“Listen, my timing may not be awesome here, and I can wait as long as you need to. But the reason cannot be Luke. You do not owe him that, and neither do I.”

“He’d lose his mind, Blair.”

“I already told him,” Blair says quietly.

“You told him what?” My heads spins.

“How I feel about you. This is not new for me, Katie. Do you really think I’d have come here like this if I hadn’t? He’s an idiot, but he’s still my brother.”

“What did he say?”

“He was pissed. He didn’t talk to me for three weeks.”

I wish I could say that it doesn’t mean anything to me that Luke still cares, but it does.

“When he cooled down, we kept talking. If I could have just gotten over it, I would have a long time ago. Katie, you had to have known, at least a little.”

And of course I had, but it had been too complicated to even look at. Sometimes, denial keeps us from seeing the good as effectively as it does from seeing the bad.

“I wouldn’t exactly say he’s given me his blessing, but he’ll get over it eventually.”

“Well, glad you two got that whole thing all sorted out.”

“That’s not what I mean and you know it.”

The fact that Blair even felt he could broach the topic with Luke makes me realize something I’ve probably known on some level for a long time. Luke was checked out of our relationship long before he ended it, and if I think he was faithful all that time while he was traveling the world and I was home falling apart, I’m kidding myself. Maybe that was when he met her, the new girl, whoever she is.

“Just come home. I understand that you needed to get away. I know it’s been hard, but you have a life back home, a career.”

“Not anymore I don’t.”

“You could get it back if you wanted to. Everyone misses you.”

I shake my head. “This shit with Penny, it broke my brain, it broke me.”

“You have access to the best sports psychologists in the country, Bomber, if you want them. But look, if you don’t want to go back to racing, then don’t. There was always going to be an after. I’m going to be lucky if I have two more seasons, there’s no way I’m making Sochi. We all have to move on at some point. Life’s not over when skiing ends.”

“What will you do? The school?”

Blair smiles. “My dad is already signed on as an investor.”

“That’s awesome, Blair, honestly.”

“And I mean if you wanted to be part of it, I . . .”

“Blair.” I can’t let him project this impossible future onto me, it’s too painful. “I’m pregnant.”