Awk-Weird (Ice Knights, #2)(50)

No one, not a single person.

Tess sat back down in her seat, her jelly knees refusing to keep her upright. “Loss of consciousness only happens in ten percent of cases.”

Fallon sat down in her seat, her sympathetic attention on Tess instead of the play on the ice. “The helmets and the game have both changed to help protect the players. Trust me, with what Zach goes through every game, I looked into this.”

“You only get one brain,” Tess said, her voice quiet compared to the roar of the rest of the fans.

Why did the inane words still keep coming out? Sure, it was true; there was totally a one-brain-per-person limit, but she really could just shut up right about now. Actually, five minutes ago would have been even better.

Fallon didn’t roll her eyes, though, and she didn’t edge over on her seat to put as much space between them as possible. Instead, she took Tess’s hand and squeezed it.

“Do you want me to see if I can get you down to the players’ tunnel after the game so you can see for yourself that he’s fine?” Fallon asked.

Yes!

No.

What was she doing? This wasn’t her. This gut-twisting, ass-clutching anxiousness about someone who wasn’t part of her found family was definitely not what she did with 99.6 percent of people. Even worse, she was halfway to telling Fallon yes before she caught herself. That wasn’t her place. That was for girlfriends like Fallon or expected-to-be wives someday like Marti, not accidental obligations like her. She was just temporary.

“No. That’s not necessary,” she said, clasping her hands together in her lap and turning so she was facing the ice again. “I don’t want to impose.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Fallon snorted in total disbelief and disagreement. “He’s the father of your baby, and you guys are…” Fallon waved her hands in the air as if she—the woman with no filter—couldn’t find the words to explain what they were.

Tess understood. She was right there herself.

“The unexpected happened,” she said, because the last thing in the world she was going to do was admit that she had no clue what was going on between them, either. “He took pity on me when my apartment flooded. That’s it. That’s all.”

“But you two—”

Tess put her hand over Fallon’s mouth before she could announce to the entire arena that she’d had sex with Cole. Again.

“Are friends. Sorta.” Tess let out a sigh and slipped her hand from Fallon’s mouth. “Look, I don’t know what we are, but whatever it is, it’s temporary, because we’re most definitely not a couple—not while he’s holding out hope for Marti to come back—and we’re also forever because we’re gonna have this baby together. It’s complicated.”

And as she watched the clock tick down on the game, she had to wonder how much time she still had and what kind of mark it was going to leave on her heart because even though she wouldn’t admit it out loud, staying with Cole had changed everything.

And God help her, she was at a loss to figure out what to do about it or how to remember how to breathe when that goon of a Rage player started skating after Cole again. The best thing she could do was just ignore it all, use the old pretending trick like she had when she was little and her mom would tell her they were going for ice cream. Kid Tess would play along, hoping this time was different, that this time her mom wasn’t going to end their ice-cream date with an announcement that Tess was going to be staying with this aunt or that uncle for a little while.

It never was different—not one single time.

So why would whatever was going on with Cole be anything other than the inevitable heartbreak she expected?





Chapter Fifteen


The media had been shuffled out to the postgame press conference room, AKA The Upchucker, and Cole was buttoning up his shirt when Peppers strolled by his locker.

“Phillips, my office,” the coach said without even the slightest break in his stride as he headed out of the locker room to his office right outside.

Fuck. Coach only liked to have little chats when the shit was going down.

The game replay in his head started running at triple speed. It hadn’t been his best game, but it hadn’t been shit, either. Grabbing his jacket and heading out of the locker room, he went through every mistake, every missed pass, that fucking late hit, and tried to prep for whatever Coach was about to chew his ass about. After a quick tap on the doorframe, since the office door was open, he walked in. He was so preoccupied that he almost missed Marti being in there until he practically plowed into her.

On automatic, he reached out to steady her. “I’m sorry.”

“No worries,” she said, taking a step back, her smile as huge as it was genuine. “How are you doing? That was a helluva hit.”

His head could be hanging on by a string and he’d answer the same thing. “Fine, no problems.”

A weird silence fell between them. Normally, this would have been where he took a step closer and the process of them getting back together for the millionth time would start, but he didn’t have the urge. It was the weirdest thing, as if part of him had switched off and that thing that had always been between them was gone. He still cared—come on, they’d known each other for more than a decade, he always would—but it was different.