Elite ballerina Allie Rousseau is no stranger to pressure. With her mother’s eyes always watching, perfection was expected, no matter the cost. But when an injury jeopardizes all she’s sacrificed for, Allie returns to her summer home to heal and recover. But the memories she’s tried to forget rush in and threaten to take her under.
As a Coast Guard rescue swimmer, Hudson Ellis knows that hesitation can mean the difference between life and death. He’s always prided himself on being in the right place at the right time, especially when it came to Allie Rousseau…until the night he left for basic. After the biggest regret of his life, the secrets he keeps mean he can never be with the one woman he wants more than his next breath.
When Hudson’s niece shows up on Allie’s doorstep, desperate to find her birth mother, Allie finds herself in an unimaginable position. Allie and Hudson’s past and present might be endlessly complicated. The thread that tied them to each other all those years ago may have unraveled, but the truth could pull them back together, or drive them apart forever.
Why You Should Read This Book
Tropes
Trigger Warnings
Variation
“If that means I have to watch from a distance as she lives her life without me, then it fucking sucks, but so be it. I love her enough to let her go.”
“I’m done trying to prove myself to you, pushing myself until I break, tearing my body to shreds, done trying to win your approval like it’s some kind of game where you keep moving the goalposts. I’m done. I have loved you, worshipped you, idolized you my entire life, but I no longer want your approval. Whatever I do from here on out is for me.”
“You look like a fucking dream, Allie. Truly breathtaking.”
“Hudson, do me a favor and at least say goodbye to her this time before you go, would you? It would be a shame for me to go to jail for acting on a decade’s worth of intrusive thoughts when it comes to your demise.”
“Hudson might be the baddest motherfucker alive to the US Coast Guard, but you put Allie Rousseau in a room with him and he’ll trip over his own feet.”
“I’m not breaking up with Allie. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not ever, if I get a say. Letting her go was the worst mistake I’ve ever made in my life, and I’ll be damned if your inability to pull your head out of your ass is going to cost me the only chance I have with her.”
“I meant what I said. Every word of it. And if you want to use someone for an escape, then it’s me you’ll be using. Sure, I’d like you to fuck me because you need me, but I’ll take you however I can get you, Allie.”
“So while sure, it makes me jealous that there are a couple of guys here who have seen you naked, I actually feel sorry for them because they’ll never have you again. But I will. First means nothing. Last means everything.”
“I cared about you. That was a mistake I never made again. Sex is fun—necessary, even—and keeping the same partner allows for a certain level of comfort I prefer. But I don’t get jealous because I don’t get attached.”
“There’s no one else. Never was. Not for either of us. They were all just placeholders.”
“Truth always differs depending on who’s telling the story, and in complicated situations, there are countless variations. But when it comes to that summer, in every single variant, I’m the asshole who wasn’t strong enough to hold on to her.”
“You know, Allie’s walls were about six feet high as a teenager, just short enough for me to peek over. I was never foolish enough to think she let me all the way in, not with the way you Rousseau girls keep secrets for each other. But now, those walls are thick as hell and easily twenty feet tall, if not more, which is fine—I know how to climb—but we both know those bricks aren’t all because of me.”
“Oh, and as for Hudson, he’s built like a Greek god and fucks like one, too, so I’m all taken care of.”
“You have to stop dating those dancers. If you can’t tell someone’s working their ass off for you, then they don’t deserve you.”
“I’m the one who needs you. I need you, I always have.”
“You broke my heart. Maybe we were just friends, but you broke my heart.”
“Mom says Uncle Gavin is prone to stupidity, but you’re supposed to be the one who does the right thing.”
“So what? Until now, I’ve only dated women I knew wouldn’t ask for a ring. Things change, and I don’t give a shit who she’s dated before, because she’s with me now.”
Subscribe to Late Night Reads Weekly Newsletter
Get early access to our TBR list, podcast episodes, bonus content, irresistible book recommendations, and so much more!
