His crabbiness is a staple around town. He’s got a hard shell to him, but it doesn’t put me off. If anything, it sets me more at ease and gets me to open up.
“Yeah. A lot’s changing and the pressure’s on. This is my last year to make it in the draft. I’ll be above the age requirement before next season.”
“You’re the team captain this year, I hear. Lombard drinks with me down at the sports bar.”
“Yeah. I wasn’t expecting it, to be honest. I thought Reeves would’ve made a better captain.” I scrub my face. “And I just need to stay focused. This is when it counts most.”
“But you’re not focusing,” he surmises.
I duck my head when he levels me with an expectant look, lifting his bushy gray eyebrows. Sliding my lips together, I pinch the zipper on my duffel bag to tug it back and forth.
“I am, it’s just—there’s…a girl.”
“Uh huh. Always is.”
“Usually it’s not a problem, except I can’t stop thinking about her.” Warmth prickles through my chest. It’s strange to unload like this about feelings. Especially to him. “I never expected there to be anything in my life that could possibly rival my concentration on hockey, and I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Cannon narrows his eyes. “Holding back never did anyone any good.”
I blink, nodding at his advice. It gives me a new perspective I hadn’t considered. I’ve always drawn a line in the sand between me and the girls I’ve been with. No sleepovers. Keep it casual. No repeats if they think what we have is going anywhere, because I don’t let it go further.
But none of them have ever made me crazy the way Maya does. It was easy to hold back with them.
With her, I feel like I’m fighting against a whole team to skate towards the goal.
“Like game seven of the Stanley Cup the year before you retired where everything was riding on that win. Down in points until halfway through third period. Your hat trick tied it up and you won in overtime with a wicked assist.”
Cannon grunts in acknowledgement. That game solidified him as one of my favorite players. I look up to him. Hell, I picked my number because it was his.
“When it’s all on the line, you make it count,” he says.
The heaviness sitting on my shoulders lifts, leaving me lighter. “Thanks.”
“Sure, kid.” He rises to his feet with a restrained groan people his age make whenever they get up, stuffing his hands in the pockets of his jacket. “Buck up. I don’t want to see the Knights get your asses handed to you again on the ice.”
A laugh huffs out of me and I squeeze the back of my neck. “Yes, sir.”
While watching him continue his nightly walk, something Dad used to say to me filters through my thoughts.The players that seem like they have it all are the ones who put the work in, on the ice and off it to achieve their goals. At the time, I didn’t think much of it beyond remembering when to rest my muscles and when to put my all into practicing, but now it rings a little differently.
Having it all could mean I don’t have to draw any lines in the sand when it comes to Maya.
The thought is dangerous, taking root as soon as it slips through my mind. I picture her as something much more than a casual hookup. Coming to my games wearing my number to cheer me on, celebrating my wins with me at The Landmark, eating dinner with me and the guys followed by breakfast the morning after. All things I’ve never had with any other girl—an actual relationship.
I have Mom to talk to. My little brother, Asher, although he’s too young for topics like this. Coach and the assistant coaches. My boys. But it’s not the same. Sometimes I get hit square in the gut with how much I wish Dad were still here with me instead of the hole left behind in my heart after we lost him in the accident.
Five years isn’t enough to make the grief of losing him go away. It will probably always hurt that I lost my dad too soon. I try to be strong for Mom and Asher. It’s my job to take care of them now.
If he were, I think he’d be proud to see how far I’ve come, how hard I’m working to achieve what we both believed I could. Proud of the man I’ve grown to be. He’d want me to have it all.
Including the girl.
The corner of my mouth tugs up with a renewed sense of drive. Hell yeah.
NINE
MAYA
“We’re goingto be late! Let’s go. Come on, come on.” Reagan appears in the doorway to my room and claps her hands when she finds me sprawled across the bed.
