Moonlighter (The Company, #1)(69)

But nothing happens. And I notice that the lock screen shows only the time—not the photograph I took of New York from the window of the jet. With a sweaty hand, I tap the phone again. And when it refuses to unlock again, I try the pass code, instead.

PASS CODE INCORRECT.

I reach for the land line, which luckily, I still have, because I own a cable company that packages all these services together. I hit the talk button.

No dial tone.

That’s when I scream.





24





Eric





“Good work today,” Chip says.

“Thanks,” I grunt at the therapist, accepting the towel he hands me. I’m starving, and all my muscles are screaming. I swear Chip is trying to kill me.

Rehab is the worst. Ask any athlete. It’s all pain without much gain. It didn’t help that I was up late last night driving around the city like one of my brother's operatives.

And now I have to hustle to make my lunch date. Although “hustle” is a relative term on a knee you’re trying to rebuild. I walk slowly down the Brooklyn sidewalk, taking care to use a measured gait that would make Chip proud.

I pass myself in the plate glass window of a Brooklyn cookie Shop. My reflection shows a guy in the prime of his years, looking fit and healthy after a morning workout. I only feel old, I suppose. And did I mention that rehab sucks?

My phone buzzes with a text from my agent. Eric, I hope you’re almost here because I ordered two hot appetizers. We’re starting with the Thai wings and the avocado tacos.

Thank God for Bess Beringer. She knows exactly how to cheer a guy up. I’m so in. Order me the pulled pork sandwich with fries. I’m two minutes away.

When I finally walk into the bustling restaurant, she waves me down from a table in the corner that’s already loaded down with a bread basket so appealing that I nearly let out an unmanly whimper.

"Hey, Bessie," I say as she stands up to receive a kiss on the cheek.

“Sit down, sit down! The focaccia is barking our names.”

I take my seat and we dig in. "Good to see you in New York," I say after my first bite. “What’s the big occasion?” Bess is based in Detroit, so I don’t see her on my home turf very often.

“Get used to it. I plan to spend more time here,” she says. “I need to see more of my brother and his family. I’m not getting any younger.”

“Same,” I grumble. "And that makes your job harder. This spring you need to convince the Bruisers to hang on to my geezer ass. And you’re probably renegotiating Dave at the same time, right?" Bess’s brother is my teammate, Dave Beringer. I expected him to sign an early extension over the summer, but then it didn’t happen. I wonder if the team is balking at resigning two of its older players.

Bess can’t tell me. She would never reveal the confidential negotiations of another player. But I’m sure hoping she says something to put my mind at ease. Anything really.

I’m reaching for the breadbasket again when she grabs my hand to give it a squeeze. "Eric, if you rehab like a trooper these next few months, Brooklyn will offer you an extension."

"Did you hear something that I didn’t?"

"No. But I don’t need anyone to tell me how valuable you are to your team. You bring so much more to the room than your score tally. Without you, they’d have a really young forward lineup. You have wisdom that the younger guys need time to develop. And your temperament is rock solid. Coach Worthington knows better than to staff himself with a bunch of young hotheads. So it’s not all about points."

“Yeah, sure.” This sounds like something an agent says to a client who’s in a perilous position. “It’s only, like, ninety percent about points.” Luckily, I’ve got months to prove that I can come back.

“You don’t have to listen.” She shrugs. “The rehab is the same either way. At least until the moment you have to decide whether to have that other knee surgery, or to wait.”

“I haven’t made any decisions.”

“Uh huh. You forget that I know you. You’re going to avoid that other surgery and try to skate on your right knee. You’re going to do the macho thing and play through the pain. And that’s your choice. But promise me you won’t hurt yourself just because you’re worried about your contract extension. That’s not the most important thing.”

“Of course it’s the most important thing. What else is there?”

She sets down her butter knife and gives me a green-eyed glare. “Your life, dumbass.”

But hockey is my life.

“Look.” She goes back to buttering a piece of bread rather violently. “You told me after your 2012 season that you regretted putting off that shoulder surgery. That you never wanted to play another entire season in pain. You said, ‘I got the stats I wanted, but I was miserable from December to May.’”

“Good memory,” I mutter. Because that does sound familiar.

“Yeah, well I hope my memory isn’t better than yours. If you put off the meniscal repair because you’re so desperate for a contract extension, it might be 2012 all over again.”

“Except for the part where I’m seven years older.”

“Except for that.” She shoves a piece of bread in her mouth and then waves over a waiter who’s holding our platter of wings.