Page 14 of Breakaway to You

“I do realize it.” My frustration seeped out of me. “That’s why I’m working harder than I ever have before. To play for as long as I can.”

“And I’m not saying you shouldn’t enjoy it while you can, but hockey isn’t everything.”

My hand squeezed the phone, the urge to throw it across the room hard to ignore. That’s what people didn’t understand. Crew understood more than most, but he didn’t understand it all. He didn’t get it. No one did.

No one understood that hockey was all I’d ever had my entire life. Most people had family, a loving parent or two, a sibling, someone who cared about them. That wasn’t my life. It never had been. Hockey had been my family as far back as I could remember. How was I supposed to just let it go?

“Maybe what you need is a woman,” he said playfully. I assumed he’d heard the annoyance in my silence and was trying to lighten the mood.

“Yeah, no.” I shook my head even though he couldn’t see it. “You know I don’t do the relationship thing.”

“I know why you didn’t want to do the relationship thing for a while, but it’s been a long time since Anna.”

Yet, hearing her name still stung. I didn’t have any feelings for her anymore. Crew was right about how it had been a long time ago. But when someone leaves you, that crap sticks with you forever.

I sighed. “I know you are all twitterpated with Addie, and I’m happy for you, but love and relationships are not on my radar right now.”

“Maybe they should be.” He sounded serious this time.

“Trust me, now is not the time. Hockey needs to be my focus if I want to keep playing.” I was saying that as much for him as I was for me. I didn’t have the luxury of putting my attention anywhere else. “The only woman I have time for in my life is my physical therapist.”

He didn’t need to know my physical therapist was a young and very attractive woman whom I enjoyed spending time with.Ineeded to not know or recognize it either. Blurring lines with her would only make a mess of things.

Crew’s laughter had me smiling. “I don’t miss those days. My last year playing, I was with my physical therapist more than I was on the ice.”

“Sounds about right.”

We talked for a few more minutes about how coaching the Glacier Gators in our hometown was going, about how things were going between him and Addie, and about how Tyler would be going trick-or-treating on his own with his friends for the first time this year, reminding us of when the two of us would try to hit up every door in our small town.

Their wedding plans were underway, and he sounded happier than I’d ever heard him. He made it sound likehewas living the dream, not me. Like even his years in the NHL couldn’t hold a candle to where his life was right now. It was hard to not envy that kind of happiness, that kind of contentment.

After we hung up, I couldn’t decide if Crew’s phone call had made me feel better or worse. Since I was debating about ordering another drink—I never ordered more than one—the call must have made it worse since my loneliness was made even more apparent. I stared at the bottom of my glass, warring back and forth about whether I should order another.

“Is this seat taken?” a woman’s voice said to my left.

Pulling my gaze from my empty glass, I turned to see Piper sliding onto the stool next to me.

One side of my mouth pulled up in a smile at just the sight of her. I’d never seen her with her hair down before, since she always had it in a high ponytail for work. Her golden-brown hair fell around her shoulders and looked silky enough that I wanted to run my fingers through it. She wore jeans and a long-sleeve black shirt that showed off her curves even more than her fitted scrubs did. If I had thought Work Piper was attractive, this Casual Night Out Piper was another level. I wasn’t sure I was a strong enough man to not flirt with her. Everything in me wanted to pull her in and see if she had as hard of a time keeping her distance from me as I did her.

But maybe that was just the loneliness talking.

I shook my head to clear it and turned my focus back to my glass. Getting involved with Piper was a bad idea on many levels.

“Nope,” I answered, hoping my answer didn’t sound too gruff.

The bartender grabbed her drink order before she turned her attention back to me. “I got to say, I’m surprised to see you here sitting alone instead of out with the team.”

The bartender set down a club soda in front of her, and I asked him to bring me the same. Better to keep my one drink rule.

“I’m just full of surprises.” I gave her a forced smile.

She looked at me quizzically, like I was a math problem that didn’t add up. “What’s up with you tonight?”

“Nothing.”

“Definitely something,” she said in reply, still sizing me up. “I don’t get you. One second you’re mister fun and flirty, and then the next you’re a grump. Your back and forth is throwing me for a loop.”

Her assessment was fair. Usually I was known as the fun and flirty guy, but lately I’d definitely been more of a grump. I was trying not to let on that this trade had been the hardest one I’d had to deal with. I felt like the walls were caving in on me, my time running out, and with all the pressure, it was causing random grumpy outbursts.

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