13. Scott
SCOTT
I watched my old buddy walk towards me like some kind of conjured image. I was sleep deprived after the night Stella and I’d had, but something told me the guy coming towards me was all flesh and blood.
“Sam?” I asked, looking around the airport.
“You have something to tell me, bud?” He crossed his arms over his muscular chest.
Sam might not have played professional hockey like most of the men I knew, but he worked hard with his hands, day in and day out. The guy was built like a brick house with slabs of muscle he’d earned manually and only added to at the gym.
“I was going to call you.” I put my hands out to try and keep him calm.
“And?”
“And…” I shrugged. There was no use in putting off the inevitable. Like him punching me.
“I love your sister,” I confessed and shut my eyes, not wanting to see one of my oldest friends clock me.
But nothing happened.
I peeked through one eye and stared at Sam standing there, arms still crossed, biceps bulging as he stared at me. With a huge shit-eating grin. The type of smile I’d never not once seen on his face after over two decades of friendship.
“You’re not going to hit me?”
“Na.” He shrugged. “Not when you were smart enough to see what you had when you had it in front of you.” His arms dropped.
I was man enough to admit I might have flinched when he moved forward to give me a hug and pat me on the back.
Who the hell is he, and what fucking aliens have snatched my friend?
“You love Stella?” he asked, but there was no surprise in his tone. No worry in his features. He was almost… relieved? Like a man who…
“You set this up?” I rasped, looking around, needing to make sure Stella was nowhere near us. “You set us up?” I asked, looking at Sam through new eyes.
Sam. The over-protective older brother of three sisters who, according to him, were a constant pain in his ass. Sisters he’d had stepped in and helped raise. Sisters who had kept him up late at night with worry they’d end up with the wrong guy.
“Maybe not when I first suggested she meet you when she told me she was moving to Houston, but…” He shrugged. “The more I thought about it, the more I thought you two would… make sense together. She likes to say she’s the psychic one in the family, but I had a feeling about the two of you.”
“But… me?” I touched my chest, and his gaze softened.
“You’re a good man, Scott. You’ve always been a good one, from before you went pro to now when you’re about to… you know,” he said softly to make sure no one overheard.
“You know? That I’m going to retire?” He gave me a knowing look.
“How?”
“Man, I know you. I’ve known you. I could see the signs last year, after you left LA and played in San Jose.” I opened and shut my mouth, unable to find the right words.
“And you thought I was a good match for your baby sister? I’m about to be unemployed.”
“I call bullshit.” He snorted, tipping his chin towards the little shop in the airport, grabbing a magnet and hat. “Knowing you, you’ve invested in restaurants and shit all over Houston.”
“Jesus, man.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re not.”
“You like it here.”
“And that’s okay with you? That I like it here way too fucking much to return to Forge Creek?”
“As long as Stella’s happy, what more could her family want?” I swallowed hard. We were quiet as he paid and pointed behind him. “I gotta head back to Colorado.”
“I gotta…” I pointed towards the terminal where the team and Stella were waiting.
“Go. I gotta catch my flight.” I frowned.
“Wait, did you fly out here just to talk to me?” He nodded and chuckled.
“Guilty. Just don’t tell her. She’ll bitch me out.”
“This mean I have your blessing?”
“Hell ya, man, you got my blessing. You’ve always been like a brother to me even if we’ve been thousands of miles apart and only caught up once a year.
Now it will be official. Just don’t take too long.
And please, for the love of god, no big crazy wedding, yeah?
Save me from that.” His pleas fell on deaf ears when I barked with laughter.
“It’s cute you think I could ever tell your sister no.”
“Well…” His lips twitched and his eyes softened. “If those are my problems in life, guess it’s not too bad of one to have, right?”
“Right.” We hugged and patted one another on the back before he started to walk away.
“Sam!” I called out and watched him look over his shoulder. “Thank you,” I said, meaning every goddamn syllable.
I wasn’t sure what had driven him to do what he did, but it all suddenly made sense—the pestering, the pushing for us to hang out, for me to show her around town, hell, to even think Stell and I would work, but thank fuck he’d been the pain in the ass he was.
Because without him, I wouldn’t have Stella in my life.