Page 29 of Branded (Breakers Hockey)

Twenty-Seven

Smitty

“Excuse me,” Kailey said, releasing my hand and hopping down from her barstool.

A second later, she was hurrying across the bar floor, disappearing down the hall.

Her disappearing out of sight had me finally unsticking.

My feet hit the floor, and I started after her when my mom caught my arm.

“We’ll take care of the bill. And”—her face clouded—“your brother. Will you ask Kailey if we can try this again? Promise her that it’ll be without a side of the bullshit?”

I took a breath, released it slowly. “Yeah, Mom.”

Her hand hit the side of my neck, squeezed lightly. “Also, for the record, you should marry the girl.”

My lips turned up. “Already planning on it.”

“I’m—” A squeeze before she released my hand.

“I’ve never been disappointed in you, baby,” she whispered.

“I know you have to go after your girl, but I need you to know that I’ve always loved you for the man you are.

The kind, selfless, bright, and wonderful person you are defines you, not how easily you can read some letters on a page. ”

Shit.

Now my eyes were burning.

My stare caught my dad’s as I moved from the table, snagging Kailey’s jacket and purse. “Go,” my dad mouthed, “we’ll talk later.”

“I—” Brandon began.

“Not fucking doing this right now, man,” I said.

I turned away from my brother, wove across the floor, moved into the hall. Jules was coming around the corner as I entered it.

“Out the back door.”

“Thanks, Jules.”

My legs made quick work of the hall, and then I was pushing out into the night air.

Kailey was there, her face in her hands.

It was cold, so I dropped her jacket around her shoulders, tugged her close, and just held her. Those hands stayed on her face, but she burrowed into me, letting me hold her.

Long minutes later, she asked, “Did I really say all that?” A whispered question. “Or was it just a bad dream and I’m going to wake up, go to dinner with your parents and be the perfectly charming girlfriend and?—”

“I love you.”

She stilled.

“My fierce little bird, pecking the eyes out of the person who tried to hurt me.”

Those hands dropped to my chest.

Her eyes finally hit mine.

“He made me mad.”

One half of my mouth kicked up. “He made me wish we were on the ice so I could check him through the boards.”

A breath, her forehead falling forward.

I dropped my hand to her nape, held her there, was lightly massaging the tight muscles there.

“I fully support this idea,” she murmured.

That made me want to laugh. When I really shouldn’t want to after what happened inside CeCe’s. So, I held it back and just hugged her tightly until she stopped trembling, until she relaxed against me. “My fierce little bird,” I said again, stroking a hand down her spine.

I felt her smile against my skin. “I’m not going to hear the end of this, am I?” she asked softly.

“Definitely not,” I told her.

“They’ll hate me.”

Fingers in her hair, tilting her head back. “My mom just told me to marry you.”

She started, going completely still, mouth dropping open.

“For the record, I told her I’d already planned on it.”

Her exhale was shaky. “Smitty.”

“This isn’t a proposal,” I said, smoothing my thumb over her bottom lip, “though I’m not saying that I wouldn’t elope if you gave me the chance.”

“No.”

I frowned.

“I want the wedding,” she whispered. “I want everyone to see how much I love you.”

For the second time in less than an hour, I was near tears. “I love you so fucking much,” I whispered, “and I’m so thankful, so proud of you for what you said, for being here, being in my life and?—”

My voice cracked.

I pushed on. “For never making me feel like a disappointment.”

A hand on my cheek, brushing lightly against my beard. “Baby.”

I smiled. “Thanks for standing up for me.” A breath. “I clearly have some things to unpack with them. I…Brandon has done shit like that before, and I’ve always laughed it off. Never to that point,” I added. “Never that overt. But, yeah, he’s made the occasional sharp or snarky comment.”

“Maybe he saw you were happy and couldn’t take it.”

“Maybe.” But it seemed like more than that, more than just being jealous, and I didn’t know what to do with that.

Brandon was my older brother.

I’d always looked up to him.

Wanted to be like him.

To think that Brand had fostered this antipathy for years made me feel off-balanced.

Wrong.

Despite my mom’s assurances. Despite what Kailey said.

If my brother could think those things about me…then who else might?

“Baby?” Kailey whispered.

I blinked, pushed the question away. “It’s cold. Let’s get out of here and go home.”

A flex of her fingers, but her hand slid away, drifted down, and wove with mine. “Yeah, baby, let’s go home.”

I went out with my parents for breakfast the next morning.

Brandon had flown home early, and I was glad I hadn’t had to deal with my brother, not when I felt both settled because I fucking loved Kailey for speaking up for me when I knew how difficult it was for her, and that she’d done it for me …yeah, that fucking slayed me.

But I was supremely rattled.

I hadn’t known my brother had that much dislike for me, disdain for my abilities.

My parents had made it clear they were proud of me, and I hated that a part of me had needed those words, that they’d been like water to a parched desert. It wasn’t like they’d ever shirked on praise, and it concerned me that part of me needed that praise, especially since I was a fucking adult.

Maybe that wasn’t fair.

Maybe people always needed that from their parents.

Maybe so much had shifted in my mind in the last months that I needed that, especially now.

Lots to think about when I should be focusing on hockey.

I’d asked Kailey to come for part of the road trip.

The team would be going to some big cities, places that would make for fun nights out.

There were a few restaurants I’d love to take her to, ones I’d found on my walks through the cities, little hole-in-the-wall places and underrated tiny bistros with the best fucking food.

But Kailey couldn’t come.

She’d been working on that side project for Marcel’s dad in her spare time and was nearly done, so she’d decided to pass on the road trip, promising to get it done, so we’d spend my free weekend when I got back from the travel together.

I had plans for that weekend.

Plans that would get me through the next few days.

I parked, got out of my car, and grabbed my bag from the trunk, headed for the bus that would take me and the guys to the airport.

But I stopped before I got on, seeing Raph getting out of his car.

My mouth opened, quickly slammed shut when I saw what my friend looked like.

Hell .

He looked like hell.

Long strides brought me to Raph’s side by the time my teammate was retrieving his bag from the back seat. As he straightened, the bag tossed over his shoulder, I asked, “What’s wrong?”

Dark circles under Raph’s eyes. Stubble dotting his cheeks when he always shaved, only growing his beard for No Shave November, a stupid team tradition all the guys participated in. Skin pale. Hair a mess. Suit wrinkled and smelling like he’d been bathing in whiskey.

Raph’s shoulders lifted and fell on a sigh. “Figured I’d at least have five fucking minutes before you got in my face, asshole.”

I’d take asshole in this.

I’d own it if that meant Raph unloaded whatever in the fuck was putting this look on his face.

“You looking like that”—a wave of my hand—“you don’t even have five fucking seconds .”

Another sigh then Raph shoved a hand in his pocket, yanked out…a crumpled piece of paper.

No.

It was glossy.

Like…photo paper.

Like…one of the ultrasound pictures that Raph had been showing off in the locker room since he’d found out he was going to be a dad, just a few days ago.

“I was supposed to go with her to the doctor. She’d kept scheduling appointments when I couldn’t make it, saying there just weren’t a lot of open times.

” A muscle in his jaw twitched. “I said I’d call the doctor, explain the situation, see if I could get to a couple of them.

I wanted to hear the heartbeat and I had questions, wanted to make sure I was supporting Monica and?—”

My stomach began churning.

Shit.

Had he lost the baby?

“She called when I was visiting my dad at the home”—he’d grown up with a single father who’d had a stroke a couple of months back and was currently residing in an assisted living facility—“said that they moved her appointment up, and I left right away, tried to get there in time.” Another rise and fall of those big shoulders.

“But I was too far away. Got there just as she was walking out. Supposedly had just finished.”

Supposed—

“I’d never looked at these closely before, not the writing anyway.

” He shoved the picture at me, jabbed a finger at the small white letters at the top of the print-out.

“I looked at the head, the legs, the heart. But not the writing…and it’s not even the same hospital.

Not the same date. The same fucking year, even.

The — She— ” He shoved a hand through his hair, paced away.

I was trying to make sense of that, of the fact that, yeah, the ultrasound’s date that was printed on the picture was from four years before, when Raph spun back around, jabbed out his fist.

Not at me.

But at the car.

It thunked against the metal hard enough that I knew it had to fucking hurt.

Raph wasn’t feeling anything, though. He didn’t even shake out his fist when he twisted back to me and said, eyes full of fury and agony. “She was never pregnant.”

I blinked, mouth dropping open.

“She made the whole damned thing up.”