30. Tyler
TYLER
We drive home in complete silence. My car is still at the arena. I decided to drive Nora’s car because Harper’s already buckled in the back, and I refuse to let Nora drive in the state she’s in.
I’m gripping the steering wheel so hard my knuckles are white, trying to process what the hell just happened.
My girlfriend—my secret girlfriend whom I'm supposedly keeping things quiet with for Harper's sake—walked into my practice, confronted my team captain, and slapped him in front of everyone.
I should be furious.
I should be terrified about the fallout.
I am terrified about the fallout. It's the only thing my brain can focus on.
PR. Lawyers. League discipline. Jessica seeing it on a hockey gossip site and calling her family lawyer.
The trial we haven't had yet, the trial we might have to have, and the fact that the woman I love just made it ten times harder to argue Harper has a stable home environment.
Then I look at her, and underneath all of that, I keep replaying the look on Reaper's face when she called him a coward. The shocked silence that followed when the slap echoed through the arena. The way she walked out with her head high, like she owned the place.
We're three blocks from home when I finally break.
"I still can't believe you slapped my captain," I say, and my voice comes out somewhere between disbelief and awe. "In front of the entire team."
"He hurt you." Her voice is calm, unapologetic. "He deserved it. Someone had to stand up to him."
"Red, the consequences—"
"I told you. I know."
"You think you know."
"Tyler." She turns to look at me. "I'm a twenty-six-year-old woman who walked into a building knowing exactly what would happen.
I knew the team would file something. I knew Coach might back Reaper.
I knew you might lose your spot on the line.
I knew Jessica's lawyer could use it. I went in anyway.
So when you tell me I don't know—I do. I just didn't care more about those things than I cared about you not getting hit again. "
I don't have a good answer to that.
We pull up to a stoplight, and the laughter I expected never quite comes. Nora's looking at me, and I'm looking at her, and Harper's babbling in the backseat, completely oblivious.
"Why did you do it?" I ask quietly. "Really. You could've gotten hurt. Banned from the arena. Made things worse for me."
"Because you matter." Her voice is fierce, protective. "You matter to me. And to Harper. A lot."
My chest tightens. "How much?"
"So much it scares me." She reaches across the console, and our hands link automatically. "So much that watching you hurt makes me hurt."
I stare at our joined hands—her small pale fingers threaded through my larger tanned ones, the silver bracelet I gave her catching the dashboard light, and the casual intimacy of it.
We agreed to keep this quiet. To be together in private but maintain distance publicly. To protect Harper by keeping things professional.
And she just threw all of that out the window to defend me.
"Red—"
"I know." She squeezes my hand. "I know we're supposed to be careful. But Tyler, I can't watch someone hurt you and not do anything."
The light turns green, and I have to let go of her hand to drive, but the phantom feeling of her fingers in mine stays with me the rest of the way home.
Harper's fussy when we get inside, teething and cranky, and we fall into our usual routine. Nora handles Harper while I shower, trying to wash away the practice, the confrontation, and the lingering adrenaline.
When I come downstairs, Nora's got Harper in the high chair, and she's made dinner like nothing happened. Like she didn't just walk into a professional hockey arena and slap my captain.
My phone has been buzzing since we got home. I'd put it face-down on the counter when I came in. I look at it now.
Twenty-three missed calls. Forty-something texts. The team's PR person. My agent. A reporter from the Athletic. Danny. Liam. Emma.
"Tyler?" Nora is watching me. "How bad is it?"
"It's out." I scroll through, my stomach sinking with each notification. "Someone leaked it. The Falcons captain was slapped at practice by a player's nanny. There’s no name. But there's a photo from the parking lot of you walking out with Harper."
She closes her eyes.
"Right," she says. Quiet. "Okay. So that happened."
"I'm calling my agent."
"Eat first."
"I can't—"
"Eat. The damage is done. Five more minutes won't change it."
She's right. We sit at the kitchen table, Harper between us in her high chair, and force ourselves through pasta and garlic bread that neither of us tastes. Nora's quiet. I can see her recalibrating, working out what this means, what she'll have to absorb.
I call my agent at eight, after Harper's gone down.
He's somewhere between furious and impressed, and doesn't try to hide either.
He spends fifteen minutes telling me what Puck Daily is going to do tomorrow, what the team's PR person will want from me, and what statements to make and not make.
Don't apologize for her. Don't disavow her.
Don't say a single thing on social media.
Don't talk to a reporter unless I clear it. We'll get ahead of this.
I tell him she's not my nanny, technically, she's my girlfriend, we've just been keeping quiet about it.
There's silence on the phone.
"Jesus Christ, Tyler."
"Yeah."
"How long?"
"Public for everyone now, I guess."
"That's going to be the second item by Friday. They love a hidden-relationship reveal." He sighs. "Okay. That doesn't change strategy; it just changes the headline. Talk tomorrow."
I hang up. Nora is on the couch, knees pulled up, staring at the dark TV.
"He didn't yell at me," I say, sitting next to her. "Mostly."
"Mostly."
"He said once the relationship gets out, it'll be the second item by Friday."
She nods, but doesn't say anything for a long moment.
"Tyler?"
"Yeah."
"This is the part where I tell you I'm sorry for making this complicated, for dragging your career into it." She turns to look at me. "But I'm not going to, because I'd do it again. But I want you to know I see what I cost you today, and I'm not pretending I didn't."
I take her hand.
"You didn't cost me anything I'm not willing to spend," I say. "Hear me? Not a single thing."
She doesn't say anything. Just curls into my side, careful of my ribs, and lets me hold her while the house settles into the night.
Thursday morning comes too fast.
The team email is in my inbox before I'm fully awake. Sent at 6:47 a.m. by the GM's assistant.
Subject line:
Visitor Access—Practice Facility—Effective Immediately.
I read it twice, the second time slower than the first.
Following the incident on Wednesday afternoon, an internal review has been conducted.
Effective immediately, Ms. Nora Collins is prohibited from entering the practice facility, including all team-controlled areas of the arena (excluding family seating during games).
This restriction is permanent unless formally reviewed by team management and the league.
Mr. West is requested to attend a meeting with the GM today at 8 a.m. to discuss the incident and any related employment implications.
Failure to attend will be treated as a separate matter.
Permanent.
There's no warmth in the language. No, "we understand the circumstances," just a formal letter, copied to my agent, the team's PR person, and someone in the league office I don't recognize.
I show it to Nora at the kitchen table. She reads it without speaking. Her face doesn't change much. She hands it back.
"That tracks," she says.
"Red—"
"I expected something like that. I just didn't think it would be permanent."
"It can be reviewed."
"It won't be." She stands up to make coffee. "Not for a long time. They have to be seen doing something, and the easy thing to do is bar me. So that's the thing they do."
I want to argue, but I can't. She's right.
"I have to be in the GM's office in an hour," I say.
"Then you should go."
She kisses me at the door. Her face doesn't crack. I think it might later, when I'm gone, but it doesn't crack now.
The GM's office is cold and very orderly. Team management on one side of the table. The team's lawyer, the PR director, Coach—looking like he hasn't slept—and me.
"Tyler." The GM doesn't bother with hello. "I'm going to ask you some questions, and you're going to answer them honestly. We're trying to assess the situation and get ahead of it. We're not adversaries here. Understood?"
"Understood."
"Has Ms. Collins ever displayed violent behavior in your home, around your daughter?"
"No."
"Have you ever known her to instigate physical confrontations?"
"No. Yesterday was the first."
"Was she acting on your behalf? Did you ask her to confront the captain in any way?"
"No. I had no idea she was coming. I tried to stop her when she got there."
"What is the nature of your relationship with Ms. Collins?"
I look at the GM. I look at Coach. I think about Nora at the kitchen table making coffee with her face deliberately not cracking.
"She's my girlfriend. We've been together since January.
Before that, she was, and continues to be, the primary caregiver for my daughter, who came into my custody at eight weeks old after her mother left her on my doorstep.
Nora has lived in my home in a professional capacity since August. The relationship developed over time. "
The PR director and the lawyer are taking notes. The GM doesn't react.
"Did anyone in the organization know about the relationship before yesterday?"
"No."
"You concealed it deliberately."
"Yes. Pending finalization of custody."
"Custody is contested?"
"Not currently, but it could be if Harper's mother resurfaces. The relationship complicates the picture."
There’s a long silence.