His mouth opened. Closed. “That feels like a HIPAA violation.”
“That’s not what HIPAA is.”
“Tessa is still terrifying.”
“Yes.”
He scrubbed both hands down his face, then seemed to remember where I’d told him to keep them. He dropped them back onto his thighs without being prompted.
That quiet correction hit harder than defiance would have.
“I can’t do tonight,” he said.
“You can.”
“I’m not saying I have dinner plans. I’m saying standing in a ballroom for four hours while everyone talks at me and cameras keep popping off sounds like hell.”
The honesty in it slowed me down.
I should have adjusted. Offered an alternative. Sent him home with a list and a check-in time.
Instead, my voice lowered. “You won’t be there alone.”
His eyes held mine.
The words sat between us, too intimate for an office with a team logo on the wall and his phone on my desk.
I opened the event folder. “You arrive at six. Black suit. Tie. Tessa will give you talking points. You’ll sign jerseys, take photos with the kids, speak to two sponsor reps, and stay through the auction unless Tessa clears you earlier.”
Jace’s gaze dropped to my mouth for half a second and snapped away. “You’ll be there?”
“Yes.”
His fingers flexed on his thighs.
“No games tonight,” I said.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“Coach, there are always at least seven things I’m about to say. Most of them are terrible.”
“Tonight is public. Staff, players, sponsors, families. You keep yourself together.”
He gave a short nod. “And if I can’t?”
“Find me.”
The answer left my mouth before I could make it colder.
Jace looked at the phone on my desk, then back at me. “Okay.”
By six-thirty that evening, I knew I had made the right decision for the wrong reasons.
The Weston ballroom was packed with donors, youth hockey families, local media, sponsor executives, players in suits, wives, girlfriends, staff, and children in oversized Blizzard jerseys cutting between adults with miniature sticks they had been told at least twelve times not to swing indoors.
Jace was flawless.
