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Prologue
Craig
The morning begins just like every other morning has before it for the past year and a half. Being a twenty-one-year-old college student on a hockey scholarship allows me to lead a life that consists of the same things on a regular basis—hockey, parties, a bit of studying, and a lot of women.
Okay, so the long line of women might be a relatively new development for me—since my long-term girlfriend, Ella, dumped for me unknown reasons about four months ago—but they’ve become my favorite kind of distraction from what’s missing in my life.
Which just happens to be her.
But I’m almost finished my final year of college, and if my hockey career doesn’t take off right away, at least I will have a diploma in my hand, with the chance to earn my automotive technician licensing.
That’s the thing—not only am I a damn good stick handler, I’m also damn good with my hands, too.
Just ask the pretty blonde woman in my bed. She’s still passed out from the night before, and normally I still would be as well if it wasn’t for the dull headache starting to pulse in my head. I slip out of bed and pull my jeans on, finding them crumpled in a pile on the floor.
Wow, by the looks of things, she and I must have been pulling our clothes off from the moment we got in the door. My t-shirt is on the floor just inside the doorway, and her bra is slung over the chair by my desk on the other side of the room. Other articles of clothing are strewn haphazardly between those two points.
This dorm room must have been barely big enough to contain our lust last night.
It’s too bad I can’t remember it. Or her name, for that matter.
I know I should probably be ashamed of myself, but that would involve feeling something. Something other than the betrayal and pain from Ella’s departure. I can’t even call it a breakup because there was no breakup, just a note saying she was sorry and that this wasn’t how she wanted things to be.
Well, that makes two of us.
By then, she had already been to my dorm room and grabbed the few things she’d kept here for the nights she spent with me off and on throughout the school week, leaving the dorm key I’d given her on my nightstand and placing the note in the middle of my bed.
I tried to call her, but she changed her phone number.
I tried to track her down by calling her parents, but they wouldn’t tell me anything except that Ella didn’t want to see me and that I should respect that.
It’s hard to respect someone who leaves you with a written note of apology, though.
So, after almost two years of living a life that revolved around Ella Barker, I’ve managed to move on the only way I know how. More hockey, more partying, and more sex with women to try to take my mind off the pain that engulfs me when I’m sober.
The shrill ringing of a phone makes me squint my eyes in front of the bathroom mirror. I’ve just gotten the cap off the ibuprofen bottle and I’m shaking a couple of them into my hand when the sound assaults my ears.
“Are you going to get that?” A groggy voice speaks up from the bed.
I retreat from the bathroom, taking in the sight of the woman in my bed, still huddled under the covers like it’s a fortress from the annoyances of the world, only her head peeking out. Her blonde hair is tousled and there are dark circles under her eyes from mascara and lack of sleep.
Something knots in my gut. She’s pretty and can’t be older than twenty-one. She deserves so much better than the one-night stand she’s getting from me.
“Yeah,” I grunt. “Just give me a sec.”
She groans some kind of incoherent response, but I’m already popping the pills into my mouth and chasing them with water from the bottle on my nightstand, my eyes searching out the phone. Another loud ring alerts me to its location on the desk, and manage to answer it on the third ring, much to my bedmate’s frustration.
“Hello?” I don’t even bother to check the caller display, too eager to make the shrill sound stop reverberating through my head.
“Is this Craig Connelly?”
I don’t recognize the voice on the other end of the line. “It is. Who’s this?”
“My name is Marla, sir. I’m a nurse at the Richmond County General. I’ve been asked by Ella Barker to contact you—”
“What happened?” Every nerve ending in my body has begun to sizzle and snap with anxiety. My brain automatically conjures up numerous reasons for Ella and the local hospital to be associated with one another. “Is Ella okay?”
Her voice is even, controlled. She’s obviously been trained to deal with people on the verge of impending hysteria. “Ms. Barker has been in an accident, Mr. Connelly. She’s requested that we call you.”
An accident. “I asked you if she was okay,” I repeat, growing more assertive. And more worried.
More hesitation. “She’s currently conscious, Mr. Connelly, but it would be best if you could get here soon. We can fill you in on the details in person.”
There’s something in what she doesn’t say that scares me more than what she does. “I can be there in twenty minutes. I’m leaving now.”
“Take the elevator to the third floor,” she instructs me. “We’ll be awaiting your arrival.”
I toss the phone onto the foot of the bed just as the blonde woman under the covers pulls the blankets back and sits up slowly. “Everything all right?” she asks me, wiping her eyes with the back of her hands.
