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M ullens peeled his jersey off over his head and dropped it in a crumpled heap on the locker room’s rubber floor.

Players were still filtering in from the afternoon practice, and when he looked up, he spotted Athena in the doorway.

A sheaf of papers trembled in her grip and she swallowed hard, as though trying to summon the gumption to call the room to attention.

She hadn’t always been like that. This was because of him. She didn’t know what to expect, didn’t know what reaction she might receive. Didn’t know if he was going to torch her career or save it.

He’d mended a lot of fences with her over the past several weeks, to the point where she no longer ghosted his text messages, and she’d let him bring her supper in her shop. But he still had work to do. Especially here with the Dragons.

Her soft brown eyes met his, and he saw them harden with an edge of wariness. If he disrespected her, she’d be gone. No more second chances.

And rightly so.

She was a lot more forgiving than he would have been if their roles had been reversed.

“I have a new recipe for everyone,” she called, raising her voice to be heard over the din of players. They’d won enough games recently that they were in good spirits, increasing the volume of every locker room interaction.

The chatting quieted, but didn’t cease the way it did when the coach addressed them.

“It’s super easy and filling,” she continued, making her voice louder.

“Hey!” Mullens stood. “Pay attention to Athena!”

“You mean Tina?” Dylan asked with a smirk.

“Shut it, O’Neill.”

Athena’s eyes had gone wide and she swallowed again. He had a feeling that if she thought she could flee the room without losing face right now, she’d choose that option.

Mullens, still in his skates, towered over his quiet teammates as he made his way past discarded gear to Athena’s side.

In his hockey shorts, shoulder and chest pads, he took her stack of recipes.

A chorus of hoots rose in the room as the men waited to see what he’d do with them. Even Athena tensed, the muscles of her neck standing out.

Mullens walked to the room’s outer ring, where the lockers and benches were situated. He turned the papers around to read the recipe’s name.

“This is a good one.” He handed it to a rookie, who crumpled it like Mullens had with the pancake recipe that fateful first day. Mullens cuffed the man upside the head. “Don’t be a jerk like me. Show some respect.”

He cut a quick glance at Athena and raised his brows, waving the bundle of papers. “Any pro tips for us lugs?”

She blinked, shaking her way out of her stunned silence. “It’s a fairly easy recipe. If you have questions, you know where to find me.” She turned as if planning to leave, then faced the room again. “Oh, and there are various dietary modifications listed at the bottom for those who need them.”

“Hey, Athena?” Mullens called.

She slowly faced him, her expression one of extreme wariness.

“I want to apologize. I know I haven’t shown you anywhere near a proper amount of respect in the past. I was a jerk. No excuses. And I’m sorry. I’m going to do better.”

She inhaled, her chest expanding, the tension lines in her face smoothing like a reversal of a water drop causing ripples.

Mullens turned back to his task of handing out recipes. “I know y’all probably won’t believe me, but I’ve tried every single one of her recipes from that cookbook she gave us when she joined the team.”

“Tried ripping them out of the book, you mean?” Landon muttered, looking at the sheet he’d been given.

“Nope. Cooked them all. Athena knows what she’s doing, and in case you haven’t figured it out, I’m a giant, disrespectful doofus who she should’ve taken out back and shot on day one.”

“Giant old doofus,” Leo chirped. The guy was in his late twenties, and not that much younger than the men on the team he called old.

“Yeah, I’m old. Old enough to not act so stupid when trying to catch a woman’s attention.”

“Dude, you have no game,” Dylan said, shaking his head.

“Like you’re one to talk. Doesn’t Jenny hate you?” Mullens fired back.

Dylan smirked and lifted his brows, making Mullens wonder if the hate-hate relationship he’d heard about around Sweetheart Creek was actually a pack of lies.

“I hope you’ll make him grovel for a very long time,” Maverick told Athena as he reached for his copy of the recipe.

Mullens made him tug it from his grip, grumbling, “Very funny.”

Maverick grinned. “Just trying to be helpful.”

“Give her one of your cars, Mullens,” Leo suggested. “Then she’ll know you’re serious about your groveling.”

“Women like new cars and trucks,” Landon commented, perking up.

“Mullens did let me borrow his Corvette,” Athena said, her tone playful.

Mullens. She’d never once called him that.

But instead of it feeling like she was putting distance between them, making the interaction impersonal, it felt the opposite.

Like he was accepted. All parts of him. From his horrible playboy persona to the guy who was still healing his childhood wounds.

From the man who’d disrespected her in front of the team to the one now trying to make amends.

Accepted and forgiven.

He’d never experienced such an overwhelming, surging swell of love.

“Oh-ho!” Dylan crowed. “Mullens has it bad! Look at him!”

He smiled and shook his head. He didn’t particularly enjoy being ganged up on by the guys, but if it brought Athena into the team’s fold they could tease him for the rest of his life. He might even give them some fodder to keep it going.

“Be careful with him, Athena,” Leo said. “He’s one of our oldest geezers on the team, and sadly, we still need him.”

She smiled at Mullens with such warmth and gratitude that he ducked his head to hide what was surely a goofy expression.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Leo,” she said lightly.

“You might want to put him on a soft food diet to help protect his dentures, too.” He cackled.

“Hey! Most hockey players have some fake teeth,” Mullens protested. As a joke, he lunged at Leo, who laughed and tumbled off his bench.

He wouldn’t give up this team for anything.

Athena straightened up her desk, prepping to head back to Sweetheart Creek. Today, like most weekdays, she’d work the quieter evening shift at the Huckleberry Bookshop before closing up for the night.

She smiled, pressing her palm to her heart as she thought about that earlier moment in the locker room. Her hesitation about forgiving Chad, about possibly dating for real this time, and how he might treat her, had all been laid to rest.

They were both a work in progress, but they were willing to put in the effort.

There was a gentle rapping of knuckles at her open office door, and she turned to see Chadwick Mullens.

Her boyfriend.

He’d changed and showered since she’d last seen him, half an hour ago. He was wearing a crisp, cotton button-up shirt in a deep shade of blue that made his brown eyes seem almost black.

“Got a moment?” he asked, already closing the door behind him.

“What if I don’t?” she asked in a sassy tone. She propped a hand on her hip even though she was suddenly nervous. He was here either to deliver bad news or kiss her.

She really hoped it was a kiss.

“You have to relieve Meddy in about an hour and a half,” he said, checking his watch. “I’ll keep it quick.”

“Are you keeping track of your girlfriend? How possessive of you.”

Before he could speak, she made up the distance between them and wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him deeply, leaving no doubt where she wanted them to be, relationship-wise.

After a long moment they broke apart, resting forehead to forehead.

“So you’re officially my girlfriend?” he asked.

She nodded, feeling a sudden shyness.

“No more dodging me? No more being crazy busy?”

“I still have a cookbook to rescue.”

He laughed. “It’s aiming its way straight up to the top of the bestseller lists. What’s to rescue?”

She shrugged.

“You really want three jobs, huh? Hate spending time with me that much?”

“Hey, two of the jobs involve spending a lot of time with you.”

He kissed her again, slowly and meaningfully, as though they had all the time in the world.

“How about this?” he suggested. “We confess on TV?”

“Confess to what?”

“That we were enemies, and that I did anything and everything to get you riled up. But I don’t do that any longer because I finally grew up. Now we’re mad about each other instead of mad at each other. We can make it cute. You know, capitalize on our relationship to sell the cookbook?”

“That’s a bit too cutesy, and goes against your image.”

“Maybe it’s time for a change. Time to settle down and get the things I truly want.”

“And what’s that?”

“Love. Marriage. Family. Lots of kids and pets. A real zoo, you know? A house stuffed to the rafters with chaos and people and animals and a million things going on.”

Athena blinked at him in surprise. He was serious. He wanted the whole meal deal. And not just that, he wanted to supersize it.

Whatever the man had been doing behind the scenes over the last several weeks to heal his past, the effort seemed to have been well worth it.

“What?” he asked, wrapping his hands around her waist. “You don’t want that?”

“I do. It just sounds really busy.”

“We both love having full lives.”

“True.”

“And this kind of hecticness we can do together.”

She smiled. She liked his dream.

“You know we haven’t actually been on an official date yet.” She allowed a finger to lazily trace the edge of the tattoo that dipped under his shirt.

“We can remedy that.”

“Good.”

Above Chad’s collarbone was a branch with a few leaves, a bird that was half-angel. Athena gently tugged at his collar, pulling it downward to take a peek at what was hidden by fabric.

“It’s a tree,” he said.

She looked up from her survey, meeting his dark eyes, which held a rare invitation to dig deeper. “Why a tree?”