Page 64 of Her Coach

I grinned as I took a stab at the shrimp. “Glad you like it.”

She cleared her throat after washing the food down with some wine. “I’ve always wanted to write a self-help book of sorts.”

About grief. “About what?”

“Grief,” she said, making me grin to myself, “Loss. You know, a book to help older kids who have joined the ‘dead dad’ club.”

“It’s a hard club to be in. Even if you don’t know the parent before they pass away.”

She held her hand out toward me. “Exactly. For someone like you, you’re just… born into it. You didn’t have any power or control over what happened.”

“Neither did you.”

“But you get what I’m saying, yeah? It’s like…why should we have to struggle with this thing that no book or person seems to really, genuinely understand?”

Her beauty, I found, was only second to her caring nature. “And you want to write a book to help close the gap in that market?”

She shook her head. “No. I want to write that book so people don’t have to struggle the way Mom and I have struggled.”

She went quiet for a second, stabbing at another shrimp. Then, like she hadn’t meant to say it out loud: “I even have a title. Have had it for years.” She shook her head softly. “Stupid, probably.”

“What is it?”

She looked up. “‘The Part Nobody Tells You.’ That’s what I’d call it.” She held my eyes for just a second before she reached for her wine. “Anyway.”

“That’s not stupid,” I said.

She didn’t answer. But she smiled down into her glass, and I filed it away.

I stabbed another shrimp and took a bite. “Is everything good between you and Victoria?”

Her brown eyes grew unfocused for a second, and I vowed not to bring her mother up for the rest of the night. “I’ll talk to her in the morning after she’s had some sleep.”

And just like that, I dropped the topic. “Fair enough.”

I expected the dinner to grow silent, like most did. But instead, Brynn plucked another shrimp off the plate with her fork for herself and peered at me from beyond her wine glass.

“Ready for the big game this weekend?”

I chuckled as the waiter brought out our food. I waited until he was gone before I answered. “We’re as ready as we will be. Though, I think the boys are struggling to sleep.”

She snickered. “I don’t blame them. When my dad coached the team⁠—”

“Your father coached hockey?”

She smiled brightly and nodded. “He played for them, actually. Back when they were still minor league. When his playing days were done he transitioned into coaching, and Mom bought the team so he could stay in the game. He coached them right up until he died.”

I searched her face for a while before turning her back to the conversation. “What did he do before the opening games? Did he have any rituals?”

That seemed to pull her out of her trance and her smile broadened. “He used to run them ragged during practice the day before, and then he’d bring them all to the bar for food before telling them to rest up. He swore up and down that the hard practice and the full belly helped them to rest.”

“I don’t doubt it.” And it wasn’t a half-bad idea, either. “What else did your father do with the team?”

I’d never seen a woman beam with such pride before she started in on all of the things her father did with the team back when he coached it. A man who played the game his whole life and then coached it until the day he died, with his wife buying the team just to give him that. That wasn’t a small thing. That was a whole life built around something he loved. Either way, it was a legacy I needed to understand if I was going to move this team forward. And if there were traditions he established, I’d like to revive those.

If for no other reason than to make her smile like that.

“He always bought new jerseys for every season,” she said, shaking her head, reliving the memories of her dad. “It drove Mom insane, him wanting to order and reorder jerseys for each season. We ended up with a room in our house that had nothing but those yearly jerseys mounted on the wall.”