2. Russ
CHAPTER 2
RUSS
Five weeks earlier
The hockey season is measured in games, and if you’re lucky, wins. If you aren’t, then injuries. Eighty-two games in the regular season. One stint on the injured reserve list for an upper body injury. Sixteen wins in the playoffs to make it all the way to hoisting the Cup over your head.
The hockey off-season, on the other hand, is measured in weddings. And if you’re single and lucky, phone numbers.
Luck has not been on my side this summer. Or last season. Or any season in the sixteen years I’ve been playing professional hockey.
And yet I still believe, deep down, what I learned from my juniors coach—if you’re really stuck into it, if you’re competitive enough, and you’ve got your teammates’ backs, eventually the luck will turn your way. “It’s hard work, boys,” he would say. “Hard work and team work. Never give up on that. Be fucking relentless.”
Last year, we came really fucking close.
Not close to getting the Cup. Not that close.
We shat ourselves in the first round, unfortunately. Our playoffs were measured in four losses, and then we were kicked to the curb for wedding season to start earlier than we wanted it to.
But in the regular season, we had the right combination. We worked so fucking hard. We pulled ourselves together as a team, climbing the standings and finishing on a hot streak. And in that streak, at the end of the season, that’s where we got really close.
That’s also where it ended.
But we had the right combination. We could taste it.
All summer, in between the inevitable weddings, all we’ve talked about is getting that energy back for this coming season.
And now everyone else is finished with social events.
Me? I have one more wedding. It’s in progress, actually, and I’m the big dummy paying more attention to his phone and the group chat than I am to the party around me.
But dancing has started and I don’t feel like it.
I’ve been miserably in love with someone off-limits for a year, so I’m not yet ready to browse the singles table. Also, nobody wants to dance with a six-foot-five enforcer. I wear a neon sign that screams this guy has no rhythm .
So I’ve succumbed to the team group chat.
The vast majority of us keep training pretty hard in the off-season, but there’s “stay fit and keep skating”, and then there’s “training camp is around the corner and we want vengeance for how last year ended.”
Two different modes, and our captain is officially shifting gears. He starts with the smaller group chat for the older players, those of us who aren’t going to get waived out of training camp.
GROUP CHAT
Max Tilman: Marshie, are you back from your honeymoon yet?
Kieran Marsh: Just flew back this morning. What’s up?
Max: We need to start training
Kieran: Did you ever stop?
Max: Never
Kieran: I’m getting back to it, don’t worry - Rusty’s booked us some ice time next week up at his new cottage
Max: New cottage? Armstrong, WTF, you holding out on us? You secured some real estate?
I groan and shoot Kieran a private WTF message of my own. I did buy a cottage, a right place, right time opportunity that landed in my lap right after Kieran’s wedding, when I was having a personal crisis of confidence in some of my choices over the last year. The property is my commitment to myself, that I’m going to earn the performance bonuses due to come my way if we are better this year.
If I’m not distracted.
Kieran: Sorry, bud, jet lag got the better of me.
GROUP CHAT
Max: Dude, we need to have a team retreat immediately.
Max: How many people can this place sleep?
Even as I’m sighing, I have to admit Max has the right idea. And my cottage is big enough for this.
Russ: At least fifteen.
Max: Excellent.
Max: The girls, too? You know Marshie’s not going to be separated from his new bride. I’d be down for guys only, of course.
Russ: Better halves are welcome.
And then a string of individual texts come in as he spreads the word. Some I like.
Hayden Calhoun: Congrats on the new cottage, man! Tiller says I need to work with you on my defense, so count me in on a retreat.
And some I don’t know how to respond to.
Shannon Tilman: Hey, so… Max says you bought a new place and everyone in town is invited? That’s really generous of you.
Dots appear on the screen, then disappear. A minute goes by and I just grip my phone. Other text messages from teammates come in and I ignore them, waiting for those dots again.
This is exactly the problem. I need to move on from these feelings that trap me in moments exactly like this.
Shannon Tilman: Whatever you need, I’m yours.
Fuck. Me.
I drop my phone on the flower-laden table in front of me. I’m ready for the hockey wedding season to be over.
I need a far less romantic setting for my first attempt to get back into the dating space. Because I do need to get back on that horse.
Can you call it a rebound relationship if there wasn’t a break up before it? I need an emotionless, physical fling to get over my nothing-but-one-sided-feelings obsession.
“What’s wrong, Rusty?”
The groom’s sister drops into the seat beside me. I haven’t seen her in a couple of years, but that doesn’t stop her from immediately inserting herself into my private misery.
Once upon a time, Emery “Buzz” Granger was a tomboy teenager who geeked out on getting to play hockey with pro athletes because her older brothers are all in the league.
Today, she’s a bridesmaid at her oldest brother’s third wedding. She’s still a bit of a tomboy, because she’s got Converse sneakers on under her champagne-coloured satin dress. Earlier, she won an arm-wrestling competition against a D-man twice her size.
Grangers have always been fiercely competitive. And nosy.
“Who said anything’s wrong?” The open bar has thickened my usually mild Scottish accent. Twenty-four years of living in Canada undone by top shelf liquor.
“Your face.”
An observant tomboy, then.
I narrow my eyes at her. If the universe thought this was the woman to put in my path, there’s no hope for me.
But all I see staring back at me is friendly curiosity.
And fuck it, I need to talk this out with someone. Might as well be someone who doesn’t know anyone on the Highlanders. Emery speaks hockey, but she lives three states and a province away from all my problems. I’m not likely to see her again for another three years after tonight—or ever.
“I bought a house two weeks ago.” I leave out the fact that it was a rash purchase, a reaction after another wedding just like this one, teaming with hockey players and their wives and girlfriends.
The girls, too?
I walked right into that one.
The worst part is that he doesn’t even want her there—but I can’t resist the temptation of making him bring her along.
“My condolences,” Emery says dryly.
“It’s a huge compound in cottage country.”
“Even worse.”
“And my team captain just found out. He’s, uh, demanding I host something for the team next weekend.”
“Oooooh.” Now her sympathy seems sincere. “You got volun-told.”
“I sure did.”
“A team-only retreat before training camp? Getting everyone on the same page about coming back even tougher than last year?”
“You really were raised in the NHL, weren’t you?”
“The hype speech pumps through my veins, yeah.” She lowers her voice and does a bang-on imitation of her father, a legendary player and now a part of the Chicago front office. “You have to dial in and really find a focus together.”
I laugh despite myself.
She sighs melodramatically. “How are you going to survive?”
“Shut up.”
“Okay.” She swirls the ice in her glass, then shoves it at me.
I take a swig, expecting it to be whiskey.
It’s ginger ale, and the sweet carbonated bubbles make me choke in surprise.
She laughs, burying her face in her hand.
I swear under my breath, and she wipes her eyes. “Oh, man. Your face right now. I’ve missed you, Rusty.”
“Same, kiddo.” I make a face and down the rest of her drink. “What’s new with you?”
“I went to culinary school. But let’s not change the subject so fast. What’s the problem with hosting what you know is probably a good idea?”
Because it’s getting harder and harder to lie to myself about what I really want. “It’s complicated.”
“Try me.”
“It’s private.”
“I’m good with secrets.”
“Buzz—”
“Do you know why my nickname is Buzz?”
I try to remember, but I’ve had a lot of whiskey and her childhood was a long time ago. “No.”
“My brothers told me to buzz off all the time, and I refused to leave them alone.”
I laugh, because the way she delivers it is funny. And then I stop, because it’s not really funny. “Oh.”
“I’m persistent,” she says.
“I got it. That’s pretty clear.”
“Is this a midlife crisis?” She tips her head to the side. “How old are you?”
I sigh. “I’m thirty-six.”
She pretends to do math on her fingers. “So…it could be. Like Camden marrying a divorce attorney.”
Yeah, that was a weird choice for his third wife. Hopefully she’s his forever person, but the odds aren’t in his favour and I bet that prenup is weighted nicely in hers. “Fuck off.”
She smiles. “Is it a nice cottage?”
Sighing, I pull out my phone and show her the photos. She whistles as she scrolls through them. “Straight out of a fancy magazine, Mr. Armstrong.”
“I’ve never bought a house before. Turns out, I can afford a pretty nice one.”
She snorts. “You think?”
“Hey, have some sympathy for those of us in the bottom six, okay? Being relatively rich but also having constant job security concerns is more stressful than you might think.”
She purses her lips together and nods, mockingly. “Tell the girl skater more about how hard your hockey career is, bro.”
Fuck. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right.” Her eyes twinkle. “All of my brothers have full no-move clauses, so I wouldn’t actually know what this stress is that you talk about.”
“You. Brat.” I swat in the air. “Fully earned your nickname.”
“Won’t it be nice to show off your place to your teammates?”
“It’s not just the guys.” I swallow thickly. “The attached ones are bringing wives and girlfriends.”
Her brows knit together. “And?”
And it fucking hurts. “I feel like a damned fifth wheel. I’m the only older guy who’s single, and I’m over that. I bought this place to put down roots and tell the universe I was ready for more. By more, I didn’t mean a dozen overeager young hockey players.”
“Ah.” She nods.
“What, ah? ”
“This was supposed to be a house to feel your feelings in, and now your teammates are going to crash that party.”
I grunt. “I wouldn’t say it like that. It’s the first step in a rebound plan.”
“Rebound from what?”
“Never mind.”
She carries on as if I’ve said more than that. “Most people just hook up with a stranger. Real estate is an interesting choice.” She waves across the tent at her brother. “Camden bought a lake house after his first divorce. A word to the wise, though—he slept with the stranger, too, at the lake house, and she became his second wife.”
I remember. It didn’t last long. “Did she get the lake house in the divorce?”
“Oh yeah.” She twirls her finger in the air to refocus the conversation. “Okay, so this retreat is a good idea, yes?”
“Yes.”
“But you don’t want all the happy relationships rubbed in your face in your last week of summer.”
A heavy weight presses down on my shoulders. I hate how easily she got all of that out of me. I need to deal with this shit once and for all so I can focus on hockey properly this upcoming season. “Get to the point, Buzz. And don’t be too wise. I’m not humble enough to take advice from a twenty-one-year-old.”
“I’m twenty-four,” she says blithely. “Is that too young for you to date?”
I jolt upright, too fast, and my chair topples sideways, dumping me onto the floor.
Everyone turns and looks.
Emery waves her hands. “It’s okay, folks! He’s just had too much ginger ale.”
I stare at her sneakers, then at the swish of her satin gown as she stands and leans over to give me a hand up. I avoid making eye contact with her cleavage as the world tilts around me and I heave to my feet, because twenty-four or not, she’s still my buddy’s little sister, and I’m in love with someone else.
“Is the idea of dating me that awful?” She’s teasing.
I glare down at her now that we’re both standing. “You’re teasing, right?”
Because I need to be sure, and I’ve had a lot to drink.
She pats my chest with the confidence of someone who hasn’t been drinking at all. “Relax.”
“Look, Emery, you’re very pretty and smart and?—”
“You don’t need to let me down gently, Rusty. I’m not into you. Ew, please be serious. You’re the same age as my thrice-married brother, and you literally just bought your first house. No offence, but my standards are higher than that. I’m offering you my help.” She looks at me like I’m an idiot, which is very possible given that I didn’t consider the obvious fact that of course the youngest Granger would be above dating me , a third-line journeyman player. A nobody.
“Can you take pity on an old man and spell out what exactly this help you’re offering might be?”
She gives me her cutest, most deadly smile. “You don’t like that this was thrust upon you. You don’t want to feel like an outsider at your own housewarming party.”
“I wouldn’t call it a party.”
She rolls her eyes. “Yes, but you should . And to make it a proper party, you need a hostess.” She flutters her hands down her satin-covered body, and back up to her now-innocent expression. “Me.”