That had his nieces squealing and kicking their boots against the front seat.
“Daddy has a team dinner tonight,” Emira announced. “He’s probably going to that early so he can eat the most food.”
Right. The team dinner.
Not only was Eren not coming home early, but August also wouldn’t be around if Quinn showed up at his house.
He took a deep breath to settle his nerves and tightened his hands on the steering wheel.
August was okay. Niko told him he was okay.
Quinn had two girls who were depending on him for food, homework and nighttime routines, so now that he knew August wasfine, he had to do his job.
Besides, he would see August play against Toronto the next night, so he wouldn’t have to wait long to talk to him.
Quinn could handle one night of not talking to August. He wasn’t completely hopeless.
He turned in his seat and smiled at the girls. “Do you guys want to order pizza and watch movies?”
Excited cheers solidified his plans for the rest of the night, so Quinn sighed and surrendered.
Tomorrow. He would see August tomorrow.
August wasn’t there.
He wasn’t at the game, and Quinn didn’t know what that meant.
He had asked for two seats behind the Bigfoot’s bench for him and Bea so he could at least see August during the game, but he hadn’t come out with his team. Quinn was left sitting on his own until Bea showed up, and by then, his heart was pounding in his ears so deafeningly that between that and the cheers from the spectators, he could barely hear himself think.
The moment Bea appeared, Quinn sent her a pleading look, begging her to tell him what she knew.
Her answering frown said everything he needed to know.
“He’s off for personal reasons,” said Bea. “Logan doesn’t know a lot, and the guys don’t like to gossip about their teammates. I know he’s okay, but he might be gone for a week.”
A week?!
“He’s still not answering my texts,” said Quinn. “And I tried calling him, but he won’t pick up the phone.”
Bea touched his arm, and Quinn didn’t miss how her gaze flicked to Logan on the bench. “Maybe it’s a family thing. You said he looked at his phone before he ran, right? What if someone he knew passed away?”
That was also a possibility, and Quinn would accept that with no issues if it were the case, but the way August was avoiding him didn’t feel right.
He had gotten used to the daily conversations with August, even if Quinn couldn’t respond right away because he was in class or his hands were covered in paint. Since Toronto, August had made a point of sending him messages about artwork he found interesting, thrift stores he wanted to visit, and, of course, hockey.
August always seemed happy to hear from him, and he always texted back soon after Quinn messaged him. So, to go from that to being left on read for hours meant something was wrong.
To make matters worse, Niko had ignored him during the warm-up and was refusing to meet Quinn’s eyes. He had tried waving to the younger player, but Niko kept his head bent during a nail-biting first period against Jett, and he showed no signs that he was willing to communicate.
“I have a really bad feeling,” said Quinn.
“Quinn—”
Quinn was on his feet and squeezing past Bea before she could stop him. He didn’t know where he was going, but the first period buzzer was about to go off, and he needed to talk to Eren—to Niko—
Toanyone.
Frantic waving from the Toronto bench made Quinn pause his mad dash, and he ignored the grumbling of the man whose seat he was standing in front of as he locked eyes with Jett Killinger.
