17. Paxton
Hockey proved a relief for my frustration about the situation with Hana. From the moment Stol slapped the puck my direction after winning the face off, I was in the zone. I raised my gloved hands in the air after scoring a third goal deep in the second period and ended up mobbed by my teammates. We were up by four over the team considered our biggest rival for the championship.
Coach Whittaker pulled our line early in the third, and I drank deeply from my water. As I set the bottle down, I studied the crowd. I felt my eyes widen as my parents waved to me. My mother looked tentative, but my father was his usual confident self. He shot me a double thumbs-up and a big smile.
I looked away. Seems they hadn’t believed me when I’d told them I was done, so they’d showed up at one of my games, just like they had off and on for my entire hockey career.
The itch to know where I stood with Hana grew, and by the time the final buzzer sounded, I’d lost some of my enthusiasm for our big win.
“Great game, man,” Cormac said, patting my helmet with his gloved hand as we trudged down the hallway toward the visitors’ locker room. A thick rubber pad protected our skate blades and kept us out of the melted ice that dripped from our gear.
“Thanks.”
“What’s with the grumpiness?” Stol asked. He elbowed my side, and I grunted as I scowled. “Definitely grumpy.”
“My parents are here,” I told him. “They’re going to insist I talk to them.”
“This about your girl?” Maxim asked.
I shrugged. “I’m not sure she’s mine.” I sighed. “She’s not ready to commit.”
“Considering she spent the day with our wives, I’d have to say she’s one of us,” Maxim replied.
“She did?”
Cormac nodded as he began to strip off his gear. “Keelie sent me photos of their shopping excursion. Hope you’re prepared for that bill.”
Stol grimaced. “I’ve heard Adam complain about Naomi’s trips to Nordstroms.”
“Whatever, dude. Your wife is way more loaded than you,” I shot back.
He shrugged. “Until she figures out how to divest herself, sure. But she doesn’t want that weight for Bree.”
“Weird that you’re trying to get rid of what most people covet,” Cruz said from his locker. His hair was a mess, and he had dark circles under his eyes. He looked unkempt and exhausted, and I understood completely. That made me wonder if he was having relationship problems. But…that couldn’t be right. He’d said his woman was dead and buried.
“Everything good with your mom?” I asked. “Your sisters?”
“Yeah, they’re all good. Bianca’s son, Ethan, just started peewees. He’s got some good stick work.” Cruz sent me a look that let me know to drop the topic.
I gave him a faint nod. He’d tell me when he was ready… I hoped.
“If you don’t want to talk to your parents, don’t,” Stol said. “They need to respect your wishes, but you should also be aware of theirs.”
“I don’t know if that’s the best or worst advice ever,” Maxim said. He gestured around. “Most of us didn’t exactly have loving starts into the world.”
Cruz’s lips folded inward under the mass of his beard. “Do what you want, man, but remember, sometimes you don’t get that second chance.”
This was about the woman he’d mentioned when we flew out to San Jose. Definitely something going on with him. He lifted his shaggy head, met my gaze, and gave a tiny shake. Not now, his eyes pleaded. Oh, I was getting to the bottom of Cruz’s issue. Most assuredly. But if he was that keen to keep it private, I’d respect his choice. For now.
“Good game,” Coach said as he breezed in. “Naese, your statistics tonight are top of the league. Very impressive. Your parents are in the office. They said they need to speak to you.”
My shoulders slumped. “Thanks, Coach.”
His eyes swept over me. “You have twenty minutes to get cleaned up and talk before I’ll need you for the presser.”
I nodded, giving him a thankful glance. He moved over to our goalies, who had huddled with Adam, our former goalie turned coach.
With a heaviness I shouldn’t feel after such a highlight reel of a game, I cleaned up. Then, feeling like each step brought me closer to doom, I headed toward the small guest coach’s office. As I entered, my mother jumped out of her chair and hugged me with an exclamation of joy. I patted her back once before I let my hands fall. She stepped back, her expression hurt.
“I told you I didn’t want to see you,” I said to my father.
My mother gasped, her hands to her chest. “You don’t mean that, Pax,” she cried.
“I do. Thanks to your meddling, I lost the best part of my life. Hana was hurt, nearly died.”
“And she doesn’t want you back,” my dad said with satisfaction as he leaned back in his chair.
I glared at him. “Is that why you’re here? To fish for information?”
I looked over at my mother, whose eyes were wide with shock. Clearly, she hadn’t been part of my father’s scheme.
That was something. Maybe.
“You horrible, piece of…” I pulled in a breath as Dad straightened, his mouth slack and eyes burning. I pinned him with my glare. “Don’t you dare involve yourself in my life. Ever. Again. As far as I’m concerned, you’re dead to me.”
My mother’s pained cry barely registered as my father rose. “You’d do that—pick that, that girl over your family?” he asked.
“You ceased to be my family when you created a vendetta against the only woman I’ll ever love. When you decided not to tell me Hana had been hurt, that Hana lost our baby, when you took away my choice to be there for her, to grieve with her. You took away my choices and pretended it was for my own good. Except you didn’t care that when you hurt her, you were hurting me, too. You knew that, and you still did this to us,” I hissed.
“Pax—”
“No, Mom. I don’t need a peacemaker. I need someone who actually cares about my feelings, my future.”
“I do,” Dad insisted. “That’s why I want you to steer clear of the Sato girl.”
I shook my head. “If you loved me, you’d want me to be happy. You’d want me to make my choices and live my life in the way that best suited me.” I turned to my mother. I took her hand and squeezed her trembling fingers. “Goodbye.”
I walked from the office with my head high.
“There are reasons you needed to break it off with her,” Dad called after me. I kept walking. “She’s not good for you, son.”
“Is he really spouting that steaming pile?” Stolly asked as I joined him in the hallway. He took one look at my face, placed his hand on my shoulder, and squeezed. Then he moved forward into the office doorway. With a firm click, the door shut behind him, and Stol rained his riot act on my father’s head.
The guys surrounded me as if I were a wounded member of the pack.
“Thanks,” I said. “But I’m fine. Really.”
“Thought you might want to see this,” Maxim said. He started a video on his phone. Ida Jane, Millie, Keelie, Naomi, and Hana, all waved at the screen, yelling, “Go, Wildcatters!”
“She’s at the watch party,” Cormac said. He bumped my shoulder, offering the support I hadn’t realized I needed.
“Ida Jane just sent this one, too,” Maxim said. The next video popped up, and he handed me the phone.
“Tell me, truthfully now,” Naomi coaxed. She sipped from her margarita glass. “What do you want?”
Ida Jane’s video skills were crap; the camera tilted and shook enough to make me slightly seasick, but I couldn’t look away.
Hana bit that lush pink lower lip as she stared at something I couldn’t see. Her profile was lovely, all soft curves and delicate chin. Her thick, dark bangs were swept to the side, and I could make out the soft arch of her black eyebrow.
“I want to be happy. Fulfilled,” she said, turning back toward Naomi. That gave me an excellent view of the sleek hair that fell in a fluid sheet down between her shoulder blades.
“How do you achieve that?” Naomi asked as she slurped her drink.
“I’m not sure.”
“The NASA job?” Naomi prodded.
“That would go a long way…” Doubt filled Hana’s voice.
“And?” Millie asked. I couldn’t see her, but I knew her voice.
“And…” Hana heaved a sigh. “And I need to see what could be with Paxton.”
The women cheered even more loudly than they had for our goal in the last video.
“The guys didn’t score,” Keelie said as the racket died down.
“Naese just did,” Ida Jane said. “Probably the best one of his night.”
“Keep in mind that if you stay with him, you’ll be able to pay off your student loans faster,” Millie said.
I hadn’t thought about her loans. I ought to do something about those. Maybe that’s how I could get her to agree to move in with me. I chewed the inside of my lip. That thought was manipulative, and I didn’t want to manipulate Hana into staying with me…did I?
What if it’s the only way I can get her to agree?
My stomach knotted as I worried over the right thing to do.
“Plus, he has the best house,” Keelie said. “I’m in love with that walk-in closet.”
“If you would have put more effort into the décor today…” Naomi said on a sigh.
“It’s not my place to decorate Pax’s house,” Hana said.
“Um, yes, it is,” Millie said. “He wants you to.”
“I need to think about all this,” Hana said.
The video ended.
I handed the phone back with shaking hands. “Send it to me?”
“Already did,” Maxim assured me.
I nodded.
Coach called, “Need you, Naese.”
I headed toward him.
“You should make another pass,” Cormac said. “You know we don’t always score the first time we shoot.”
My lips twitched as I nodded again. “Get rid of my parents before Stolly rips off my dad’s head.”
“For what it’s worth,” Cruz said, falling into step next to me, “I think your father has an irrational fear of Hana.”
“I know.”
“And there’s a reason for that,” he said.
“Don’t care.”
Cruz grunted. He stopped at the door to the press conference. “Gotta feeling you will.” He turned and headed back to the locker room.
* * *
After the press conference,we decided to grab a late dinner. We were all starving—common after a win—and we took over a great ramen place a few blocks from our hotel. The moment my bowl settled in front of me, I slurped the excellent pork broth from my large spoon and munched my mung beans and bamboo.
“Keelie really likes Hana,” Cormac said next to me. He wielded his chopsticks like a pro, and I winced as my noodles slid back into my bowl.
“Millie, too.” Stol scowled at his bowl of noodles and meat, having the same problem I was.
“That’s because Hana’s cool,” Cruz said. He was even better with his chopsticks than Cormac, the big showoff. Somehow, he slurped the noodles without getting a drop of broth in his beard. That was just…inhuman. He pointed his chopsticks at me, which neatly held a perfect piece of meat between the little wooden ends. “She is cool.”
“I know that. She’s really funny, too. When she’s not freaking out like she was with all the CATS today. Maybe that was a bad idea, having them with her there.”
“They can be a little much,” Cormac mused. “That’s why we sent Paloma in. To diffuse. Plus, if Hana’s going to be with you, she needs to know what she’s getting into.”
I slurped up noodly goodness. I loved this stuff—when I could get it in my mouth. “What’s that?”
“We play hard and we love harder,” Maxim said, leaning back in his chair.
That asshole had ordered bao…and used his hands. I wished I’d thought of that. I managed another bite, probably looking like the animated version of the Beast in the Disney film, so I went back to the spoon.
“That’s right. Not only do we love hard, we do it as a family,” Cormac said. “Which means we got your back, Naese.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“Slippery little shits,” Stol said. He’d given up on the chopsticks and asked for a fork. He’d almost finished his big bowl while I was only about a quarter of the way through mine. “Your dad’s a real piece of work, and I don’t like him. Millie likes Hana, which means I will, too. Have her come over for dinner soon, yeah?”
“I’ll try. But…” I grimaced and set down the chopsticks. “I can’t make her stay with me. I need to offer to pay off her loans?—”
“Whoa. Nope. No.” Maxim shook his head.
“Not a good idea. She won’t be receptive to that now,” Cruz said. “You need to let her get used to the idea of being around you again. She’s skittish because she was hurt, right? It’s not going to be a quick transformation. She may fight you on this, but if you want her in your life, it’ll be worth it.”
“Then later, you don’t offer to pay off the loans, you just do it.” Maxim smirked. “And she’ll be mad, say she wanted to be independent, but you’ll tell her that’s how you show her you love her.”
“Can you believe he’s happily married?” Cormac said with a long-suffering sigh.
“No accounting for taste,” Stolly said cheerfully. “But Cruz is right. Show her how much she means to you. That worked for Millie and me.” He grinned. “And I’m the dumb one of the group, so if I can pull it off, you totally can, Mr. Aeronautics.”
“You’re not dumb,” Cruz said. “You have dyslexia. If that had been sorted when you were a kid, there were interventions that would make reading easier?—”
“That’s enough, big guy. I’m good,” Stol said, patting Cruz’s shoulder. “I’m fabulous.”
Cruz studied him for a minute before nodding.
“Get her to stay with you,” Cormac said. “Then you take the next step.”
* * *
Once we madeit back to the hotel, I lay in my bed and sent Hana a text.
Me: Once you move here, I’d really like you to stay with me. We deserve the chance to see if we still fit together.
I held my breath as the text went from delivered to read.
Three dots appeared…disappeared…fuck!...reappeared…yes! Answer me…
Hana: I’m thinking about it.
I blew out a breath.
Me: Anything I can do to help you make up your mind?
Hana: I don’t think so. It’s a mental thing. Fear’s pretty difficult to overcome.
Me: Yeah, but it’s not impossible. And we are a great team, Hana. The best. I know things ended badly, but think about before that. We were so good together, so happy.
I expected her to respond about the crash and the ensuing months when she struggled to survive. She surprised me instead.
Hana: If I do manage to overcome the initial fear hurdle, it may come back.
Me: And I’ll prove to you each and every time that you made the right choice by giving us this second chance.
Hana: Okay.
I figured that was enough for tonight.
Me: Night, Hana.
Hana: I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Great game, Pax.
I stared at the screen for a long moment.
Me: I love you.
I hit send and once again watched for the message to be read. Once I was sure she had, I closed my eyes and imagined how good it would feel to come home to Hana.
That was a dream—no, a goal—worth fighting tooth and nail for.