Chapter 6

6

Anxious to avoid the inevitable teasing, he skipped the optional morning skate and arrived late for the game call. His teammates were too absorbed in their prep to give him more than a few funny looks and locker room jeers.

After the game was another story. They lost 4-1 to Detroit, and during the third period, one of the Motors D-men slammed Banks so hard into the boards no amount of padding could save him. It was his shoulder again. Not a complete separation, he was sure, but painful enough that it would bruise big time and take a while to heal. He’d suffered enough injuries over the years that he knew which ones warranted medical attention and which ones he could manage for himself.

A very pissed off Cal Foreman was currently pacing the locker room, looking for scapegoats. After some back and forth about whether O’Malley’s tumultuous love life was to blame—hockey players were a superstitious lot—talk shifted to where these nosy fuckers wanted it to go.

“Maybe it’s Banks’s fault,” Erik Jorgenson, the Rebels tender, said as he pulled off his pads. “He didn’t invite anyone to his wedding. That has to be unlucky.”

Banks continued with taping his stick. It calmed him when each breath had him wincing in pain.

“Those All-Star games are always trouble,” Reid Durand said.

Banks refused to rise. Scowling he could do, though. He sent O’Malley a pointed glare, though the kid had claimed he didn’t spill. Grey had also professed his innocence as they lined up in the tunnel before the game.

“Let us know when you set up the registry,” defenseman Theo Kershaw said. “Make sure you put ‘sense of humor’ on it along with a tuxedo for all those fancy galas you have to attend with your socialite wife.”

Coach came in and began the game post-mortem, aka the listicle of who fucked up and how (spoiler: everyone). Banks tuned out, stuck to his stick-taping and breathing through the pain of his shoulder, then distracted himself with a replay of his conversation with his gran.

How happy she was for him.

How she couldn’t wait to meet Georgia.

How hopeful she was for another great-grandchild.

Her health had taken a turn over the last year. She might not have much time left and this was a sliver of color in a gray world. He could do that for her.

Except it would be a lie. Pretending to be someone he was not: a good grandson, a dutiful husband.

Two months ago in Vegas, he had gone to sleep thinking this could work. So Georgia was twelve years younger than him, better suited to some young buck straight out of the draft than a has-been on the butt end of his career. But they’d connected enough to think that getting hitched was a good idea.

Then he woke up alone and realized that only one of them was stuck in that headspace. Any embers of hope were doused when he tried to contact her. The message was clear: pretend it never happened.

It was what she wanted, and after he’d calmed down, he reckoned she was right and put it out of his mind. He had a team to gel with, a city to acclimatize to, and a house to set up for the inevitable influx of relatives. And if every now and then his misbehaving fingers ran Google searches on his ex-wife, that was down to normal curiosity. Who wouldn’t want to know more about the bullet he’d dodged.

Only that bullet was now firmly embedded and would require major surgery to excise.

He looked up to find that during his navel-gazing, the locker room had cleared out. Dex O’Malley remained, checking his phone for the fiftieth time because of his love life drama, and for a brief moment, Banks felt an affinity with the younger man.

He quickly swatted that away. Banks didn’t have woman problems, at least not on the same level as O’Malley. He could fix his issue easily. This time he’d do it right. His family would have to slow their roll and suffer the disappointment.

“You still think I ratted you out?” O’Malley looked like one of the sad little puppies in that dog shelter where he had gone to sell his soul.

“You say you didn’t. I believe you.”

“Except you’re looking at me like you want to use that stick in a NSFW way.”

He placed the stick down on the bench. “How long has she been your neighbor?”

“Georgia?”

Banks’s hand itched for the stick he’d just taped and laid to the side for everyone’s safety. Who else would he be talking about?

“Since I moved in? Maybe eighteen months ago. But I don’t know her all that well. It’s a ships passing in the night kind of thing.”

Dexter was a bit of a man whore, and Georgia … well, he didn’t know a thing about her.

A suddenly intuitive O’Malley picked up on the vibe. “Dude, Georgia and I?—”

“Georgia and you?” A red mist raged before his eyes. His hand flexed again. The stick was right there .

“There is no Georgia and I. That’s what I’m trying to say. We’re neighbors, sort of friendly—” He held up a hand, that newfound intuition sensing Banks’s irritation. “But that’s it.”

Banks released a pent-up breath. Eighteen months. Was that when her parents cut her off? Castle Apartments was where the team stashed players on short-term leases before they settled enough to find their own place. Some guys, like O’Malley, stayed longer while they waited on a multi-year contract. Basically, it was high-end corporate housing, and the fact a woman who came from the kind of money Georgia did was living there said something—he just wasn’t sure what.

He hated to ask, but right now, O’Malley was his best source of information. “Is she seeing someone?”

The younger man had the decency not to betray any surprise at the obvious.

She’s not seeing me.

“A lot of people come and go from her place, but to be honest, I think they’re friends, or maybe just acquaintances. She entertains a lot. All night parties. I had to get my bedroom soundproofed because I had trouble sleeping when I first moved in.” O’Malley took a seat on the bench beside Banks. “What happened?”

I thought we had a connection, but I was out of my fucking mind.

“Too much tequila.”

O’Malley nodded sagely. “But you’re still married when you thought you weren’t.”

“Paperwork problem.”

“And now you need to get it fixed.”

Correct. Letting this continue had no upside except for the fact it got Georgia out of a jam and made his grandmother happy.

Don’t you owe it to yourself to explore what led you to this point?

Not now, Mom.

When he remained silent, O’Malley stood. “If you need to talk, I’m here. You’ve been a decent ear for me.”

“I have?”

“We had dinner at the Sunny Side Up diner a few weeks ago and you listened to my whining.”

“Before you stiffed me with the check.”

O’Malley winced. “Sorry about that. Something came up.”

It pained him to ask but the kid looked so miserable. “What’s going on with you and …?”

“Ashley.” Just saying her name deflated him. “We had a fight. She interfered in my business.”

The details didn’t interest Banks, but he’d lived long enough, and well, sisters , to know this much. “Relationships are about give and take, O’Malley. So she screwed up. Probably pales in comparison to your BS.”

“Just not sure why she bothers.”

“Who knows? She probably thinks you’re not as much of an asshole as you think of yourself. Women tend to have a broader view of these things.” Years surrounded by opinionated females had given him some perspective.

Yet he couldn’t for the life of him work out Georgia. Was it really all about money? Or was there some other reason why she needed him?

Now you’re just grasping at straws, desperate to assign her a less mercenary motive.

O’Malley looked somewhat cheered. “Hey, you coming to the Empty Net to drown our sorrows?”

“Sure. I’ll follow you there.” After he’d iced his shoulder and knocked back a shit-ton of pills.

Within a minute, Banks found himself alone with his thoughts, which lately was not the safest company. He checked his phone and the “wedding announcement” in the Chicago Tattler .

Belated congratulations to Georgia Goodwin, who was recently revealed to have married in a Las Vegas wedding ceremony in January. Ms. Goodwin is the daughter of Penny and Marcus Goodwin, owners of the AmeriTrust Corporation and noted Chicago area philanthropists. Ms. Goodwin’s new husband, Dylan Bankowski, plays hockey.

The dismissive mention of his profession couldn’t quite compete with the possessive clench that phrase wrapped around his balls. Ms. Goodwin’s new husband … why the fuck did that send a dangerous sizzle through his veins? Only on paper, yet the thought of it, of belonging to her in that way, was doing strange things to him.

He shouldn’t want this. Not for any reason other than his gran’s peace of mind. He certainly shouldn’t want to relive the feelings from Vegas, the sense that if only they’d met here in Chicago this thing might have had legs.

She’d made it clear that the sole reason to continue this circus was because she was running out of cash. He should accept the unvarnished truth in that.

He sure as hell should not be looking for reasons to say yes.