Chapter Sixty-Nine

Darcy was bleary-eyed from the flight. She texted her sister to let her know she had arrived. Now came the hard part. She walked through the airport wishing she hadn’t fallen asleep on the plane. Wishing she had a better plan than this half-baked, probably pointless one.

Don’t you dare leave the airport without getting me something from the Black Dog.

Darcy stared at her phone. Was she hallucinating? Her sister was asking her to run an errand? Now?

No

Her phone rang in her hand. “I swear to god, Darcy. Get your ass to the Black Dog store by gate...” She paused. “It’s in Terminal C. I want you to get me one of their sweatshirts.”

Darcy protested.

“It’s the least you can do for making me do all the party planning with Mom.” She hung up and Darcy stared at her phone.

She needed more sleep. She trudged through the airport until she hit Terminal C. At least it was near where she had to go for her next flight. Not that she needed to be here, the whole point was that she had time to leave and come back.

Fucking Kit.

She stared at the sweatshirt display. They came in a million colors and with or without hoods. She touched a few of them, like that was going to help her decide what Kit wanted. She typed out a furious text.

As she typed, she heard someone talking outside the store.

“Grace, why did you make me get here so early? My flight isn’t for hours.”

Darcy’s thumb hovered over the send button. She knew that voice.

“What do you mean you got the time wrong?”

Darcy tucked her phone in her pocket and wandered out into the terminal. Now she had to be hallucinating.

“Natalie?” Darcy stepped forward.

Natalie spun at the sound of her name. “Darcy?” Natalie stared at her for a minute before realizing her phone was screaming at her. “Sorry, Grace. I gotta go.”

Darcy took another step closer, still not believing her eyes. “What are you doing here?”

A family of five bustled between them, the parents shepherding their children through the crowd and dragging suitcases behind them. Natalie and Darcy had to take a step back to avoid being kneecapped by a rogue rolling bag.

Natalie fiddled with the straps to her bag. “I have a flight.” She looked at her watch. “In four hours.” She smiled. “Grace insisted on dropping me off a hundred hours early. What are you doing here? I thought you were back home?”

Darcy shifted her weight. “Can we step over there?” Natalie followed her to an empty seating area by a closed gate. She should have prepared something to say, written something down, even a few notes. She was going to fuck this up. She looked at Natalie and set her backpack down on the seat next to her.

“Did you stop at Logan just so you could shop at the Black Dog? I would have sent you a T-shirt if that’s what you wanted,” Natalie said with a hint of a smile playing at the corner of her mouth.

Darcy shook her head. “I came for you.” She looked at the floor, trying to gather her thoughts into something coherent. “My plan was to go to your house between my flights. But then my sister asked me to get her some stupid sweatshirt and you walked by and now... Now none of the things I wanted to say sound right.”

A smile spread across Natalie’s face. “You were coming to find me? How did you even know where I live?”

“Grace.”

Natalie shook her head. “That explains why she brought me here forty-seven hours early.”

“Would have been helpful if she told me you’d be here.” Darcy sighed. “Nat, I screwed up. I was so overwhelmed by getting my dream job I didn’t even talk to you about it or how it would change our plans before accepting.” Darcy searched Natalie’s face. “I’m so sorry. It was stupid and selfish and it cost me the most important thing. You.

“I was focused on all the wrong things. I wanted to prove to everyone, including me, that I deserved the job. I thought I had to do everything perfectly so no one would ever think I got a spot on a team or got a job because of my last name.”

“Darcy, no one seriously thinks that.”

Darcy laughed. “You know that’s not true. You were there with those guys who wished my dad would make our show worth watching or that I would talk more about how great he is. I wanted to prove I was great, too.”

Darcy’s throat felt full of gravel. She paused to take a breath, her emotions threatening to overwhelm her. “What I didn’t understand was that no amount of hard work, preparation, or perfection would stop them from saying that. No job, not even the job I’ve been dreaming about since I was a kid, could make me feel worthy.

“But you did.” Darcy looked at Natalie and blinked away the tears she couldn’t stop coming. “You made me feel everything I thought my dream job would. Being with you has always been the best thing in my life and I’ve done a fucking terrible job of showing you that. I got scared that without the job, I’d never feel like enough. But in chasing that I lost sight of the fact that you have always made me feel like I was enough. Not because of my last name, not because I could score goals or win games, but because you saw who I am and wanted to be with me anyway. You’re thoughtful and sweet and such a massive pain in my ass and I cannot imagine living the rest of my life without you.”

Natalie took her hand. Darcy smiled, not caring that people had stopped to stare at them. She was sure she was a sight with tears streaming down her face. She gave Natalie a watery smile.

“I love you and I’m so sorry I screwed this up, again. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I called Grace to find out how I could have one last chance to talk to you.” Darcy looked down at their interlaced fingers. “I don’t know how you feel but I hope you’ll give me another chance. Because I love you and I would like a chance to work as hard at being worthy of your love as I’ve worked at everything else in my life.”

Natalie wrapped her in a tight hug. “That was some speech, LaCroix.” When she blinked, Darcy could feel her eyelashes against her cheek. “Do you know how long I’ve waited for you to say you love me?”

Darcy sniffled and kissed Natalie on the cheek. “Does that mean you forgive me?”

Natalie grinned.

“Wait, you never said what you’re doing at the airport. Where are you going?”

Natalie rubbed the back of her neck, her cheeks showing the first signs of the red creeping up her neck. She shoved her boarding pass toward Darcy. “I was flying to see you.”

“What?” Darcy scanned the ticket. “I was coming to see you and you were planning to fly to Toronto to see me?”

Natalie laughed. “I had to slide into your sister’s DMs to find out when you were coming home.”

Darcy covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh my god. She knew you were going to be here and instead of telling me she tried to get me to buy her a sweatshirt? I’m going to kill Kit.”

Natalie laughed. “I guess I can thank Grace for not making me buy her airport swag.”

Darcy cocked her head to one side. “You were flying to meet me? And then what?”

“I had a speech prepared.” Natalie rubbed her thumb across the back of Darcy’s hand.

“I want to hear it.”

Natalie shook her head. “What? You already asked me to take you back, I think my speech is unnecessary.”

“Well, I don’t know. I might need some convincing.” Darcy squeezed Natalie’s hand before dropping it. “Woo me, Carpenter.”

Natalie sighed and rubbed her palms against her jeans.

Darcy wondered if Natalie knew how impossibly cute she was when she was nervous.

Natalie tucked her hands in her pockets, her shoulders rolling forward. God, she was adorable. “Do you remember Kelly?”

Darcy nodded, a flicker of confusion crossing her face.

“Kelly was a fucking showboat. Her crowning college achievement was the goal she scored when we played Team USA. She spent the next two weeks crowing about it. But the only reason she scored was because she was hanging out at center ice while the rest of us dug the puck out of the corner. The only reason she ended up on goddamned breakaway is because McD sent a perfect pass across half the ice. We lost the game but she walked around like she was god’s gift to hockey because she scored that goal.”

Darcy couldn’t keep the confusion off her face. Nothing about this speech seemed designed to win her heart.

“Don’t look at me like that. You wanted the speech, just listen without being all judgy.”

Darcy nodded solemnly and suppressed the urge to kiss Natalie.

Natalie huffed out a breath. “This may sound stupid coming from the woman who was planning to fly to Toronto to talk to you, but grand gestures are showboating. They’re hanging out at center ice while the other person does the hard fucking work of digging in the corners, killing penalties, blocking shots. Grand gestures get all the credit.

“I love you and I want you for-fucking-ever. But there’s more. I planned to fly to Canada to get your attention, to talk to you. To tell you I want to be with you in the corners, scrapping for everything, stepping in front of the shots when they come, picking you up when you need it. I want you to trust that when we’re together I’m not floating around looking for a way to make a splash. I want you to know that whether I’m having a good shift or a shitty one, I’m going to go after the next one just as hard.

“That’s what I want. I know I’m going to fuck up. Because you will, too. I know it because we always fuck up. But when that happens, I want you to know that I’m not going to storm off the ice or break my stick or have whatever fucking tantrum. I want you to know I’m going to hop over the boards and pour my heart into doing it better the next time. I know how much you worry about being perfect. I don’t need you to be perfect, I need you to be the scrappy, hardworking, play-to-the-last-whistle woman I fell in love with.

“So, yes, I planned to fly to Toronto to make this big speech, but this isn’t about a grand gesture. I need a teammate who will pick me up when I have a bad day or a bad week or when things are just really terrible. I need someone willing to do the work. I promise you, I’m willing to be that for you. I’m willing to do all the work and not swan around looking for the breakaway to cover up for the fact that I haven’t been doing the work.” Natalie paused, her chest heaving from emotion as she caught her breath. “I fucked up. I got scared and I ran away. But I promise you, in the middle of the airport like the end of some cheesy movie, I’m in this with you. I want you and I can’t imagine doing this with anyone else. You’ve been the one for me since I was eighteen. And I know I fucked this up at least seventeen different ways, but...” She took a deep breath. “I love you. I’ve always loved you. And if you can forgive me for being scared and running away, twice, I want to spend the rest of my life with you as my teammate.” She swallowed, terrified that Darcy wasn’t saying anything. “If you’ll have me.”

Darcy looked around, people were staring at them. One person had their phone out, taking a picture or maybe a video. She took a deep breath. People might recognize them here. People knew who her dad was and who she was and for the first time, she didn’t give a shit.

She kissed Natalie right there in the middle of the gate. Her heart was beating too hard, her entire body vibrated with the feeling that kissing Natalie Carpenter was the only thing that mattered to her.

She pulled back. “That was a good speech. I’m glad I asked to hear it.”

“Brave of you to ask for it knowing mine was obviously going to be better.” Natalie laughed.

Darcy rolled her eyes. “I love you. You are the most frustrating, amazing, sexy, infuriating woman I have ever known, and I love you so much I can’t think straight.”

Natalie half sighed, half laughed. She took Darcy’s hand. “I can live with that. I’m a pain in the ass, but I’m your pain in the ass.”

“Kiss her again!” someone yelled from behind them.

Darcy turned to find a two-mom family waving to them. One of their kids was wearing a Team Canada jersey.

Natalie grinned. “We better give them what they want, eh, Princess?”

“Shut up,” Darcy said before pressing her smiling lips against Natalie’s. “I can’t believe you’re coming home with me. You do know that there’s a big, stupid party at my parents’ house, right?”

Natalie smiled. “Yeah. I heard you weren’t too thrilled about having to go alone. I was hoping you’d let me be your date.”

Darcy kissed Natalie again. “I fucking love you.”

“I know,” Natalie said with a satisfied grin.