Page 41 of Icy Pucking Play

"No, but I've been watching you pine over this guy for months. I'm invested now."

My phone buzzes again.

Evan:No pressure about the badge. But practice wouldn't be the same without you. Neither would a lot of things.

"Well?" Brad prompts. "What are you going to do?"

I take a deep breath and pull out my notebook, flipping to a fresh page. At the top, I write:

"Some people say Evan Daniels is made of ice. They call him cold, unapproachable, impossible to know. But they've never seen him teach his daughter to butterfly slide across their kitchen floor in sock feet. Never watched him stay late after practice to help his nephew perfect a shot. Never witnessed the quiet moments where being the Ice Man means having a foundation strong enough to hold everyone else up..."

I pause, then add:

"This isn't a story about redemption. It's a story about love—the kind that shows up every day, that teaches hockey moves, and makes chocolate chip pancakes, and believes in people until they believe in themselves. The kind that turns a team into a family, a house into a home, and maybe, just maybe, turns ice into something warm enough to melt even the most carefully guarded hearts..."

"Now that," Brad says, reading over my shoulder, "is a story worth telling."

I grab my phone and reply to Evan’s last three texts.

Me:Wouldn't miss it for the world. Any of it.

Because maybe that's the real story here. Not the one Lexi wants, or even the one I'm supposed to be writing.

But the story of how a grumpy goalie and his hockey-obsessed family somehow became the best part of my day.

How they became my story.

In every sense of the word.

Now I just have to figure out how to tell it without losing everything in the process.

Maybe I already know how this story ends.

And maybe it's better than any story I could have planned.

No pressure, right?

Just my heart, my career, and a family I'm starting to wish could be mine too.

But hey, I've always liked a challenge.

Especially one that tastes like caramel sauce and possibility.

Chapter 12

Evan

There’s nothing worse than being distracted during practice. Well, actually, I guess it’s worse if it’s during a game. My position requires focus, though. One hundred percent focus. And I’m far from that today.

"Your glove side's a little slow today," she calls from her usual spot in the stands. "Everything okay?"

I resist the urge to flip her off, mostly because Natalia's watching from the bench. Instead, I focus on the next shot coming my way, trying not to think about how Sophie's been a constant presence in my mind since that night in my kitchen.

"Dad?" Natalia had asked at breakfast this morning. "Is Sophie your girlfriend now?"

I'd nearly choked on my coffee. "What? No. She's just...she's working on the story about Ry."

"But you smile more when she's around." She'd given me that too-perceptive look she definitely got from her aunt. " And she’s at the rink all the time."

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