Chapter 7 Kieran
SEVEN
KIERAN
Even after all these years, training camp and preseason still wore Kieran down more than he expected. His whole body ached so badly he wanted to collapse on the floor of his empty townhouse and never move again.
He’d stuck to his off-season program all summer—weeks with a specialized trainer, a new nutrition plan, a mountain of conditioning.
All of it designed to give his body the best chance of surviving another grueling five years.
Funny, considering that after all those tips, tricks, and hours of complicated stretching, Kieran felt like he couldn’t play another minute, let alone five more seasons.
He was getting old. That much was obvious. At thirty-one, his body was finally pushing back against the years of abuse he’d put it through. Honestly, it was a miracle it had taken this long.
A familiar chuckle brought Kieran out of his mortality-induced spiral. He looked up from the bench where he was hunched, trying to summon the energy to peel off his pads. Ivan had dropped down onto the one across from him.
“Feeling it today, huh?” he asked, stripping off his pads and jersey in one smooth motion that made Kieran ache harder just watching.
Ivan had a few years on him, but he barely showed it—just a bit of silver in his dark beard and laugh lines around his eyes.
He still moved around the ice like a freight train: never tiring, always steady, always commanding.
Trusted by every player, coach, and staff member.
He was exactly what a captain should be. Infallible.
Kieran couldn’t help but smile at his old friend. “I’ll be alright in a minute. Coming to terms with the harsh reality that I’m not twenty-one anymore.”
Ivan scoffed. “You haven’t been twenty-one for long time.”
“You’re one to talk.”
Ivan grinned back at him as the rest of the team filed in from the ice.
Practice had just ended, but Kieran had been pulled early to shoot some promotional material.
He was sure the footage would be unusable.
No Inferno fan wanted to watch their supposed star player panting through awkward lines and looking five seconds away from passing out.
He hadn’t exactly radiated elite-athlete energy.
“Uh oh, did we interrupt something?” The voice came from Daniel Bergstrom, a loudmouth rookie fresh up from the AHL. He reminded Kieran a little too much of his younger self. “Were you two having a moment?”
Kieran stiffened, glancing around the room to gauge his teammates’ reactions, but most seemed to miss the chirp entirely.
Bergstrom flopped onto the bench next to Ivan, tossing his feet up, smirk on full display. “Need us to give you two some privacy?”
Kieran’s stomach dropped. His so-called relationship with Ivan had been one of the NHL’s worst-kept secrets. By now, everyone knew they’d slept together when they played for LA. He’d caught a fair amount of shit for it over the years.
It used to bother him. The narrative implied that simply because they were two queer players on the same team, they must have hooked up.
What did the league expect? The never-ending homophobic stereotype that if two gay men exist within each other’s orbit, they must be sleeping together.
It left Kieran sick to his stomach, second-guessing what they were doing more times than he could count.
When he really looked at it, he realized—fuck—the media might’ve had a point.
Kieran and Ivan had been good friends first. They’d hit it off almost from day one.
Ivan took him under his wing, like he did with every rookie, but being two out players in the league deepened their bond even more.
One night, after Kieran scored his first league hat trick, they had one too many drinks and ended up in bed together. After that, it became a habit.
Kieran had seen other people, dated a few casually, but Ivan never showed much interest in any kind of relationship, at least not publicly.
From the beginning, he’d made it clear that what he and Kieran did was just about getting off.
It was casual. Comforting, even. Ultimately unimportant in the grand scheme of Kieran’s life.
When he was traded to Seattle, their hookups came to a screeching halt, and Kieran hadn’t lost a moment’s sleep over it. Not like the sleep he lost over another former teammate.
“Married, remember?” Ivan cut in smoothly, flashing the wedding ring that hung from the chain around his neck. His tone had enough edge to shut the rookie down.
Kieran swallowed hard. He hadn’t considered how his history with Ivan could affect the team.
Was there tension he hadn’t picked up on?
Did the other guys resent him for being here?
Everyone had been pleasant enough to his face, but he hadn’t settled in here the way he had in Los Angeles or Seattle.
Who knew what these guys were saying behind his back?
Ivan gave him a questioning look. Kieran responded with a raised eyebrow and a glance toward Bergstrom, now facing his locker and peeling off his gear. Ivan shrugged and mouthed cocky shit back at him. Kieran smothered a laugh. If Ivan wasn’t concerned, neither was he.
“Speaking of husbands,” Ivan called out, turning to address the whole room.
The chatter hushed, every player instinctively pivoting toward their captain.
“Jasper and I host BBQ this Sunday. Partners and kids welcome. Come hungry.” He leaned around a row of lockers, spotting Elis, the equipment manager, sorting jerseys. “Staff too. More is better. Da?”
Elis gave him a grateful smile. “I’ll let everyone know. Thanks, Ivan.”
“You come,” Ivan said to Kieran. Not a question.
“I don’t know, I…”
“Kieran, I know changing teams is hard. I do it a few times. You remember? But this is home now. For five years, at least. The season starts soon. Guys need to trust you on ice.”
Kieran couldn’t quite pinpoint what held him back. Something about New Jersey didn’t feel like his. He felt unmoored. Adrift. Like, even with a signed contract, he shouldn’t let himself get too comfortable. He couldn’t put his finger on the cause.
Well. That was a lie.
If he let himself think about it longer, the answer was obvious.
It was Matthieu—his phantom presence slipping back into Kieran’s life—that made him uneasy.
It hadn’t hit until Kieran ran into him at the coffee cart outside the practice facility a few days ago.
Sharing ice time this season had felt manageable.
Seeing Matthieu outside that structured bubble, existing in the same universe as Kieran again, had rattled him to the core.
Now Kieran caught himself looking for Matthieu around every corner.
He held his breath walking into every room at the facility, dread—or maybe hope—tightening in his chest that Matthieu might be there.
He lined up at the same coffee cart each morning, torturing himself with the idea that Matthieu was a few people behind him.
It was unsettling.
Maddening.
Fucking distracting on a level that left Kieran feeling brittle at every edge.
Ivan was right: if Kieran wanted the team’s trust, he had to make an effort. Whether or not New Jersey felt like it, it was home. The sooner he settled in, the better his chances of shaking whatever hold Matthieu’s sudden return had on him.
“I’ll be there, don’t worry.”
Kieran pulled up outside Ivan’s ridiculously large Maplewood home just after two on Sunday. It looked like he was the last to arrive. Cars lined the street in every direction, and finding a spot for his Jeep was harder than he’d expected.
He was about to give up when a white Toyota, not flashy enough to belong to any of his teammates, pulled away from the curb a few blocks up. Lucky, because the only thing Kieran wanted less than this BBQ was having to face Ivan at practice the next day if he bailed.
He parked reluctantly, grabbed the bottle of wine he’d brought to avoid showing up empty-handed, and followed the voices around the side of the house into a sprawling backyard.
The place was packed. Kids tore across the grass, playing a wildly uncoordinated game of soccer with a few rookies, while the vets clustered nearby, chatting amongst themselves.
Up on the patio, a gaggle of wives held court, Jasper among them, hands flying as he spoke.
Kieran spotted Ivan manning the biggest grill he’d ever seen, an apron stretched over jeans and rolled-up flannel. It wasn’t until Kieran got closer that he saw the phrase stamped across Ivan’s chest.
“‘I like my butt rubbed and my pork pulled?’” Kieran scoffed, stepping up beside him.
“You know better than anyone.” Ivan grinned, throwing him a wink.
“Other than Jasper, of course.”
Ivan’s smile didn’t falter, though something in his eyes flickered for just a second. Kieran caught it, then it was gone, buried beneath a shrug as Ivan turned to the grill. Whatever was sizzling under the hood smelled incredible, and Kieran’s stomach let out an audible groan.
“Sorry if I’m late—wasn’t sure when things started.”
From the looks of it, everyone was already a few drinks in.
Ivan waved him off. “Is all-day thing. People come, people go. I’m glad you came.”
“Well, it was strongly implied I didn’t have a choice, so…”
A hand landed on Kieran’s shoulder with a light squeeze. He turned to find Nix behind him, the other arm loaded with burger buns.
“Great to see you, Kieran.” He beamed as he handed the buns to Ivan. “You’ve met my wife, Cynthia.” He nodded toward the women on the porch, “…and those are my three rugrats down there.”
Kieran didn’t have to ask which three. The boys were carbon copies of their dad, and the little girl playing goalie had the same fierce look Cynthia wore in net.
“Did you bring anyone?”
Ivan chuckled, stacking burgers into a mountain of buns. “This man settle down? Is same day hell freeze over.”
While that was true, Kieran couldn’t help noticing the little sting the comment left in its wake.
“I used to say the same about you.”
Ivan’s chuckle came slower this time, the corners of his mouth twitching before he glanced down at the grill.
Kieran filed it away. Then Ivan grinned, a flicker of emotion sparking in his eyes as he glanced toward the patio, where Jasper was approaching.
He took the plate from Ivan without a word, rose onto his toes to press a quick kiss to his husband’s cheek, and then walked away without looking back.
“You’ll find your person,” Ivan said at last, his eyes lingering on Jasper’s retreating form. “Just need to start putting self out there.”
The problem was, Kieran had already found—and lost—his person, whether he wanted to admit it or not. What was the point of dating someone new, pretending anyone else could ever measure up? It would be unfair even to try.
Ivan seemed to be waiting for a response.
What was there to say? Kieran wasn’t interested.
A few years ago, Ivan would’ve agreed with him.
Both of them had written off the whole idea of settling down.
That was before he apparently fell ass over tit for the blonde hipster weaving through the kids, handing out paper plates of food. It was all very domestic.
“Maybe one day,” Kieran replied, to shut him up.
Nix, clearly picking up on Kieran’s discomfort, finally stepped in. “The kids loved having you at the center the other day. Cynthia says Emily hasn’t stopped raving about meeting the great Kieran Lloyd. I know the season’s busy, but if you’ve got time, we’d love to have you back.”
Kieran shifted his weight, grateful for the change in subject. He glanced past Nix to the lawn, where a group of kids had just tackled a cackling Bergstrom to the ground.
“Yeah, definitely. I’d love to do more,” he said, turning toward Andre. “Maybe I could pick your and Cynthia’s brains sometime? Does the center need anything—gear, equipment? I could write a check.”
Ivan grunted and jabbed the hot dogs with a little too much force. The fork clanked hard against the grill grate. Kieran couldn’t tell if it was amusement or skepticism, but either way, it felt like he’d said the wrong thing.
Nix sighed, rubbing a hand over his jaw as he watched his kids race across the yard. “You want my honest opinion, Kieran?”
“Um… always.”
“Cynthia won’t say no to a check—God knows the center’s underfunded. But these kids come from nothing. Money doesn’t stretch as far as you think. The equipment’s old, sure, but it works.”
Ivan flipped the hot dogs, the smell of charred meat rising between them. He shot Kieran a sidelong glance, quick and unreadable, then dropped the grill with a soft thunk.
“There’s got to be something, right?” Kieran asked, rubbing the back of his neck. “I want to help, Andre.”
“What these kids need is time,” Nix said, turning his full attention back to him.
“Some of them lost their parents years ago. Others technically still have them, but you wouldn’t know it.
They’re neglected, ignored. They need role models.
The center’s the only place they get real attention and support. ”
Kieran nodded slowly, lips pressed together. His gaze dropped to the brick beneath his feet, then lifted when a kid’s shout rang out from the lawn.
“A lot of folks stop by the center once,” Nix continued.
“They do their community service because it’s required, or to feel better about themselves, then move on without giving the kids a second thought.
Maybe they send checks for a few months, but these kids don’t care about that.
They need someone who shows up. Again and again. ”
Kieran hesitated under the weight of Nix’s words. He’d known someone once who could’ve used a place like that, someone who’d grown up with a roof over his head and food in his belly, but never felt the love he deserved.
“Andre, I meant what I said—I want to help. Those kids were amazing. If they need time, I’m happy to give it. The season will make it tough, but I can find a way to show up. In the summer… maybe we could build something, some kind of program. I just don’t know where to start.”
“Well, Cynthia can help with that.” Nix smiled, clapping him on the shoulder, a flicker of approval in his expression. “You’re a good man, Kieran.”
Kieran gave a crooked smile in return. The grill’s warmth cut through the cool air, the kids’ laughter rising behind them.
“Now go. Stop hanging with old men and talk to your team,” Ivan said, half-demand, half-tease. He shoved an overflowing plate of food into Kieran’s arms. “Take this with you.”
“Fine,” Kieran grumbled, more for show than anything. Sooner or later, he’d have to put his reservations to bed and start planting roots, even if they were short and shallow ones.