Back On Ice

Chapter One

SOPHIE

“Aunt Fee, you’re not going to believe what I just heard from one of my favorite hockey influencers!” Jordan calls through the rolled down window on the passenger side of my car as he throws the backdoor open and tosses his gear bag inside. He’s a flurry of ten-year old energy as he crawls in after it, settling himself on the seat free of his stuff.

“What’s that, bud?” I glance at him through the rearview mirror while he pulls on his seatbelt. His hair is damp from the locker room shower, his blue eyes shining with excitement that only someone his age can muster after a grueling hour-long hockey practice. He turns to meet my eyes in the mirror, and it’s not for the first time I’m struck with just how much he looks like his dad—my older brother, Tom. Besides the smattering of freckles on his cheeks and his sandy brown hair, he is almost an exact replica of how I remember Tom when we were young.

Putting the car into drive, I let my foot off the brake to pull away from the curb.

“My favorite hockey player of all time is going back to his hometown, and that's Ivy Glen!”

It only takes me a few moments to register what he’s saying. There is only one NHL hockey player to ever come out of Ivy Glen, and that’s Carter Williams.

My foot stomps the brake so hard we both lurch forward. I’m very thankful he didn’t tell me this while going forty down the main street.

“Woah!” Jordan yelps, jarred from the sudden stop. “What happened?”

“Squirrel in the road,” I say, smiling tightly at him through the mirror and trying not to let the emotion bubbling up inside me show. “Sorry bud. That’s… super exciting about that hockey player coming to town.” Pulling away from the curb completely this time, I drive us home.

“I know right? I’m so excited that I…” Jordan’s voice fades in my mind as I process this absolute bombshell.

Carter fucking Williams.

Carter motherfucking Williams.

The boy who had been my everything.

Memories flash through me like lightning, quick and painful. Our grade school years. Romantic dates in high school, overlooking the lake in the back of his truck. Making plans for college together.

Taking each other's virginity.

A shiver runs through me remembering the morning after, when my life changed forever. I was stuck with waking up in an empty bed. His text, with the timestamp of around four-thirty in the morning, hadn’t given me any indication that anything had been wrong.

Carter: Hey, beautiful. Last night was amazing. My dad was freaking out about something, so I had to go. Lunch later? I’ll text you by noon.

I hadn’t heard from him all day and showed up at his house, looking for him. The look on his mother's face, with tears in her eyes, had my heart falling. Carter was gone, leaving only a letter for me behind, filled with promises of making things work, and how he wouldn’t let his dad come between us.

It’s you and me, Soph . The words, which he had said so many times to me over the years, signed off the end of his letter. That was nine years ago.

Then the asshole cheated on me.

Parking in the driveway of the townhome where I live with Tom and Jordan, I’m brought out of my daze. Jordan still rambles about Carter’s player stats and how he might try to get an autograph. The townhouse is one of the newer additions to Ivy Glen, having been built fifteen years ago. All three of us take pride in its appearance, touching up the paint every three years or so, and keeping our small space of lawn nice and manicured. The stone-gray paint is easy enough to touch up on my own, but call Dad whenever we need to go over the white trimmings on the second floor. Painting shutters while being twenty feet above the ground is not something I’m comfortable doing myself. We head inside, and I hang my purse on the hook next to the door as Jordan drops his bag before shucking off his shoes.

“Forgetting something?” I raise a brow as he tries to bolt up the stairs. Shooting me a guilty look, he walks back toward his gear bag that he had tossed aside and hikes it back up over his shoulder.

“Sorry, Aunt Fee.”

“No worries, Jordy. Thanks for picking up after yourself.” I press a kiss to his hair before passing through the living room, framed photos of my nephew over the years lining the walls. There’s a couple family photos too—Mom, Dad, Jordan, Tom, and me, as well as one of Tom, Sarah, and Jordan before the accident. Most of the photos are of Jordan, one for every year he’s played hockey, starting at four years old in his black and burgundy “Jr. Thorns” jersey, a helmet tucked under one arm and a hockey stick clutched proudly in the other.

Turning the corner, I head to the kitchen to start dinner. My phone buzzes in my pocket, and when I look at the screen, the word “MOM” flashes at me.

“Hey.” Thankful for the distraction from thoughts of Carter, I answer, tucking the phone between my ear and shoulder as I get dinner going. Warm yellow walls greet me when I enter the kitchen, making me feel slightly lighter even with the news of Carter coming back looming over my head. The white cabinets and light wood countertops keep the room bright, something I deeply appreciate right now.

“Sophie!” Mom’s voice is warm in my ear. “Hi, sweetie. Listen, I need to talk to you about these floral arrangements in the front of the shop?—”

“Mom!” I scold her, scowling at the pot of water I’m filling up in the sink. “What are you doing at the shop? You know working on arrangements makes your arthritis flare up.”

“Oh, I’m fine,” she huffs. “Besides, I’m just helping Kerry with a few things. Her eye for floral design is just impeccable.” Even if I do worry about Mom working when she should be retired and letting me take care of everything, at least she couldn’t be more right about Kerry.

I had been so excited when Kerry walked into the shop a year ago, fresh out of high school, and asked if we were hiring. She had brought in a binder filled with photos of different bouquets and arrangements she had made for friends and family. It was really quite cute. She had a whole pitch and presentation about why we should hire her, telling me that all her college classes are at night so she’s free to work during the day. She even went as far as to say that even if Hart’s Flowers wasn’t the only flower shop in Ivy Glen, it would still be the best.

Hiring her had been the best thing we’d done in a long time.

Even though staying local for college wasn’t what I had in mind, it was worth it to be able to help Tom take care of Jordan while he recovered from his accident. Online classes had provided so much flexibility for my schedule, allowing me to take a full load of courses while helping Tom get back on his feet.

Then, a little later, Dad asked if I had learned enough from school to help with taxes for the shop, which revealed just how much my parents had been struggling to keep the shop above water and turned into me completely changing the way they do their bookkeeping. Thank goodness I went with a business degree in accounting and financial management and not… creative writing or something. No more sticky notes left on random surfaces to keep track of expenses, or the invisible “inventory sheet” Dad kept only in his head.

Spreadsheets all the way, baby.

“I’m going to have to tell Kerry to send you home when you show up at the shop,” I grumble, putting the pot on the stove. I put her on speaker, placing my phone on the counter as I tie my long auburn hair in a messy bun at the top of my head. The kitchen gets unbearably hot while I cook.

“Oh, you wouldn’t dare,” Mom chides, her voice echoing through the kitchen, then quickly changes the subject. “I hear they’re having another town hall meeting about the rec center.”

The rec center… and the twin rinks by extension. Ivy Glen Rec Center is falling apart and there’s not enough money for all the repairs it needs. The owner, Benson Scott, is an 80-year-old idealist who refuses to charge for rink time for school teams and won’t raise his prices for individual skaters.

His heart is in the right place, but it’s leaving room for the town council to try to get rid of the rec center to put a strip mall in its place. I can’t let that happen—I refuse to. I’ve been at every town meeting, every vote, every conversation that involves the future of the Ivy Glen Twin Rinks and Rec Center. The center means so much to the town and to the hockey community, how can they turn their back on us? On every person like me who spent their entire childhood in that rink? Who spent years forming happy memories, and have always wanted their future kids to have the same opportunity?

“Yeah, I know, I’ll be there,” I say, throwing some frozen meatballs and pasta sauce into my pressure cooker.

“Good. I know how much the rec center means to you. Speaking of… did you know that Carter is coming back into town?” First Jordan, now Mom? Am I the only one who was left out of this apparently widespread announcement? It’s not enough that he essentially ghosted me, now I don’t even get the courtesy of being told he’s coming to town sooner than the day before? Not that I want to speak to him—the thought of hearing his voice fills me with such a sense of dread I’d rather go swimming in a bloody ocean full of sharks. But he could have told Tom to tell me. Or asked his mom to call. Or something.

The sound of the front door shutting snaps me from my train of thought. “Looks like Jordan is telling everyone. How nice for him. I bet his mom missed him.”

“What about—” Whatever she’s about to say is thankfully cut off by Tom walking into the kitchen. Mom has always loved Carter and almost took it as hard as I did when we broke up. Good thing I never told her what really happened. I’m sure whatever she’s going to say, it has something to do with mine and Carter’s past.

“Mom, Tom just walked through the door, I gotta go. Love you.” I hang up as quickly as possible, hoping she doesn’t get her feelings hurt, but I just can not do that conversation right now.

“Hey, Soph.” My brother walks into the kitchen, pulling a chair out from the table in the little breakfast nook in the corner and lowering himself down gingerly. His auburn hair, the one feature we share, is in desperate need of a haircut. He pushes it out of his blue eyes as he stares down at the kitchen table.

Frowning, I study him. “What did the doctor say?” Normally, Tom would have been the one to bring Jordan home from practice since he’s their off-season coach, but he had an ortho appointment today. His leg’s been bothering him more than usual.

“Just to start physical therapy again. Same old shit.” He runs a hand over his face, looking tired. Ever since the car accident that claimed his late wife, Sarah’s, life and broke Tom’s leg in four different places, leaving him with chronic pain and a limp, he’s been in physical therapy on and off. The doctors did all they could in the aftermath of the accident. It seemed like things were improving the first couple of years, but the pain came back with a vengeance around four years ago. Since then, he’ll go to physical therapy for three to four months, he’ll stop going because his leg feels better, and then his pain comes back.

It’s why I moved in with him and Jordan after the accident. Between suddenly being a single dad, as well as having to regain his ability to walk, Tom had needed more than an extra pair of hands. He needed his sister.

“I was reading up on a clinical trial for muscle regeneration?—”

“Not this again, Soph. It’s fine. I’m fine. I don’t want to go through the whole process again just to find out I’m not qualified.” Unfortunately, despite the fact that he can’t walk without pain, Tom’s otherwise healthy physical form disqualifies him from the majority of the trials that could be helpful to him. “Did you hear Carter’s coming back to town?”

Trying not to let his dismissal get under my skin, I turn to pull the bagged Caesar salad out of the stainless steel fridge. “Yep, twice now,” I say dryly into the cold air.

His silence on the matter unsettles me, and I turn to face him, bagged salad in hand. His face gives nothing away as I stalk over to him, raising my brow. “What do you know?”

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“I seem to be the only one who had no idea he was coming back. Jordan told me in the car, and then even Mom just told me over the phone.” I wonder if he’s still in contact with him. It would be surprising, considering Carter didn’t even bother to show up after Tom and Sarah’s accident, but maybe I’m the only one he ghosted after the fact. I mean, they were best friends.

You would think that having a boyfriend who was so close with your brother would be weird, but back then, it had worked strangely well for us. Tom had known Carter through me previously, but the year that Carter and Tom were on the high school team together they had cemented a friendship as teammates, and later as player and assistant coach. We weren’t worried about what he would think when we started dating the year after Tom graduated and some of the best times we had were hanging out as a group with us, Tom, Carter’s other close friend, Jake, and my best friends Abbie and Gwen.

“He’s a superstar hockey player, of course I know about him.” He sighs, leaning back in his chair and sticking his bad leg out in front of him. “His seven-year contract is up, so it would only make sense that he would come back home for a little bit.”

I’m probably the only one in town who doesn’t keep up with Carter’s hockey career, and Tom knows this. He most likely didn’t say anything out of consideration for my feelings.

He saw how broken I was when everything happened. I’m resolved to never let him have that power over me again. In a town as small as Ivy Glen, crossing paths with Carter is bound to be inevitable, but if I see him again, I’ll simply treat him like a stranger. He doesn’t deserve any more from me after he broke my heart and left me to pick up the pieces.