Page 210 of Pucking Strong

I glance around. “Where’s their chair?”

She turns and points. “One row past the Rays chair, like five down on the left. You’ll find Ilmari over there with the Langleys.” She reaches out, placing a hand on my arm. “Just, whatever you do, tell Poppy you’re voting for the Rays chair. You don’t want her to swap out your Christmas cookies for lumps of coal.”

Every year, Poppy hosts a party and makes enough desserts to feed a village—cookies and fudge, rum balls, macarons, coconut clusters. Every player and member of staff gets a thoughtfully organized tin of the most delicious treats. It’s one of the highlights of my holidays.

Next to me, Teddy groans. “Man, I forgot about her cookies. She gave me a tin when I was an intern. I think I cried when I ate the last mocha truffle.”

Rachel smiles. “Since you’re both on staff, don’t be surprised if you get two tins. We had to beg her to stop giving us four every year. It’s too many cookies, and we could never eat them fast enough.”

I cast Teddy a warning glare. “If you think I’m sharing any cookies with you, think again.”

He crosses his arms. “If you love me, you’ll let me have the whole tin.”

Draping my arm around his shoulders, I kiss his brow. “Nice try.”

Rachel and Caleb both laugh. “Hey,” she says, one hand on her belly. “Do you guys have plans for the holidays? Henrik, I know you usually go back to Sweden if you can.”

“Not this year,” I reply. “Now that they’ve added the New Year’s Eve game, there’s just not enough time for travel.”

She nods. “Yeah, Ilmari really wanted to get home to Finland this year too. But with the kiddos, it’s just too hard—”

“And you’re pregnant,” Caleb presses with a scowl. “That’s why we’re not flying across an ocean to Finland. Because you’re pregnant with our twins, Hurricane.”

She just rolls her eyes. “These babies still have plenty of time to cook. I’m fine.” She turns to me. “We were thinking of doing a quick trip up to my family’s ranch in Montana. I wanted to make a party of it, take the private plane. My brother will meet us there with his husband and their girls. And the Langleys will come. You guys would be welcome too. I bet Karolina would love the snow.”

Hearing her name, Karolina perks up. “I love snow!”

Rachel smiles down at her. “I knew you would. Do you know how to make snow angels?”

While Karolina explains her favorite memory of making snow angels in detail, I glance to Teddy. He just shrugs, casting a wary glance down at Karro. I know what he’s saying without words. We thought we would hear something from her case worker by now. It was two weeks of chaos, then nothing, nothing, nothing.

Elin has advised us not to prod. There are processes for these things, and pushing our point won’t make anyone rush. She told us not to go anywhere this holiday. We shouldn’t be traveling withKarolina until we hear from the court about any potential changes to the custody arrangement.

“You don’t have to decide now,” Rachel says. “There’s time. Want to just let us know?”

“Can we?” Teddy replies with a weak smile. “There’s just some stuff still up in the air.”

She nods, reading between the lines. Then she glances at Caleb. “Babe, we should get going. Tess asked us to bring them back some coffee and donuts.”

We part ways with the Prices, leading Karolina in the direction of the Rays lifeguard chair.

Teddy loops his arm with mine as we walk. Karolina walks in front of us, zigging and zagging to take in every sight and sound. “Montana would be fun,” he says with a wistful sigh.

“It would be fun,” I reply. “I’d love to be able to give Karolina a white Christmas, a little taste of home. But we should probably wait until we hear something.”

“I know. It’s just hard to turn down an offer to ride on Hal Price’s private jet again.”

I smile, patting his arm. “Next year.”

We get through our photo shoot at the Rays deck chair, which includes approximately fifty poses, with Jake and Poppy acting as dueling set directors. The chair is designed to look like a coral reef with all these fish and rays swimming around it, all wearing Santa hats.

Karolina eats up every moment, posing first on the chair, then on each of our laps. Then we all stand in front of it. Then a shot with her on my shoulders, my arm around Teddy.

“Okay,” Teddy calls, snatching my phone from Poppy. “I think we’ve probably got a good shot in there somewhere.”

Jake helps me get Karro down from my shoulders while she whines that she can see all the chairs better from up there. I get her down to the ground as, next to me, Teddy gasps. “Ohmygod. Babe—” He shoves my phone in my face.

I take it, leaning away, wincing at the bright screen. “What?”

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