Page 50 of Mac Meyers Needs Me

I plan to be honest with her on the drive home, but when we get in the car, she folds her hands together and bites her lips.

“Fee?” I touch her shoulder.

She raises a finger, then claps a hand over her mouth to stifle a sob.

“Hey, hey.” I slide my hand under her hair and curve it gently around the back of her neck. “It’s okay, sweetheart.”

“I’m sorry,” she says from behind her hand. “I didn’t…I can’t.”

“Don’t apologize. Come here, let me take some of that weight for you.” I lean over the center console and hug her as best I can.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles against my neck.

“Please don’t be.” I stroke her hair. “I’m glad you feel safe enough to cry with me, and I’m sorry it hurts right now.”

“I just miss them so much, Mac. Especially on days like this.”

“I can only imagine. But you have me, okay?” I want to be the person she relies on. The one she comes to when she’s sad, and happy, and everything in between.

“The grief just comes in these big crashing waves sometimes.”

I cradle the back of her head in my hand. “I’m here. I can be your life jacket.”

“Thank you for being such a good friend, Mac.”

“Always.” I just hope that’s not all I am.

CHAPTER 19

MAC

It’s go time.

Now or never.

Do or die.

I didn’t tell Fee how I felt yesterday because she needed my emotional support, not my emotional baggage, but she’s in much better form today and I’m bursting with the need to say something already. Also, the guys told me if I didn’t do something about it immanently, they’d stage an intervention and Gage would be at the helm. I don’t want to know what a Gage intervention looks like. Ever.

“Are you sure everything’s okay?” Fee asks for the third time. “Are you stressing about hockey? Do you want to book some extra ice time?”

“No. Yes. I mean yes, everything is cool, and no, I’m not stressing about hockey.” I need to pull the plug on my anxiety. “I need to ask you something.”

“Okay.” She sits up a little straighter and gives me her full attention. “I’m listening.”

“I want to take you on a date.” No finesse, no lead-up. Just honest truth.

“Oh.” She blinks twice, but that’s all the reaction I get.

Fuck. What if I’m too late? What if my window of opportunity has already closed?

“Do you have another hockey thing?” She pulls up her calendar, dutifully preparing to save the date. “Do you know when it is and who will be there? Dress code and stuff?”

I beat back the swelling wave of panic. She kissed me back. She made this incredibly needy sound that I want to hear on repeat. I send a prayer to the gods of attraction that I’m right about this. “There’s no event. I want to take you on a real, not-fake date, Ophelia.”

More blinking. “A real date?”

“Yeah. I like you, Fee.”