Checking from Behind (Boston Enforcers #1)

CHAPTER ONE MARSHALL

CHAPTER ONE

MARSHALL

I'd seen the photos a hundred times, and I still thought the house still looked way bigger in person.

I had scrolled through every photo on my phone during the flight from Wyoming, to remind myself of what it looked like.

I'd zoomed in on the kitchen island, the backyard, the two-car garage I didn't need because I was one person and only had one truck.

But standing on the front walkway with my duffel bag over my shoulder and the late August heat pressing against my neck, the place felt like it belonged to someone else. Someone who had their shit together.

I set the duffel down on the porch and pulled my phone out of my pocket.

My hands were steady, but my stomach wasn't. It kept doing this low roll every time I thought about what the next few months looked like.

Preseason camp was in two weeks, with a roster full of guys who'd been playing hockey for years.

I checked my email for the lock-box code the realtor had sent me last week.

I punched it in, removed the key, and stood there holding it for a second, looking at the front door.

This key and house were mine. So was the mortgage payment, which was something I was going to need to digest for a minute, because the number was more than my parents had paid for their entire ranch.

I took a breath, unlocked the front door and pushed it open.

The house was empty. I had shipped nothing yet aside from the small trailer I'd pulled behind my truck. Those boxes were now stacked along the far wall of the living room, and my mattress leaned against the wall in the hallway. I could still smell the fresh paint and the new carpets I’d had installed over the last couple of weeks.

I walked through the downstairs slowly, running my hand along the granite countertop in the kitchen, checking the gas range I didn't know how to use, opening the fridge that had nothing in.

The backyard was fenced, which was good, even though I didn't have a dog or a reason to go out there.

The neighborhood was gated, which still felt ridiculous to me.

It even came complete with a guard at the entrance.

He had checked my ID and waved me through like I was entering the players entrance at the arena when I'd arrived today.

I stood at the kitchen window and looked out at the yard.

The grass was perfect, not a weed in sight.

The owners before me had worked with a landscaping company, so I'd hired the same one, which was something I never had to deal with before.

Back home, our grass was whatever survived the winter.

My dad mowed it twice a month in summer and didn't think about it the rest of the year.

My phone buzzed.

There were three texts from my mom, each one of them asking me something different about the house.

One from my brother Chase with a photo of himself wearing my old college jersey with the caption wearing it better than you ever did, and one from my agent confirming that training camp started September ninth.

I had fourteen days of freedom left, and the thought made my stomach roll, even though I was excited.

I texted my mom back, told her I'd made it safe and that the house was great, and that I’d call tonight. I knew she was worrying about me ever since the draft and then about whether I'd be okay here on my own. I was going to be fine. This was my life now even if I wasn't ready for it.

My cousin's buddy Knox Evans had been the one to talk me into the gated community. He'd convinced me when we were at my cousin Dylan's wedding three months ago. Dylan and Knox both played for the Vancouver Dominators, and he got married to his girl Aurora in Cabo, in a ceremony that lasted a little less than twenty minutes. It was the most messed up situation. The resort’s officiant had fallen ill and they weren’t able to replace him. Just as things looked like they weren’t going to happen, Charlie Towns, the Dominators newest right winger stepped forward.

Apparently, Charlie was a retired minister, so he stepped in to save the wedding.

Dylan and I had always wondered why everyone insisted on calling him Pastor Chuck.

The wedding had been beautiful though. Aurora had walked down an aisle of white sand with the Pacific behind her, and Dylan had cried, which made my aunt cry, which made my mom cry, which made basically everyone cry except my dad, who'd stood in the back row with his arms crossed and his jaw tight pretending he had something in his eye.

I'd been standing at the bar afterward, nursing a whiskey when Knox appeared beside me.

"You can't just rent an apartment downtown," he said, loosening his tie, his face sunburned from the beach ceremony. "You're about to be a professional hockey player. In Boston. You're twenty-three, single, and you're not that bad-looking. You need privacy."

"I grew up in Wyoming. I don't need privacy; I've had it my entire life." I chuckled, downing the shot of tequila that was in front of me.

"Then I hate to say it but you’ll need it even more now.

I'm serious, man. The second your face shows up on sports blogs, and magazines, people are going to find your address.

Fans, women, and reporters looking for a story will hunt you down.

You need a gated community with high security, somewhere you can come home, kick back, and just be a normal person.

If you don't believe me, just ask Colton," he said, nodding over to where Colton Fox was sitting with his girl, Emma.

I knew he was right; I didn't need to ask Colton about anything.

I'd seen the news and knew his story well.

So, here I was in an upscale gated community in a suburb of Boston, with an enormous house that had granite countertops and a two-car garage with grass so soft that I swore it probably used moisturizer.

I texted Chase back: Your arms are too skinny for that jersey.

He responded immediately: Guess I got Mom's genetics for my arms; you are lucky; you got Dad's. Life isn't fair.

I let out a laugh. He wasn't wrong about that either.

The doorbell rang at four-fifteen. I opened it to find Jeremy Thatcher leaning against the door frame with a six-pack of IPA in one hand and a grin that made him look like he'd been doing this his whole life.

Which, to be fair, he kind of had. Jeremy had played for the Enforcers for three years, serving as a right winger.

He was twenty-six years old with a physique built for hockey.

Six-one, two hundred and five pounds, with sandy hair that always looked like he'd taken off a helmet, and this energy that made you feel like you'd known him much longer than you had.

"Welcome to Boston, rookie." He handed me the beer and walked inside. "Place is nice. Way nicer than the shithole I had my first year."

"Thanks for coming," I said. I'd met Jeremy twice: once at a team event after the draft, and once over FaceTime when the coaching staff was introducing the new guys to the existing roster. Both times, he'd been the one who made me feel like I wasn't walking into a wall.

"Wouldn't miss it. Setting up a rookie's first house is a rite of passage.

" He was already wandering through my living room, inspecting the space like a real estate agent instead of a friend and teammate.

He opened a closet, looked inside, and closed it.

Then he checked the thermostat. "Your AC's set to seventy-four.

You're going to want sixty-eight. Trust me—the Boston summer will cook you alive. "

"It's August."

"Exactly. You've got another month of this bullshit heat before it cools down. Wyoming didn't prepare you for East Coast humidity, just trust me on this," he said, turning the temperature down.

"Hawthorne's parking," Jeremy said, settling onto the floor since there was nowhere to sit. "Ashford's running late but that's nothing new for him and I think Callaway might swing by too, but he's got his kid tonight, so it will depend."

Ryan Hawthorne came through the door a minute later. He was the team’s starting goalie, twenty-eight, with the kind of calm that came from standing in front of rubber discs traveling ninety miles an hour for a living. He shook my hand, looked around the house, and said, "You need furniture."

"I need a lot of things."

"Well, you certainly need a couch. Everything else is optional." He set a bag of groceries on the kitchen counter and began emptying it. "Figured you wouldn't have food yet, so I brought you some things."

"Thanks, man."

"No problem."

We started with the boxes. Jeremy and Ryan helped me haul the mattress upstairs, a process that involved three wrong turns, a banged elbow, and Jeremy telling a story about the time he'd helped Aiden Callaway move and dropped a dresser on his own foot which sent us laughing.

Once the mattress was on the bed frame, we unpacked the kitchen stuff my mother had packed for me.

She'd insisted that her son wouldn't eat off paper plates for the upcoming year, so she purchased plates at Target for me.

She'd also given me a set of pots, and then she'd surprised me with a brand-new coffee maker.

At some point she'd slipped a handwritten note inside the box, telling me how proud she was of me.

Matthew Ashford showed up an hour later with an apology and a bottle of whiskey.

He was our left winger, twenty-five, with dark hair and a quiet confidence that made you pay attention when he talked, which wasn't often.

He set the whiskey on the counter, looked at the three of us sweating from hauling boxes, and said, "Looks like I timed this perfectly. "

"You're an asshole," Jeremy said, laughing.

"I prefer 'efficient.'"

"We'd have been a lot more efficient had you of been here." Hawthorne yelled from the other room.