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CHAPTER THREE

RYAN’S PHONE BUZZES just as he pulls his suitcase off the conveyor belt at Bradley International.

That’s either his mom, who has been texting him all day, or Kaden, who has also been texting him all day. Ryan’s mom is worried about him, so those texts basically just make him feel worse. But Kaden’s texts. Those piss Ryan off. He hasn’t talked to him since he broke up with him.

So their conversation literally went from last week’s sorry I don’t think I wanna do this anymore to today’s just saw, u ok?

Ryan did not answer his question. He also didn’t reply to any of his other thirteen texts. Ryan counted when he was bored on the plane. Before he goes looking for Liam Hellstrom, he does check his phone.

From: World’s Greatest Asshole

Ryan what the fuck?? stop ignoring me

Ryan locks his phone. He will not stop ignoring him. In fact, Kaden deserves to be ignored for the rest of eternity.

Maybe Ryan should get a new number. Since he’s not in Canada anymore. He did get a plan that works here and there because they do travel a lot, so it’s not an immediate concern, but— fuck, he has to change his address on everything. Actually, some of his paperwork has his parents’ address in Pennsylvania on it.

His mom is planning on coming by soon, she told him earlier. Maybe she’ll bring Dad. As much as getting traded fucking sucks, Ryan doesn’t mind being a little closer to home.

Piling all his bags onto a cart, Ryan looks around for Liam.

He isn’t hard to spot. He’s tall, blonde and Swedish. And he’s holding the hand of a little girl, who’s waving at him with a sign that says RYAN HARRIS in big glitter letters.

“Hey,” Ryan says, holding out his hand to shake Liam’s. “I’m Ryan.”

“Liam or Lee or Hellie, or, if you must, Satan,” Liam says, keeping a straight face the entire time. “Good to meet you.”

Well, they’ve met, technically. Twice this season already. But it’s not like they talked—they were just on the same sheet of ice for a little while.

Ryan crouches down next to the kid, who is just as blonde as Liam. “And what’s your name?”

“I’m Ida Hellstrom,” she says.

“It’s so nice to meet you, Ida Hellstrom,” Ryan says and hopes he doesn’t butcher the last name to hell and back. Heh. Hell. “I’m Ryan Harris. Thanks so much for picking me up.”

“She insisted on coming,” Liam says, smirking down at the kid.

Ida bounces on the balls of her feet. “I’m the welcome committee,” she says proudly and holds the sign out to Ryan. “You can keep this.”

“Thank you, that’s really nice,” Ryan says. He doesn’t know why he suddenly feels like crying. Today has been an absolute shitshow, so maybe that’s it. Or maybe it’s that at least two people are happy to see him.

Ryan made the mistake of looking at the Cardinals’ trade announcement on Instagram. Nobody in the comments was happy that they traded for him. Someone said the Cardinals may as well be adding a trash can to the lineup. So. Yeah.

“Why don’t you carry it to the car for him, hmm?” Liam suggests, giving Ida’s head a gentle tap. “He’s got enough stuff to carry already.”

“Of course ,” Ida says and reaches out to take Ryan’s hand. “Come on, let’s go.”

Okay, Ryan is definitely going to cry.

He’s glad that Liam starts leading the way to the car and pushing Ryan’s cart because Ida was not happy about the prospect of letting go of Ryan’s hand. Clearly, Liam has taken in trades and call-ups before. He rattles off a perfectly rehearsed list on the way—when he usually leaves for practice (“I can give you a ride”), when his wife goes to the grocery store (“She’ll buy you whatever you want”), tidbits about the rest of the team (“If you need anything, just ask Yoshi. He knows everyone and everything and people will do whatever he wants, no questions asked. Don’t talk to Jordie early in the morning. He’s great to talk to otherwise, though. Oh, and Waldo will eventually knit you a hat. You will like it and you will smile and say thank you, understood?”)

Ryan isn’t sure anyone wants to give him anything, but he still nods along.

Ida tugs at his hand. “Ryan, you have the day off on Saturday—”

Liam huffs at her. “Ida.”

“I have a hockey game and Papa is coming and can you come, too? Please?”

“Uh, yeah, if we have the day off,” Ryan says. He was about to go on a roadie to Seattle and Vancouver and now he suddenly isn’t. The Cardinals have a completely different schedule (duh) and that probably should have occurred to him much earlier.

“You do.” Ida nods excitedly. “I’m going to ask Lou if he’s coming, too. He came to one of my games last year.”

Ryan has no idea who in the absolute fuck Lou is. He did think he knew the Cardinals’ roster, though. He looked it up on the plane. Maybe Lou is a weird nickname?

“She’s talking about Louie Hathaway,” Liam says, coming to his rescue. “He just got called up this morning and he usually stays with us. ”

“Oh,” Ryan says. Did he steal some guy’s room? Great. One of his teammates probably already hates him and he hasn’t even met him yet.

“Lou is staying with Dave Santana,” Liam says. “He’ll like it better there because Ida won’t be waking him up in the morning to ask if he wants to play with her, even though we told her that she’s not supposed to do that.”

“I thought it was way later,” Ida says. “I was worried he was dead.”

Ryan snorts.

“He wasn’t,” Ida adds helpfully.

She falls asleep on the drive back to Liam’s house. Liam fills Ryan in on the Cardinals’ season so far—not bad in the beginning, but lots of injuries getting in the way, and now they’re trying to still make the playoffs. They’re only a few points out of a wild card spot, so it’s not impossible.

“Santa isn’t coming back before the playoffs,” Liam says. “I guess you’ll give us a chance at least.”

No pressure. Ryan only makes a vague noise to hide just how much all of this makes him want to throw up all over Liam’s car. Honestly, in all honesty, straight up looking at the facts, Ryan has no idea why the Cardinals wanted him. He’s a PR nightmare on legs. His last few games weren’t even that great. He does score a lot for a defenseman, but he hasn’t contributed much goal-wise recently. He must have been a last resort.

“What are you worried about?” Liam asks, eyes firmly fixed on the road. “That everyone will hate you?”

“Well…”

“This isn’t Toronto. Nobody here hates anyone.”

“I mean, people didn’t hate me in Toronto either,” Ryan says. “At least not until last week.”

“Look. You know Lucky? Luc Girard?”

“Yeah,” Ryan says. Everyone knows Luc Girard. Drafted by Nashville, first round, a new hope for the franchise, a chance to finally rebuild, all that jazz. Girard made the NHL team in his first season, went on to sign a five-year contract and three years in, he got tripped into the boards during a game. One of his own teammates, who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. It took him ages to come back from that concussion. Nashville didn’t re-sign him. Then Hartford came along and said, “Let’s take a chance on this guy.”

They do that a lot.

Case in point. Ryan is here.

“Nobody thought Lucky would work out for us,” Liam says. “When Nick Rivera got traded here? Everyone said he was such a problem in the locker room. You know who plays hockey on the floor with my kid when she’s at the rink? Nick Rivera.”

“Really?” Ryan asks. He cannot see a guy like Nick Rivera on the floor. Nick Rivera is the second-best paid guy on this team. He lives and breathes hockey. He is a god on skates.

“See?” Liam says. “You fell for it, too. It doesn’t matter so much what other people say about you. Half of it isn’t true anyway.” He glances at Ryan. “I’m guessing you weren’t blackout drunk when you wrecked your car.”

“I didn’t wreck my car,” Ryan says with a sigh. “It just slid into the ditch. And I’d had a beer, like, two hours before I drove.”

“Yeah, so they’re just saying stuff. It doesn’t matter. The team matters. And nobody on this team hates anyone. It’s not what we do.” Liam takes the highway exit for Silver Lakes and Cedar Mills. “You don’t get to hate anyone either, by the way. And if you do, you keep that shit to yourself.”

“I don’t really want anyone to hate me quietly , though,” Ryan says. “I don’t want anyone to hate me.”

Liam laughs.

“What?”

“There’s always someone out there who hates you, even if it’s just some douchebag with a stupid username somewhere on social media. ”

“True,” Ryan says.

He also hates himself a little for fucking up this badly. He could still be in Toronto. Because one thing’s for sure: they wouldn’t have traded him if it hadn’t been for all those rumors. They didn’t care what the truth was—at least Liam asked. The team even put out this press release where they were all like, we’re aware of the allegations, we take them very seriously, blah blah .

Well, Ryan will definitely make a point of not falling in love with some dick who’ll break up with him over text in Hartford. That’s his promise to himself and he’s sure as shit going to keep this one.