Page 40 of Sweet Thing

Me

Good game tonight, H. You on the plane yet?

Hatch

At the airport. And thanks. We did good.

Before the thread could launch into a blow-by-blow account of the game (or Conor’s sex life), I bowed out. A minute later, Hatch called.

I answered quickly. “Hey, is everything okay?”

“It’s fine. I just wanted to check in. I feel like I’ve barely seen you since you came home.”

Hatch and I were usually close; at two years older, he felt protective of me, and I had always adored him. As a kid, I’d followed him around constantly, and he’d never once told me to get lost. Yet, since returning home, I’d placed distance between us, mostly because I hated lying to him. Not sharing what happened in Greece felt dishonest.

“I know. We should make some time to get together when you’re back in town.”

“Yep. Or you could just tell me what’s going on now.”

Anxiety made my hands itch. “Going on?”

“Yeah, you’ve been quiet. Or quieter than usual. And this nanny thing is kind of out there.”

“Like I said, Lars needed help.”

He passed over that. “How come you came home early? Rosie said you guys were loving Italy and you still had Spain to do. What changed your mind?”

I squirmed, hating myself for keeping it from him. “Just homesick. I missed everyone.”

“Well, I missed you, too.”

“Oh, everyone but you.”

“Ha ha.”

I changed the subject. “You haven’t said how you like working with Dad.”

“Dad’s gonna dad, y’know? It’s cool. I always knew he was the hardest worker in the league but seeing it up close is … well, inspiring.”

I smiled, loving that he was in this enviable position. “I think I’m going to have to put a video together. You and Dad tearing it up on the ice.” When I was younger, I loved creating highlight reels of my dad’s best moves. My brothers, too.

“That’d be cool. Mostly I just want to be there for him this season because it could be the last. I worry this Nyquist drama will have a negative impact on the team. We need everyone on deck.”

“That’s why I’m trying to help. Keep everything on an even keel. Go Rebels.” Which meant my own drama needed to stay well and truly buried. We chit-chatted some more and rang off with promises to meet up when he returned.

With no more family to occupy me, I lay back in the bed in the guest room, feeling the shadows draw in. Perhaps I should have bunked with my mom and Tilly tonight or taken Rosie up on her offer to stay over, but a show of strength was almost as important as actual strength. I reopened the guest bedroom window, closed it, and made sure it was secure.

I rechecked the alarm. Again.

Not yet ready to sleep, I took out my computer and started pulling clips of the game into my editing software. My dad’s tenacity and perseverance still amazed me. Sure, his stats had slipped a touch over the last couple of years, but that was understandable. Defenseman statistics weren’t as flashy as the offensive ones anyway.

He had made a couple of minor mistakes tonight, but Lars was always there to cover. The two of them were a well-oiled machine, cogs in each other’s engines. To the soundtrack of Mabel’s baby snores, I worked on creating a video of the defense’s greatest hits since the season had started.

Then I took a walk around downstairs, checking doors and windows once more.

I was overdoing it, I knew that much. Before my travels, I was devil-may-care about my safety. I thought nothing of walking home with headphones on or barely noting my surroundings after dark. Used to people and cars, I was a city-raised girl with what I thought was an innate common sense and spatial awareness. Slickers like me grew up with Spidey senses, but that night, six weeks ago on the island of Santorini, they failed me.

I should have stayed with Rosie, but of the two Australian guys we’d met at the village bar, the one “assigned” to me wasn’t really digging it. Neither was I, but I was trying to be more open to new adventures. My guy Shane was already hedging his bets: yawning and talking about getting up early to hike while his gaze wandered to a couple of cute French girls at the bar.

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