Aelin blinked, her eyes suddenly swimming. She needed to say something, to act normal, but her throat felt like it was clamped with a chip clip.
“I’ll be right here on the porch.” Ryan’s voice floated down the hall. Thank heavens he wasn’t still standing in front of her. Aelin grabbed a tissue and pressed it to the corner of her eyes.
A second later, Bailey rounded the corner and threw her arms around Aelin’s waist. “Love you, mom.”
“Love you.” Her words were more of a breath than a whisper as she clutched her daughter to her chest. “Have a great day at school.”
Bailey ran back to the front door, and Aelin didn’t say a word about her running through the house with her shoes on. She strode directly to the back door and opened the garage.
She did not pass GO.
She did not collect two hundred dollars.
Chapter
Three
This would all bea lot simpler if you weren’t so difficult and exhausting to love.
Ryan chewed on the text message he’d seen pop up on Aelin’s phone. He hadn’t meant to look, but it was hard not to with a message like that.
With Bailey mentioning going to her dad’s house and Aelin on her way to the lawyer’s, it didn’t take a genius to figure out Aelin had to be going through a divorce. Still. What an asshole.
Aelin had disappeared through the garage before he had a chance to ask her about locking up. He left the door open for the time being, just so he could use the washroom if he needed. He wasn’t going to go tromping through a stranger’s house, though he had to admit, this stranger had piqued his curiosity.
The WiFi password alone. And the towel.
He felt like an idiot for spouting off about her parenting and asking if she was the damn nanny. Clearly, the universe had decided he was worthy of falling into one of his teenage fantasies, and it had taken him all of five seconds to screw it up.
Ryan sat back down on the porch swing and clicked the Zoom link. His screen populated with a message telling him to wait for the host to start the meeting. Tom Beech. He worked outof the head office in Vancouver. This parking garage was a massive project, made more difficult with the ribbons of clay that ran through Calgary soil. Not a surprise that he wanted to be updated.
He leaned back and checked the time on his watch. Five more minutes. He picked up his phone and swiped to his messages. There were seventeen notifications from his brother, his mother-in-law, and Tyler’s girlfriend’s sister who he’d been invited to double date with the week before. He ignored them and started with the team chat, scrolling to the last message he sent.
I need to get back to the rink on start times. Thoughts?
Brett:
I'm not dragging my ass out of bed at five in the morning to make it to the rink at six.
Sean:
School’s out in a week and a half, dumbass. We don’t need to start that early
Ryan laughed. He typed out a message.
Just let me know what you want for the younger group. 8-12yo will be from 3:30-6
Tyler:
That works. Starting July 2?
That’s the plan. We’re already full that first week
He set his phone down. They’d been trying to start up a hockey camp for kids for the past two years, but getting ice time between peewee practices, figure skating, and general skates was like trying to get a parking spot at Lake Louise.
Now things were finally lining up. Brett and Sean were taking the younger group since their work was more flexible. He and Tyler were taking the older kids. All the other guys on the team were filling in where they could.
He’d already arranged with work to come in early for the three weeks they were offering the camp. Then the last week of July he’d booked off to spend with Amaya. It had been over a year since they’d last gone on a trip that wasn’t visiting family.
