Page 28 of Top Shelf

I roll my eyes, and he lifts both hands. “Sorry. This situation is very serious and also incredibly odd.”

“Yes,” I agree, my chest loosening for the first time since I read Anton’s text. “It is very odd.”

Chase’s mouth curves, but he doesn’t push the joke. “What happens if you tell Anton to wait until the deadline?”

“He is not doing anything forbidden. Our lawyer says preliminary enquiries are allowed as long as nothing is executed before transfer.”

“So he’s standing at the starting line with his foot over it.”

“Yes.”

“And you’re over here playing hockey.”

I meet his eyes sharply, but he doesn’t back down. “I don’t mean that like you’re doing something wrong. I just mean that’s the problem, right? You’re here. He’s there.”

Yes. That is exactly the problem.

Hockey has been the answer to every question for most of my adult life. The game gave me a career, a place in rooms where men like Chase and Reid and Jake become something close to family. It also kept me across an ocean while Solvik became a deadline.

Chase taps his knuckles against the bench. “Does anyone else know?”

“My family and our lawyer.”

“What about over here?”

I shake my head.

“Not even Reid or Carina?”

“No.”

“Heidi?”

The sound of her name in this room is strange. I suddenly get a vision of hot pink and the sound of laughter in my helmet. The feel of her soft skin as I adjusted the strap on her chin.

“No,” I say.

Chase watches me for a little too long, then he stands slowly. “Do you want some advice?”

I look at him suspiciously as he grabs his jacket from his stall, but gesture for him to continue.

“If the only thing between you and losing your home is a ridiculous condition, maybe the solution gets to be ridiculous too.”

I go still at his words, and he pauses with a shrug, watching me. “Just an observation.”

My phone vibrates again, and Chase nods toward it. “Answer your sister. She sounds terrifying.”

“She is terrifying.”

“Good. You need terrifying women in your life.”

I think of Heidi again, smiling with every tooth at the man who hit her car this morning.

Chase leaves to find Zoe, and I stay sitting. Because outside this room, the arena is emptying. Somewhere down the hall, media is holding post-game interviews, girlfriends and wives and babies wait for their players to trickle through to find them, and the rest of the night awaits.

On the ice tonight, I spent sixty minutes taking away other men’s options. Off it, mine are beginning to disappear in front of my very eyes.

And inside my chest, Solvik pulls at me from across the ocean.