She was smiling the whole time.
Chapter 5
Saturday morning arrived with the kind of crisp, clear cold that made Jake grateful for the heated rink. By 6:30 AM, he was already on the ice with Emma Rodriguez and the rest of the youth hockey crew, running them through drills that would have been ambitious for players twice their age.
Emma nailed the spin move on her third try, stopping in a perfect spray of ice.
"Did you see that, Coach Jake? Did you see?"
"I saw. That was perfect."
"Can I show my dad? He's up in the stands."
Jake glanced toward the bleachers where a handful of parents sat with their morning coffee, watching their kids skate. Emma's dad—a dentist named Mike who'd introduced himself three weeks ago—waved.
"Go ahead. Take five."
Emma skated off, and Jake found himself checking his phone. 7:15 AM. Practice would wrap at 8, which gave him thirty minutes to get home, shower, and meet Lucy at 8:30.
His stomach did something complicated.
This wasn't a date. Lucy had been clear about that when she'd texted him last night to confirm:Looking forward to farmers market research tomorrow!
Research. Right. Because they were both professionals who needed to investigate local produce suppliers. Nothing romantic about it.
"Coach Jake!" Owen appeared at his elbow, somehow having volunteered for youth hockey duty despite the fact that he was barely old enough to buy beer. "Can I ask you something?"
"If it's about hockey, yes. If it's about anything else, probably not."
"It's about hockey. Kind of." Owen shifted his weight, looking uncharacteristically nervous. "That scout who's coming to our game tonight—do you ever get nervous? Like, knowing someone's watching specifically to judge you?"
Tonight. Right. The Nashville scout would be there, watching Jake play, evaluating whether Jake Morrison at twenty-eight was worth an NHL roster spot.
Jake had been trying not to think about it.
"All the time," Jake admitted.
"Really? But you're so calm during games. Nothing rattles you."
"Being calm and being nervous aren't mutually exclusive." Jake watched Emma show her dad the spin move, both of them grinning. "You know what helps?"
"What?"
"Remembering why you started playing in the first place. Not for scouts or stats or contracts. Just because you loved it."
Owen was quiet for a moment. "Do you still love it?"
The question hit harder than it should have. Did Jake still love hockey? Or had it become just another routine, another thing he did because he'd always done it?
"I'm figuring that out," Jake said honestly.
Tommy's whistle cut through the rink. "All right, wrap it up! Final drill!"
The kids gathered at center ice, and Jake led them through one last exercise—a relay race that was more about fun than fundamentals. Emma's team won by half a second, and she celebrated like she'd just won the Stanley Cup.
This, Jake thought.Thiswas why he'd started playing. The pure joy of it. The way it felt to move across ice with complete freedom.
When had he forgotten that?
