“I don’t know where my skates are.”
“You’re too organized not to know where they are.”
Junie shot down every argument I had. She was right. I did know where my skates were. I also knew in my heart where I wanted to be and who I wanted to be doing it with.
I didn’t know if the four of us would ever be a family, but I had to try, not just for the kids but for Easton and me. I owed myself that much. Mark was gone, and he wasn’t coming back. This was my life now, and I had to stop living for someone who wasn’t here anymore. My guilt over what happened was misplaced. I’d been a good wife, and he’d been a good husband. We hadn’t been in love, and looking back, I don’t know if we would’ve lasted over the long haul.
Easton and I had something special. We always had.
I needed to give us a chance.
**Easton**
My new year was starting out crappy.
On New Year’s Eve, I’d joined the Puck Brothers, but no amount of alcohol dulled the pain inside me. I still had my kids, but I didn’t have Caro. I didn’t realize until that very moment how much that hurt. She didn’t feel the same. She didn’t trust me. She assumed the worst of me. She should know me better than that, but obviously we hadn’t come very far since we’d reunited.
I insisted on time with the kids, and rather than being subjected to my company, she conceded by allowing me to take them on my own. We had fun together, yet I missed her. I guess I’d harbored hope we’d form a family together.
Now I was at the family skate at the practice facility on the third Saturday in January with the twins. We sat on a row of bleachers while I laced up Hailey’s figure skates, making sure they were tight enough to offer proper support. Heath insisted on doing his own, but I checked them afterward and did some minor adjustments. He was wide-eyed as he watched the skaters on the ice. Several of my teammates skated by with their kids. Even guys without kids were there, enjoying skating for the pure joy of it. All of us lived to skate, or we wouldn’t be hockey players.
This was my first somewhat public outing with my kids, and I had cautioned my teammates not to mention I was their father. I hoped everyone remembered, but if they didn’t, I’d deal with the fallout if I had to.
Straightening, I stood and reached for their hands. Hailey took mine and rose to her feet. She was fucking adorable in the pink skating outfit she’d insisted on wearing. Heath, on the other hand, wore the jersey I’d previously bought him. My heart swelled with pride seeing him in it, just as it had that first time I’d laid eyes on him. They were mine, and I was their dad. I would always be their protector, their port in a storm, and the guy who had their back.
“Why doesn’t Mommy ever go with us?” Hailey asked me.
“Mom likes to skate,” Heath added. I might be imagining things, but I thought I heard a note of accusation in his voice.
“I know. She’s busy with school and all, but, yeah, she’s a good skater.” I put my arm around both their shoulders and guided them onto the ice.
“You’ve seen her skate?” Heath narrowed his eyes and studied me closely.
“I, uh, yeah, long time ago. I’ve known her since high school.”
Heath was appeased by my answer and I blew out a relieved breath.
“I wish she was here.” Hailey pouted and stomped her blades on the ice. I tamped down my panic. I wasn’t sure how to diffuse Hailey if she went into full tantrum mode.
I didn’t respond but began to skate with smooth, easy strokes of my blades on the ice. Heath pulled away as a couple other little boys raced by and gave chase. Hailey, usually outgoing, hung back.
“What’s wrong, honey?”
“Daddy used to skate with us.” She sniffled and looked away from me, staring into the distance at something I couldn’t see. My heart constricted, not only because of the depth of her loss, but also for more selfish reasons. Would they ever call me Daddy? I didn’t want to erase their memories of Mark but for them to create new memories with me. This was so hard, not knowing if I was doing or saying the right thing.
“I’m so sorry. I know it hurts.” My words were lame, but what else did a guy say under these circumstances? I glanced around for a distraction and spotted our goalie Brick’s little girl practicing spins at center ice. “Would you like to join Macy?” I pointed toward the pretty little girl who was Brick’s pride and joy.
Hailey nodded, and I skated out to center ice with her. I introduced her to Macy and the two of them hit it off immediately. Before I knew it, I was left alone while my kids were skating all over the place.
“They’re damn good on those blades,” Ice said in my ear. I hadn’t heard him skate up to me.
“Yeah, they are.”
Someone had broken out the hockey sticks, and my son had grabbed one. He was big for his age and held his own with the older boys as they scrambled up and down the ice in an impromptu game. You couldn’t get a bunch of hockey players together on the ice without someone finding sticks and a puck. Obviously, the same was true of our children.
“You’re a lucky guy. Where’s Caro?” He clapped me on the back and grinned at me. His own pregnant wife sat in the stands talking with some of the other WAGs.
“She didn’t want to come. We’re not on the best of terms.” I met his gaze, and I wasn’t fooling him.
“She’ll come around, E. Or you can nudge her a little. Never hurts to say you’re sorry. It might damage your pride a bit, but it’s worth it.”
“I don’t know what I’d be sorry for. She doesn’t trust me. She said so.”
“Did you do something to cause her to mistrust you?”
I didn’t think I did, but maybe I had by not discussing my plans with her. Instead I told her what I wanted. Maybe I did owe her an apology.
Ice coughed and inclined his head in the direction of the tunnel from the locker room to the ice. “Looks like someone changed their mind.”
My head snapped in the direction he was looking. Before I’d even spotted her, my body knew she was here.
Caro stepped onto the ice, dressed in black tights and my jersey. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a sassy ponytail. Fuck, but she was stunning. My heart caught in my throat. By wearing my jersey, she was announcing to everyone in this place she was here for me and no one else. I skated toward her with strong, deliberate strokes of my blades, my eyes never straying from her beautiful face. She smiled tentatively, and I grinned like a damn fool. She met me halfway, and we stopped a few feet from each other, unmindful of the skaters skirting around us or the puck whizzing past us.
“You came.” I stated the obvious and looked even more the fool, but I didn’t care.
She nodded and reached for my hand. Together, we skated along the boards, trying to avoid the rambunctious hockey game going on around us. I only dared imagine what had brought her here. She’d dropped into my lap like my own personal angel from heaven.
“We’re taking our lives in our hands,” she said as a group of young boys chased down the puck a few feet from us with Heath in the lead.
“Watch me, Mom!” he yelled as he raced by. Caro beamed at him, ever the proud mother.
“Be careful!” she shouted.
“Yeah, we are. I’ve always liked living life on the edge.” I smiled down at her, and her returning smile lit up my day.
“He’s your son.” She pointed toward Heath fighting for the puck with a bigger kid. Heath emerged victorious, took the puck several feet down the ice, and passed to a teammate.
“He is,” I said proudly, as my chest puffed out a little. “And she’s your daughter.” I indicated Hailey, who was trading off spins with Macy.
“She’s a scrapper like you though.”
“And a neat freak like you.”
“In some things. You saw her unwrap her present.” She laughed, her eyes sparkling with good humor and something else I didn’t dare name for fear I’d be wrong, but that something was there in her eyes. It gave me hope.
“Unwrap? She tore into it like a wild woman.” We grinned at each other, and hope rose inside me. We could make this work.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.