"Great. Now Mike Beacon is going to break my jaw."
"Bones heal, and chicks dig scars," Lauren said, quoting Evel Knievel.
"Good to know."
THIRTY-TWO
Beacon was in the zone tonight.
Nothing existed but the game. He squinted against the ice's white glare, clocking the puck, calculating play probabilities like a boss. Outside the crease, the world kept on spinning. Time marched forward. People loved him, or didn't. None of it mattered, but for eleven other players and a six ounce rubber disk.
He listened for the slice of blades against frozen water and for the slap of the puck off the boards. The crowd was a dull roar in the distance. Unimportant.
The score was tied 2 – 2 in the third period. His boys wanted it, though. He could see their hustle. It was going to pay off, so long as they kept it up.
There were people in his life who mattered. But during game time, they were relegated to the edges of his consciousness. A hockey game lasted a few hours, no more. When he was done here, they could have him again. Elsa. Lauren. The new baby. They'd have his full attention just as soon as this game was in the bag.
Dallas made an attempt on goal, their center rushing the net while the left wing attempted to disguise his hopes at a wrister.
Denied. He flicked it away like a bad idea.
His boys took it off his hands on the rebound and pressed it down the ice. And this time Dallas's defense wasn't ready. Finally, finally, Trevi sank it. And that was that-the end of the overtime period and the end of the game. They now led the series 3 – 2, and Dallas couldn't close the gap.
One game closer to the Cup. One more win.
We're still fucking in it, he told himself as his teammates swarmed after the buzzer. We're still alive.
He liked to think he appreciated it a little more than the younger kids. Nobody knew when their number was up-not in hockey, and not in life. The best you could do was live hard and be grateful.
After the handshake line, he followed his sweaty teammates to the dressing room. He showered in a tired daze and put on his suit. Then, unfortunately, Georgia corralled him onto the dais for the press conference. There went another half hour.
The win was awesome, but if his teammates decided to do some hard drinking tonight, he was going to sneak out after the first beer. There were just two more games left in the season. Then he could spend more time with his girls.
He couldn't wait.
Publicity finished, he walked through the mobbed hallway. Players, families, and journalists all crowded the place. He wove carefully through the crush of bodies, locked on the exit like a heat-seeking missile.
But someone grabbed his arm a few paces before he reached the door. When he turned, he saw the best sight ever. Lauren, with a smile on her face. "Hey! You came!" He grabbed her into a hug. "I thought you had to work."
"I hitchhiked with Nate."
"Yay!" He gave her the first kiss of the evening, and it was every bit as happy-making as winning the game. "Let's go," he said, suddenly twice as impatient to leave as he'd been before.
"Are you going to ride the bus?"
He shook his head. "Let's walk. You can catch me up on your day." He took her by the hand and led her outside, where the street curved past a couple of restaurants and office buildings on the way to the Ritz-Carlton. "So you rode on Nate's Gulfstream? What is that like?"
She groaned. "Well, I spent some quality time puking in the jet's very fancy little bathroom." She filled him in on her nausea woes.
"And I thought my day was hard," he joked, squeezing her hand.
"Maybe it won't last very long. I'll ask the doctor next week."
Next week. It sounded like the distant future. By then, the Cup would be won or lost. Although the world would keep turning on its axis either way. "Tell me about this doctor visit. Will they be able to tell us the baby's sex?"
"Oh, I'm not going to ask."
"What?" he stopped walking, and she turned to him with an eyebrow raised. "Seriously?"
"Sure. In the olden days, nobody knew. They survived. I don't want to know until the baby is here and healthy."
He snorted. "People survived in the olden days, huh? Unless they got the plague or tuberculosis. Embrace the progress, baby. I want to know if I have to repaint the nursery."
"Hmm," Lauren mused, squeezing his hand in hers. "That's a good point. I suppose we'd want to repaint before the baby comes."
"Right? Paint fumes would be bad for the baby. Very bad." He was probably overselling it, but he was desperate to know if he'd have a daughter or a son. Either one would be grand, but every new kernel of news was exciting to him.
"Okay," she said, and his heart leapt. "Let's paint the nursery white. That way it won't matter."
Beacon threw back his head and laughed. "You kill me."
"Shh!" Lauren said suddenly, squeezing his hand, and stopping on the sidewalk. "Look!" she whispered.
"At what?" he asked, sotto voce.
She pointed.
Ahead of them, the sidewalk passed the curved facade of an office building, with a nearly deserted plaza outside it. A couple had paused there under a street light, the man's hands on the woman's waist. As they watched, he leaned forward to give her a lingering kiss.
Lauren made an excited little squeak beside him. "That's Nate and Rebecca!"
"Uh-huh," he agreed. "But honey-I knew they were a thing."
Her glance cut toward him. "What? How? You didn't tell me!"
"You're the one who knows Nate best," he said with a quiet chuckle. "I just assumed you knew. But remember that night I, uh, let myself into your hotel room in Bal Harbour?"
She gave him a smile. "How could I forget?"
"The next morning when I snuck out of your room and let myself into mine, he was sneaking out of Rebecca's."
"No way!" Lauren giggled. "Finally!"
"Finally," he agreed, but only because he could see the hotel in the distance. "Is it safe to keep walking now?"
Lauren squinted toward Nate and Rebecca, who were now walking toward the hotel, hand in hand. "Looks like it."
"Good. Because I'm going to take you up to my room now, and nobody is sneaking out afterward."
She wrapped an arm around his back. "Sounds perfect."
And it was.
THIRTY-THREE
EIGHT MONTHS LATER
There was a delay boarding the team jet in St. Louis.
The Bruisers were in the middle of a six-day road trip, so the players weren't feeling bent out of shape by the holdup. They weren't racing home to their girlfriends or families. Tonight would mean another hotel bed and another team dinner.
Beacon was feeding quarters into a claw machine, trying to win a stuffy for Elsa. "Trevi-it's going to work this time. Are you ready?"
"Sure, man," he chuckled, holding up Beacon's Katt Phone. "Go."
The video was for Elsa's benefit. Because he'd finally figured out how to position the claw properly before lowering its metallic jaws toward the toys. She'd freak if this worked.
He fed in the quarters and began the work of angling the jaw into the corner where the toys were piled the highest.
"It's a tough angle," Trevi narrated for the video's benefit. "But he's a skilled competitor . . ."
"And . . . now," he said to himself, dropping the claw.
"Go, baby!" Trevi enthused. "YEAHHH!" the kid whooped as the claws closed around something. "Will it be the pink pig? Or that blue thing . . ."
The mechanical arm jolted, lifting not one but two toys in its steel teeth. Unbelievable.
"Looking good as he heads into the dismount," Trevi said. "This could be a world record . . ."
Unbelievably, both the pig and a little blue bulldog dropped into the corner where the chute was. Mike yanked them out and laughed.
"It's a podium finish," Trevi said, pointing the camera in his face. "And . . . the phone is ringing. Whoa. Your very pregnant wife is calling." The kid tapped the screen to stop the video and handed it to Mike.
The screen read Lauren. He answered quickly. "Hey! Everything okay? How are you feeling?"
"I'm feeling like my water broke."
"No! Really? Are you sure?" She wasn't due for another ten days.
"Oh, I'm sure. Luckily I didn't flood my office. It happened when I . . ." She laughed.
"What?"
"I'd just sat down on the toilet. Then whoosh! Weirdest thing ever."
"Wow." He smiled into the phone even as the reality of the situation set in. "Okay, you need to get to the hospital."