Prologue
Cormac
* * *
“So, we’re agreed?” I asked. “We’re moving forward with the plan to fix Cruz’s relationship with the nurse from San Francisco?”
“Her name is Vivian,” Naese said. “And he met her last summer. From what Hana told me, they really hit it off, but then Cruz shut it down.”
It was early February, and we were gearing up, as our season seemed poised to transition into a playoff run. Our current record gave us a strong shot for the Stanley Cup, and we had gathered at my house today to strategize about changing up our play and our lines to maximize health and scoring potential. And eventually, we would get to that all-important tactical meeting. But I’d asked the core group of our team, my best friends, to come over early so we could sort out Cruz’s love life.
He'd played with the tenacity we expected from him this season, just sometimes with too much fervor—unusual for one of the steadiest men on the team. And he’d seemed defeated since Naese had announced his plan to marry Hana, which he’d now done. No one liked Cruz’s current funk, so we’d decided to solve the problem.
I studied the intense faces of my teammates Maxim Dolov, Luka Stol, and Paxton Naese, and coaches Kramer and Whittaker, as they considered my question, sprawled on a semi-circle of three large sofas in front of the fireplace I’d never used. Above it hung a large, flat-screen TV playing the sports station, muted. They were all big men. Our head coach, Silas Whittaker, was graying a little at the temples, but he, like the rest of my teammates, was of powerful build.
As I waited for a response, I picked up my glass—fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice and sparkling water—and took a long, refreshing drink. The rest of the guys had sports drinks or fresh-squeezed orange juice. We were all pretty good about our diets, particularly when our coaches were in the room with us.
I’d invited Coach Whittaker to this meeting because he likely knew Cruz’s history the best, though none of us was particularly well-versed in it. While Cruz was great about helping all of us with our lives, he rarely gave details about his, the shit bag.
But we were changing that—and we were going to help him.
After a moment, the heads all nodded, their lips pressed together in firm commitment.
“You won’t tell the ladies?” I asked, using my stern, team-captain voice.
This caused Naese, Maxim, Stolly, and Coach Adam Kramer—still weird to call him that since he’d been my teammate for so long—to falter. Their gazes dropped to their clasped hands or out the window as they shifted.
“I don’t like keeping secrets from Naomi,” Coach Kramer said, his brows tugging lower. “It’s a huge deal in our relationship, and I won’t intentionally break her trust.”
I nodded. “I get that, and I’m with you. Normally. But we found this woman for Cruz?—"
“We didn’t do shit. I did,” Naese said, narrowing his eyes.
“And I’m the one he’s talked to about her for months now,” I shot back. “I’m the one who found him all mopey at your wedding a couple of weeks ago and realized he’s totally in love with her. Granted, she doesn’t understand how he feels about her, but we do, and that’s why we’re using this information, and our closeness to Cruz, to make sure we close this deal for him.”
“He’s mentioned her to me, too,” Coach Whittaker said. That wasn’t surprising. Coach was like an older brother for the veterans on the team. I’d gone to him for advice more than once.
“Me, too,” Coach Kramer added. “You know, I don’t think he realizes how much he’s talked about her.”
“Which is why we have to fix this,” I stressed. “He’s not the same Cruiser, and I—we—want our guy back.”
“He’s playing with more anger,” Stolly said. “I watched the film again to make sure. He does his job, and does it really well, but when it came time to let the gloves fly, well, you saw.”
“I think so, too,” I said, glancing over at Coach.
He didn’t say anything. If he knew more, which I’d bet he did, he wasn’t going to break Cruz’s trust by telling us why our best D-man was throwing too many punches.
“You think he got another concussion?” Maxim asked. His scowl appeared frightening, but that was Maxim: intense. He and Cruz were our first line D-men, and Maxim was protective. Almost as protective as Cruz.
The rest of the players looked toward Coach Whittaker. He compressed his lips. “He hasn’t had a concussion this season.”
I raised an eyebrow. Coach was dancing around the answer. “But in the off season?” I pressed.
Coach hesitated again. “There was an incident.”
“And that incident included a concussion,” Maxim concluded. “As bad as he had a few years back?”
We all shifted, likely remembering the hard hit that had caused Cruz to crumple to the ice during an early season game the Wildcatters’ first year in the league. He’d seemed okay at first, even been able to give all the pertinent information to prove he was okay—but he wasn’t. The next few hours had been surreal as he’d faded in and out of reality, sometimes thinking he was back when he’d found out his brother Ruben had been killed in action. I shuddered.
