Page 9 of The Pucking Date (Defenders Diaries #3)

THE NAME I CARRY

FINN

T he call comes right after media day as I’m peeling off the branded quarter-zip and tossing it over the back of the sectional in my house. I live close to the Hudson, not far from the Defenders’ complex, but far enough from everything else.

The space is quiet. Minimal. Clean lines, dark wood floors, and large windows that frame more sky than skyline. Boxing gloves hang in a shadowbox over the bar cart, my gym bag half-unpacked by the door. The espresso machine hums in the background, but the sound barely registers.

I’m thinking about Novak, how she keeps pretending that night in Montreal didn’t leave a mark.

The way her breath caught when I touched her, the way she kissed me. How she arched when she gasped my name.

And that crack in her voice, every time my Southern slips through, like it knocks the air out of her, makes her forget she’s not supposed to fall.

And she wants to fall. She’s just terrified I won’t catch her

I saw it in Montreal, when I took control, when I stopped asking and simply showed her. She let go. Unraveled. This woman who commands every room she walks into, who speaks in sharp angles and doesn’t flinch, loved being handled.

She wanted to stop thinking, stop leading. She wanted to be wanted. And she didn’t just let me take the reins, she clung to them.

Novak will appreciate a big gesture. Something loud enough to cut through her armor. Make her forget she’s supposed to resist me. And fuck it, I’m good at grand. One thing the league’s taught me? Show up big or don’t show up at all.

Another date. No cameras, no pitch decks, no jerseys.

Her and me, and something unforgettable.

Something that pulls her out of her head and into the moment.

Not a rooftop, not another sleek reservation with vintage wine.

She’s had all that. I want something quieter.

Personal. Something that’s important to her.

And yeah, her father’s watching, hovering like he’s got veto power over her life. But I don’t give a fuck. She’s not his player. She’s mine…if she’ll let me be hers.

I’m already half smiling at the thought as I grab my phone, thumbing open the browser to start searching—late-night jazz spots, hole-in-the-wall diners, anything off the radar but impossible to forget.

That’s when a ring cuts through. Aoife.

My little sister doesn’t call. She sends chaos in bite-sized form—memes, GIFs, and grainy clips of her three-year-old twins climbing the furniture like it’s Everest.

A call means something’s wrong. That the decline we’ve all been dreading—the one that visits in the middle of the night, stealing pieces of Patrick O’Reilly we’ll never get back—has stepped out of the shadows .

I swipe to answer before the second ring. “What’s going on?”

There’s a pause, long enough to say everything. Her voice is tight. “It’s Dad. He’s worse.”

Six hours later, I’m stepping off the plane in Raleigh, grabbing a rental at the airport.

The air hits different here, thick with humidity and the ghost of honeysuckle from Mrs. Henderson’s fence line.

I can smell it even with the car windows up.

The Bojangles sign still flickers the same dying neon, and there’s my old high school’s championship banner hanging from the same rusty light pole.

It’s early September, but the heat is still thick. The trees are full, green, but the light’s gone gold around the edges. Like even the air knows summer’s about to slip.

This town is soaked in nostalgia and sweat, where football’s gospel, front porches are confessionals, and nothing ever really changes.

The Vipers made me an offer. A big one. Come home, play for the city that raised me, let the press spin it as some poetic full-circle moment.

But I can’t do it.

Can’t lace up my skates two miles from the man who blew up the name I’ve been dragging out of the mud ever since I was seventeen. Can’t breathe the same air and pretend it doesn’t choke me.

Then there’s my sister Aoife. A walking contradiction, chaos and competence in one messy bun and a threadbare hoodie.

Twenty-five, raising three-year-old twins solo without ever looking like she’s asking for help.

Their dad bailed before the boys turned one.

She never talks about it. Never lets it slow her down.

She freelances content strategy from her laptop, shoots reels between diaper changes, and somehow makes the rest of us feel like we’re the ones falling behind. I think about her sometimes when I’m taping my wrists, how hard she’s working to give those boys a name they don’t have to apologize for.

Same as me.

Being near her again would’ve been the only good reason to take that Raleigh contract. But some ghosts you don’t play in front of. You leave them behind.

The hospital’s familiar—sterile walls, low lighting, that hum of forced calm. I’ve done this walk before.

Room 208.

My father sits by the window in a recliner, hands folded neatly in his lap. He’s smiling. The same vacant smile he wore the last time I saw him. Like he knows he’s supposed to look happy to see me, even if he can’t remember why.

“Hi, Dad,” I say, keeping my tone gentle.

His head turns slowly, and for a moment, I hold my breath, waiting for recognition. His eyes land on mine, but they don’t light up, just stare through me like I’m a stranger wearing a familiar face.

“Finn,” he says, almost like a question, like he’s not sure if that’s really my name.

I nod, stepping in, keeping the expression polite. Easy. “Yeah. Just in town for a bit.”

“Good, good.” He smiles again, the blank sweetness I’ve come to dread. “That’s nice.”

He doesn’t ask about the team. Or the league. Or the nonprofit I’ve been pouring myself into, trying to scrub clean the damage he left behind .

He doesn’t remember the wreckage. Or maybe he does but is unable to say it.

Before the tumor, before everything cracked open, my father was a force. Big. Loud. Charismatic enough to charm every scout and sponsor in the room.

And when I was a kid, I wanted to be like him.

That all changed the summer I turned seventeen. The headlines hit just as I was packing for Canada to play major junior. Suddenly my last name meant scandal instead of promise, trouble instead of talent.

The league called him a liability. Sponsors pulled out. My ticket out got stamped with a scandal I had no part in.

And he didn’t explain or apologize. Just folded in on himself and let the world torch us both.

All he does now is smile.

I’m standing there, stuck between memory and ache, when I hear the familiar shuffle of heels on laminate and the soft slam of the door.

“Finn?”

My mother’s voice wraps around the space before she even appears, warm and already half laughing like she can’t believe I’m really here.

She steps into the hospital room and pulls me into a hug, smelling of cinnamon and stress.

“Sugar, you should’ve called from the airport, I’d have had a plate waitin’ for you,” she says, patting my chest like she’s checking I’m real. “You missed the boys, they had to go down early. They were wrecked.”

I nod, glancing toward the hallway outside the room. My mother keeps moving, tucking the blanket around my dad’s legs, smoothing the wrinkle in the curtain, adjusting the volume of the TV even though it’s not too loud.

Busy with the little things. The kind of quiet fussing that keeps her hands full when her heart’s too heavy to hold still. The kind people do when they need to feel like they can do something. When the hard parts sit between you, thick as grief and equally quiet.

With Dad, she’s patient. Gentle. She dabs his mouth when he forgets to swallow. Finishes his sentences when he loses track. Never lets the sadness creep into her voice.

With me, she’s fierce. Loving, but firm. The glue that kept things together when everything went sideways. The reason Aoife made it through high school without hating the world, and the reason I didn’t walk away completely.

My mom helps him into bed and smooths the blanket up over his chest now. Her voice stays light, but I know the rhythm, it’s the same one she used when I was thirteen and trying to lie about a busted taillight on my bike.

“So,” she says, fussing with the edge of his bed. “You came. Just for the weekend?”

“Couple days.”

She hums, like that tells her everything and nothing. “I heard the Vipers made an offer.”

I don’t ask how she knows. This town breathes gossip faster than weather.

“They did.”

“And?”

I glance at him, at my father staring out the window, smile painted on like a half-remembered habit. He hasn’t said a word since I sat down.

“I’m not taking it,” I say quietly.

“Shame,” she murmurs. “You’d be close. The boys would love having you around. Aoife too.”

“Yeah.”

We both look at him. He blinks, smiling, eyes distant. Like he’s watching something we can’t see .

“You think he knows?” I ask.

She takes a breath. “I think…sometimes he does. I think there are days he remembers more than he lets on. But it’s hard. Watching him disappear piece by piece.”

She pats his leg gently, then moves to pour a glass of water.

“And your team?” she asks, back to her rhythm. “Any movement on the contract?”

“Nothing locked yet.”

“You holding out for something better?”

“Maybe.”

She turns, arms crossed. “You still boxing?”

I smile faintly. “Yeah. When it doesn’t mess with my training.” She lifts an eyebrow. “You know how strict it gets mid-season. They track everything—heart rate, recovery time, even sleep. Boxing’s not exactly coach-approved cardio. Too much risk.”

“But you still do it.”

“When I can,” I say. “When I need it.” She tilts her head. “It keeps my head clear. The noise quiet. I’m not the guy punching walls, I’m the guy hitting bags so I don’t.”

She nods once, satisfied, then walks over and sits on the edge of the visitor’s chair beside me.

“You seeing anyone?”

I exhale slowly, scrub a hand over my jaw.

“There’s someone,” I say finally. “But she won’t have me. Smart woman like her...she sees the headlines, the reputation. Probably thinks I’m just another mess waiting to happen.” I glance at my father still smiling that empty smile. “Can’t say I blame her.”

My mother raises a brow, all mischief and mama sass. “Well honey, what in the Sam Hill is wrong with her? Can’t she see you’re finer than frog’s hair? ”

“She’s smart.”

She snorts. “Baby boy, that don’t narrow it down one lick.”

I sigh, rubbing the back of my neck. “Yeah…that’s kind of the problem.”

“Don’t you even start with me,” she says, already reaching for her phone. “I seen that last photoshoot, Finnian James. Shirtless and grinnin’ like you done caught the cat AND the canary.”

She pulls out her phone, taps, then flips the screen toward me. It’s one of those curated disaster pieces—me with two girls on my arms at some post-game event from months ago. Skin, teeth, lighting, staged to sell something.

“It was a sponsor event. Everyone’s trying to get their shot. I blink, and it turns into a headline.”

“But this kind of carryin’ on probably ain’t helpin’ your cause none,” she says, dry as week-old cornbread.

I wince. “Yeah. I know.”

“You’ve gone and made yourself quite the name, haven’t you?”

I look down at my hands. At the familiar calluses, the healing split on one knuckle. The gloves help, but hours on the bag leave their mark anyway. Bone-deep tension doesn’t sweat out easy.

“Yeah. But I like this girl, Mama.” She watches me, eyes narrowing. “I mean it. She’s different. Smart. Sharp. Scary as hell in heels.”

A flicker of amusement crosses her face. “So naturally, you’re smitten.”

I nod. “She don’t take nothin’ from nobody. She’s all polished edges and fire, and underneath it, I can see how much she’s carryin’.”

“And she won’t give you the time of day? ”

“She wants to,” I say quietly. “I can feel it. But she’s been burned. Bad.”

“And now she sees you as another matchstick.”

I swallow hard. “Pretty much.”

She leans back slightly, that hard edge in her gaze softening.

“Then you best show her she’s wrong about you, baby boy. ’Cause if she’s got half the sense God gave a goose, she ain’t fixin’ to sit around waitin’ for you to prove her right.”

Behind her, my father makes a sound. A low, gravelly hum. We both turn. That same smile, eyes fixed somewhere beyond us. Shifting his gaze between us and the TV. Whatever he’s seeing, it isn’t us. Whatever’s happening in his head, he’s keeping it locked away.

My mother rises, brushes her hand over his shoulder, and begins to tuck him in for the night.

So I sit there in the growing darkness with the man who gave me everything—and then watched it all burn. The father I’ve been trying to forgive. The ghost I’ve been trying to outrun. The reason I’ll never be able to come home, no matter how much I want to.