Page 73 of Breakaway Goals

“Spit it out, Reynolds.” Of course Braun didn’t sound sympathetic.

“Should I not have come?” He’d worried if he was overstepping. If he was actually a distraction, adrawbackeven. More than once. Or a hundred times. No matter how many times Finn smiled at him and said,I’m so glad you’re here, Dad.

“To this game? I don’t think Finn would’ve ever forgiven you for missing it,” Jacob joked.

“No,no. I mean . . .should I not have come down here? Rented the house?” It hadn’t been easy. And not for the reasons everyone assumed.

Danny was the only one who knew why it would really suck for Morgan to basically move to Tampa. And he’d called him on it a bunch of times. Danny gave him plenty of shit for not being over Hayes, six years later, but it was when he got careful and kind that Morgan realized he was actually kind of pathetic.

Danny had been really mindful about the whole Tampa thing, even for Danny.

“Oh, well, no the house rental thing was a good idea. You’d havereallycramped our style if you’d insisted on moving in,” Jacob said.

Morgan made a face. Like he was ever going to live under the same roof as his son andJacob Braun. That was not happening. There were limits. “I was never going to do that.”

“Thank God for that.” At least he and Jacob were on the same page about that. “But seriously, I think it’s good you’re here. Finn respects you a lot, and you give him a good perspective, and well . . .this is a big time in his life. You’ve been there, too. You get it.”

“So do you,” Morgan said, and yeah, this was the biggest reason he could stomach Jacob these days. He looked at him and occasionally saw the same pain in his eyes. It was hard to hate someone who was going through the same shit you were.

“Yeah, I’m his boyfriend. But you’re his father,” Jacob said. “It’s okay that you’re here. I promise. If it hadn’t been, you’d have known.”

For a second Morgan assumed Jacob was sayinghe’dhave told Morgan to fuck off, but then he realized thatno, Jacob meant Finn would be the one saying it.

His son was growing up, becoming a full-fledged adult with a backbone, and Morgan had never been prouder. Even when he ended up on the shit end of the stick. If he did, it was probably because he at leastpartiallydeserved it.

Kind of like the last six years of Hayes’ cold shoulder.

“Good.” Morgan looked out on the ice. Realized, as the lights went down, that the warmup was starting. Which meant the moment he’d been looking forward to and dreading in equal measures was about to happen.

Finn’s rookie lap.

“Oh, look, it’s . . .uh . . .it’s starting.”

When he’d been a rookie, this hadn’t been a thing, but now it was a beloved tradition. He’d known this was coming, and he hadn’t been sure he could get through it without embarrassing himself.

“Did you bring—” Jacob asked, voice sounding suddenly rough.

Morgan dug the item in question out of his pocket. He’d knownhe’dneed them, but he hadn’t realized Jacob would too. That had been a stupid assumption. The way they loved Finn was very different, but they both loved him.

He smacked the tissues into Jacob’s hand. “Here,” he said through a tight throat as Finn stepped onto the ice.

“Thanks,” Jacob muttered.

Braun might not be the son-in-law he’d imagined having, but the truth was, Morgan realized as he and Jacob both tried to discreetly wipe the tears out of their eyes, he wasn’t half-bad.

Two periods later, Morgan was re-thinking his casual acceptance of Jacob.

“God, Monty’s on fire tonight,” Jacob said, tilting the bottle of beer towards his mouth. “Nice he’s giving Finn some great offensive support.”

Yeah, he sure was. The score was 5-1, Sentinels, and Finn had played well, but his biggest advantage was how aggressive Hayes and the Sentinels’ offense had been all night.

Morgan told himself not to tense because it would make it all way too obvious, but he was out of practice with Hayes Montgomery sneak attacks. When he had to talk about him on a segment, he almost always knew in advance. Could practice saying his name normally, like his whole heart wasn’t yearning for something it hadn’t figured out yet—or ever—that it couldn’t have.

“Yeah,” he said uselessly. The trick he’d used every time he’d faced Hayes on the ice did not work with Hayes still playing and him in the stands. He couldn’t just pretend he didn’t exist. Couldn’t look right through him like he wasn’t there at all. Likehe was just any other player on the ice, even though he very much wasnot.

He definitely couldn’t do it when Jacob kept insisting on bringing him up.

Jacob looked over at him. “Yeah? That’s all you have to say? You’re the biggest fucking yapper in the universe when it comes to hockey, and all you have to say about Montgomery’s four point night isyeah?”