Amelia had faith in him. Macy was calling him Daddy with heartwarming frequency. He couldn’t screw this up. He had to think everything through before he made his final decision.
Brick picked up a green dress and started to put it on the Amelia Barbie.
“No, not that one. She can’t wear that to the ball. She wears that to work.”
“Oh, sorry.” Brick suppressed a grin. “And what kind of work does she do?”
“She owns a hockey team.”
Brick nodded approvingly, and Macy beamed at him. He dug through the pile of clothes and held up a foofy pink dress. “How’s this?”
“Better.”
His phone beeped a few seconds later, and he reached to turn the fucking thing off when he saw 911 scroll across the screen. That was Rush’s code that he needed help ASAP.
Frowning, Brick took the phone into the bedroom to call his buddy.
* * * *
“Dinner’s ready,” Amelia called out to Brick.
He strode out of the bedroom, tucking his phone in his jeans. His troubled expression caught her off guard.
“What’s wrong?”
“Not sure, but I have to go. Rush needs me. I’m sorry. I’ll eat when I get back.” Worry wrinkled his brow and brought a deep frown to his face. This was serious.
“What’s going on? Is Rush okay?”
He whipped around, agitated and even angry. “I fucking don’t know. I need to go. Sorry. Later. I’ll call you as soon as I know more.” He left without another word, slamming the door behind him.
Macy ran into the kitchen. “Where’s Daddy going?”
“He got called away.”
Her face fell, and she sniffled, her big eyes filling with tears. “He won’t eat dinner with us?”
“Not right now. Maybe later.”
She didn’t know what the hell was so damned important he couldn’t stick around for a half hour and at least eat dinner with them. As she dished up the meal, her phone chimed. She grabbed it, expecting a text from Brick. Instead, it was Vi checking in. Amelia sighed. Whatever had happened with Rush, she had to believe it was serious. Brick had looked almost panicked.
They were sitting down to dinner when the doorbell rang. Amelia prayed it was Brick and he’d forgotten his key.
“Keep eating, sweetie. I’ll be right back.”
Amelia swept the door open to find an attractive older woman dressed in trim jeans and a sweater on the doorstep. They blinked at each other, both surprised to find the other there.
“I’m Connie Bricker. Marty’s mother. I’ve come to get my granddaughter.”
Chapter 18—Hugging the Post
Brick paced the floor, muttering obscenities Amelia had never heard before. He wrung his hands and stopped in front of her. She’d been watching him fret and stew with a detached expression. Little did he know she felt anything but detached. She wanted to wring his muscular neck and shake those broad shoulders until the rocks in his idiot head rattled around.
He glared at her and pointed his finger in her face. She swatted his finger away.
“Let me get this straight. You let my mother take Macy without contacting me?”
“I did contact you. You were too busy partying to be bothered.”
“I wasn’t—”
“Why didn’t you answer your phone?”
“I couldn’t call. I lost my phone somewhere. Fuck if I know where. The damn thing was dead anyway.”
“You escaped like a coward knowing your mother was coming to pick up Macy. You left me to do your dirty work.” Her voice rose to a shrill pitch, reminding Amelia of her mother, and she hated that.
“A coward?” He ground the words between his teeth.
“Yes, a coward. You avoid the hard stuff in your life, assuming it’ll eventually go away. Well, guess what, asshole. It did, and so am I.”
“Calm down, Ammie, let me explain.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. “Make it good.”
“I had to get the rookie out of a potentially disastrous situation before he was arrested. Unfortunately, I was a little too late. By the time I got there, they were hauling him off to jail, and I had to bail him out. Do you have any clue how long they make you wait around before they’ll release someone? It’ll be all over the news in a few hours. Trust me.”
“Why couldn’t Rush handle it?”
“Rush was too drunk to be much help.”
“Oh.” She deflated somewhat, but his smug expression built up her steam once again. She’d make him feel something. “Well, then, I’m sorry. But that doesn’t explain why your mom couldn’t reach you all week.”
“Guilty as charged. I didn’t have an answer so I never responded. I honestly didn’t think she’d drive all this way without actually talking to me first.”
“She did try to talk to you. Last night was the only time she could make it before Christmas. She would’ve been much earlier but there was a fatal multicar crash on I-5, and she’d been stuck in traffic for hours.”
“Why didn’t you insist she wait for me to return?” He raked his fingers through his hair and paced the floor, cussing under his breath.
“I did, but I had my own emergency to take care of.”
He sobered slightly and slowed his pacing. His gaze swept over her, and for the first time that night, she saw concern for her. “What?”
“Dean called. Ruby left him for good, and he was in a bad state. I was concerned about him. Your mom said she’d stay with Macy. When I got back hours later, she was gone and had left that note.”
“My mom doesn’t like to be kept waiting,” Brick said quietly, staring at his feet. All the fight had drained out of him.
“Obviously. She was really annoyed with you. Said it was normal for you to ignore her messages.”
“She lectures,” he admitted sheepishly. “I hate hearing it. It’s not like I don’t know all that crap she’s telling me.”
“Brick, instead of fighting about this, we need to go get her.”
He stopped, his expression stricken and conflicted. “Maybe Macy is better off with her, anyway, because I’ve disappointed her one too many times. I suck as a father.”
“Like we haven’t all been disappointed by our parents countless times?” Amelia shot back.
“According to my stepmother, I’m a worthless fuckup.” Brick looked up. Irritation flashed in his eyes, and he sounded like a petulant child. He’d come so far to slip back into his selfish ways. Damn the infuriating man.
“Why do you keep insisting on being the man your stepmother claims you are?” Amelia was indignant. “You’re not a fuckup, and you don’t suck as a father.”
“Really? I don’t? Then why didn’t I have the guts to tell my mother I’d changed my mind? That I wanted to be a full-time daddy?”
“I don’t know. Why didn’t you tell her?” Amelia lowered her voice and met his tormented gaze.
“Because I’m a selfish asshole and maybe deep down I didn’t want the responsibility. It’s done. I was playing at being a father, not taking it seriously. It was just one more game to win as far as I was concerned.” He turned his back on her, raking his fingers through his hair.
“I don’t believe you.” Amelia reached out and touched his shoulder.
“Leave. Me. Alone.” He jerked away. The coldness in his voice would’ve frozen ice in an Arizona desert.
“Marty. I’m sorry. I wish this hadn’t happened.”
He leaned his forehead against the windowpane. “I’ve been trying to be a good dad.”
Amelia lowered her voice. “I know you have.”
“This fucking sucks.”
“She’s your daughter. Tell your mother you’ve changed your mind.”
He turned, resignation in his eyes, as if he’d already given up. “She’s better off with my mother.”
“You aren’t going to fight for her?”
“This is for the best.” His voice was peppered with frustrat
ion and resignation.
“You’re a coward. You’re afraid to try for fear you might fail. I understand that, because I’ve been there, too. But failure is the best way to learn to do it better next time.”
“There won’t be a next time. She’s gone.” Anguish contorted his handsome face. He wrung his hands together and moaned.
“Get her back.”
He shook his head, turned on his heel, and grabbed his coat by the door. She ran after him. Uncontrollable anger boiled up in her toward the man who didn’t want his child when she couldn’t have one.
She stopped him before he could do what he did best—run away from the real problems in his life and let someone else clean up his messes. Grabbing his arm, she wrenched him around with strength born from adrenaline and fury.
“You fucking bastard. You’re throwing away the two best things that ever happened to you. I’d give anything to have a child, but I can’t ever have one. And you throw her away.”
“You can’t have a child?” He stared at her hand on his arm, then slowly raised his gaze to meet hers. His eyes weren’t filled with anger or annoyance but with regret and sadness.
“No, never. Complications from my stillbirth. A hysterectomy. But what the hell do you care? The only person you care about is yourself.”
She could almost see his inner battle. Then his face turned stone cold, causing her stomach to plummet.
“You’re right. If you’re smart, you’ll get out while you can,” he said, his voice dead and lifeless.
“Oh, trust me. I am. I’ll be gone when you get back.”
“Fine.” The door clicked shut behind him. She wanted to run after him but didn’t. Instead, she started throwing her stuff into suitcases and garbage bags, anything she could find, barely able to see through the blinding tears.
Chapter 19—Square to the Puck
Dejectedly, Brick slumped in front of his locker after an especially brutal loss to the Penguins in the fifth game of a grueling eight-game, two-week road trip. They’d lost five to two, and Coach had benched him halfway through the second period. He’d been playing like shit on this road trip, but his defensemen had risen to the challenge and done everything but stand in the net for him. Even so, they’d won three and lost two, no thanks to Brick.
The coach’s rah-rah speech didn’t register in his muddled brain. He rubbed his breastbone. His chest ached like a motherfucker. He must be getting the flu.
Coop spoke next. He wasn’t nearly as nice as Coach. “We played like a bunch of pansy-assed ladies at a tea party. Get your fucking heads out of your asses, and be the contenders we all know we are. Myself included. I’m not bringing my A game, either. But I will be. Rising up from defeat separates the men from the ladies. We’re all men here, aren’t we?”
Shouts of agreement rang around the room as guys stripped off their sweaty uniforms. Brick wiped his face with a towel and stared at his helmet. He’d been contemplating putting Macy’s name on one side like a lot of the other fathers did on the team. His shoulders slumped. She was gone, and he’d let her go. He’d let them both get away. The few times he’d talked to Macy, she’d been hurt and uncommunicative. The last time, she’d refused to speak to him at all.
It’d been two weeks since he’d lost the two women in his life, leaving him live the way he’d wanted. Only he wasn’t living it. After away games, he was sitting in his hotel room staring at four walls, watching reality TV, and sipping ice water.
A shadow blocked out most of the light in the room, and he glanced up wearily, expecting to see Rush with some kind of harebrained idea to torture the rookie or cheat at poker once they boarded the plane to Detroit. Instead, Coop, Smooth, and Ice stared down at him, wearing matching expressions of concern and irritation. At the next stall over, Matt watched with detached interest, like a rubbernecker driving past a car wreck.
Brick met each pair of steely eyes, feeling as though he was in a shoot-out and severely outnumbered. Revealing any weakness around these three would be detrimental to his health and his hockey career.
“You’re playing like shit.” Never one to mince words, Ice jabbed his finger in Brick’s face.
“Tell me about it.” Brick decided the best defense was to not get defensive. He sighed and swiped the towel across his face again. “I really need a shower.” He started to get up, but Coop’s firm hands on his shoulders pushed him back down.
“It’s not like we don’t know what’s wrong with you. You aren’t fooling anyone, least of all us.” Smooth’s knowing smirk pissed Brick off. After all, they’d been former party buddies, with Smooth leading the way for the younger guys. Now that he was wearing the old ball and chain, he acted as if he had all the answers.
“So what’s wrong with me?” Brick countered in a surly tone, poking the three bears and certain he’d not get out of this confrontation with his balls intact.
“My God, you idiot. Do we have to spell it out for you?” Coop snorted with absolute disdain. His two cohorts nodded their agreement.
“I guess you do. What can I say, I’m a moron and proud of it.”
“You’re lovesick.” Coop propped his hands on his hips and glared at Brick, daring him to deny what Coop saw as the truth.
Brick narrowed his gaze and glared right back. “What the fuck did you say? I am not fucking lovesick over anyone.” He tried to get up again, but Smooth and Ice flanked him and placed firm hands on his shoulders.
“We were like you once. This’ll be less painful if you admit you were a dumbass and beg forgiveness.” Ice looked to his partners in crime for affirmation.
“Whose forgiveness?” Brick played dumb, but they all knew the truth.
“Amelia’s and Macy’s.” Smooth’s voice grated with rare agitation. The guy rarely got riled.
“If you won’t do it for yourself because you’re too stubborn or stupid to see the light, at least do it for them and for the team. We need you at one hundred percent, Brick.” With Coop it always came back to the team. That’s why he was captain.
“Swallow your pride. Do some groveling and get them back.” Ice squeezed his shoulder so hard it hurt like a motherfucker, but Brick showed no outward signs of pain.
“He’s too stupid to see how miserable he is,” Smooth said.
“I’d do anything to have a good woman at my side, one who could love my children as her own, and you’re throwing it away.” From the bench, Matt added his two cents, drawing a scowl from Brick.
“He hasn’t sunk low enough yet, boys,” Coop added.
“But he will,” Ice said.
“You can lead a horse to water…” said Smooth.
Then as a unit, the three of them marched off and left him to his thoughts. Feeling Matt’s eyes on him, Brick reluctantly turned his attention to him. “I suppose you have more to say.”
Matt shrugged. “Nope, they’ve said it all, but the longer you stay away the less likely Amelia is to forgive you and give you another chance. Not sure about Macy, but you haven’t won many points there either, as far as I can tell.”
Brick lowered his voice. “Macy won’t talk to me anymore when I call.”
“There you go.”
“How is Amelia?”
Matt, the rat bastard, had hired Amelia as a nanny within twenty-four hours of her leaving Brick. “She’s good. She loves the boys, and they love her, but I think she misses you. God knows why— you’re such an asshole—but there’s no accounting for taste.”
Matt stood and headed for the showers, leaving Brick with only his sorrow and his conscience for company, and shitty company, at that.
* * * *
Brick grabbed Rush and together they walked to a neighborhood bar and tied one on, like the old days. Women came out of the woodwork, hanging on both men. Rush ate it up; Brick hated it.
They’d returned earlier from their two-week road trip, and Brick managed to pull his head out of his ass enough to prevent any more losses, though he attributed their wins more to the supe
rior play of their defensemen than to him. But he’d avoided any major mistakes, and considering his current state of mind, he’d take that as a win.
Sensing Brick needed space and didn’t need female company, Rush managed to send the women packing, except for a pair of pushy females. Eventually, the hard-assed female bartender forcibly removed them.
“I didn’t think we’d be bothered much in a place like this.”
“Ve’re bothered everywhere.” Rush grinned. “Ve are that gorgeous.”
Brick rolled his eyes. “Don’t you ever get tired of it?”
“Of vhat?”
“The endless parade of women. Never getting to really know any of them. And never finding one who likes you for you instead of your fame and money.”
“I not care vhy they like me as long as they get naked.”
That would’ve been Brick’s answer a few short months ago.
Rush narrowed his gaze and studied Brick as best he could, considering he was having a hard time focusing. “You miss her.”
“Fuck no,” Brick lied.
“You idyot. You miss her.”
“I don’t.”
“Then vhy you not flirt with sexy women?”
“I’m not in the mood.”
“Since vhen?” Rush could be a stubborn bastard when he grabbed hold of something. He wasn’t going to let this go until he got a satisfactory answer, despite how drunk he was.
“You miss her,” Rush insisted.
Brick shrugged.
“Then vhy not go after her?”
“She won’t take me back now. I’m a bastard. They’re both better off without me.”
“Shouldn’t you let them make that decision?”
Brick frowned and rubbed the short beard on his chin. He took another swig of his beer, but the stuff tasted flat. Grumpy as hell, he slammed the glass on the table a little too hard.
Goaltending: Seattle Sockeyes Hockey (Game On in Seattle Book 8) Page 21
