Page 42 of Hot for the Hockey Player (The Single Moms of San Camanez: The Vino Vixens #2)
“No, it absolutely does not,” I said slowly.
God, what Maverick must be going through right now …
Feeling attacked and like nobody had his back.
No wonder he was filling his days with countless workshops and trying to make new friends.
He had no idea the fate of his career—or his relationship with his family—so he was doing his best to not think about it.
Was this podcast a contingency plan if he didn’t have a hockey career to go back to?
Would the league really get rid of him for speaking out against the toxic masculinity and serial sexual predators in the NHL?
“They are also really upset that he made a point of saying on the Pucktastic podcast that if the women Henderson hurt need financial help with their legal fees, Mav will help them.”
Holy shit.
“That’s huge,” Laurel said, finishing up her spaghetti and taking a sip of her water.
“He said about half the team is on his side and have reached out to him, the other half thinks he was wrong,” Damon went on.
“Then the other half are the problem,” I replied. “Anybody who is aware of such behavior and sits back, allowing it to continue without taking a stand, is the problem. Neutrality doesn’t benefit the oppressed, it benefits the oppressor.”
Both kids nodded, and we finished up our dinner chatting more about the podcast, and all the good it had the potential to do.
Damon asked if he could go online and play video games for a while, since he’d finished his homework, and Laurel retreated to her room to get lost in a book.
I found myself pacing like a lioness in heat or some shit, waiting for the clock to move its lazy ass to seven forty-five so I could leave.
Damon was in the zone with his headphones on, playing some middle earth video game, so he had no idea his mother was wearing a trench into the floor behind him.
This was ridiculous. I was excited. I was nervous. I was … horny . At least, I think I was horny. I must have smelled my armpits like eight times and reapplied my deodorant twice. Not that I was a heavy sweater, but if there was ever a time for that to change, now was it.
My smart watch vibrated on my wrist to indicate that it was indeed quarter to eight now, since I set an alarm because I was unapologetically type-A like that.
“Okay, I’m heading over to the McEvoy’s now,” I announced to the house.
Damon waved but didn’t turn around.
No response from Laurel, which didn’t surprise me.
I swallowed my nerves and took my drunk butterflies out to my SUV.
The drive over to the brewery felt shorter than usual. I approached the security gate—a feature they installed last year after some dangerous mishaps with paparazzi—and hit the buzzer.
“Hey, Gabrielle,” Bennett said over the intercom. “Come on in.” There was a click, and the big metal gate silently swung open. I pulled ahead slowly, parking in front of the second house in the row of five. All the houses were identical, just different colors. It was cute.
Bennett was at the front door by the time I turned off my ignition. He gave me a friendly wave and his dark-blue eyes sparkled behind his glasses. “Raina says you’re definitely going to want to make changes to the diorama,” he said with a smirk as I followed him into his house.
I snorted. “She knows me well.”
His partner, Justine, who was also my doctor, was busy in the kitchen fixing kids’ school lunches. “Hey,” she greeted, her smile warm.
I removed my shoes, since they were also a shoes-off house, and followed Bennett into his cozy and inviting home toward the diorama which sat on the kitchen table. It looked professionally done.
“Did you make this?” I asked, taking in the topography of the land, the gentle slope down to the sandy beach and ocean, and thick trees on either side of the land. The attention to detail was staggering. Driftwood, rocks, even kelp.
He shrugged. “It’s been a fun evening project for the two of us these last few weeks. Not enough to turn me into one of those guys who becomes obsessed with creating a model train world and spending all my time and money painting miniatures, but it’s been fun.”
I snorted again. “You had me worried for a sec there, Bennett.”
“So, like we discussed, we put the row of cabins along this side to allow for more natural light into each of them. If we have them east facing, they’ll only get morning sun, then be dark the rest of the day.
Justine suggested skylights on the A-frames for even more light, and while it might not be as aesthetically pleasing or go with the natural vibe we’re after, and cost more upfront, we should consider metal roofs for the cabins.
Aluminum, Galvalume, and stainless are all corrosion resistant and fine for near the ocean. We’d never have to replace them.”
“And, we can put rain barrels on them to collect water for the gardens, and other things on site for when we’re in a drought,” Justine added as she joined us at the table.
“We put the main rainwater reservoir station up here, since it makes more sense to have it at the highest point and run it down to all the buildings and gardens below. There is a creek,” she pointed to the stream running behind the cabins, “but it’s prone to drying up in long periods of no rain. ”
They’d put in so much work and thought into the entire thing. I was left kind of speechless. His photo earlier definitely didn’t do it justice.
“What’s this here?” I asked, pointing to a trail that led into the artificial trees.
Bennett bobbed his brows. “Our favorite part.”
I glanced at Justine, and she nodded. “This was fun.”
Bennett reached forward into the diorama and lifted up the entire copse of trees which were actually all glued together, to reveal a bunch of hidden cabins on stilts. “Did you know that Bonn’s land extends another like fifty feet into the trees on this side?”
I shook my head, still stunned by their great reveal.
“If we put more cabins in here, or a bunkhouse for seasonal staff, we could get away with preserving the land, but still utilizing it,” he went on.
“We went with cabins for the diorama, but a bunkhouse, or a bunch of prefab tiny homes could work too. Just make a road in off this main road here, clear out some of the trees, but not all, and create like a little functional nature sanctuary.”
Bennett put the trees back in place and plunked his hands on his hips. “So? Feedback?”
My mouth opened, and a choked sound came out. “Uh … I thought I had some when I saw the photo, but honestly … I don’t know if I do. This is amazing. Better than anything I could have ever done.”
They’d been so fair in allowing space for all of our visions.
The grapes, the event pavilion, the herb and veggie garden for the pub, even the space where they wanted to try growing their own hops.
We all agreed that if we could, we needed to keep Bonn’s cabin.
Preserve it, restore it, or whatever we could.
Maybe turn it into the honeymoon suite, or the space where the bridal party could get ready.
Either way, unless it needed to be condemned, we planned to keep it.
“So, no changes?” Justine asked, surprise in her voice.
Slowly, I shook my head. “No changes. This is perfect.”
Both of them beamed, then smiled at each other with pride and love.
“Well then, shall we go over the proposal one more time?” Bennett asked, opening up his laptop at the empty end of the kitchen table.
“Now that I have some suggestions on,” I said, causing him and Justine to both laugh as Bennett pretended to wipe sweat from his brow.
“Phew. I was beginning to wonder who you were and what you did with Gabrielle Campbell.” He pulled up a chair so we could sit beside each other.
I took a seat, and Justine went to the kitchen to pour us each a glass of wine from my winery.
Who was I to say no to some liquid courage?
It was eight-thirty before I knew it and I was saying goodbye to the McEvoy’s on their doorstep.
We were set to present our proposal in-person to the Island Elder’s Council in exactly two weeks, and it seemed like all of us were getting pretty nervous about the whole thing.
The four men who owned the distillery also wanted it, as well as the five women who owned the cidery, and one mystery party that nobody could figure out.
We had a twenty-five percent chance of getting it, and while I didn’t like those odds, it was all we had.
“I’ll send you the revisions tonight and then we can all start reading over and memorizing our parts,” Bennett said as I climbed into my SUV.
“Sounds good.” I nearly hit myself in the forehead with my door as I opened it, my brain already no longer with the McEvoys, but rather, down in the cabin with a certain hockey player who made my body light up like Fourth of July fireworks.
I hit the button for the gate to open in the opposite direction this time and waited on pins and needles for it to swing wide enough for me to move. I nearly spun out in the gravel, I hit the accelerator with so much force.
Calm the hell down.
Breathing out slowly, I crawled my way down the hill and through the pub parking lot toward the pickup truck parked in front of the same cabin as before.
He was home.
A heavy mist and fog encapsulated the island in the last half hour, making it more difficult to see things on the property. This worked in my favor. Maybe nobody would pay any attention to my vehicle parked in front of his cabin. Maybe nobody would be able to see it.
I turned off the SUV and sat there for a moment, collecting myself.
I had condoms in my purse, fresh underwear on, and I applied a third swipe of deodorant right before I left.
I was good to go—sort of. Except for my racing heart and the lawyer side of my brain arguing that this was a terrible idea.