He finally pulled the buzzing phone from his pocket. “What are you doing?”
“I’m calling Deb and asking her to hire someone to answer your damn phone.”
I knocked his hand away from the screen. “Don’t be an idiot.”
“I’m serious.” There was a bite to his voice that told me he was, in fact, serious. “If that’s what it takes to keep you from hearing her voice, that’s what we’re going to do.”
“It’s not really a big?—”
He glared at me. “Don’t tell me it’s not a big deal. You get upset every time you talk to her. I’ve seen you after you’ve been on the phone with that woman.”
I bit down on my bottom lip, hard. I wanted to tell him that she was my mother. That of course I would find it upsetting to talk to her after the way she treated us. But that didn’t make it any easier to completely cut her out of my life.
But I didn’t say any of that because I knew exactly what his response would be. He would tell me that it hadn’t been at all difficult for him to cut her out. He’d tell me I just needed to be tougher. And maybe he would be right—maybe it was my own thin skin that allowed me to be hurt by her over and over again. But I’d never been too successful at toughening up.
“Hey,” he said, his voice soft, and I realized he was once again searching my face. “I’m sorry. I just hate seeing you upset. She isn’t worth it, Ace. You know that, right?”
I nodded. But somehow, knowing that had never made it much easier.
His voice turned firm, colder. “We have everything we need right here. Jobs we love, good friends.” He squeezed my hand. “The only family that matters.”
I grinned over at him, all of my tension about our mom wiped away just like that. It wasn’t very often my brother got sentimental and I could tell by the rough set of his clenched jaw that he hadn’t enjoyed it much. But he’d done it anyways. For me.
I leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Thanks for the beignets, little brother.”
“Thanks for the coffee.”
“Any big plans today? Do you want to catch a movie or do you have world conquering to do at the office?”
His grin turned mischievous. “Actually, I’m heading over to the arena to officially meet the team. You wanna come with me? Since, you know, you have no long-lasting feelings for any of my new players.”
I glared at him and he laughed, throwing an arm around my shoulder. “Come on, big sis. I want to show off my fancy arena. I promise you won’t have to talk to any former flames.”
“He was never a flame.”
“Is that a yes?”
I sighed, crumpling up my sugary napkins. “Fine. Let’s go see your shiny new toy.”
CHAPTER 5
Two hours after successfully showing Josie the new house, I wasn’t quite so enthusiastic about the move. I sat in my parked car in the player’s lot at Knight Arena, wondering what I could expect when I went inside. From out here, the place looked top of the line. If I knew anything about Andrew Knight, he wouldn’t have spared any expense in making his own hockey arena. I was sure the facilities inside would be just as swanky as the glass fronted building appeared to be. The guy had always been a smug little show-off on the ice.
The facilities weren’t what had me feeling anxious. It was the team itself. Since the trade went through, the logistics of a cross-country move occupied most of my brain space. Now that I’d finally gotten Josie down here and settled in the new house, I let myself think about the team and everything that had happened.
There were few people in the league—and even fewer people in the media—who believed we had much of a shot at success. My high school coach, Levi Newton, who I still talked to regularly and considered a mentor, had called me after the trade became public to wish me luck. He’d tried to put on a good front—his positivity was one of the things that made him my favoritecoach ever—but I could tell even he was feeling bad for me getting stuck in this mess.
There was just too much baggage with the Atlanta team and the sale and move had happened so quickly it was hard to see how things were going to improve much any time soon.
It had been more than a year ago that the hockey world was rocked by the sudden arrest of Frank Manchin, the owner of the Atlanta Blades. The feds indicted him on all kinds of charges from tax evasion to insider trading. Most damning of all, they alleged that the hockey team was little more than a cover for his money laundering schemes. Big names in team management—including the GM—had been indicted within weeks of Manchin’s arrest. Several players had even been caught up in it. The entire thing was a mess.
The NHL had promptly taken over the team while bankruptcy proceedings began. There were rumors floating around that they were going to put the franchise on hiatus, something that hadn’t been done in the league in almost a hundred years.
Caught up in the whole mess were the players. Not a single free agent elected to stay with the team. Who would blame them? Many of the guys who were trapped in long-term contracts demanded trades. No one wanted to be a part of a sinking ship and the ongoing federal investigation in Atlanta, the NHL imposed budget freeze, losing their GM to racketeering charges, and the constant hounding of the press was enough to make anyone wish to be anywhere else but Atlanta.
Enter Andrew Knight. He made an offer on the team, even agreeing to clear out a huge chunk of the debt the league had been forced to take on. That, I was sure, was the prime reason the board of governors allowed the sale in time for the new season. Throw enough money around and you’re more than likely to get your own way.
I hadn’t seen Andrew in years, not since we’d been seniors in college. We’d been competitive our entire lives, from our peewee squad in St. Paul right up through a head-to-head matchup in the Frozen Four our junior year of college. I’d expected to face off against him in the big leagues as well—Knight had been drafted the same year as me, only three spots lower, but a wicked knee injury in senior year kept him from ever lacing up in a professional game.
