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Her eyebrows scrunched together in concern.
“I get it. He wants to establish his relationship with her, and that’s priority, but then he still does things that are relationship-y, and it kind of messes with my head and makes me all hopeful.” I shrugged. “I just have this feeling that he’s the one for me, so I guess I just need to be patient.”
She twisted her lips in thought. “I wouldn’t stress at all then. Love connections, soulmates, whatever you wanna call them, they don’t expire, ya know? Just look at me and Duke. I think I knew I was supposed to be with him when we were like seven years old, but sometimes that’s hard because you both have to grow and change and make your way back to each other.”
I nodded. I just already had an amazing little taste of what it’d be like together, and I really hoped it wouldn’t take that long for us to make it official again…
Right off the bat, I could tell it was going to be a rough game. The Crewmen couldn’t get anything done because Carolina’s defense was just too good– they couldn’t even break into the offensive zone at all.
Late in the first period, Tyler took a beating in the corner and blood gushed from his nose.
Stevie jumped in her seat at the shock of the hit, then looked at me cautiously, like she was judging my face to see whether or not she should be nervous, so I had to keep it together and act like it wasn’t a big deal. But watching him gag because of the blood as he skated back to the bench made me a little worried.
37. Tyler
We were getting killed out here. I briefly glanced over at our family section and ground my molars. My daughter’s first home game and it was going to be a complete and utter failure.
Dropping my head down, I stared at my skates and tried to catch my breath.
“Their D is nasty,” Duke said beside me, squirting some water in his helmet. “Got any ideas?”
I watched the next shift in silence, but my eyes kept drifting to Josie and Stevie, both wearing my jersey.
“Jettersen! Is there a reason you’re staring all googly-eyed at my daughter?” Coach shouted at me.
Fuck.I snapped my head forward.
My teammates were thankfully smart enough to keep their mouths shut. But I couldn’t completely wipe the grin from my face, because the perfect idea just came to mind.
My next shift out, I rounded Griff and Duke over to me before the puck drop. “Okay guys, I have a plan.”
“Thank fuck,” Duke breathed out.
“Okay, so Griff, when you take the faceoff, don’t even fight it, let their center win and put it behind him where he wants it.” Griff’s face twitched, he hated losing face-offs, so I knew this play was a big ask. “Then scoot around him, get to the puck, pass it right over to Duke cutting through the center for a shot.”
Griff paused for a split-second, thinking it over. His serious eyes cut to mine. He nodded. “Worth a shot.”
Duke tapped both our helmets. “Let’s go, boys!”
We lined up for the face-off, and as soon as the puck dropped, their center moved to snap it back, and Griff was already maneuvering around him for the puck. He quickly did his best to wiff it over to Duke who was perfectly lined up for a quick one-timer. A second later, their unprepared goalie looked stunned as the goal light went off.
My guys pummeled into me for a hug instead of Duke, the actual scorer.
“Holy shit. It worked! Did you just come up with that? You’re a hockey genius, dude,” Duke shouted.
“No, it wasn’t me,” I laughed. “It was Kennedy Sky.”
Griff’s eyebrows knit together. “Wait, like, the romance author? My wife reads those.” His eye bugged out. “You had me lose a face-off because of some writer chick?!”
“Yes!” I laughed, tapping his helmet.
“Dude, you can read?!” Duke cackled.
“Yes!” I shouted excitedly.
We were all smiling maniacally as we skated back to the bench to knuckle punch the rest of the boys.
After our shift, Griff pulled Coach aside and whispered in his ear.
