Page 65

PRESENTATION TIME

Tyler

On the ice that afternoon, I get up in Phoenix’s business, cutting off passes, stealing the puck.

I race behind the net, fighting it out in the corners with a kind of loose and easy pace that sends adrenaline rushing through me.

It’s a natural high.

This is why I play hockey—for games like this. When everything comes together, and you feel on top of the world. Every pass, every blocked shot feels a little like magic.

The magic that comes from years of practice, performance, experience.

And…joy. In the third period, the Phoenix center charges ahead on a breakaway, chasing down the net, but I cut him off, smacking the puck far, far from him and right toward my brother’s stick.

Where Miles spins around and takes it the other way. He sends it skipping past their goalie’s leg pads, and it lodges in the twine.

The lamp lights. Yes!

We hug, because why the fuck not? We’re three goals ahead and everything on the ice is going my way. And maybe soon, everything else will too.

We hop over the boards, and I tug off my gloves to grab my water bottle and down some. “Falcon to Falcon,” Coach McBride says, clapping me on the shoulder, then Miles.

“That’s the way we like it, sir,” Miles says.

“Keep it up,” Coach says, and when he heads back down the bench, Miles turns to me. “Got your text. Let’s have lunch with Mom and Charlie tomorrow, ’kay? We’ll figure it out.”

“Thanks, man,” I say, feeling like everything is possible.

“I’m stoked for you,” he says with a genuine smile.

“Me too,” I say, then we hit the ice again, and soon, we wrap up the afternoon with a W.

Yeah, everything feels possible.

When I return home, I pull into the garage, then knock first on Sabrina’s door downstairs. Maybe she’s with the kitten. But there’s no answer, then the sounds of pots and pans drift downstairs.

Ah, they’re upstairs.

When I reach the first floor, I toe off my shoes in the foyer and head to the kitchen, but I stop short.

Holy shit. Sabrina’s alone and cooking…like five things.

In a whirl, like she’s an executive chef in a Michelin-star joint, she grabs a saucepan from the heat while stirring a different pot.

On the counter sits a huge metal bowl with a salad.

This is…Thanksgiving-level stuff.

“Hello,” she says evenly as she lowers the ladle for the boiling pot, while dumping the sauteed veggies into a serving dish.

“Hey, Sabrina,” I say, impressed she’s moving so quickly and efficiently, but concerned, too, since there’s something almost robotic to her right now. “Are you okay?”

She lifts her face and flashes a closed-mouth smile as she spreads the veggies in the serving dish.

“I’m great. Just making dinner for you and the kids.

And the kids are upstairs putting on their jammies.

After they came home this afternoon from their friends’ homes, I made sure they did their homework.

I double-checked everything. Their math is so good now.

Yay. And they both showered and cleaned up their rooms. So after dinner, you can put them to bed.

They even fed the kitten and measured out her food, so that helped with fractions too,” she says, and holy shit.

Something is really wrong with Sabrina. She’s slid into Super Nanny mode for some reason.

“Are you okay, baby?” I ask softly.

She shoots me an admonishing stare, then presses her finger to her lips. “We don’t want them to hear.”

But maybe we do . “What’s going on?” I ask, stepping toward her, really looking at her.

Her eyes are…rimmed with red.

She doesn’t answer my question though because the clatter of little feet grows louder. And like a summer rainstorm that comes out of nowhere, two freshly showered, wet-behind-the-ears children skid into the kitchen.

“Hi, Dad,” Luna says, then hugs me.

“Guess what, Dad?” Parker says, but Luna shushes him.

They look like they’re up to something, and I feel entirely unmoored. “What’s up, kids?” I ask, trying to get a handle on the situation.

Luna sighs, but bounces. “Fine. We were going to surprise you at dinner. We have a presentation for you. ”

Oh. This should be interesting. They haven’t done a presentation since a year ago when Luna campaigned for a dog. She went full PowerPoint and everything. “Okay,” I say, going along with it. I’ll have to talk to Sabrina later. Maybe she’s only focused on the to-do list of the day.

This is a good reminder. I need to focus on these kids first too. “Give me a minute,” I say, then I head to my room to change out of my suit and into jeans and a T-shirt.

When I return downstairs, the table is immaculately set and Luna and Parker sit like angels, waiting for me. Sabrina stands though.

My brow furrows. “Are you joining us?”

She shakes her head. “I need to…” She stops, like she’s collecting her thoughts briefly, then says, “tend to some things downstairs.”

Okay. “But you usually do…join us,” I point out, and really, I hope she will every night. I hope these dinners become our norm—us doing all this together.

“Right, but I don’t want to intrude,” she says, brightly, as if she’s doing us a favor. “You should have your family time.”

Her words are a gut punch. But…have I been assuming too much?

Is this too much for her? Too presumptuous of me? I look around at my kids. They’re the loves of my life, but that doesn’t mean she wants to have dinner with them every night. Or take them to school every morning. Or help them with homework. Or have their schedule be her schedule.

It’s one thing to do it as the paid nanny. It’s entirely another for me to ask her to take on…being the girlfriend of a busy single dad with a complicated schedule.

Just because we’re into each other doesn’t necessarily mean she’ll want to have every meal together.

Hang out with us in the kitchen, the living room, the car .

Do things together whenever I’m home and not playing hockey.

My pulse spikes annoyingly. I got far out on my skis, didn’t I?

Just because she’s great with my kids as the nanny doesn’t mean she’ll want to become an instant family.

Shit. My chest tightens.

They’re my kids, not hers, and it’s not fair to think she’d want to jump from taking care of them for a season while she’s paid to being saddled with… us. As what—the twenty-six-year-old girlfriend to a single dad who travels half the year?

Fuck. I need to think this through. See my brother, sister, and my mom. Figure out my life.

But manners are manners, so I roll my shoulders and shove those thoughts away. I gesture to the dishes. “You made plenty of food though. But you can take a plate downstairs if you’d prefer,” I say.

Sabrina’s expression falters. Hurt flashes briefly in her blue eyes. And…that was probably the wrong thing to say.

I shake my head. “I didn’t?—”

“Don’t leave yet, Sabrina,” Luna jumps in. “We want to do the presentation first.”

“Yeah, we worked on it together,” Parker says. “Can you stay for it?”

Parker sounds so desperate, and it must work on Sabrina, since she says, “Of course I can.”

She takes off her apron, wipes her hands, but still doesn’t sit. “Let’s hear it,” she says, and I guess it’s time for a PowerPoint now.

Sabrina stands on the other side of the island, across from the kids and me.

Parker swipes the tablet, opening a PowerPoint that says Our Big Plan. He clicks to a picture of…us doing face masks. “Let’s start with Exhibit A.”

“Yes, Parker, excellent idea,” Luna says, adopting an adulting tone. “We call this…the beginning. See how much fun we had?”

They wait for a response, so I nod and say, “Yes.”

Sabrina doesn’t say a word.

“And here is Exhibit B,” Parker says, clicking to the next slide.

A photo of the four of us from last night. I’d fallen asleep and Luna looks to be taking a selfie of her, Parker, and Sabrina with me and my carrot nose. I couldn’t be dadding any harder.

“And this was the best,” Luna says, “wasn’t it? But then there was…this.” She clicks to the next one.

“Exhibit C,” Parker says in an announcer voice as he gestures to the photo of the four of us from Halloween. He’s wearing his astronaut costume, I’m a football player, and Luna and Sabrina are skaters. My heart swells.

“We all had so much fun here too,” Parker says.

“We did,” I say, unsure where this is going.

The next photo is a picture of us at the Ice Spectacle . “And here is Exhibit D. We all went to New York together,” he adds.

Then Luna is practically bouncing and…

Oh, fuck.

Everything snaps into place. How did I not see this sooner? They’re onto us. But I steal a look at Sabrina, and she’s tight, tense.

This is bad. I should stop this. “Kids—” I begin.

But they’re running the show. Luna straightens her spine and cuts in. “And we know you two like each other, so this is why we think it’s time for you to get married.”