My father couldn’t make it to the ceremony. He wasn’t allowed to leave Illinois while awaiting his sentencing, but he’d sent me a nice voice mail congratulating me on my achievement. Then in the same breath, he had asked me to reconsider showing up as a character witness for his sentencing, due to happen in a week. Always with the ulterior motive.
The door opened and my eyes immediately flew to the entrance. Jason walked in with Theo and his sister-in-law, Elle. He waved at me, but his attention was immediately snagged by one of his classmates.
When I’d asked Alexei if his father would attend his graduation, he had shrugged and said, “it is unlikely.” I had hoped he’d be here, so I could introduce him to my family. Let him know that he wasn’t alone. But perhaps that was Jason’s job, not mine.
My phone buzzed with a message from the man himself.
Alexei
Meet me outside. The alley.
He wasn’t coming in? Panic made my hands itchy.
“I need to hit the bathroom,” I said to my family, and I headed to the restrooms’ corridor. I walked to the bar’s emergency exit, which I knew from experience was not alarmed because the staff needed unfettered access for smoke breaks. I pushed through and looked around.
He was waiting on the other side of the dumpster. Our spot.
Yatesy, you are such a sap.
“Hey!” I moved toward him, unsure about how to greet him. A kiss? A high five?
He pulled me into his arms and hugged me. It felt so good, yet there was something else. A hesitancy I couldn’t define.
After a long pause, he pulled back. He looked absolutely gorgeous in his suit, as if he was already part of the professional hockey world. No sign of his cap and gown, though.
“Congratulations on graduating, Silver Eyes.”
“You, too,” I whispered. “Why don’t you come inside?”
“I have to leave.”
“Leave?”
“I must return to Moscow. My father is ill.”
I gripped his upper arms. “Alexei! Why didn’t you tell me?”
He shook his head. “I just found out. I’m not sure when I’ll return, and when I do, I will be in Miami.”
Right. It seemed so far away, both time and distance. But it didn’t have to be. “You never know, I might end up there.”
No reaction, just pure Russian stoicism. The response, when it came, was flat, lifeless:
“It would be easier if you didn’t.”
Oh. Here I was trying to pretzel my life around his. Absolutely pathetic.
I dropped my hands and stepped back. My chest felt like the cavity had been scooped out. “Got it.”
He winced at my candid assessment. Tough tatas, Nazarov.
“Lauren, I hope we can be friends. But anything more …” He left it hanging.
“No, I get it. I do.” It wasn’t as if we would see each other much, as both of us headed into the pros. He would end up playing three times as many games as me, and even if we were both in Miami, our schedules would rarely align.
Now I prayed I would be drafted by Chicago. Ending up in the same city as him would be torture.
But tonight, I could be gracious. There would be time later to more thoroughly calcify my bruised heart. “You should come in anyway. It’s a night to celebrate, right?”
