Chapter Seventeen
Brinley
I haven’t told Cooper his hockey coach is my father.
I haven’t told him the truth behind why I really came to Rixton.
And every day that passes, it feels less like I’m waiting for the right moment and more like I’m lying to him.
The worst part is that I keep justifying my decision.
I tell myself it’s cleaner this way. Whatever is developing between the two of us should get to exist on its own. It shouldn’t have to interfere with whatever relationship I could have with my father, or with the fact that Cooper is one of the players on his team.
I don’t want one to affect the other. But the longer I let it go, the harder it is to ignore what I’m not saying.
Cooper doesn’t ask too many questions. He never presses when I dodge, and he never digs too deep when I give him half answers. However, I know him well enough now to see them written on his face.
Maybe it’s getting harder because I trust him now… and I want that to go both ways. Which also means trusting that when I’m ready, I’ll tell him.
And I’m not ready… yet.
By the time we go upstairs, my head won’t quiet down. I grab my things and head for the guest bathroom to freshen up. When I step out, wrapped in a towel, I can hear the shower running in the bedroom. I pause for a second, just standing there, listening to it.
It’s too easy to picture him.
I press my lips together and push the thought away, getting dressed quickly before I can get stuck there.
By the time I make it to the living room, I settle onto the couch, tucking one leg beneath me as I stare down at my phone without actually looking at anything.
The shower shuts off.
A few minutes later, Cooper steps out, running a towel through his damp hair. It’s a little slower with his right hand, but he doesn’t seem to care. His shirt hangs loose, still damp in spots, and I catch myself looking a second too long before I force my attention somewhere else.
He notices anyway. I can feel it.
His gaze lingers just a beat before he shakes his head slightly, pushing his hair back.
I push myself up before it turns into something else, closing the distance between us. My fingers brush his arm without thinking as I move past him.
“I’m gonna head to the student center,” I say, grabbing my bag from the back of the chair. “I’ve got some homework I need to get done.”
He watches me for a second. “Yeah, okay,” he says after a beat. “I’ve got a couple of things to do for my mom, but I was thinking we could grab dinner after.”
For a second, I almost stay. Almost say yes without thinking about it.
“Maybe when I’m finished?” I say instead. “I don’t know how long I’ll be, but I don’t want to hold you up.”
I force an easy smile, the way I learned how to while growing up.
He nods, even if it takes him a second. “All right. Just text me when you’re done. Or if you need anything.”
I nod, forcing a small smile as I sling my bag over my shoulder. “I will.”
I don’t miss the way his eyes stay on me as I head for the door. And I don’t miss the way it makes it harder to leave.
By the time I get to my car, I’m already replaying everything I didn’t say as I drive toward campus.
I don’t head to the student center like I told him.
By the time I realize where I’m going, the arena is already in front of me, the parking lot coming into view as my stomach flips.
I pull into a spot outside the athletics facility and sit in my car longer than I meant to, working up the courage to get out.
You’ve got this, Brinley. I tell myself that repeatedly as I make my way toward the building.
Following the directions on the wall, I make my way through the halls until I’m standing in front of a woman at the front desk. She looks up at me, her expression is neutral but warm.
“Can I help you?”
“I—uh.” My throat tightens. “I’m here to see Coach Dawson. I’m a… family member.”
Her eyebrows lift slightly. “Is he expecting you? I don’t see anything mentioned on his calendar.”
“No,” I admit. “But… he knows me.”
She smiles thinly, clearly unconvinced, but picks up the phone anyway. “Let me see if he’s available then.”
I shuffle anxiously as she attempts to call him before she hangs up a moment later.
“You can go on back. His office is the third door on the left.”
I nod, flashing her a polite smile. The walk to his office feels like I’m floating. My pulse is loud in my ears. The door is cracked open, and I knock once before I push it open wider.
“Hey, babe,” he says without so much as glancing up. “I thought you were at—”
He looks up and stops mid-sentence.
The room goes quiet, like the air has been sucked out all at once. His eyes narrow, confusion flickering across his face before it settles into something else entirely.
A mixture of recognition and shock, then something harder.
“Brinley,” he says, my name heavy like it takes effort to say out loud.
I close the door behind me. My hand is shaking, so I shove it into my jacket pocket before he can see it.
“Hi,” I manage.
He stands too fast, the chair scraping loudly across the floor. “What are you doing here?”
Clearly, he’s not happy to see me. All the softness in his voice from a second ago is gone.
“I wanted to talk to you.”
His jaw tightens. He glances toward the hallway, then back at me. “Not here.”
“If not here, then where?” My voice comes out sharp. “When?”
“You should’ve called. Or emailed.” His tone is clipped now. “You can’t just show up like this.”
My heart feels like it’s beating out of my chest.
I told myself I was prepared for this. I’ve replayed dozens of scenarios in my head, trying to imagine how this conversation would go down.
Not one of them went like this.
“I didn’t think I needed an appointment to see my own father,” I say quietly.
His expression flickers, and he exhales a heavy sigh, taking a seat in his chair.
“I can’t say I’m surprised to see you, Brinley. I was wondering when you might come by.”
My spine stiffens when I hear him say my name again.
“You… knew,” I say.
He nods once, like it’s obvious. “Yes.”
“You knew I was in town?” I stare at him. “So you just…” My voice wobbles despite my effort to steady it. “Watched?”
“I was aware of you,” he says evenly. “I saw you sitting in on our practice.”
The room tilts.
I stop myself, swallowing hard. “You knew I was here. You saw me, and you chose not to reach out? You couldn’t even say anything?”
He leans back in his chair. “I figured you would reach out when you were ready.”
His words sting. My hands curl in my lap, nails biting into my palms.
“Because,” he says calmly, “you enrolling here and suddenly appearing around my program creates complications. Our season just started, and I have a lot on my mind and on my plate, a lot that needs my focus and attention.”
The word lands heavy.
“Complications,” I repeat.
“You’re an adult,” he continues. “You made a choice to come here. I wasn’t going to assume that choice was about me.”
“It was,” I snap. “At least partly.”
A flicker of what looks like annoyance crosses his face.
“That’s exactly the issue,” he says.
I still. “Excuse me?”
“If people start drawing lines,” he says carefully, “if it becomes known that you’re my daughter, that brings attention I don’t want or need on my program.”
There it is.
He doesn’t care about getting to know me. All he cares about is protecting himself and his image.
He holds my gaze for a beat too long. “I’m here to coach hockey. I have a lot riding on that, a lot of responsibilities on my shoulders. I can’t afford distractions.”
“So that’s all I am to you. A distraction?”
“I didn’t reach out to you because I didn’t want this,” he says, gesturing between us. “Not here and not now.”
“So when?” My voice cracks. “When would it have been convenient for you?”
He doesn’t answer that.
Instead, he says, “You’ve been showing up at my practices. Sitting in the stands. You think I wouldn’t notice?”
“I wasn’t trying to hide.”
“I know,” he says. “That’s the problem.”
Silence fills the room.
“You think I came here to expose you?” I whisper. “Is that what you think I’m doing?”
“I think,” he says slowly, “that you didn’t consider how your presence impacts me.”
The coldness of his words is staggering.
“I spent twenty years without you in my life,” I say. “You don’t get to act like I’m the disruption.”
His jaw tightens.
“It was one night,” he says, like that explains everything. “Your mother and me. I was a young kid, the same age as you actually, playing hockey. I wasn’t ready to give it up or to build a family.”
“You mean you didn’t want me.”
He doesn’t soften.
“She told me she was pregnant,” he says. “I didn’t believe her, so I chose not to involve myself.”
Not couldn’t.
Not didn’t know how.
He chose not to be a father.
“Why did you pretend I didn’t exist?”
His eyes flicker. It’s brief, and it’s the closest thing to regret I’ve seen so far.
“All I wanted was a hookup,” he says. “I was young. When you’re in my position, when you’re living that life, women tend to throw themselves at you. I only took what was being offered to me at the time.”
I say nothing.
“Almost seven months later, she showed up after a game,” he says. “Told me she was pregnant.”
My stomach twists.
“And I told her to leave,” he says plainly. “I didn’t believe her.”
You didn’t want to believe her.
“At the time, my now wife and I had just gotten back together.” His voice hardens. “I knew what would happen if something like that got out.”
I swallow hard. “So you decided it wasn’t true.”
“I didn’t believe you were biologically mine.”
The words land like a punch to the gut.
“So you just told her to screw off,” I blurt out, not bothering to mask the way my voice shakes. “You told her you weren’t taking care of a baby that wasn’t yours.”
His silence confirms it.
I press my lips together, trying to keep my breathing even. This is worse than not knowing. Worse than imagining.
“You never bothered to check?” I whisper. “You didn’t care enough to follow up and ask for proof?”
“That’s not—”