“What do you want, Rick?” she asked flatly.
“I saw that you were skating again, and I just decided I needed to make the trip to see you. You’ve matured nicely, Tessa. I’ve missed you.”
She watched as Homer climbed down from the stands, his gaze pensive as he sat some distance away from Rick, as though he didn’t trust him.
Don’t worry, Homer. I don’t trust him, either.
“You decided you had to see me after all these years? Why?” She felt her body tense.
“We had something together, Tessa. Maybe we gave it up too easily. I haven’t been able to find anyone like you again.”
Rage boiled inside her, a fury that she hadn’t realized still existed. “Oh, you mean after you kicked me out of your home and moved another woman in? Or after you dumped me at one of the lowest points of my life.”
“I loved you, Tessa. I just didn’t know how to deal with your handicap. But now that you can hear again—”
“No!” she shouted at him. For an instant, she was thrown back to the life they’d had together. It had been good, but only when she was his perfectly behaved, champion figure skater who was molded to be exactly as he wanted her. “I learned to deal with being deaf, and I am not handicapped. And I don’t need you anymore. I don’t think I ever did.”
“You’re right. You’re not handicapped now,” Rick pointed out. “Come back to me, Tessa. Things can be like they were before. We put a lot of years and a lot of work into our relationship. You can’t just forget that. I even still have your ring.” He pulled a small box out of his pocket and popped it open.
It was the diamond she’d worn on her finger, the very ring whose loss had made her finger feel bare and empty for quite some time after their breakup.
He must be between women if he came searching me out. Or no other woman but a naive eighteen-year-old would put up with him. What the hell? Does he think I’m still the trainable girl I used to be?
Tessa shuddered. The last thing she could imagine was going back to the way she was before. In this one area, her hearing loss had probably been a blessing. It had taught her what love wasn’t, and she hadn’t ended up married to the most selfish man on Earth.
“Funny, I seem to remember that you said we fell out of love,” she reminded him, portions of that last conversation with him floating through her brain, a discussion that had once hurt her so much.
“I know what I said, but I’m ready to take you back now.” His expression turned dark and irritated.
Tessa skated down to the wall opening, and Homer came to greet her. She patted the dog on the head and then took her skates off quickly, slipping on her shoes. Then, she stuffed the skates into the bag she’d brought with her and put the straps over her shoulder, ignoring Rick completely until she had to pass him on the way out.
He gripped her arm, keeping her from leaving. “Did you hear me? I said I’m ready to take you back.”
She had to hold back a laugh as she looked at his annoyed expression. Did he really think she’d go crawling back to him that easily? For what? Money? Honestly, he really was a dick. How had she never seen that before? How had she ever been with a man like him?
I was young and easily led because I knew nothing about relationships. My whole life revolved around skating. Then it also revolved around him.
She’d put just as much effort into pleasing Rick as she had the figure-skating judges, and she really had lost everything she was or could have been in the process. She had lost herself, any identity that she would have developed from her own ideas, her own experiences. Because she’d loved skating, she hadn’t minded trying to please the judges. With Rick, she’d had a choice, but she’d been convinced that she loved him, and she forgave herself for being a fool. Unfortunately, he didn’t seem to understand that she was all grown up now.
She shrugged out of his hold, and when he went to grab her arm again, Homer bared his teeth. By the frightened look on Rick’s face, she assumed her canine was giving him a warning growl.
She patted her thigh, and Homer came up beside her, walking at her side as she truly left her past behind. Her relationship with Micah might be finite, destined to end in the near future, but she realized she’d rather spend five minutes with Micah Sinclair than a lifetime of hell with somebody who didn’t give a damn about her.
Rick followed and came stomping out the door as she held it open for him, then shut it behind him to lock it.
His expression was outraged as she looked at him in the sunlight. “You’re making a big mistake, Tessa. Women would kill to be my wife.”
“I might kill you if I was your wife,” she shot back. “You’re a controlling, pretentious bastard who treats women like they’re garbage. I’m not the same woman I was back then, thank God.” She waved him off. She was done. “Go find yourself a woman who values the same things you do. I don’t.”
She started walking toward her car with Homer before she called over her shoulder, “By the way, I’m still deaf, but I’m definitely not handicapped. I’ve just realized that I can still skate with or without my hearing. Now go back to Boston. There’s nothing here in Maine for you.”
He’d have much better luck in a bigger city finding another gullible girl. Tessa was already pitying any woman who hooked up with him.
She never looked back as she drove away, but she did smile as Homer licked her face and then settled into his seat.
She got a text later in the day from Julian, letting her know that he was due to land shortly with Xander in tow. He asked if she could possibly go to Evan’s guesthouse to make sure there was no alcohol or pills in the residence.