Center Ice (Boston Rebels Book 1)

“Ihate this part,” Zach Reid, the other new player for the Rebels, says as we sit in Alessandra Jones’s office, waiting for our meeting with the team’s general manager. He’s a couple of years younger than I am and was traded from Philadelphia.

“What part?”

“Starting over. This is only the second team I’ve played for.”

I know this about him because I’ve made sure I know everything there is to know about everyone I’ll be playing with this year. Easier to avoid missteps this way.

“Starting over sucks,” I agree. “But it’s also an opportunity.”

“True,” he says with a nod. “What do you think she’s like?”

“AJ? She’s like any other GM—a hard-ass, but only because she’s committed to doing what’s best for her team.”

“That’s the fairest assessment I’ve ever heard.” AJ’s voice comes from behind me, and I thank God that she sounds pleased with my assessment. We’ve had a few conversations leading up to my trade, and I already feel like I know her better than any other GM I’ve played for.

Zach and I both stand as AJ sweeps into the room, followed by our team captain, Ronan McCabe, one of the alternate captains, Patrick Walsh, and our goalie, Colt.

We all shake hands and do some brief introductions, and then we’re dragging our chairs away from her desk and toward the seating area near the full wall of glass that overlooks the practice facility. AJ and Patrick sit on the cream couch against the glass while McCabe and Colt each take the cushioned armchairs on either side of the coffee table.

Before he sits, McCabe grumbles about the throw pillow on the chair, and ultimately sets it on the coffee table so it doesn’t get in the way of his huge frame, which fills every inch of the seat. AJ’s office is surprisingly feminine for someone who’s staked her reputation in hockey as a total ball buster, and it feels like McCabe takes offense to the soft frills.

“We wanted to meet with you both while the rookies are practicing,” AJ says, ignoring McCabe, “because you each come with significant experience and a little baggage.” She glances at me, then at Zach. “It seemed like a good idea to chat about the culture of the club we’ve built here⁠—”

Ronan clears his throat, and we all turn toward him. “I think AJ just wants to make sure you’re not going to be dicks.”

It’s amusing to watch the effort it takes AJ not to roll her eyes. She looks over at Zach. “You have a reputation for avoiding fights,” she says, but that’s an oversimplification. Zach Reid doesn’t just avoid fights, he goads his opponent into losing his temper, but skates away before a fight can start. The mind games he plays on ice are both brilliant and infuriating—I know because I’ve fallen victim to them before when we played on opposing teams. “But I need to know that if we needed you to, you could step in and defend your teammates.”

“You don’t want me to fight,” Zach says. “Trust me.”

“Why?” Patrick Walsh asks. “You can’t throw a punch? Or you can’t take one?”

Zach presses his lips together between his teeth and says, “Quite the opposite.”

We all look at him, awaiting elaboration, but he says nothing else.

“So is that a yes?” AJ asks.

“If I need to defend someone, sure.” Zach shrugs.

AJ turns her gaze on me. “You, on the other hand, could benefit from a little restraint on the ice.”

“I’m working on that,” I assure them. “It won’t be like that here.”

“Let’s talk about Colorado.”

It takes everything I have not to respond flippantly with, “Let’s not.” Instead, I keep my face in the most neutral expression possible, wishing she’d brought this shit up in one of the conversations we had before she signed me, rather than now, in front of my teammates.

“You weren’t overly big on fighting when you played for Vancouver. What happened in Colorado?”

I glance at Colt, McCabe, and Walsh, who all look interested in my response. I see the question on their faces: how does a player who spent less than a year in the AHL before being brought up to the NHL, who then had three great seasons with Vancouver, get traded to Colorado and let it all go to shit?

“I got off on the wrong foot with one of my teammates and it messed up my relationship with the whole team.”

“We’re going to need more details than that,” AJ says, folding her hands in her lap as she assesses me coolly with her dark eyes.

I exhale so suddenly it comes out like a grunt. The rumors have been out there for years; she’s really only asking me to confirm or deny them.

“On one of the first nights I was in Colorado, I accidentally almost slept with my team captain’s wife.”

Walsh, one of the most happily married guys in the NHL, looks like his head’s about to explode. “How do you accidentally almost sleep with your teammate’s wife?” He grits the question out between clenched teeth.

“I didn’t know who she was.” I emphasize this truth because his wife sought me out, not the other way around. “I’d only been in town a night or two, and went to a restaurant to grab dinner. I was eating at the bar, this hot blonde started chatting me up, and things…kind of progressed…” I don’t mention that we full-on made out at the bar until we were asked to leave. “We were leaving the bar together when Leland Alistair showed up and introduced me to his right hook.”

“Maybe if you knew someone for more than fifteen minutes before you decided to sleep with them, that wouldn’t have happened,” Walsh says.

McCabe shoots Walsh a look, then asks, “Did she know who you were?”

“Yeah. She did it to piss him off. In the end, I don’t think he ever quite believed that I was just a pawn in her games, even though they were already well on the road to divorce.”

“What’s that have to do with your hockey game?” Colt asks, and I just stare at him in return.

“Seriously?” I ask.

“Yeah.” He crosses his arms across his chest.

“Leland was my captain,” I say again, trying to keep my tone level. “And he made sure I always felt like an outsider. He turned most of the other veterans against me, and even though several of them eventually told me I didn’t deserve that treatment, it still messed with my game—badly.” I was beyond pissed off every time I was on the ice, and I couldn’t take my aggression out on my teammates, who were the real culprits, so I took it out on my opponents instead. Hence all the time in the penalty box.

“That’s a coaching and management fail, if you ask me,” AJ says. “If your teammates are out there on the ice and not passing to you after the puck drop…” Clearly, she’s watched enough footage of the game to see how my teammates treated me after each face-off. “Why didn’t the coaches get involved?”

“They did, eventually, but it took way too many games for them to figure out what was happening, and by then, the damage was done.”

“Idiots,” AJ mumbles. “It was so fucking obvious.”

“Yep. I guarantee it won’t happen again.”

“Good,” AJ says. “Because we need our Center on the ice, not in the penalty box all the time.” And that’s that. She moves on to other more logistical conversations about things like equipment, practice schedules, and our upcoming pre-season games, and ten minutes later, she’s asking McCabe to stay, and dismissing the rest of us from her office.

Patrick Walsh and Zach Reid strike up an easy conversation as they walk down the hallway. AJ asked Walsh and Colt to give us a quick tour of the practice facility, and Colt falls into step beside me as we follow the others.

“You left early last night,” Colt says.

“Yeah, I had some unpacking to do.”

“You sure it had nothing to do with Flynn’s sister? I saw you follow her into the house. You’re damn lucky he didn’t notice.” Goosebumps trickle down my spine. I was hoping no one noticed, but Colt’s apparently more observant than I gave him credit for.

I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to the idea that Audrey is Jameson’s sister. Did I ever know her last name? Did I even know she was from Boston? Did I know she had a brother? Did I know any damn thing about her, other than she was smart enough to get me through calculus, immediately put me at ease every time I was around her, and was pretty terrific in bed?

Shit, I was such an asshole.

“I went inside to use the bathroom, not to chase after his sister.”

“Hmmm.”

After a nearly sleepless night, my mind is mush today. I don’t know if I’m reading too much into Colt’s noncommittal reply, or not enough, but it leaves me wondering what he thinks he knows.

“Flynn said you two went to college together?” Colt says.

“Yeah,” I say, taken aback that Jameson knows this. Given that his fiancée clearly didn’t know that I knew Audrey until last night, I’m guessing maybe she told him? I decide this is the most likely scenario, since how could Lauren have not mentioned that scene in the kitchen? Then again, if she suspects I’m Graham’s father, she clearly hasn’t told Jameson, because there’s no way he knows or I would have already heard from him. “She was a year behind me at BU and tutored me in calculus.”

“Calculus?” Colt lets out a laugh that’s practically a snort. “So you’re smart, then?”

“Not at math, hence needing a tutor.”

Like my fellow new player Zach, I know that Colt didn’t go to college. They both came to the NHL through the Canadian Hockey League when they were barely twenty. And while Zach’s still in his mid-twenties, Colt’s got at least a decade and a half in the league. There’s a ton of speculation about him being close to retirement, but the guy doesn’t seem ready to leave the crease any time soon.

Colt lets out another noncommittal noise, then says, “Yeah, math makes sense, given that she’s an architect now.”

“Is she?” I spend a second trying to remember if I knew she wanted to be an architect or not. It’s shameful how little I remember about her—my memories are more like short clips from a movie: meeting her for the first time in the library, the way she always smelled like honey and citrus, us sitting cross-legged on my bed as we reviewed problems before my mid-term exam, the way she tasted with my face between her legs, how her name sounded rolling off my lips while she was coming with me buried inside her…

“Yeah, she and her sister run a construction company. Jules is the contractor, and Audrey is the architect. It’s actually…” Colt pauses with a proud smile and a quick shake of his head. “It’s amazing what they’ve accomplished in the last couple years. Who knew so many people wanted a company that only hires women?”

“You mean all the contractors they work with are women?”

“Yep. And they’re one of the fastest growing construction companies in Boston. They keep making all these ‘Best of’ lists.” He tells me how they were featured in a famous Boston magazine last year, and how things really took off from there. I don’t even know how to process what she’s accomplished while also raising our child, except that I’m not surprised. If anyone could do it, it would be her.

“Hey,” Walsh says, turning back toward us, “let’s check out the locker room so you know where to go tomorrow.”

After a brief tour of the locker room and some of the other parts of the facility, we head out. I’m walking into the parking garage attached to the rink, when Colt calls out from behind me.

“Hey, I like you, so I’m going to give you some advice.”

I can’t help but notice that he waited to share his advice until we were in an empty parking garage with no one else around. I turn to face him. “Alright.”

“Stay far away from Flynn’s sister… That’s a path you do not want to walk down. He’s overly protective of those girls, and you’d have to be crazy to test him like that.”

“Why’s he so protective? They’re adults, and they’re his sisters, not his daughters.”

“Same difference, really.”

“I’m going to need you to explain that, because if they’re his sisters and his daughters, that would mean⁠—”

Colt punches me in the shoulder hard enough that it actually hurts. “Dude, watch your fucking mouth. First of all, they’re his half-sisters. And second, he pretty much raised them.”

I can tell there’s a lot more to the story, but if Colt wanted to tell me, he would. Jameson’s always struck me as an intensely private person, so maybe he’s sworn Colt to secrecy, or maybe Colt’s just the kind of guy who knows when to keep his mouth shut.

“Do you know them well?”

Colt shrugs. “He’s my best friend. I’ve spent my whole adult life around that family. Those girls are practically like my little sisters, too.”

It’s hard to imagine looking at Audrey and thinking of her like a sister. It’s her eyes that get me every time—they’re a crisp, bright blue, and I’ve always found them hard to look away from. Last night was no different.

“So I’m saying this not just on Jameson’s behalf. If you know what’s good for you”—he raises his eyebrows—“you’ll stay away from them.”

Well, fuck.