. The house that used to be mine when this was his. I wonder if this feels wrong to him. Like this house is still his.

I wonder, for the first time, if he feels like this life was meant for him. But he couldn’t possibly.

He was always meant for hockey.

I have to believe that.

“I loved him.” The words are true and clear, even as they are soft and fragile. I feel fragile.

Holt doesn’t speak for long moments, but I can feel his eyes on me. I think there’s more he wants to say, more he wants to ask. I’m afraid. Afraid of the unspoken truth that stands between us.