Fallon took in a sharp breath. What did he mean?

“I was extremely drunk and high when I came to your dorm that night. Allison came on to me, and I…” he shrugged his shoulders as he looked away.

“Slept with her.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t mean to or want to for that matter. I just missed you so much and I was horny. It was bad and I was really f**ked up.”

Fallon pushed her burrito off her lap, and brought her knees up under her knee. “Why, Lucas?”

“Why what?” he asked, looking back at her.

“Why did you start it? Was it before me? Or during?”

“Before, when my dad died,” he said sadly. It pulled at Fallon’s heart strings. She hated that he had to go through losing his father. “That was what caused it. I didn’t deal with his death the right way. I didn’t get the help I needed. I was young and stupid and I didn’t know how to make the pain stop,” he said, and Fallon could tell he was embarrassed. “I never meant for it to get as bad as it was. I know now that nothing could have helped me until I admitted I needed the help.”

“I never knew,” Fallon said as her heart ached. How could she love someone so thoroughly and not know that he was dying inside? That he had to resort to alcohol and drugs to make it through his days. Was she not enough? Could she not make him better?

“I wouldn’t let you see that side of me. It was bad enough that you knew I couldn’t read. I couldn’t tell you that I had an issue with drinking or popping pills too. I couldn’t imagine what you would think of me.”

“I would have loved you and helped you through it.”

“I know that now, but Fallon, I was so embarrassed”

Fallon nodded. “I understand that you were embarrassed, Lucas, but you made me believe that I was your everything. We planned a life together.”

“I know and you don’t know how much I regret throwing it away.”

Fallon nodded again, her heart beating in overtime. It was all such a shock; she would have never suspected it. He didn’t act like a drunk. He wasn’t hung over all the time. He functioned just fine. How could she not know? “When did you get help?”

“Five years ago.”

“So two years after I left?”

“After you left I got worse,” Lucas said looking out towards the ocean. “The Sharks told me to get help or they weren’t going to renew my contract.”

Fallon took in a sharp breath. “It got worse?”

“I got careless and starting drinking all the time. At one point, my mom and Levi said they would leave me too if I didn’t get my shit together,” Lucas said with sadness in his voice. “I couldn’t lose my mom too. I had lost you and my dad, I couldn’t lose her.”

Fallon didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know what to do. She could just sit there, in completely shock. Molly threatened to leave her baby? It must have been horrible. Lucas must have been out of control. She couldn’t believe it. She had never heard anything in the news, not that she followed the sport but still, Audrey would have said something when she said that Lucas was Aiden’s dad.

“I never heard anything about it.”

Lucas shrugged his shoulders. “Levi can hide anything. He’s an ass but he is damn good at his job.”

Fallon nodded, and when his eyes met hers, she knew that he saw the shock and sadness in her eyes. “I went to rehab for a year and have been sober for the last four years.”

Fallon raised an eyebrow because she was confused. If he had only been sober four years, what happened to the other one? As if he knew what she was thinking he said, “I don’t count that year I was in rehab, I had to be sober to be in there.”

Fallon shook her head, it was just so unreal. “I never wanted to hurt you Fallon. I loved you, so much, but it was bound to happen. I was bound to f**k up, I was too far gone.”

Fallon shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know what to say.”

“There really isn’t anything you can say. I just wanted you to know what happened, why I did it. I don’t remember anything from that night. I only remember a little of our fight afterwards.”

Fallon tried to process what he had said. Then she looked up, her lips wobbling as she asked, “Could I have helped?”

Lucas shook his head. “No baby. I was too far gone.”

Tears sprang to Fallon’s eyes. She had spent the last seven years thinking she had done something wrong — that she had made him cheat — when really he was messed up. He was sick and she should have known. There had to have been signs or something telling her that he was suffering. Did she not ask? Was she that blind?

“Talk to me baby, tell me what you are thinking,” Lucas said, taking her hand in his. She looked down at their hands before looking up at his face.

“I feel like I failed you in a way. I should have known.”

Lucas started shaking her head before she even got the sentence out. “I hid it. No one knew. I was 18 years old with vodka in my Gatorade bottle on the bench; no one suspected anything from me. They babied me because of my dad dying. You can’t feel like you failed me. You didn’t baby, I failed you.”

Fallon felt like she couldn’t breathe and she fumbled with the words she wanted to say. She still wasn’t processing what he was saying, it all seemed so unreal. “I was so blind.”

Lucas scrunched his face up. “I don’t think so.”