"Good." His gaze flickers briefly toward Grentley, then to my brother Alder and a few others who were involved in the mess that played out in the media at the end of last season. Coach mutters something about character and admirable behavior off the ice.
The meeting wraps up, and I'm one of the first out the door, eager to get home and back to bed. I'm nearly to the parking garage when a voice stops me.
"Stag."
I turn to find Grentley following me, his expression unreadable. I paste on an exaggerated grin. "What's up, G?"
"I saw your little boat party yesterday," he says, no preamble. "All over social media."
I bristle instantly. "And?"
"And we just sat through a meeting about character and training. About representing the team with dignity."
"It was a tiki boat, not a coke bender,” I retort. "Since when are you the fun police?"
His jaw tightens. "Some of us take this job seriously. Some of us understand what it means to be a professional."
The condescension in his tone sparks something hot and defensive in my chest. Fuck this guy. “Some of us also understand that it's the off-season, and what I do with my free time is none of your fucking business."And you don’t even know the half of it, asshole.
"It is when your drunken antics reflect on all of us," he says coldly. "Some of us are trying to maintain a certain standard."
Before I can respond, Howie appears at my side. "Everything cool here?" he asks, glancing between us.
Grentley steps back. "Just a friendly reminder about priorities. Nothing to worry about."
"Great chat," I say through gritted teeth, hating his self-righteous attitude, trying not to blurt something shitty about driving his wife away. "Let's do it again, never."
He walks off without another word, his posture rigid, shoulders set in a straight line.
"What was that about?" Howie asks.
"Hell if I know. Guy's got a stick up his ass the size of a ketchup bottle.” I push through the door to the parking garage. "Always has."
But as I slide into my car, I can't shake the feeling of being judged, of falling short. It's a familiar sensation, one I've carried since I was the wild child among my more focused brothers, the enforcer on a team of skilled players, the Stag who seems perpetually out of step with the family legacy. Man, if Grentley only knew the whole truth.
And what’s worse is I can’t stop thinking about her. I am obsessed, and not because I’m bad or trying to get back at him. We connected, me and Sloane. There was a spark between us. A sizzle that had nothing to do with revenge or drama or anything other than two people, maybe meant to find one another.
I start the engine; the decision crystallizes. I'm going to find Sloane again. I'm going to show her—show everyone—thatthere's more to me than they think. That I'm worth a second look, a second chance.
My phone buzzes with a text from my agent about upcoming endorsement meetings, but I ignore it. That's the Tucker Stag everyone expects—the party boy, the entertaining loose cannon, the guy who sells socks and condoms with a wink and a smile.
But there's more to me than that. There has to be. And somehow, I'm going to prove it.
CHAPTER 7
SLOANE
I'm lost.Completely, totally lost.
The professor's voice washes over me like white noise as incomprehensible symbols fill the whiteboard. Statistical Analysis for Public Health seemed like a straightforward class to take, but fifteen minutes in, I'm already drowning. I glance around the lecture hall at my fellow students—most look fresh out of high school, furiously typing notes.
I stare down at my nearly blank notebook page. I've managed to write the date and "Statistical Analysis" at the top, followed by a single formula that might as well be written in Sanskrit.
"When we talk about standard deviation, we're discussing the dispersion of a dataset relative to its mean," the professor, Dr. Khan, explains. She clicks to the next slide in her presentation—a bell curve covered in Greek letters that makes my head spin.
I lean back in my seat and close my eyes briefly. What was I thinking? That I could just waltz back into academia after five years away and pick up where I left off?
I can’t imagine what I was thinking, leaving so close to finishing and then never actually doing so. I started college early and earned credits from my advanced government classes in high school. I was hot shit, academically. But then Josh had been drafted to play for Pittsburgh, and I'd been so sure that being with him was more important than my degree. I rememberpacking up my dorm room, giddy with excitement about starting our new life together. The glamour of being with a professional athlete, traveling to different cities, living in luxury—it had all seemed so romantic.
