Chasing Charli (Alaska Blizzard Book 6)

by Kat Mizera

  “We have to talk about summer,” Miikka said when they sat down to eat. “I would like to take you to Finland after the school year is over.”

  “I hadn’t thought about it,” she said, looking at him over her wine glass. “When were you thinking of going and for how long? I’ll have two weeks off at the end of May and beginning of June, then I’ll teach summer school for six weeks, and have two weeks off before the next school year starts.”

  He frowned. “Must you teach summer school?”

  “Well, no, but I’ve done it the last two years and if I give up my slot, I may not get it back next year.”

  “But if we’re together, we’ll always spend the summer in Finland.” He looked at her intently. “Won’t we?”

  Charli hesitated. “We’ve only been together a month, Miikka. I think it’s a little soon to make decisions that could impact my career going forward. I make plenty of money to survive, but the extras like summer school put a little padding in my budget so I can do things like renovations on the house.”

  “I wish it were possible for me to stay and teach your summer school and you to go to Finland in my place,” Tara said with a wry smile.

  “I don’t think it works that way,” Charli responded, “but summer school isn’t fun at all. I usually wind up with older kids, like fifth or sixth grade, and they’re all mad that they have to be there.”

  “That’s how I feel about going home right now,” Tara said, “so I understand that.”

  “You’re not telling me everything,” Miikka said to her in Finnish. “Something else is going on.”

  Tara sighed, responding in English. “No, I haven’t told you everything.”

  “If you guys need to talk—” Charli began.

  “Don’t be silly.” Tara shook her head. “I don’t have secrets from you, in particular. I just haven’t wanted to discuss my disaster of a life with anyone. Not even with my favorite little brother.”

  “Are you older?” Charli asked in surprise. “Why did I think you were younger?”

  “I’m twenty-six. Miikka turns twenty-five in October, I turn twenty-seven in January. So less than two years between us.”

  “Why didn’t I know that?” Charli turned to Miikka. “You have another brother too, right? Younger than both of you?”

  He nodded. “Yes, but he’s only nine. Our parents had...” He turned to Tara. “What’s the word they use?”

  “A surprise.” Tara chuckled. “Our mother was almost forty and accidentally got pregnant. So Leon is our surprise sibling.”

  “This is also why I enjoy to go home in summer,” Miikka told Charli. “I spend time with him. He is now learning hockey and I love it.”

  “You can go without me,” Charli said gently. “I won’t be mad.”

  “I think maybe I go first, maybe one or two weeks. Then you join me and we come home together. This way, we’re not apart too long.”

  Charli’s heart melted into a million little chunks of love. He was so damn thoughtful and always thinking about doing things for her, even something like this. “But is that enough time for you with your family?”

  He shrugged. “I have a life in the U.S. now. I can’t run home the moment hockey is over, like my life is there. I don’t think I will ever go back to Finland for good. Maybe, but not for a long time. I want to buy a house here, I will someday have a family here… I think this is my life now. I’ll always visit, of course, and go to see my family, but I would like them to come here also. When I buy a house, I want them to come to me to see America too.”

  “Our father loves coming for the dads trip every year,” Tara told her, referring to the team’s yearly trip with the players and their fathers.

  “So are you planning to stay until Miikka goes home?” Charli asked her.

  “I think so. If he can stand having me around.” She gave her brother a grin and he rolled his eyes.

  “I think I can stand you,” he said.

  “Or I can ask Logan to marry me again,” she quipped.

  “You asked Logan to marry you?” Charli asked, wide-eyed.

  Miikka and Tara laughed.

  Charli planned for Miikka to come read to the class the following week and he came in on Tuesday morning with a big box of things to give the kids and a large white chocolate latte for Charli. The kids were so excited, she’d had a rough time keeping them on task all morning and the moment Miikka walked in, he was surrounded by kids.

  “Uncle Miikka!” Ever the ringleader, Niko was on him in an instant, hugging him tightly.

  “Hello!” Miikka had a big grin on his face and seemed completely at ease with a group of five-year-olds pining for his attention.

  “What are you going to read to us, Uncle Miikka?” Niko asked when Charli finally got them in their seats and back to some semblance of order.

  “I have chosen Z is for Zamboni,” he said with a smile.

  “I think we’ll put Miikka in my rocking chair and you can all gather on the floor,” Charli said. “Find your seats and I expect you on your best behavior—he won’t start reading until everyone is sitting quietly.”

  To her surprise, they were almost silent as they hurried down to the rug on the floor in front of her rocking chair and the easel she used to teach certain writing lessons.

  “Hi.” She spoke softly to Miikka as the kids got settled.

  “Can I kiss you?” he whispered.

  “No!” She grinned as she shook her head. “Maybe when you leave.”

  “Okay.” He watched the class settling into their spots. “I’m nervous.”

  “You’re going to do great. We’ve been practicing for weeks. You’ve got this.”

  “You must help me if I mess up,” he said under his breath.

  “I’ll be right here.” She squeezed his hand.

  Miikka moved to the rocking chair, the book in his hand. He looked around at the class. “For those who don’t know me, I’m Miikka Laasonen. I play for the Alaska Blizzard and—”

  “He’s a winger!” Niko called out.

  “Niko.” Charli gently admonished him, shaking her head. “Raise your hand if you have questions.”

  A little girl named Daria raised her hand.

  “Yes?” Miikka looked at her.

  “What’s a winger?”

  “It means I play either right or left wing…” He went into a simplified version of his hockey spiel and the kids were mesmerized. They asked dozens of questions that made Charli laugh, but Miikka took each one seriously, answering them as if they were the most important people in the world. She’d never seen someone that wasn’t a teacher handle a group of kids this age so well.

  He seemed far more comfortable with kids than he did some adults, she thought as she watched them. When he read the story, the kids were mesmerized, as well-behaved as she’d ever seen them, hanging on his every word. He sounded great, having worked hard on his pronunciation and putting emphasis in the right places. They’d practiced last night and she was so proud of him and how seriously he’d taken this even though this wasn’t even part of the team’s official community outreach program. He’d done this for her, nothing else, and it was yet another check mark in the emotional plus column she’d subconsciously created. There wasn’t a single item in the negative column either, which was making it harder and harder to keep herself from falling in love with him.

  At this point, she didn’t even want to try.

  “Charli?” Miikka was calling to her and Charli was jolted back to reality.

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “I have gifts for the children. How do you want to do this?”

  “Let’s play some games…” She walked to the front of the room and exchanged a long look with Miikka, who winked.

  “Will you come back next week?” Maya, one of the little girls in the class, asked him.

  “I will come whenever Miss Charli says it’s okay.”

  “Come to our end-of-year party!” Niko yelled.

 
“Yay!” The whole class joined in and immediately surrounded Miikka, tugging at his bag of goodies, laughing with him and eventually tackling him to the ground. She moved to step in but Miikka caught her eye and gently shook his head, indicating he was fine. The children were laughing and extremely well-behaved, all things considered. She stood on the edge of the melee watching carefully, but Miikka had one arm around Niko, whom he knew well and was comfortable with, and let the other kids attempt to tickle him.

  “Miss Charli.” Daria approached her with an impish smile.

  “Yeah, sweetie?”

  “I really like your boyfriend.”

  Charli turned bright red but smiled. “I like him too.”

  “I like Miss Charli also!” Miikka called out from the floor, grinning at her.

  “I bet they’re gonna get married,” Niko said.

  20

  Since Charli was still at work during the day, and Tara was good about entertaining herself, Miikka had spent a lot of his free time at Charli’s house. The batteries in one of her smoke detectors needed to be replaced, her garage door was making a weird noise when it opened and closed, and there was a water stain on one wall in the kitchen from before she’d had the plumbing fixed. He took care of the smoke detector and the garage door in an hour and then went to the hardware store to buy what he needed to replace the drywall where it had gotten wet.

  He’d also contacted Ryder’s uncle’s contact who sold tile and had ordered the tile for the bathroom. They’d looked at enough samples online that he felt confident it was what she wanted, and he got such a good price it wouldn’t matter if it wasn’t; he’d just buy something else if that was the case. He’d paid for expedited shipping and it arrived three days later, so today he had a whole new project. Removing the old flooring would be the hard part, but he got started as soon as Charli left for work. Ryder and Logan were actually coming over to help, though Logan didn’t understand why Miikka hadn’t just hired someone to do the work.

  Miikka tried to explain that it meant more to do it himself and that he wasn’t even going to do it all because he knew Charli wanted to be part of it.

  “I’m doing the hard stuff,” he told them when they got to Charli’s house. “Removing the old tile is just muscle and no fun. But laying the new tile allows us to watch the project come together…”

  “You’re a good man,” Ryder told him. “Only reason I’m here is because I helped you get the tile. There’s no chick I would spend a day doing this for.”

  Miikka chuckled. “Someday, there will be. It’s okay. You’ll know when you meet her.”

  “Not for a long time,” Ryder said with a grimace. “But hey, I’m happy to hang out today and get out of that damn apartment. It’s too small.”

  “You’re not going wherever home is for the summer?” Logan asked him.

  “Yeah, I’ll go home to Ontario soon but I have to find a place to live first. I’m in one of those month-to-month places and I hate it. I’m not gonna want to deal with it when I get back, since we’ll be getting ready for training camp, so I’m going to spend a few weeks finding a place and getting my shit moved in. Then I’ll take off.”

  Miikka was thoughtful. “I may solve this problem for you,” he said.

  “Yeah?” Ryder glanced at him curiously as they crowded into Charli’s master bathroom.

  “I might move out,” he said slowly. “Logan will need a new roommate.”

  “You guys have a house?” Ryder asked.

  “You’re moving out?” Logan asked at the same time.

  Miikka paused. “Char-lot is very special. I sleep here almost every night now anyway. I plan to talk to her about it this weekend.”

  “Cool.” Ryder nodded, grabbing a hammer. “I’d be down.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up,” Logan told Miikka with a scowl.

  “Sorry,” Miikka said quietly. “I just thought of this today. I’m tired of going back and forth and I think it’s time for us to get more serious. I was going to talk to you but then Ryder said he needed a place to live…”

  “I get it.” Logan nodded. He turned to Ryder. “I guess we’re going to be the last two standing soon.”

  “What do you mean?” Ryder asked.

  “Guys that are single. The rest of the team is dropping like flies.”

  “Donovan’s single,” Miikka pointed out.

  “It won’t take him long,” Logan said knowingly. “I can see it in his eyes, he doesn’t want to be single. I get it, he’s older than us, so it makes sense, but man, I can’t even fathom settling down.”

  “It’s all about the woman,” Miikka said. “It changes once you meet the right one.”

  “I believe it,” Ryder said. “But I’m having a hell of a time trying them all out until I do.”

  “Ditto.” Logan fist-bumped him.

  “All right, we have work to do.” Miikka got on the floor.

  Miikka’s truck was in the driveway when Charli pulled up to the house and it occurred to her he rarely went home anymore. He took Tara back and forth, of course, but he’d slept over every night since the season had ended and his toiletries littered her bathroom. She went in through the garage now that he’d fixed the door and found him in the kitchen looking spectacularly sexy in a cutoff muscle shirt and shorts. He was kind of sweaty and she reached out to wrap her arms around his neck.

  “What have you been doing today to make you all sweaty in my kitchen?”

  “I have a surprise for you,” he said, kissing her. “Come.”

  He tugged her up the stairs and into her bedroom.

  “Close your eyes,” he directed.

  She did as he asked and he pulled her towards the bathroom.

  “Okay,” he said.

  She opened her eyes and gasped. “Oh my god, you took out all the old tile and… Is that the new tile we talked about?” She moved towards the box in the corner of the room.

  “Yes. I ordered them for you and removed the old tile so we could put in the new tile together.”

  Tears inexplicably filled her eyes and she turned to him. “How did I get so lucky to find you?”

  “Why are you crying? You don’t like the tile?”

  “No, I do.” She swiped at her eyes. “You’re just such a good guy… I love the tile and I think I love you!” She threw herself in his arms and he closed them around her tightly.

  “Minäkin rakastan sinua,” he whispered back.

  “That better mean I love you too,” she said against his chest.

  “Yes.” He stroked his hands down her back. “Why does this make you cry?”

  “Because I’m so damn scared. Every time I trust a man, he hurts me and I don’t have it in me to go through it again.”

  “Not me,” he said. “Never me.”

  “We’ve only known each other six weeks,” she said. “And you’re going away this summer…”

  “I’m not going anywhere without you,” he said, lifting her chin so he could look into her eyes. “If you have to work all summer, then I’ll only go home when you’re free. I can bring my parents here if they want to spend more time together, or maybe better when the season starts so they can see me play.”

  “I don’t want to change all your plans,” she protested weakly.

  He leaned down and softly kissed her. “Isn’t that what love is? To make sacrifices so our lives are better? Together?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “No one’s ever sacrificed anything for me.”

  “They aren’t me,” he said firmly. “I promise you, Char-lot… I’ll never hurt you. I want to be with you, make you happy.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut and pulled him closer.

  “I want to live here with you,” he said. “I told Logan today that maybe he needs to find a new roommate.”

  “You want to live here?” she asked in a shocked whisper.

  “Don’t you want me here with you?”

  “Yes. Absolutely… But it’s such an old house, and i
t needs so much work…”

  “So we fix and update. In a couple of years, if I’m not traded somewhere else, we sell and buy something new.”

  “You think you’ll get traded?” she asked in surprise.

  He shrugged. “It’s part of life with a hockey player. Is this a problem for you, that I may get traded? This year, next year, maybe many times until I retire. No way to know.”

  She slowly shook her head. “If we were married and I was going with you, no. That’s not a problem. The only reason I moved here is because my grandfather left me the house.”

  “Yes, of course we would be married,” he said. “But this was a big problem for Jaana. She didn’t want to come to the U.S., and she said someday, when we have children, she didn’t want to move them. So I want to make sure.”

  Charli froze, realizing they needed to talk about the fact that she didn’t want to have children. “Miikka… I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, but I’m not sure I want children.”

  He looked down at her in surprise. “No children? Why?”

  She sighed heavily, looking away. “It’s a long story.”

  “This is about your high school boyfriend?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you get pregnant?” he asked, his eyes never leaving hers.

  She nodded.

  “Tell me.”

  She took a shaky breath. “We were together three years and he was a year older. We met when we were fourteen and fifteen. When he graduated, he joined the military because he didn’t have the grades or the money for college. He left for basic training in August.” She looked away. “I found out I was pregnant a month later.”

  She pulled away from Miikka and wrapped her arms around herself protectively, not meeting his eyes. She walked back into the bedroom and sat on the bed. Miikka sat beside her and reached for her hand.

  “You can tell me anything,” he said quietly.