Chapter 6

ADDISON WALKED INTO THE kitchen at chez Chase and almost buckled under the all-seeing gaze of Harper. Her friend stood at the kitchen island, dressed in tailored city shorts, a sleeveless teal silk blouse, and Cole Haan peep-toe wedges. No such thing as schlubbing on the weekend for Harper—she was ultra conscious of the image she had to maintain as an almost-CEO of an almost-world-class sports brand. Addison, on the other hand, preferred yoga pants and T-shirts on her days off. People never recognized her with her clothes on, anyway.

“Morning,” she murmured and headed to the Keurig. Hmm, lots of lovely flavors . . .

“How does it feel?” her friend asked.

“How does what feel?”

“Ford Callaghan’s massive—”

“Harper . . .”

“Stick,” she finished with malevolent glee.

“I should never have said a word to you.” Addison grabbed the almond mocha K-cup and popped it into the cradle of the machine.

“You had no choice. When a woman returns to the dinner table with stubble rash and a look of immense satisfaction, quickly followed by a man who is a lot smugger than a guy in my house has a right to be, she can hardly expect to get away without a little interrogation.” She cupped her mouth with her hands. “So, you know when I said stick, I meant cock, right? That’s hockey humor.”

Addison skewered her with a look over her shoulder. “Your grandparents would turn in their graves if they could hear your language, Harper Chase.”

“Are you kidding? Nana taught me all the best swear words before the age of five. She wanted me armed for the playground. And stop trying to change the subject.”

“It was a one-off. Won’t be happening again.”

Of all Addison’s friends, Harper understood best the danger she courted by getting involved with a player on her ex-husband’s team. Michael might not have the legal grounds to fire Ford, but he could make things very difficult for his star right winger.

Harper studied her. “It is a rather awkward set of circumstances, I have to say.”

“Even without the obvious problem of Michael being his boss, I’m not looking for a relationship right now. I want to focus on the new line, on getting settled in Chicago. Dating is not on my agenda—”

Harper scoffed.

“Dating,” Addison insisted, “is not on my agenda. Not with balding accountants, and especially not with a big brute of a hockey player who’s old enough to be my . . . younger brother.”

“He’s what? Twenty-six? Six years is nothing. You’re only as old as the man you’re feeling up. Besides . . .” She hesitated.

“Besides what?”

“You like him. I could tell at the dinner table before you sullied my first-floor guest bathroom with your hot ‘n’ heavy fuckfest. When’s the last time you actually liked a guy?”

Addison blushed, though she wasn’t sure if it was Harper’s salty language or the accusation of liking Ford. She did like him.

“I don’t know a thing about him.” Except for what was on his Wikipedia page, which she’d read three times last night, along with a shit ton of media coverage he’d garnered in the last few years. He’d built an amazing career since being drafted for Philly eight years ago, though he was with the New Orleans Rage for only one amazing season when everything had come together and they’d gone all the way. Their paths had never crossed. She liked to think she would have remembered those soft, chocolate-drop eyes, the messy, rakeable hair, and his goofy-cocky grin. After her divorce, she’d put herself on a media embargo regarding all things related to Michael. No hockey, no sports pages, nothing.

“What do you want to know?” Harper considered her shrewdly, a glint of mischief sparking her eyes.

“Nothing. I don’t want to . . .” She stopped, remembering something from the Wikipedia page. Something that gnawed at her. “He had a brother who died.”

“Paul Callaghan. Best NCAA center I’ve ever seen, number-one pick in the draft that year. Toronto got him but he never even saw a game. Traffic accident the night before he was due to start.”

How awful. But there was more. Ford and another brother had been in the car. The other brother—Jackson?—was injured as well. A promising talent, the news articles reported at the time, but there was no mention of him making it to pro level.

“Ford was driving,” Addison said, repeating what she’d learned online. He would have been young, sixteen years old. Old enough to drive but not old enough to weather what came after. That must have been gut-wrenching for him.

“I’ve no doubt it was,” Harper replied.

So Addison had spoken that aloud. But it needed to be said, didn’t it?

“And now he has the Cup,” Harper added when Addison remained silent.

Addison stared at her friend. “Hardly a consolation.”

“You’d be surprised,” Harper said, her voice taking on a firm quality while her thoughts seemed to send her somewhere beyond the room. “Winning wipes out a lot of pain.”

“Go for the face, boys.”

Jackson’s voice was barely audible over the shouts of Ford’s three nephews as they tackled him to the ground. He’d considered bringing the Cup for a visit but now he was glad he hadn’t. Not that the trophy couldn’t handle it—that hunk of metal got a serious pounding on the post-Finals tour every year—but these kids might have bonked their heads or cut their lips. Ford couldn’t stand the notion of them getting hurt.

He lay still in the grass on his brother’s front lawn in Bridgeport on Chicago’s South Side, enjoying the moment of normalcy before he had to sit up and face the obvious tension when you don’t visit your family much—or ever.

Seven-year-old Coby sat on his chest while Petie, eight going on eighty, had Ford pinned by the arm. Mikey, just turned six and the smartest one, was already unzipping Ford’s duffel looking for the goods. He whipped out a Rajuns jersey.

“Aw, this is so cool, Uncle Ford!” His bright eyes sparked anew with each additional team member signature he came across on his visual journey from neck to hem.

“Michael James Callaghan,” Marcy yelled, “stop rifling through your uncle’s crap.”

“What’s rifling?” Coby asked.

Ford grinned at his sister-in-law. “It’s all right.” He’d seen the kids at away games in Chicago over the last couple years, but had missed watching them grow up, and there was something achingly everyday about how they made themselves right at home with his stuff. Guilt flooded his chest. That was on him.

All three signed jerseys had been pulled out along with his underwear, clothes, shaving kit, and . . . condoms. Marcy yanked the boys away with one hand and repacked his duffel with the other in that efficient way moms had. On depositing the condoms back in the bag, she smirked and he smirked right back, the good-natured exchange giving him a needed moment to get his shit together and face his brother.

They’d never been huggers, and they sure as hell wouldn’t be starting now. Jax held out his hand and Ford clasped it firmly, though his brother gripped harder, probably to prove something. At just twenty-eight, he was two years older than Ford but looked ten. Whiskey and kids aged a man something fierce.

“Thanks for letting me stay,” Ford said awkwardly.

Jax sniffed, and stared him down. “Where the hell else you gonna go when you come home? Some fancy hotel?”

Not going there.

Ford turned back to find Mikey and Coby carrying his duffel, looking like they might collapse under the weight of it. He moved in. “I’ve got that, fellas.”

Marcy held up her hand. “I can’t get them to do a lick of work. Let them do this.”

Two hours later, Ford pushed his empty plate a few inches forward, sat back in his chair, and rubbed his belly, the universal sign of contentment after a good meal. That lasagna was out of this world.

“Marcy, if you’re ever ready to leave all this, I’ll make room for you in NOLA.”

His sister-in-law chuckled, eying her husband slyly.

“Tempting. What do you think, Jax? Should I run off with your rich and famous brother?”

Jax circled his finger along the rim of the glass of pop. He hadn’t touched a beer or anything stronger in three years. “He wouldn’t know what to do with you. I never see him on TMZ with any models—something you want to tell us, Fordie?”

Ford laughed, enjoying this playful side of his brother. Felt like old times.

“Just not interested in some airhead piece of ass.” Oops, not very respectful toward women. He met Marcy’s eyes. “Sorry, Marce.”

“Don’t apologize to me. Apologize to airhead pieces of ass everywhere who are missing out on all this.” She flourished a hand in his direction, drawing his chuckle. “But seriously, Ford. No one caught your eye?”

Oh, someone had. Someone who could be trouble for his career . . . but damn she was trouble wrapped in a sweet package. Those gorgeous curves filling his hands as he filled her body, and the way she’d responded when he sank into her—soft and sexy, surrender and a burgeoning awareness of her unique power. He didn’t think he’d forget that as long as he lived.

He really should stay away from her but he was having a hard time coming up with a God-honest reason.

“There is someone.” Marcy dropped to the seat beside him and rested her chin on her hands, eyelids fluttering madly. “A man only smiles like that when he’s thinking of a woman.”

Jax dipped his head with a not-so-furtive glance below the table. “What’s going on down south confirms it.”

“For fuck’s sake,” Ford bit out, but Marcy just laughed her head off. Nothing could shock this woman, not after everything Jax had put her through. They’d had some tough years while his brother looked for the solution to his problems in a bottle of Jack.

Recognizing that Ford wasn’t going to fess up about his mystery woman, Marcy sighed dramatically, stood, and walked to the bottom of the stairs. “Five minutes,” she shouted up, “and then you’d better be brushing your teeth or Uncle Ford’s gonna leave right now.”

Ford heard the scramble-pound of three sets of feet and the oomph of little brothers being tortured by bigger ones. It turned him inside out with memories of Paulie and Jax.

Marcy rolled her eyes indulgently. “I’d better make sure they get a move on.” She left the room, probably deliberately to give them privacy.

Ford slid a glance toward his brother, disappointed to find any trace of levity gone and in its place something he couldn’t quite label. No, that wasn’t right. Ford knew what it was. It was the same message that crossed his brother’s face anytime he looked at Ford.

You might have it all now, Fordie, but you fucked up big time on your way.

“Been a while,” Jax said.

Ford nodded. “Tickets were always waiting for you at the box office whenever I played in Chicago. While it’s great to see the kids and Marcy, I would have been thrilled if you came to see me.”

Jax stood and went to the fridge, holding the door open as if the mysteries of the universe could be unraveled with the explosion of light.

“Haven’t watched a game in ten years, live or on TV,” he said quietly. “Until six weeks ago.”

Ford’s breath caught. He knew how his brother felt about hockey. That pin in his leg reminded him every day how much he’d lost that night. Not just Paulie, the guy who could have been as good as Gretzky, but his own hopes and dreams for an amazing career.

“How’d I do?”

Jax grabbed a big bottle of Coke from the fridge, poured a half glass, then sat at the table again. Drawing it out, he was, and Ford waited, his heart in a stall.

“You had three shots to score in game three and two in five and you held back. You were always too tentative in the crunch.”

Okay. Ford accepted that. As kids, he’d paid more attention to Paulie because he was the oldest, and from mini-squirt all the way to junior AAA, he was the god who knew everything. But Paulie was dead and Jax had watched a hockey game for the first time in ten years.

Fucking hell.

“It’s faster than you think on pro ice.”

Jax’s eyes snapped up. “You think I don’t know that?”

“I didn’t mean—”

His brother waved it off, but Ford knew what he was doing. Controlling the conversation as he had done for the last ten years. Everything was on his terms because he was the aggrieved party.

“What, Fordie?” The query emerged dripping with sarcasm. “You too much of a big shot to take your brother’s advice?”

“You’re not giving advice. You’re picking a fight. But you can’t even do that right.” Ford blew out a breath.

Killing the number-one draft pick the night before he was due to start his pro career was not how Ford wanted to be remembered. When that pick was your oldest brother and you destroyed the future of your other brother in the process, that was an even harder pill to swallow.

The worst, though? Not only would Jax never forgive him, Ford would never forgive himself. That night, he’d lost both his brothers, not just one.

Ford looked around the homey kitchen, filled with cookbooks and pots, plants and bric-a-brac. Drawings and postcards clung tentatively to the fridge door with magnets, one of them with the Rajuns logo, a crawfish holding a hockey stick in its right claw and a beignet in the other. Dumbest logo ever. This place wasn’t unlike the house they’d grown up in four blocks over, though their parents were long gone. A fitting home for a man on a city-of-Chicago salary. The money Ford sent to Marcy was spent on the kids.

He’d buy his brother a mansion if he would accept it. He’d do anything to relieve his pain. Raw bitterness tinged the air between them. Ford would rather they fought it out, but he didn’t want to upset the kids or Marcy.

“How’s work?” Ford asked, though that was another minefield. Literally.

“Perfect. I finish filling in holes on one street then go back to the beginning and start over. Job security’s a cinch in the pothole capital of the United States.”

“You should be coaching over at Rebels youth hockey camp. They’d have you in a heartbeat.”

Jax lifted his tee, showing how time had changed his formerly flatter-than-a-pancake abs. Once, you wouldn’t have found an ounce of fat on that big frame.

“Cut out the soda and don’t take an extra serving of Marcy’s lasagna and you’d be back in shape before you knew it.”

“Right. That’s all it takes. Didn’t ask for your advice.”

“You’ve no problem giving it to me when you’re watching my form.” Although Ford would prefer the rough criticism if it meant his brother talked to him again. He’d take that call after every game.

“Well, don’t worry, that’s the last time I watch. You’ve got it now.” It, being the Cup. It, being the life they’d all dreamed about every morning when they got up at four thirty to hit hockey practice before school.

“Jax—”

His brother held up his hand. “You stay out of my business and I’ll stay out of yours.”

He got up and blew the room, leaving Ford and his heart halfway to breaking.