15. Dylan

Chapter 15

Dylan

DYLAN SAVAGE THIRST TRAPS

Peaks Center Dylan “The Beast” Savage has come out of hiding with a very surprising photo. Though his selfie game is off, the same can’t be said for his biceps, which almost distract the viewer from the hockey romance he’s holding. Is Dylan a closet romantic? Has the angry player known for getting into fights with the press and scaring children turned over a new leaf? Time will tell, but for now, no one is complaining if Dylan keeps those thirst trap reader pics flowing.

—Hot Goss Online Magazine

The buffering circle of death rotated in front of the frozen, digitized image of the Peaks game versus the Saber Wolves. It was only thirty seconds to face-off. “No, no, no …”

Just another thing in this town to hate. Terrible Wi-Fi. Worse cell service. And Rosie didn’t have cable. The Peaks were down to three games to get into the playoffs, and my blood pressure was through the roof. The Saber Wolves were a formidable team, but the Peaks were better. At least we had been with me and Shiloh.

I walked around the apartment, trying to find a place with strong service, but so far, nothing. Maybe it would be better downstairs.

I held my screen over my head as I left the apartment, took a couple of steps, and felt someone grab the back of my shirt and yank me to a stop. I looked up and realized I was inches from falling down the stairs.

Rosie stood behind me wearing a red polo shirt, black pants, and a black apron. Her hair was pulled back into a playful ponytail that bounced as she stepped back.

“Saving your can, left and right.” She smirked.

“When you’re not saving it, you’re beating it,” I retorted with a wave at my nose. The swelling had gone down completely, and the bruising had faded as well, but teasing Rosie was more comfortable than analyzing why my heart raced around her.

“Just trying to make you feel more at home,” Rosie said. “I know you’re used to a few whacks to the face in your week.”

I let out a surprised laugh. “Hey, I’m trying to watch the game. Where’s a place to get good service?” I held out my phone to show her the frozen screen.

She winced. “Not here, unfortunately. We’ve got the Peaks game up on the big screen at the Icy Asp tonight.”

The Icy Asp. I hadn’t heard that name in so long, I’d forgotten about it. My friends and I had spent countless hours at the pizza place when we were teenagers. We were the reason they had to get rid of the all-you-could-eat pizza lunch buffet. All we could eat was putting them in the red.

“I’m headed there right now, if you want to join me,” she said.

I debated for a second if I wanted to watch the game enough to actually go into public, then grabbed my jacket from the hook by the door and followed her down the stairs.

“We’ve got to go fast, though,” she said. “I’m going to be late.”

“You work there?”

“A few nights a week. It helps make ends meet.”

It had been so long since I worried about money, it was sometimes easy to forget that not everyone was able to work the job they loved while also making enough money to live off of. Owning a touristy art shop in Winterhaven probably didn’t give steady business, in the off-peak season, especially.

She almost had to jog to keep up with me, so I slowed as we walked toward Icy Asps. “Do you have a car?” I asked her.

“A truck. But it’s so close, it seems silly to drive.”

My phone worked in bursts and spurts while we walked, so I’d get a few second update on the game before it buffered out again. When we arrived at the pizza place, Rosie darted away at the door to head into the back at a sprint.

I walked toward the bar to take a seat but paused when I spotted my family at a booth. I hadn’t seen my parents in eight years. Dad’s hair had gone almost completely white in that time, and he’d put on some weight around his waist. He’d shaved off his mustache at some point, and I almost didn’t even recognize him without it. Mom’s hair was still a shoulder-length honey brown color, in the same style it had been since I was a kid. But she had more lines around her eyes and mouth than I remembered.

She’d called a few times since I’d arrived in Winterhaven, but I’d sent her to voicemail. I didn’t know what I could even talk to her about—a concern I’d brought up with my new therapist. The what-ifs were eating me up: what if she was disappointed in me? What if she wishes I’d never come back to Winterhaven? What if their lives were better with me gone?

They were facing the television screen, and when I looked, the Peaks had the puck. Gage flew across the ice, and he passed it to Bret. “Come on, come on,” I said under my breath, though I shouldn’t have had any doubts. Bret took it all the way to the goal.

To my shock, the restaurant cheered.

In my wildest imaginings, I never thought anyone back home watched our games. It made sense, though, for Shiloh. Everyone had loved Shiloh. Me though? Maybe at one point, but not after I made it clear I was never coming back to Winterhaven.

Shiloh had made the same choice as me—we both left Winterhaven to go to college in Toronto to join our rival’s hockey team instead of playing for the college team we all grew up cheering for. But Shiloh, a player with more natural talent than anyone I’d ever met, had come home almost every summer to help with hockey camps and, once we made the pros, had donated money to the high school hockey program.

And I stayed in Toronto, then Montana, and trained in the off-season with personal trainers just to stay good enough to remain on the team. It took everything I had—time and money—to improve enough and rise to the top, and by the time I grew up and matured enough to regret what I’d done as a teen, it felt like too much time had passed. Words had been said that couldn’t be unsaid. Everyone was better off with me gone.

Besides, what was the point in coming somewhere I wasn’t welcome?

Shiloh had tried to convince me to be brave enough to come back home. To give everyone a chance to forgive me—and reminded me to forgive them. Shiloh wasn’t just a better player than me, he was a better person than me.

I knew the exact moment Dad noticed me, and then it was like a chain reaction where everyone in the restaurant was eventually quiet, their gazes all on me, the blaring television the only sound in the room.

My feet were frozen in place. I hadn’t mentally geared up to have a conversation with my parents yet.

Mom stood and took an uncertain step toward me. We’d never been a super affectionate family, and I didn’t know if I should hug her, shake her hand, wave? All three seemed wrong. Especially with everyone watching us, waiting to take cue from my family on how to react to my presence.

Dad slowly stood as well, and it felt like a face-off on the ice. One of us would need to make the first move, but unlike a hockey game, neither of us seemed inclined to do so. The last time we’d seen each other was crystal in my memory. Dad yelling at me that I’d ruined the family. Me throwing a punch. Mom’s upset, teary face as she screamed for us both to stop. I’d stormed out and hadn’t seen them since.

“It’s good to see you, Dylan.” Mom took another hesitant step forward. It hadn’t always been like this—the caution, the insurmountable walls.

“You too,” I replied, even though I wanted to ask, then why didn’t you ever come visit me? Why did I have to come home to see my family again?

No, I’d stopped caring about that a long time ago.

“Dylan,” Dad said with a nod, his voice low and gruff. “Still on for dinner Sunday?”

“Yes.” I couldn’t look directly at him, so I stared at a spot over his shoulder. Every part of me was tense. The anger wasn’t there anymore—that had long faded—but the hurt and regret remained.

“You’re here!” Rosie exclaimed with excitement as if she hadn’t walked into the restaurant with me less than a minute earlier. She wrapped her arm around mine, and I tore my gaze away from my parents to look down at her, relief filling me. Rosie’s presence was like an ice pack on an angry bruise. “I’ve got a table over here for you.” She turned to my parents, and I gave into the urge to tuck my arm firmly around her waist and pull her into to my side like a shield.

Her thoughts seemed derailed by my unexpected move. Her hair brushed my chin as she looked up at me and took in way too much. One of her dimples showed as she gave me an encouraging smile.

She turned her attention back to my parents, but her grip on my waist tightened. “I’m sorry to steal him, but Dylan promised to help me with something.”

I nodded. I would snuggle her undead cat if it meant getting me out of this situation.

Dad observed us way too closely for comfort as Rosie tugged me past them to the opposite side of the restaurant. He probably had questions about how Rosie and I were already so close when we’d just met—questions I definitely did not want to answer. I waved again at Mom, whose eyes looked suspiciously wet. I stopped walking, wondering if I should fight the awkward and just hug her, but she’d sat back down, and the time had passed.

Where I sat, I was hidden from their view but could still see the game clearly on the screen. Rosie leaned close enough for me to smell the fresh scent of coconut shampoo as her ponytail tickled my ear. “I’ve got to work, but I’ll take my break in about an hour. What kind of pizza do you want?”

“Whatever your favorite is,” I said, feeling more shell-shocked than I expected. My expression must have given me away, because Rosie paused with her face inches from mine. Her gaze roved over me in a way that made me feel uncomfortably seen.

“The worst is over,” she whispered.

I tried to get my footing again, my senses all over the place. Between Rosie’s closeness and the run-in with my family, my internal compass didn’t know north from south. “Are you nurturing me, Rosie?” I murmured.

Her concern was gone in a flash, replaced by a saucy smile. “I’m trying to start rumors. I think it’s working.” She ruffled my hair and took off, and I realized that most of the restaurant was watching us. I smoothed out my hair, wishing I could ignore how good it had felt to have her fingers against my scalp.

It was a playful move, bro. Don’t make it a thing.

I found my attention torn between watching the Peaks kill it at yet another game, taking us one step closer to the championship, and watching Rosie flit around the restaurant like a busy bee. She remembered everyone’s names, and often their usual orders too.

When she dropped my pizza off—it was pepperoni and pineapple; of course she was a psychopath who liked fruit on her pizza—she took a huge bite out of a slice and informed me that I should be taking pictures for social media.

The levels of ridiculousness I felt taking a picture of the pizza, the game, the restaurant, and a selfie of me eating the pizza could not be understated.

The restaurant remained busy during the game, and then people started to trickle out one by one, and still I stayed. I never watched our post-game analysis, and it was interesting to hear what they had to say. A lot of their discussion was spent on how the Peaks did without me and Shiloh there.

“While his team is playing for their lives, Beast is cuddled up with a romance novel. I don’t know what to make of this,” one commentator said, as the photo from my social media flashed on the screen.

“Our sources have told us that he’s not allowed at the arena until after the playoffs,” the other man said. “What else is he supposed to be doing? Maybe a good, relaxing vacation is exactly what he needs.”

Rosie snatched the slice of pizza she’d been working on for most of the night and finished it off with a grin and a wave as she dashed past me again.

Relaxing. Right. Something told me that aligning myself with Rosie Forrester would be the least relaxing thing I’d ever done.