Page 140 of The Dixon Rule

That gets me a punch on the arm.

We dodge a group of kids darting around the yard in a game of tag and approach a row of tables that offers an impressive array of side dishes, from creamy mashed potatoes to bowls of fresh salads.

Diana introduces me to her stepmother, Larissa, a dark-haired woman with playful eyes. She’s standing with a young man with blond hair parted to the right and a smooth baby face. It’s Diana’s younger brother, Thomas, who flew back from South America to attend this shindig and is flying back early tomorrow morning.

I gape at him. “Isn’t that a lot of travel for a few hours of barbecue?”

He grins ruefully. “I would literally be disowned if I didn’t make it home for the potluck. Like you’ve got to be dead or dying.”

“It’s true,” Larissa confirms.

Despite his boyish appearance, Thomas is super mature and more sarcastic than I expect. He’s on the premed path but took a gap year to volunteer with an aid organization.

As we chat, I sling my arm around Diana’s bare shoulder, absently stroking her warm flesh. Despite the fact that there is an unsettling number of cops here, I’m having a good time. The food is amazing, and we gorge ourselves all afternoon, to the point where I force myself to stop eating before I get a stomachache. We play a game of cornhole with two men from the Boston PD. One of them pulls me aside afterward to talk hockey, and the next thing I know, he’s calling his friends over.

“Hey, Johnny! This kid’s playing in the NHL next season.”

“What!”

Several men wander toward us, all of them massive hockey fans. Their favorite cop bar in Boston doubles as a Bruins bar, and they proceed to give me some shit for going to Chicago.

“Hey, it’s not like I had a choice in who drafted me,” I protest.

“I’ll allow it,” one says, slugging back the rest of his lager.

I discover one of them almost went pro. And he would have been at UConn around the same time as my dad.

“Do you know Ryan Lindley?” I ask him.

“Sure do. Why?”

“That’s my dad.”

“No shit! You’re his kid?”

I brace myself for the next question—then why aren’t you pasty white like him? Dad and I have gotten that question a couple times when we’ve run into old acquaintances of his, who weren’t aware he was in an interracial marriage. Although my parents have been greeted with almost unilateral tolerance in Heartsong, I know not everyone is so open-minded.

But this man seems unfazed by my skin tone. “How’s Ry doing?” he asks me.

“He’s great. Owns a bunch of properties in Vermont and runs a property management company.”

“Good for him. That was a real shame what happened in that game.”

“You saw it?”

“Yeah, of course. I was a couple of years behind him, but we were teammates. The whole team and I were over the fucking moon to see him go pro. It was a real sobering thing, you know? Watching him go down like that. I’m glad he picked himself up and made something of himself.”

“That’s what hockey players do.”

He slaps me on the shoulder. “That’s what we do, kid.”

I head back to the grill to check if Diana’s dad needs help. The sun is dipping lower, casting long shadows across the lawn. People are starting to leave, coming up to hug Tom and Larissa. They shake Tom’s hand and tell him he outdid himself this year.

I search the yard for Diana, wondering where she’s disappeared to, and finally spot her chatting with a bulky young man in shorts and a Boston PD tank top.

Thomas joins us at the grill. “So my sister roped you into her dance stuff, huh?”

“Yup,” I say glumly.

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