I nod as I chew. When I swallow, I sip my beer. “You need a second chance too.”
Sophie blushes and ducks her head. Her arms cross over her chest, almost defensively. “Not really. I just need to get off my ass and—”
“Don’t,” I say. Her head snaps up. “Don’t diminish your demons. They’re real and legitimate, and no one judges you for having them.”
“My employer did,” she points out.
Shrugging, I smile sheepishly. “Okay, there are those who judge you. But I don’t, and no one else’s opinion matters.”
Sophie laughs, but there’s still pain in her eyes. She’s a work in progress, but I will continue to work on her.
When I showed up on her doorstep yesterday, I had no intention of doing anything more than checking in on her. A quick visit—in and out.
Instead, I have a new friend who my gut tells me is going to remain an influential force in my life. Sophie is the one, after all, who changed the trajectory of my future to begin with. Not intentionally, of course, but her attack, when I just happened to be nearby—those events led me to be sitting here today. That’s some kind of cosmic shit, but not surprising. We shared an experience that bonds us in a way no one else will ever understand.
What is surprising is that my thoughts have strayed to areas distinctly out of the realm of friendship. Do friends acknowledge how attractive they find each other? I’m thinking not.
For right now, I’m incredibly grateful to have made this connection with Sophie. We’re strangers in a way, but in many ways, we’re not. Moving to a new city, not knowing anyone… she’s exactly what I need.
I think I’m exactly what she needs too.
CHAPTER 11
Baden
I rise from the desk in my office, ready to head to the meeting room for the inaugural gathering of this new hockey team.
Yesterday may have been the first full day on the job for the Titans’ rebuilt organization, but today is when shit gets real. Yesterday the coaches met in a conference room, looking at video, making lists and diagrams and debating.
Today, it’s meeting players, and I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to being nervous. In fact, I’m not sure I was ever this nervous stepping onto the ice. Then again, as a goalie, I was in my element.
Here I’m like a fish out of water.
At least I had a good start to my day. My alarm went off at five thirty a.m., and after a quick shower, I tried to step quietly down the stairs. The downside of an older home is the aches and pains of age, which manifest in squeaks and groans.
Any concern I had about waking Sophie fizzled as soon as I smelled bacon.
In the kitchen, I found her at the stove, pulling thick strips of cooked bacon out of a cast-iron skillet. On the counter was a pan with some sort of egg casserole, a bowl of browned potatoes, and a plate of buttered toast.
“I absolutely regret telling you what time I was leaving this morning,” I said as I walked in.
Sophie looked up and smiled. “Good morning to you too.”
“Good morning,” I grumbled with no real irritation. I hated she went to the trouble of making me such a big breakfast.
Last night after I ate dinner, Sophie refused to let me help clean up. She insisted that I get a good night’s rest, and since she’s currently unemployed, she said she can stay up as late as she wants.
She gave me a key and the code to the alarm panel and showed me to her guest room with the promised “incredibly comfortable bed.” I slept like a baby.
“You seriously didn’t have to do this, Sophie,” I chastised, but I was already looking forward to this feast. It was a little early for me to eat, but I wasn’t going to turn it down. My best hope for the first meal of the day was a candy bar out of a vending machine at the arena. I had hoped to shop for groceries at some point, maybe stash a few boxes of protein bars for a quick grab and go.
“Coffee is freshly brewed,” she replied, tossing her chin over her shoulder at the pot on the back counter. “And I won’t do this every morning. I just wanted to get you off to a good start.”
I almost said, “Thanks, Mom,” to tease her about her awesome caretaking. But I held my tongue because Sophie in no way reminds me of my mom—or any mom at all.
When I look at Sophie, I see nothing matronly. She is a vibrant, beautiful woman who’s a little damaged, a bit lost, but so intriguing I’m not sure friendship is going to be sufficient in the long run.
But as I said… it was a great start to the morning, and that was all Sophie.
The team meeting room has been nicknamed “The Bowl” because it’s shaped like one. While our equivalent in Phoenix was a classic squared shaped room with stadium style rows of chairs, the Bowl is circular.
There’s an area in the center about twenty feet in diameter and outward from there circular rings of seats rise upward for five rows with three staircases that divide them from top to bottom like wheel spokes. The walls behind the last row have eighty-inch flat-screens spaced roughly ten feet apart around the circumference of the room, so no matter where you’re sitting, you can view whatever is on.
The center floor of The Bowl is polished dark wood. The seats are large and wide to accommodate hockey players, covered in supple, charcoal-gray leather. Each seat has a slide-out table in the armrest that lifts up and flips over the lap to use for note taking.
The Bowl has two entrances. The top entrance behind the last row of chairs leads in from the arena’s main floor. The other is at basement level, the same level as the circular floor where the coaches stand to address the team.
I’m currently in one of the chairs in the first row. To my left and right are the other coaches.
The rest of The Bowl is filled with the players who’ve been placed under contract with the Titans: a menagerie of minor leaguers, recently retired, and not-so-recently retired, and the three rostered guys who were not on the plane due to injury or illness.
I don’t bother to look around at the players. I don’t need a visual to know that everyone is hunched in on themselves, lost in thought or awkwardly waiting for something to happen. It’s very quiet in here, completely at odds with what should be boisterous banter in any team room when waiting for a meeting to start. It’s indicative not only that these players don’t know each other and have miles to go before they gel, but there’s no precedent in the history of this league on how to handle a situation like this.
A brand-new team made up mostly of players who weren’t quite good enough to be in the big leagues. It’s a modern-day version of A League of Their Own, but Matt Keller isn’t a grumpy drunk as far as I can tell. I’m not sure what he is, since he’s not been overly consistent in his actions as compared to his words, but maybe he just has jitters the way I do.
From the basement-level doorway, Brienne Norcross walks through with Callum Derringer. She’s dressed in a skirt and suit jacket in a purple that matches the Titans’ logo, her hair once again pulled back into a tight knot at her nape. Callum Derringer is dressed in a stylish suit of dark navy with a silver tie.
The coaches are casual in athletic gear in team colors and logos. A box was delivered to my office yesterday afternoon with tons of team logo clothing from our major athletic gear sponsor. It’s now all safely tucked in my private locker. The coaches have the luxury of their own dressing room with showers, so I wear my own clothes to and from the arena and change into my “coach’s uniform” here. Tomorrow, I plan on restarting my personal workout program using the training facilities here, now that we have the team’s schedule somewhat settled.