by Sarina Bowen
But it was time to do battle.
It was odd to lace up his skates in an empty dressing room. He hadn’t been the backup in ten years. He didn’t show his face until two minutes of game play had elapsed. Then he walked very slowly down the chute and toward the bench, where his teammates gathered.
Maybe it was normal for them to gather here, but he never did. It was a little like crashing a party. Henry—the trainer—waved him in and stepped aside so that Beak could maneuver down the row to the last seat in front of the door. The backup’s seat. He got situated and checked Silas’s face. The kid’s eyes scanned the ice, watching plays develop, waiting to lunge into action. His skating looked loose and controlled.
“To Crikey!” Silas shouted at his forwards when they’d missed their open man. Detroit was setting up a rush. Beacon felt it, and he saw from Silas’s body language that the kid between the pipes felt it, too.
Come on, buddy. You can do this in game seven the same as you do it in practice.
O’Doul made a nuisance of himself, so by the time Detroit got a shot it wasn’t much of a shot at all. Silas flicked it away with all the concern of a horse batting a fly with its tail. And just like that the kid made his first save of the night.
“Yeah!” Beacon yelled.
Detroit went in for the rebound, but it took them a couple of seconds. Silas had time to get into position and grab the puck right out of the air.
The whistle blew, and Silas waited for the ref to collect it from his glove.
“He looks solid,” Trevi said under his breath from beside Beacon.
“Yeah, he does,” Beacon agreed.
The minutes in the first period ticked down slowly. The Brooklyn team relaxed into the unusual situation, pressing on Detroit as best they could. As Beacon watched, it began to work. His teammates created scoring opportunities against a flustered opponent. They took shot after shot on goal, while Detroit was forced to play defense.
Then something amazing happened—O’Doul put one into the net with only two minutes left in the period. And then Trevi got one ninety-two seconds later, with a deke that could have won an Academy Award.
The Bruisers fans in the audience erupted with glee. It was 2–0.
After one more faceoff, the team clomped back to the dressing room for the intermission, elated. “Well played!” Coach hollered.
“How’d that feel?” Beacon asked Silas.
“Felt great. You said I was gonna be scored on tonight, but I think you were wrong.” Silas removed his helmet and wiped the sweat away with his arm.
“Yeah?”
“If anyone’s getting scored on, it’s you. Coach would be crazy not to send you in now that we have the momentum. They won’t know what hit ’em. Better keep stretching.”
He was right. Beacon was sent in at the start of the second period. “Ya miss me?” he asked his opponents as they skated past.
“Thought I got a night without your ugly mug,” Detroit’s captain muttered.
“Not so much!” Beacon called after him.
They won game seven 3–1, and advanced to the Stanley Cup finals for the first time in four years.
• • •
Beacon didn’t leave the rink until midnight. The dressing room had swarmed with reporters after the game, and Beacon told them all he’d felt a bit ill just before the puck dropped. “Mighta been something I ate,” he said every time someone asked why he hadn’t started tonight.
It sounded better than “I freaked out and went AWOL.”
By the time he’d boarded the bus, Lauren texted him that Elsa was asleep. And by the time his key card let him into his room, all the lights were out. As he tiptoed through the dark toward the king-sized bed, Lauren rolled over and sat up.
“Hi,” she whispered.
“Hi, beautiful.” He took off his suit jacket and kicked off his shoes. Then he stripped down to his boxers and padded into Elsa’s room.
His daughter was asleep, hugging her pillow. He kissed her head and then retreated to his room, closing the door behind him and locking it.
Then he dropped his shorts and practically did a swan dive into bed with his woman.
“Whoa,” she said as he did the military crawl toward her for a kiss. “Somebody’s happy to see me.”
“You have no idea.” The conversation stopped while he plundered her mouth for a few pleasant minutes. Then, with a happy sigh, he rolled to the side and pulled her onto his chest. “Thank you for taking care of my girl tonight. She got her period, huh? I don’t think that ever happened before.”
“It hadn’t,” Lauren said softly. “And it’s pretty freaky the first time. Seeing your own blood doesn’t seem normal, you know?”
“Except at the hockey rink,” he joked. “No, but seriously. Hans and I wouldn’t have been nearly so helpful with that.”
“Right place, right time,” Lauren said lightly.
He ran his nose along the smooth skin of her forehead. “I love you both so much. How were your seats tonight?”
“They were great. Except Elsa thinks we’re due a partial refund because you didn’t play a third of the time.”
He laughed into her silky hair. “Sorry to disappoint.”
“Was it bad that you were late?” she asked, sounding awfully worried. “Are they going to fine you?”
“I really have no idea. What’s done is done.” He put a hand right onto her breast. “Speaking of things getting done . . .”
“Smooth transition.”
“I know, right?” He rolled, pushing her onto her back. Pushing his hips down against hers, he kissed her again.
“Mmm,” Lauren said into his mouth. “I love game night.”
It was true that they’d had some of their most energetic sex after a win. He was always too wired to go to sleep. But sex wasn’t his mission right now. “Lo,” he whispered between kisses. “Did you test yet?”
She stilled beneath him.
“Did you pee on the stick?”
Slowly, she shook her head.
“I could run out and buy one right now. It’s time, right?”
He sat up, but she grabbed his hands. “Don’t.”
“Why?”
With a groan, she sat up, too. “In the first place, if you’re buying a pregnancy test at midnight, it’s going to end up in the gossip columns.”
He threw his head back and laughed.
“But . . . I’m just not ready.”
His laughter died away. “Why, honey? Don’t you want to know? I’m dyin’ here.” He cupped her soft face in one hand.
“Lots of pregnancies don’t take,” she said, turning her head to the side.
“Thing is . . .” He stroked her cheek with his thumb. “We can keep trying. As many times as it takes. With lots of practice in between. And even if it never works, I’m still so fucking happy that you’re here. It’s not just about the baby, Lo. Tell me we’re on the same page.”
Her eyes widened and then went soft. “It’s not just about the baby. I love you. I’m in this no matter what.”
In all their years together, nothing she’d ever said had made him as happy as he was right now. He pulled her into his lap and held her even closer. And when he exhaled, it came out shakily. “Thank you,” he whispered. “I think I really needed to hear that.”
“You’re welcome.” She punctuated her words with a kiss on the underside of his jaw.
“So now you’ll pee on the stick, right?”
Lauren groaned. “One track mind, much?”
“But if we know we belong together, then why wait to find out if there’ll be a baby joining this party in the winter?”
She stroked his back with a gentle hand. “Because if we get the plus sign now, then it’s something I could lose, instead of something I never had in the first place.”<
br />
“Aw, baby.” He ran a hand through her silky hair. “It’s all risk. Every damn thing in my life is something I could lose. That’s why we have to celebrate what we’ve got. We’re here, and we’re healthy. Everyone I care about is in this building tonight. My team just won. We might be losers again in three days’ time. Any number of shitty things might happen. But tonight we celebrate the living.”
“You.” She wrapped her arms around him, her eyes glittering in the dark. “You always shake me out of my funk.”
“That’s my job, baby.” He lifted her chin and claimed her mouth. The kiss went lava-hot immediately, too. She threw a knee over his thigh and straddled him. Heaven. He let his hands skim up her body until he was cupping her heavy breasts through the thin fabric of her nightgown. Maybe he was crazy, but she felt bigger already. He broke their kiss. “Are you sure I can’t go buy a test? I’ll wear a disguise.”
She laughed. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
“Not a chance.”
“I have a pregnancy test in my suitcase.”
“What?” he yelped, pulling her down and tackling her against the pillows. “You were holding out on me this whole time?”
“Maybe if you weren’t so pushy.”
Cupping the back of her head, he leaned forward until she tipped all the way onto her back. He spread his body out on top of hers, pinning her hands over her head. Then he kissed her again, deep and slow. “You like it when I’m pushy,” he said a couple of minutes later when they were both breathing heavily.
“If you add ‘when we’re naked’ to that sentence, then yes.”
“Go pee on the stick, woman, and I’ll show you my best pushy naked game.”
She gave him a shove and he rolled off her. Then she got up and fished a slender box out of her carry-on bag. He hopped up to follow her, but she gave him a stern look at the door. “You don’t get to watch me pee.”
“Just don’t leave me hanging. How long does it take to show us the love?”
She slipped the test stick out of the box then handed him the documentation. Then she shut the door in his face.
• • •
In the bathroom, Lauren kicked her underwear off and took a shaky breath. He’s right, she told herself. Either way, it’s okay.
It was surprisingly hard to pee on a stick without peeing on your own hand, but Lauren managed it.
Then, taking care not to glance at the display window on the plastic stick, she flushed the toilet and washed her hands. This day would live forever in her memory as the Day of Bathroom Drama. First Elsa, and now this. The cycle of life was getting a full workout, here. Hakuna matata.
“Nine, ten, eleven,” Mike counted from outside the bathroom door.
“What are you doing?”
“The instructions say to wait thirty seconds. Twelve, thirteen, fourteen . . .”
Lauren’s heart shimmied. “This is going to be very anticlimactic if it’s negative. And we won’t even know, because false negatives are common early on.”
She opened the door to find him standing there, gloriously naked, leaning on the doorframe. “Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen,” he counted quietly. His big, kind eyes looked down on her. “Nineteen . . .”
Lauren stood up on her toes and kissed him.
“Mmm . . .” He kissed her, too, pulling her against his hard body, his erection poking her in the belly. Damn, this man. If the test was negative, she’d be crushed. But she knew he’d kiss her and love her until it hurt a little less.
He broke their kiss. “Twenty-nine, thirty! Let me see it.”
She lingered in his arms a moment longer, prolonging her moment of truth. “You’re insane.”
“So? It’s probably not hereditary.” He ducked around her using his smoothest defensive maneuvers and grabbed the plastic stick off the counter. “Yesss!” He pumped his fist.
“Really?” Lauren gasped. “Let me see.” She grabbed the stick out of his hand. The display very clearly read +. “Wow. That’s a plus sign!”
“Of course it is.” He took the stick out of her hand and tossed it onto the bathroom counter. Then he shut off the light, grabbed Lauren by the hips and lifted her into the air.
Two seconds later her butt landed on the bed, and big hands lifted her nightgown over her head. “Time for my victory lap,” he said, pushing her back on the mattress. His warm weight landed on her thighs, and he attacked her neck with hungry kisses.
“I can’t believe it,” she murmured, her hands running through his hair. Their baby might have his dark, wavy locks.
Their baby. Holy cow. What a crazy, wonderful idea.
“Believe it, honey.” He grabbed one of her hands and attached it to his erection. He was hot and hard in her hand, and her body didn’t fail to notice. He tongued the valley between her breasts, and goose bumps broke out all over her body.
She stroked his cock and let out a happy sigh. “Can’t believe it worked on the first try.” She hooked her heels on his hips and drew him closer.
“I should have been a forward, you know?” he said, tonging her nipple. “I’m a really good shot.”
Her answering giggle died away as he kissed his way down her body. He nudged her thighs apart and placed a very soft kiss right where it counted. “Oh,” she gasped. And when his tongue came out to play, she clapped a hand over her mouth and bit back a moan.
“I know,” he said softly. “We have to be a little quiet.”
But the brush of his play-off beard against her thighs was making her crazy. “Come up here,” she demanded.
“Now who’s pushy?” He gave her a long, lingering lick that made her see stars.
“Please,” she panted.
One second later, his big, beautiful body rose up over hers. He grasped one of her knees, lifted it and filled her completely. “Oh yeah,” he said, thrusting his hips right away. “I do good work. First rate. Pro level.”
She arched her back and tried not to make any noise, but that was hard to do when you were as full of joy as she was. The things coming out of Mike’s mouth were cocky, macho boasts. Yet this man knew exactly how it changed your life to have a baby, and he’d wanted one with her anyway.
“Kiss me,” she demanded, her eyes wet with happy tears.
Without further comment, he did.
TWENTY-EIGHT
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK
JUNE 2016
Mike had been right to celebrate when he had the chance, because the Stanley Cup finals against Dallas were a serious challenge to both his sanity and his body.
Three days after their Detroit victory, they lost game one in Dallas. Then, forty-eight hours later, they won the second game. But veteran Beringer sustained a knee injury during the overtime period and wasn’t expected to play again until next season.
The team flew back to Brooklyn feeling low. By the time they landed at La Guardia, they had just over forty-eight hours to get ready for game three.
Beacon called home and asked Hans to pick up four steaks and a bag of charcoal for the grill out in back of the townhouse.
“Four?”
“I want Lauren to join us. Make it five if Justin is free. And pick up a bottle of whatever you feel like drinking.”
“What does Lauren drink?” Hans asked.
These days? Water. “Anything. You pick.”
“Sounds like fun,” Hans agreed. “I’ll make that pasta salad that Elsa likes, with the olives in it. She’s a little blue today.”
“She is?” He rubbed his temple, where a headache threatened to develop. “Any idea why?”
“I asked, but she would not say. Even my offer to play Bach duets at twice the normal speed did not cheer her.”
“Shit.”
“You’re coming home, though. She’ll like that. I’ll tell her to finish up the math h
omework now.”
“Thanks, man. See you soon.” Beacon tossed his duffel bag onto the back seat of a yellow cab and slid in after it. “Willow Street in Brooklyn Heights,” he told the driver.
His next move was to dial Lauren. “Team huddle,” he said when she answered.
“What’s the play, Coach?” she asked immediately.
“Any chance you can come to dinner at my place? I would have asked sooner but this was a plan I hatched at thirty-thousand feet.”
“I could probably make a little room in my busy social calendar.”
“Then I’m honored. Bring a change of clothes, maybe? I’d like to keep you overnight.”
She was quiet a moment. “If you think Elsa’s ready for that.”
“I love that kid so hard, Lo. If she hasn’t figured that out by now, I don’t think another couple weeks of easing her into it is going to help.”
“Okay. If I have to stop at home, it will take me until six thirty to get to your place, though.”
“That’s fine. I’ll light the grill at six.”
“Do you cook other things these days, too?”
“Nope. Just steak and pancakes. Same as always. You’ll have to be the one who teaches the twins to cook.”
“You think you’re so funny. Until the doctor says I’m having twins.”
“Bring it, woman. Now go back to work so I can make you a steak at six thirty.”
They hung up, and just like that he was feeling upbeat again.
• • •
The first thing he did upon reaching home was to run up the stairs and knock on Elsa’s door. “Sweetie, I’m home. Can I come in?”
There was no reply.
“Els?” He turned the doorknob. She was sitting in the center of the bed, her index fingers pushed into the corners of her eyes. “Hey—are you okay?”
She nodded, but tears leaked down her face.
“What happened?” He was across the room in three paces, sitting on the edge of the bed, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
“I . . . read Mom’s letter.”
It actually took him a minute to remember what she meant. “Oh,” he said stupidly. That freaking letter. Of course it would make her sad. “I’ll bet she said some nice things.”
