Chapter 7 #2
“Yeah, I know. It’s not the kind of headline I want to make as a reporter. Anyway, I’m here to help speed up the process. So behave yourself.”
Will laughs. “I’m sure Clarke can use all the help she can get. These guys are a handful.”
“Speak for yourself, Romeo,” Tyler Kane says, coming up from behind my brother.
Tyler is even more attractive in person with his surfer tan, piercing blue eyes, and spiky blond hair. He’s tall and lean, with muscles bulging in all the right places. The last I’d heard, he married a local sports reporter. Lucky girl.
Tyler extends his hand to me. His skin is rough and calloused from years of playing hockey. “Hey, Mia. It’s been a while. Your brother talks about you all the time.”
“All good things, I hope.”
Tyler smiles in response.
He’s the team’s captain, the apparent leader of this band of cocky athletes.
When Tyler speaks, people listen. He captivates the entire room when he’s in it, and he’s a force to be reckoned with on the ice.
My brother was a fan of his before he joined the Flyers.
Even now, I see Will’s eyes light up, keeping his inner fanboy in check.
“Nice to see you again. Congrats on the win.” I give his hand a good shake. “So, who wants to go first?” I point my finger at Tyler. “How about you, captain? I want to know all of your secrets.”
He tenses at the mention of secrets, his body rigid from what was my attempt at a joke. Interesting. I wonder if there’s more to Tyler Kane than what meets the eye.
Clarke nudges me in the arm with her elbow. “I’ll take him. You can deal with your brother,” she says under her breath.
For whatever reason, Clarke and Will have never gotten along. They seem to hate each other for no apparent reason.
Do they like each other?
Guys are dumb.
When Will had a crush on a girl in high school, he kept saying stupid shit to catch her attention instead of laying it all out on the table. I’m unsure if that’s what he’s doing with Clarke, but I hate the tension between them whenever they’re in the same room.
Since this is Clarke’s gig, she takes the lead and begins by interviewing Tyler, leaving me to deal with my brother.
Alex Parker strolls up next to Tyler with Carter Donovan on his right.
He gives me a quick wave, and so does Carter.
They’ve been on the team the longest. Most players have only been with the Flyers for a few years.
It was a shock they were able to make it into the playoffs with a young team, which is part of the story we’re supposed to tell for the paper.
Will leads me by the hand to the other side of the conference table. “You already know everything there is to know about me, but ask away.”
We sit in two open chairs, and before I can ask Will a question, Ethan rolls his chair from the head of the table and stops in front of us. Fuck my life.
“I like tag teams,” Ethan says with a crooked grin. “Mind if I join?”
I roll my eyes. “I’m sure you do, you dirtball.”
“I was talking about the interview,” he challenges. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Mia.”
I wave my hand dismissively in front of him. “Well, I know how you like to avoid interviews. Don’t think you can sit here and give me a hard time because you know me. Let me do my job so I can put food on my table. So no bullshit, okay?”
“You can start with me,” Ethan offers. “And don’t worry about food or rent. Will and I have that covered for the next month.”
I lose my breath along with my train of thought. “Did you just say a month?”
Ethan nods. “We heard back from the property manager this morning. The insurance company assessed the damage. They’re telling us about three to four weeks until we can move back.”
“Let’s hope for three,” I deadpan.
“I wouldn’t count on it.” Ethan cups my knee, his fingers digging into my skin, reminding me of when we were kids hanging out on the swing set in my parents’ backyard. “You’re stuck with us for the next month.”
“Lighten up, Mia,” Will says. “Come out with us tonight. Now that we’re roomies, you have to celebrate with us.”
“You’re not supposed to be drinking during the post-season,” I remind him.
“Thanks, Mom.” Will laughs, his smile reaching the same blue eyes as mine. “We don’t have another game until next week. One drink won’t kill me. So, you in?”
Ethan tugs at the sleeve of my sweater, making a strange face. “And you might want to leave your grandma’s clothes at home. Clubs downtown have dress codes. They won’t care how hot you are if you look like you knit your clothes.”
“Dude, did you just tell my sister she’s hot?” Will leans forward, his hands folded in front of him, and looks over at Ethan, annoyed. “Stop hitting on my sister.”
I push my hands out at my sides to silence them. “There’s already too much testosterone in this room as it is. Let’s not get into a fight, boys.”
“I’d be less hostile if he would take his hand off your leg,” Will growls. His eyes are focused on Ethan’s hand, and I want to die for not telling him to remove it sooner.
Ethan moves his hand.
“Start with me,” Will growls.
I cross one leg over the other and spin my chair to face Will. With my back turned to Ethan, I can breathe a little easier.
“What’s there to know about you that I don’t already? You’re my brother, the starting right winger for the Flyers, and you ended the regular season with sixty-one points. Very impressive, by the way.”
Will gives me an amused smile. “You did your homework on me, huh?”
I nod. “It’s part of my job. I read everyone’s bio and stats before I left the office.”
“You always do more work than you need.” Will crosses his arms across his chest. “My sister, the book nerd.”
“Don’t mock the photographic memory, Romeo.” I laugh, as does Will. “Moving on. I know your stats, position, and all the basics. I even know why you started playing hockey. We can skip the usual crap.”
“No one has ever written that story about me, you know. I told a few reporters about how Pop-Pop would take us ice skating when we were kids and how he gave me my first hockey stick. They only cared about who I was dating and if I had any skeletons in my closet.”
“As a journalist, I can tell you that would bore the readers to death. Only hardcore fans care about your personal life and why you started playing hockey. I’d want to write about scandals, puck bunnies, baby mama drama, you know, the fun stuff.”
“I wouldn’t call that fun,” Ethan says, his gravelly voice forcing me to look at him as he speaks. “Our personal lives aren’t something for reporters to go digging through to sell papers.”
“I didn’t mean it like that, Waters. Don’t get your boxers twisted. I was just saying that juicy personal stuff sells newspapers.”
Ethan frowns. “It’s how you said it. Like you’re dying to find some dirt on us to print.”
“There’s not much to cover for you,” I shoot back. “Sex and hockey, rinse and repeat. Oh, and the occasional binge drinking. Did I forget something?”
“There’s more to me than hockey,” he spits back.
I flash an arrogant smile in his direction. “I don’t doubt that. Care to answer the question I asked you earlier?”
Ethan grinds his teeth together, clamping his mouth shut.
“Didn’t think so,” I say with a wink.
No matter how hard I’ve searched Ethan’s past, it reads like a clean slate.
Except for one thing. Even his family’s money and connections couldn’t erase the news articles about his twin brother.
Ethan was in the car with Erik when he crashed.
Erik was the golden boy of his high school and, from what I could tell, the favorite of the twins.
Ethan never spoke about his brother to me. He acted as though what had brought him to Pennsylvania was as simple as a new business venture for his father. The details in the local papers were limited, most likely silenced by his father. If Will knows about it, he never mentioned it to me.
“If you won’t give me something worth writing…” I tell Ethan, “… then I’ll have to make something up. How about a secret baby?”
I laugh to let him know I’m joking.
Ethan shakes his head, nostrils flared. “Don’t threaten me, woman.”
He’s sexy when he’s angry.