A huge smile overtook Michaels’s face. “Really?”
“I’m sure no one has ever called dibs on me,” he muttered.
“Actually, I was calling them on your behalf,” Mati said.
Michaela cracked up as she ushered them to her spot on the bleachers. “I want to hear all about it.”
They settled in their seats, Michaela and Mati catching up while the teams warmed up and Reese let the rink air cool his cheeks. He noticed David the moment he stepped onto the ice, mesmerized as he glided across the smooth surface and stopped next to Kieran and Chance. He washugein his gear, even next to Chance.
Kieran looked like their little brother in comparison—an observation Reese wouldn’t share with the man in question if he wanted to live.
He frowned as he searched the faces of the other men in blue. “Where’s Lachlan?”
“Oh, he’s not a McCormick Maverick.” Michaela gestured at the team in dark red at the other end of the ice. “He’s the captain of the Harvard Squares.”
Mati laughed. “That’s the name of his team?”
“Kieran came up with it when Lachlan managed to recruit several more PhDs. Some of them aren’t Harvard guys, so they object, but the name has stuck.”
“Your husband is captain of one team, and Chance, his brother-in-law, captains another?”
“It gets better. Another team in this league is now captained by another brother-in-law, Garrick. They’re called the Boston Ruins, and it’s mostly made up of people who work in professional hockey. They had to make a rule that no current or former players could join the team unless there were enough that every team got one.”
“It’s like the rule about bringing enough cupcakes for everyone in the class,” Mati observed.
Michaela laughed. “Yes! The Cupcake Rule. I like that.”
This was a seriously unusual beer league. “I’m sorry we’re missing Garrick,” Reese said. “But I’m delighted that we got to see you.”
“Had I known you were in town, I would have invited you over. Will you be around for long? I know everyone would love to see you.”
“Oh,” Reese said, trying to figure out how much he should say. Michaela and Lachlan were like family, and he would love to see Garrick, Rhian, and Savannah, but... “We would love that. We just…I'd like to check with David before we make any plans.”
“David, the super-hot dude who looks at both of you like he’s never seen anything as beautiful in his life?”
Reese felt his cheeks go hotagain.
Michaela cracked up. “Oh, man, you two are killing me. Seriously, though, are you guys okay? I know what David does for a living, and while I wasn’t sure how you two knew him, now there’s this guy,” she added, tilting her head at Marcus, who had settled a few rows behind them.
“David’s not just a bodyguard,” Mati said firmly. “Not to us.”
Michaela put her hand on Mati’s knee. “I don’t mean to imply anything. But you two have a lot of people keeping an eye on you tonight. I’m worried.”
“We’re okay,” Reese said, leaning in close and keeping his voice low. “It’s all precaution.”
Michaela gave Reese a long, serious study as they huddled together.
A piercing whistle sliced through the quiet arena, unexpected, since the game hadn’t started yet. Everyone turned to the ice.
David stood at the glass, looking up at them with a concerned frown, his hand clamped around the finger whistle still attached to some poor referee’s hand.
You okay?he mouthed.
Michaela clapped a hand over her mouth, her shoulders shaking with laughter. “Ohmy.”
Mati waved at David. “We’re fine!” she called, exasperated.
David let go of the whistle, and the ref snatched his hand back. The glare he gave David did not bode well for David’s chances of staying out of the penalty box. Given the shoves to his shoulders and the laughter from the ice, his teammates were giving David shit, too.
