Chapter Twenty-Six Ingrid and King
“Dillon wants King’s autograph.”
I look at my cellphone suspiciously. “Mom?”
“Yes, silly. Dillon wants King’s autograph. He says it’s going to be worth a ton of money one day.”
“I don’t know about that, but I’m sure I can send an autographed picture to Dillon.”
“Good. I have to say, I’ve only met King twice, but he’s a sweetheart. And when I saw the pictures Dillon sent me, I was so touched.”
“Pictures?”
“Hold on, I’ll send them to you.”
King hobbles into the kitchen. “Ice?”
“I’m asking for a chest freezer for our wedding registry, okay?” I dump out two bags of ice into a mixing bowl, then make a pack in a dish towel. “I’m glad you’re moving. Kevin’s going to go apeshit when he sees your knee.”
“It’s fine. Just a little swollen.”
“Not surprised.”
Last night, King scored two goals and put three Phantoms on the bench for injuries. Nothing major, but nothing they could brush off, either. My King was... A machine. A beautiful, terrifying, vengeful machine.
“Is that your mom?”
“It is. She says you’re family famous and Dillon the Dickbrain wants your autograph.”
“Ugh. Is he technically my stepbrother-in-law? I guess I have to.” King downs some aspirin and orange juice, and pulls out his phone. As he does so, a grin spreads over his face, and he blinks rapidly.
“Mom, can I call you back?”
“Of course. I sent the pictures to your email. I never can figure out how to forward them to the—”
“I’ll help you with it later, Mom.” I hang up and hurry to King’s side. “What is it? Your mom? Did she hear about the game and your amazing comeback?”
“No. It’s from Bryce. They’re releasing him this morning with a warning to wear his chest protector, get on a cardiologist’s schedule, and to make sure there is an AED with him at all times. He sent me a picture.” King holds out his phone.
A black and white blur greets me, but it’s unmistakable. The tiny white print on the photo reads “Baby Frobisher. 10 weeks, 2 days.”
The text from Bryce reads, “This is what Fia put in my bag. Got so excited I would have forgotten my head if it wasn’t attached.”
“Oh, God. King, if they hadn’t had an AED there...”
“I would have done CPR until they got there.” King’s jaw is set, and his face closes over.
We won’t talk about it now. I just rub his shoulders and nuzzle his cheek. “My hero. Bryce’s hero.” My phone beeps. “I have an email from Mom. I... Ohhh. Oh, honey, look.”
There’s a photo, a candid one taken by someone in the stands, I guess, showing King with Bryce’s head in his lap. Another shows King slamming a Phantom’s player into the boards, a look of cold fury on his face.
“King-dom Come-back. Babe! There’s an article about you in Hockey Tonight!
‘King Silverbow defied logic and odds when he returned to the ice tonight. After eight weeks off, the All-Star played better than ever. Not even listed on the roster for tonight’s game, he stepped in after teammate Bryce Frobisher suffered a rare and potentially fatal injury known as commotio cordis, a blunt—’”
“Stop. Stop, I don’t want to hear that part,” King holds up his hand, voice shaking.
“Okay. Got it. You’re not playing tonight, are you?”
“No. Tomorrow. Bryce needs a break. A week or two off, I think. Thanks for taking Fia to the hospital last night.”
“Of course. We’re team. We’re family.”
King beams, his stormy countenance clearing. “Have I mentioned that I love you, Ingrid Antol?”
“I like when you mention it.” I bend and kiss him. “You’re coming in for PT at three, right?”
“Yep.”
“I gotta get to work. You sure you’re okay?”
King nods. “Think I’ll go back to bed after I ice my knee.”
I gather my things and kiss him goodbye, leaving the house we’re currently sharing, his. I’m still not used to it. When you’re out of your element, you tend to forget things—like your lunch and your gloves.
I slip back inside in time to hear King on the phone, his voice suddenly much more alert than it was when he told me he was going back to bed.
“Yes, he did use to represent me. I severed my contract with him three days ago.”
I pause in the doorway. King fired his agent? Had he told me that?
No.
Why not?
That seems like a big thing, and we’re getting married in June. Six months away. Seems like that’s something you tell your partner, when you make big career changes.
My stomach twists.
“Yes, sir, I’m fine this morning. I’ll be playing in our next game.
Well, thank you. Yes, thank you. I’m glad you thought so.
Would that be for this season or— Oh, wow.
January. Uh. Could I call you back in a couple of hours and let you know?
Thank you for the offer of a tryout. I’m definitely considering it.
I just need to make sure I understand my contract thoroughly.
I’m pretty sure I’m committed until the end of the season. I assume the trial is in San José?”
My mouth dries out.
California?
California is a universe away from Pine Ridge, from my mother, from...our lives. The little future I let myself dare to believe in.
But it’s a universe closer to fame, Ingrid.
King’s back. He’s back on the ice, and he’s more famous than ever.
He’s been spending two months building a huge reputation as a loveable good guy, a team player in more ways than one, and when he made his return.
.. He was the big hero. The All-Star all over again.
Is arrogant King back, too? The King who wanted perfection and fame, and all the glittering trophies?
There’s no place in that world for this Ingrid.
I lean against the door, trying not to cry, bracing for what’s probably going to happen.
It happened. A call from the majors. Not just a call to check me out, an offer. A trial, a chance to spend a few weeks with the team, play in scrimmages, check out the team dynamics, see if I’m a fit.
And if I do? Major league salary. The minimum entry-level salary, set by collective bargaining agreements, is $775,000. Almost one million a year.
Right now, I make under a tenth of that. I make... I don’t know, an eighth or a sixth. Something in the mid-five figures, that’s for sure.
Ingrid deserves a millionaire. A man who won’t struggle to provide.
My mind fast forwards.
Little fenced-in yards turn into luxury homes, with my kids in the best schools, and pools and stables in the yard, and all of our loved ones being flown out, round-trip, first class, whenever we want.
My father and mother beaming on me.
This silly hockey lark paid off, I can hear my father saying, the begrudging tone evaporating..
“King?”
“Ingrid? Ingy! I thought you went to work.” I look up and slowly shift in my chair, ice pack moving from my knee to the edge of the table.
“No. I came back. Forgot my lunch.” Ingrid stands in the doorway, but doesn’t enter it.
“Oh. I’ll get it.” I guess I should. I’m in the kitchen. I hobble to the fridge and find her pretty purple padded lunch tote and present it to her. “Here you go, babe. Have a good one.”
“I’ll try. Good call?”
I blink. “You heard?”
She nods. Lips thin.
“The San José Sharks just called. They want me to come out for a couple of weeks and see if I gel with the team. Now, not going to lie, they’re doing pretty poorly at the moment, which is probably why they’re considering me.
They saw the game last night—probably some scout did, not the coach who called.
Nice guy. Ingrid, do you know what the starting salary for the majors is? ”
More silence. Head shaking.
“Three-quarters of a million. I could buy you a gorgeous house. A big house! Our kids could go to the best schools in the country. We could—”
“We?”
I swallow. I don’t know if I want the job. But Ingrid would probably think I’m a loser if I picked relative poverty over the chance to be a good provider. A real Orc would make any sacrifice for his mate—even leaving the life he finally realized he prefers.
“Of course, we. You’ll go with me if I get it, right?” My voice is so heavy, and my shoulders feel like lead bars are resting on them, despite the fact that I’m finally getting what I’ve always dreamed of.
Ingrid’s face is a mystery to me, just when I thought I was learning to read her so well. “No. Not out of like...obligation. Not when you sound like that.”
Well, that made my choice easier. No Ingrid in California equals no King in California.
But now she looks angry and upset, that much I can tell, so I have to ask, “But isn’t this a good thing?
Isn’t this what you’d want from me? A guy with a real career, a real chance at the spotlight?
I know we’ve talked money, but in case you need a reminder, I’m making like sixty grand, a fraction of what major leaguers make. ”
“I wasn’t with you for money!”
“I... I know that! But this is better. Isn’t it? Being a major league star is better for our family, right?”
Ingrid lets out a noise that breaks my heart. A weak, muffled sound that’s too small to be a sob. When her voice comes out, all I can think is that I broke my beautiful War Maiden. My fierce Ingrid. My knee is swollen, but I run to her and pull her against my chest.
“Don’t cry. Please, baby.” I smother her face with little kisses, horrified when I come away with tear-stained lips. “Ingrid, what is it?”
“I like you like this. I love you like this. I w-want you to want me and our little life in Pine Ridge more than the shiny trophies and the shiny things.”
“I do! Oh, God, I do!”
“I don’t want to stand in the way of your big chance, but I don’t want it to change you.
I don’t want it to change us. I... I don’t.
.. Think about how much you do for people around here, how lucky I am that you’d only go a few hours away for most of the season.
The money is plenty to live on in Pine Ridge.
To the Sharks, you’d just be another player.
But here... How are you going to meet Lester and Steve at the dog park and watch their puppies grow up?
How are you going to meet with the music students and football team members from the high school who want to take over the day-to-day scheduling for Team Paws? ”
Why does she think I didn’t say yes immediately?
“I have thought about all that. About how I’m being selfish.
I’m thinking about how I like being the big fish in a little pond now, when I should be thinking about how to make your life the best. I could give you luxuries that you deserve, all the things you want. ”
Ingrid shakes her head vigorously and grabs my shoulders. Her lower lip trembles, but the fierceness in her face makes my heart start beating normally again. The warrior rises.
“I only want you. Like you are. I don’t care where that is, as long as you’re happy and you’re still the man I love—not the person I first met, the arrogant jerk.” She lets out a shaking sigh. “I’ll go with you, with the King I love, anywhere.”
Forget beating normally, my heart feels like it’s sprouted fluffy wings, and it’s fluttering around like some derpy canary. She loves me. She loves me like this—simple, broken me, or rich, maybe famous me. Just me.
“Do you get it?” Ingrid demands with a soft shake. “You’re my trophy. My All-Star. Not because of some title, but because of your heart.”
I swoop Ingrid up and kiss her, whisking her around to sit on the kitchen counter.
“You are all my stars, all the stars in the sky and the universe that holds them. I love you, Ingrid. I just want my main job to be being the man in your life, and I don’t care what happens next as long as we’re together. Will you still marry me?”
She kisses me back, hands in my hair, her bags now dropped off her arms and scattered on the floor. “Of course.”
“Will you marry me... tomorrow?”
Her eyes fly open as her lips are pressed to mine. “What?” she asked in a surprised, muffled voice.
It would be comical except for the desperate need I feel to have her with me, to have those vows that declare “for better or for worse” binding us together.
“Tomorrow. Would you marry me tomorrow, and marry me again, later, with a big fancy wedding if that’s what you want? I just...”
Ingrid pushes me back. “What? Where? I... I don’t have a dress or flowers or—”
“I don’t think any of those things matter. If I have your wedding rings, and you have your dress, will you marry me tomorrow, before I get back out on the ice?”
Her face softens. “Okay... but if you break anything that impedes us from having a proper wedding night, I’m going to be one very sulky bride.”
“As long as I don’t break your heart, I’m happy.
I gotta call my parents and see if they can fly over, I gotta go to the jewelers, and see if Bryce is well enough to be my best man, and—” I stop with a deep breath.
“I’m being selfish again? Impetuous? You want a big summer wedding and you’ve already told your Mom that it’ll be in June. ”
Ingrid gathers up her bags, a thoughtful look on her face.
“Well, we’ll still have that big, beautiful wedding.
We could invite our families for that one.
Tomorrow could be a small, intimate wedding—and I’d like the people we consider our real family there.
” She lists names. “Chip. Daisy. The gang from Hilltop, the team, Kev and Marina...”
“You won’t mind?”
“Having a chance to be the bride twice in my life, but to the same wonderful man each time? No, I won’t mind that.
That’s the kind of guy I’m marrying. He gives me more than I ever expected.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go to work and immediately take off so I can kidnap Marina, hit the mall, and tell Kevin to get his suit out of mothballs. Where will this wedding be held?”
“Uhh... Give me a minute.”