Home Ice (13 page)

MATTIAS SPENT THE
night at my house again. We hadn’t exactly had a huge conversation about it or anything. It felt right, so we let it happen.

I was already getting used to waking up in his arms, and it had only been two nights. This could only spell trouble for me, but I didn’t know how to stop it. For that matter, I wasn’t sure I needed to stop it anymore. He cared about my girls—enough that he was going to all sorts of trouble to keep a promise to Sophie—and they seemed to like him. This weekend, we were doing things with just the two of us, but all of our plans for the future were things that would include my daughters, and he was the one making the suggestions.

He wasn’t asking me for things I wouldn’t be able to give him. He didn’t expect me to drop everything and be with him, and he wouldn’t drop everything to be with me, either. We both had our own lives, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t find a way to share parts of them with each other. Did it?

Oh, and then there was the small matter that—despite the fact that we’d now had sex several times—he could still make my panties melt with nothing more than a grin. If anything, that had only increased.

I was a mess over him, but for some odd reason, I couldn’t seem to make myself mind.

While he was gone to deal with practice and other work with the Storm on Sunday, I used that time to clean my house, try to make a dent in the massive piles of laundry that had built up over the course of the week, and go grocery shopping in preparation for the week to come. There was a brief moment when I debated taking a nap, but I brushed that aside. I could nap when my girls were grown and living on their own. I didn’t often have time to myself like this, and I knew better than to let it go to waste.

There was still a Mt. Everest-sized pile of laundry waiting to be washed when the doorbell rang, signaling that my time alone was at an end. The instant I opened it, Mattias put his arms around me and gave me a toe-curling kiss, as if he hadn’t seen me in months instead of hours. I wouldn’t have minded continuing with what he’d started if not for the fact that Dan’s weekend with the girls was at an end, and I needed to go pick them up.

Mattias came with me to get them. “I’ll stay in the car if you think it would be better,” he suggested once he’d parked in Dan’s driveway.

I shook my head. “No need for that.” In fact, it was better for my ex to meet Mattias now, because I had made up my mind that I wanted to take things further. I wasn’t sure what it would look like, and I was even less positive what the girls were ready for, but I wanted to make things as smooth as possible for my kids. That meant their father needed to know there was a new man in my life.

Zoe answered the door and let us in, giving Mattias a wide-eyed look. “Just so you know, that was all my phone’s fault.”

She’d barely gotten that out before Sophie came running, arms wide for a hug. But instead of jumping into my arms, she made a flying leap for Mattias. She hugged him hard, nearly strangling him with her grip around his neck.

It was too much for me. I stepped back, blinking down the tears stinging behind my eyes. My baby girl had decided he should be part of her life, so who was I to say otherwise? Even if I hadn’t already been leaning toward making this relationship with Mattias more official, I would have given in upon seeing this.

Once Mattias extricated himself from Sophie’s exuberant display of affection, he shook Dan’s hand and exchanged a few pleasantries while I helped the older girls pack up the last of their things so we could head home.

We were in the SUV heading back to my place when Sophie piped up with, “Bergy?”

“Yes, Sophie?” He glanced at her in his rearview mirror.

“Good job on kissing Mom. Zoe showed me the picture.”

Everyone burst out laughing, including Mattias. Everyone but me. I bit down on my lower lip, unable to decide between snort-laughing along with the rest of them or burying my head in the sand like Zoe kept threatening to do.

“Well, we had a deal, right?” he said after the laughter died down.

“Right. So when can I skate?”

He turned onto my street, smiling like he’d just won the lottery. I wasn’t sure what to make of that, but he answered her before I got the chance to overanalyze it. “Soon,” he said. “But first, we need to start doing some exercise so we can build up your muscles.”

“Like what kind of exercise?”

“Do you know what crunches are?” he asked.

“Yep.”

“Well, we’ll do things like that. You’ll need strong core muscles to be able to skate.”

“We can all do it together,” Izzy said. “So we can all skate.”

“Sure,” he replied, and his grin just kept getting bigger. “We can call it Workouts with Bergy or something like that.”

“Can we work out with Levi?” Evie asked.

Mattias chuckled. “Not sure I can make that one happen, but maybe we can get some of the guys involved when we’re ready to skate.”

That was apparently enough to get the girls chattering and giggling.
Hormones
.

Sophie wasn’t taking part in it, for once. She sat quietly for a moment, but I had no doubt she wasn’t finished with her questions. Her mind was working a hundred miles an hour. When he parked in my driveway, she said, “Can we start now?”

MORE THAN HALF
the team had come to the practice facility today, including a few of the guys who didn’t have families.

Like 501.

He was here as a favor to me—there wasn’t any point in trying to think he’d come for any other reason—but the fact was, he was here.

It was a Saturday afternoon in early March. With the playoffs only a little over a month away, the other coaches and I had decided the guys needed a break. A day with their families would do a lot more for how they played each night than another tedious practice going over the same systems and strategies we’d been pounding into their heads all season.

Soupy was still recovering from ACL surgery much earlier in the season, so he couldn’t get out on the ice, but he and Rachel had brought all their kids. Rachel was busy suiting their twin toddlers up to go out on a sled that one of the young, single guys would pull around. Soupy had his bad leg propped up on a bench and was helping tie the skate laces for one of Dominic “Bear” Medved’s kids. Tuck and Maddie Campbell were already out on the ice, as were Nicky Ericsson and his adopted niece and nephews, Marc “Danger” d’Aragon’s teenagers, Grant “Wheels” Wheelan and his teens, and Mitch and Mia Quincey with their two little ones.

Babs and 501 were over on the other side of the ice, along with Webs and Drywall. All four of them were huddled up and bent over, no doubt putting finishing touches on Sophie’s rig.

I’d carried in a bag of skates for Paige and the girls, and I dropped it on the bench next to Cam and Sara Johnson. Sara was bouncing their newborn in her arms while Jonny sat on the floor tying three-year-old Connor’s skates. Connor, meanwhile, was bopping a Minion toy on his father’s head. It kept saying unintelligible things with every hit, but then it said something that sounded distinctly like, “What the fuck?”

Connor giggled maniacally and repeated it. “What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck?”

“What did I tell you about not using Mommy’s bad words?” Jonny said.

His son laughed even more fiendishly than before.

I did my best not to laugh out loud while I bent over to unload skates and other gear for my crew, but I saw Jonny calmly take the toy out of his son’s hand, put it in their diaper bag, and give his wife a look that had her rolling her eyes.

“Don’t blame that one on me,” she said. “It’s a toy.”

When I handed Zoe the skates in her size, she was fighting the urge to bust up. I shook my head slightly, and she put a lid on it and took her skates.

Once Paige started helping the older girls get ready, I turned to Sophie.

She was bouncing on the balls of her feet and staring out at the ice. “Do I really get to skate, Bergy?”

“You really get to skate,” I said. “So that means we need to put your gear on.” I picked up her skates, kneepads, and helmet and took a seat. When she turned to look at me, grin a mile wide, I patted the spot on the bench next to me. She raced over and sat down.

By the time I had her properly outfitted, Babs and 501 were on their way around to join us with her rig.

Her older sisters giggled and made their nervous sounds, but not Sophie. She looked up and beamed at him. “Hi, Levi.”

“Hi, Sophie. You ready to skate with me?”

She nodded emphatically and tried to stand up, but she wobbled on the skates.

I took her by the waist and steadied her, and the two brothers and I got her all strapped in. Drywall came over to be sure we had her situated right and all his measurements had been correct.

“Told you I could do this,” he said, slapping me on the back after he’d completed his inspection.

“So I can skate?” Sophie squealed.

“You can skate,” I said. I took one of her hands and 501 took the other, and we helped her walk cautiously to the door with her backward walker on skis coming behind her. When we got there, I picked her up and set her on the ice.

Then 501 took over. He took both her hands and skated backward, pulling her along with him. “You’ve gotta bend your knees,” he said to her. “Get down low and push your skates into the ice.”

In no time, they were too far away for me to hear them anymore. I could hear the other girls coming up behind me thanks to their giggles. Evie and Izzy stepped onto the ice and almost fell. They decided to take the easy path around the boards so they’d have something to hold on to.

Zoe stopped by my side before joining her sisters, though. “Hey, Bergy?”

I kept my eyes on 501 and Sophie to be sure that her rig was supporting her the way we intended it to. So far, so good. “Yeah?” I replied.

“I was just wanted to tell you that I’ve been talking to my sisters.”

I chuckled. “No surprise there.”

“Yeah. But we all agree.”

Now I was curious. To my knowledge, they never agreed on anything but the fact that they needed to kidnap 501 and convince him to stay with them forever. “Agree about what?”

“Well, you know about the whole brother-husband thing?”

I nodded, internally cringing.

“Well, we think you should be Mom’s brother-husband. Only there should just be you.”

I definitely hadn’t been expecting that one. “Don’t you think that’s moving a little—”

Before I could finish my question, she was rushing to catch up to the group of teens congregating on the opposite end of the ice.

I stayed in place for a few minutes, watching 501 and Sophie skate circles. She wasn’t doing much of the work, letting him drag her along with him, but she lit up the entire rink with her smile. Even better, though, the rig was doing its job. It was supporting her weight while she found her legs and gained her balance. She might not ever get to the point that she could skate without it, but I wouldn’t put it past her. Not when she was clearly having the time of her life. That would only make her want to work harder to make it happen.

Paige came up behind me and put her hand on my arm.

“She’s doing great,” I said.

Paige sniffled.

I spun around to face her and used my thumb to brush away the tears falling down her cheeks. “Hey,” I said. “What’s this about?”

“I didn’t think this would ever happen,” she said, shaking her head and waving her hand toward Sophie and 501. “She’s doing things even I thought would be impossible, and it’s all because of you.”

“Not because of me.”

She laughed through her tears. “Okay, fine. All because of Beefy, then.”

I wrapped my arms around her and held her close, resting my chin on the top of her head. Not that I agreed with her assessment, but it wasn’t worth arguing over. I was just glad to hold her for a while.

Over the last several weeks, I’d spent more and more time with Paige and her daughters whenever the team was in town. We weren’t shy about showing physical affection for each other in front of them, but we kept it all on a PG level. The girls had started giving me hugs and acting like I was a normal fixture in their lives instead of an outsider they had to be on their best behavior for, and there had even been a few nights when, after the girls had gone to bed, Paige had snuck me up to her room before sending me on my way. I wasn’t about to spend the night with the girls in the house. That seemed like stepping way over the line. But I couldn’t deny that I liked the thought behind Zoe’s suggestion even if it might be too soon to take that kind of step. It was something to think about.