by Amber Lynn
Her son shrugged at the idea. She hadn’t expected him to perk up or anything, but she thought the inquisitive glare in his eyes would lessen. He couldn’t seriously think she had plans to replace his father.
“I was planning on it anyway,” Kevin said with annoyance.
“Well, good.” Lacey added a nod to her words. “Rachel, do you want to stay over at Fiona’s?”
Asking Fiona’s parents if it was okay should have been her initial step, but Kelly, Fiona’s aunt slash mother, had repeatedly said Rachel was welcome anytime. If Lacey mentioned she was planning to go out for the night, Kelly would probably suggest keeping Rachel for the whole weekend, so Lacey could get her “groove” back. That was what the women in her small circle called it.
It was preposterous. She was a thirty-four-year-old mother of two. She wasn’t ready to be put out to pasture or anything, as absurd as that saying was. The idea of putting herself out there, even for a quick weekend of fun was just as absurd.
Even if she wanted to get her freak on… Is that phrase even still used? Lacey shook her head. Even if she wanted to do that, it wasn’t like she had guys lining up to help her out.
It had been ten years since she’d been pregnant, but her body had always stubbornly hung on to the last five or ten pounds of baby weight. On her slim frame, it showed. At least George always found pleasure in letting her know that.
“Earth to mom. I know conversations aren’t your thing, but when you ask a question, chances are someone is going to answer it.”
Kevin wasn’t to the point of snapping his fingers in front of her face, but the edge to his tone broke her from her thoughts. It was his own fault her mind wandered towards the incredulous idea she had plans of finding a date.
“Sorry, honey,” she said as she focused on Rachel. “What did you say?”
Rachel gave her a small smile. If the annoyance that filled her brother ever latched on to Rachel, Lacey would be in so much trouble. She may have to go into hiding or something. At the very least, lock herself in her room most nights.
“I said I can stay with Fiona. You should have a night out. You spend all your time worrying about us.”
“Last I checked, that’s my job.”
And it was her only job. George and she had met in college. His career had required some moving around at the beginning, so she hadn’t settled in to a job before she found herself pregnant with Kevin. At that point, it was somehow decided she wouldn’t find a position in the workforce. George was too busy with training and games to be even a part-time parent, so everything fell to her.
It wasn’t like she regretted being there for every milestone of her children’s lives. It was the long days home alone when they were at school that made her wish there was just a little more in her life. George’s salary still provided them more than enough money to live pleasantly, but she had floated the idea of getting a job with mom hours around in her own head.
With summer coming up, it wasn’t likely she would find anything anytime soon. She had a few years before she could even begin to trust Kevin to babysit. Even then, if things kept going the way they were, she’d be trusting Rachel to babysit her brother long before she’d trust the reversal.
“Well, everyone needs a vacation from time to time.”
Rachel had returned to her homework as she said the words, no care or understanding that she’d just said something that made her seem so much older than ten. Lacey wasn’t sure when her daughter grew up so fast. She wanted to say it was just in the last few months. Brushing it off on their lives being thrown into chaos was the easy option.
But, if she let herself think about it, Lacey had to admit her daughter had been going on forty when she turned six. More than anything, Lacey wished hanging out with other kids like Fiona would allow her to be young for just a little bit. Of course, Fee was probably not the best kid to act as an influence. The little girl might as well be forty too, but at least she seemed to have fun.
She’d probably have an easier time being a kid hanging out with Nina. That woman was a mother now, but at times she was more childish than a two-year-old. Which did nothing to explain why Lacey apparently was going to spend the night out on the town with her.
It was a bad idea. Maybe she shouldn’t go. The idea had popped in her head out of nowhere. She’d tried to stay away from everything that reminded her of what was no longer part of her life. Staying away from the kids couldn’t be changed, but she’d pushed her friends from the team away.
Lost in her own thoughts, she realized friends from the team were the only kind of friends she had. Her brow furrowed as she considered that.
They’d been in the area for six years. Her kids were both in school and had friends there. Lacey should have friends there too. Over six years of dropping kids off, going to book fairs and concerts and all the other parent activities that fell to her to attend, and not once during that time had she made a friend among the other moms.
Sure, she was on good terms with her kids’ friend’s parents. She couldn’t trust her kids to stay over at their houses without making sure they were okay people. And she had done that. She knew Michael’s mom was a nurse and his dad worked with numbers, although, as she thought about it, she’d probably only met the latter once or twice.
Anyway, that wasn’t the issue. The issue was, as this new light bulb went off in her head, she didn’t have a life outside the world of a hockey team. She was a stay-at-home mom with no husband, stuck in a family that ex-husband more than likely didn’t know he provided her.
She needed to get out. Not with Nina and Hannah on her arms, dragging her around to all the usual places. She needed to get out and find some new friends. Granted, a bar or nightclub probably wasn’t the best place to find these new friends, but she required the liquid encouragement those types of places could provide.
Chapter 4
The kid was getting on his nerves. As if things weren’t bad enough in Vasily’s world. The chair surely permanently molded to his ass was big enough for only a two-year-old, and yet the annoyingly chipper matron from hell, otherwise known as Melanie Burke, assured him he wouldn’t break it.
Somehow, he hadn’t, which was a miracle in his eyes, but he was going to have to learn to play hockey with a chair as an appendage. The chair, as annoying as it was, couldn’t compete with the scruffy-haired kid staring at him.
People staring at him wasn’t unusual. Women did it all the time. Kids tended to too. His size, he assumed, made them look up at him with wide eyes.
The stares from the ankle biters were something he got used to over the years, and the kids generally didn’t bother him. That was why he opted for the Buddy Connection or whatever the stupid name of the charity he’d signed up for was. It beat the hell out of picking up trash and spending five hundred hours in a nursing home. Those seemed to be his options.
Something about the kid, just inside his peripheral vision, unnerved him. Vasily had been showing up dutifully three days a week to try to get through his sentence as quickly as possible. Melanie had said when he came for orientation that eventually they’d pair him up with a kid.
After two weeks, he was still sitting at a table with four kids around him pretending he enjoyed coloring the different animals that greeted him each visit. Today it was a giraffe, which he’d decided to make blue. It drove the kids crazy that he never made things realistic.
“Kid, if you got something to say, spit it out.”
One of the girls at the table laughed. Something about his accent sent the girl into giggles. At least that was what her older brother, sitting next to her, had said when he couldn’t take the laughter without explanation anymore. That had been his second day of misery.
That word didn’t feel right, but he wouldn’t admit to anyone he didn’t mind spending a couple of hours a day around the munchkins. If Judge High-and-mighty got wind of it, she’d take away his choice of community service.
The annoying kid took a deep breath and
stepped forward. Vasily hadn’t really noticed him before, but he seemed a little older than most of the kids. The ones Vasily interacted with all seemed to be around five to eight, not that he was the best judge of age.
The kid cleared his throat. “You’re Vasily Oxentenko, right?”
Cocking his head to the side, Vasily tried to decipher the tone in his voice. For as much trepidation as he’d felt rolling off the kid, his voice seemed clear, matter of fact. He didn’t need to ask to know who Vasily was, and he didn’t sound in awe.
“Most people generally just call me Ox.”
“Or the Crushin’ Russian.”
Vasily bristled at the nickname. It was not one of his favorites.
“What can I do for you kid?”
There was no reason to drag things on. He was sure the kid wanted an autograph or something. That’s what they always wanted. A slip of paper or a t-shirt that they would probably toss in a pile at some point and forget about.
Leaning back in his chair, the action causing a worrisome crack, he studied the kid. There was something about his blue eyes that were vaguely familiar, but Vasily couldn’t put a finger on if he’d ever seen them before. He supposed the kid could’ve come to a game or something and he managed to see him in the crowd. It was unlikely, since kids generally weren’t who he was making eye contact with among the thousands of fans, but it could’ve happened.
“You know Curtis Power, right?”
The fact that the kid didn’t show any fear in asking what should’ve been a kick to Vasily’s ego made the whole tentative crap of standing around for fifteen minutes hemming and hawing stupid. All that indecisiveness just to ask about Curtis? Of course, the kid would want information about the team captain. He was one of the big stars of the team. Vasily had only been around for a few months.
“I think I’ve heard of him. You want me to ask him for an autograph or something?”
Interest in the kid waned, leading Vasily to sit up and move back to his coloring. God, if any of his teammates could see him now. A scoff from the kid brought him out of thinking about that misery.
“You really think I need you to help me get an autograph from Uncle Curtis? I was name dropping, Ox.”
His name could have easily been substituted with the word idiot. The kid had an attitude, which Vasily was inclined to respect, just a little. For his small size, it took some balls to have that much disdain in his voice.
“Your uncle?”
There was no denying the doubt in his voice. Vasily didn’t know the Power’s family, aside from Curtis, Hannah and their kids. He didn’t question that nephews existed, but he highly doubted the kid in front of him was one of them.
It had nothing to do with familial resemblance, Vasily thought as he looked back up to the kid. If Curtis had any connection to the kid, he wouldn’t be in a place for kids looking for good influences in their lives. Curtis was the epitome of a do-gooder, and chances were he came from a long line of the same.
“He insists I call him that. I think it’s annoying, but old habits are hard to break.”
“He insists you call him that?”
The broken record deal wasn’t how Vasily usually communicated, but he couldn’t believe the kid really knew Curtis.
“That repeating thing is annoying. I imagine Uncle Brady hates it.”
The kid walked closer to the table as he spoke, mentioning another of Vasily’s teammates. He tapped one of the smaller children and nodded his head to the side, a clear sign to get lost. The move made Vasily raise an eyebrow as the younger boy grabbed his sheet of paper and left. The newcomer plopped in the chair, slouching so he looked almost as tall as the other kids around the table.
“These chairs suck. How in the world do you come in here and sit a few times a week for hours?”
“Language, Kevin,” Melanie howled from the other side of the room.
The kid hadn’t been overly loud, but somehow she’d heard him. It frightened Vasily a little.
Kevin rolled his eyes and scoffed. “Someone has their hearing aids turned up.”
The remark caused a small smile to tickle the edges of Vasily’s lips. The first day Vasily showed up for his imposed sentence, he’d been given the same admonishment. Melanie was maybe forty, so he doubted she really had a hearing aid, but the comment was funny.
“Is there a reason you’re scaring off little kids to gain an audience?”
“An audience?” the kid said with a snort. “You pretending to be some lofty king or something?”
Vasily shrugged. The way some of the little kids flocked around him when he showed up, he could probably convince them he was some sort of royalty.
“The question remains. What do you want?”
The kid’s head shook. “The question you should be asking is what I can do for you.”
“Let me guess, you’ve got some oceanfront property you want to sell me.”
He sounded like a smarmy salesman, so Vasily went along with it. He didn’t care what the kid thought, there wasn’t anything he could do for him. Kevin considered the comment, his eyes squinting.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I have a proposition for you.”
Vasily waited for him to continue. He started to wonder if the kid was there because he had some mental issues. That was the only explanation he had for their odd interaction.
The kid didn’t continue. He stared at Vasily, evidently expecting something from him. Or maybe he was sizing him up, trying to figure out if the man would be dumb enough to fall for whatever idea the kid had whirling around in his head.
“You going to spit it out? I’m only planning on being around for another hour,” Vasily said, hoping the boredom in his tone either jumped the kid into action or sent him packing.
“Is coloring with five-year-olds really how you want to spend your community service? I know you guys do all sorts of charity work, but five hundred hours of this has to have you pondering banging your head on the table.”
The scornful look the kid gave the crayons and papers on the desk accented his words. Vasily couldn’t stop his brow from raising at the details he gave. Kevin seemed obsessed with the team, calling Curtis and Brady his uncles made that obvious. If he knew the details of the community service, it moved him closer to a stalker label than just obsessed fan.
The skinny kid didn’t seem like much of a threat, but Vasily didn’t like the feeling of dread that washed over him. The kid was trouble, and he didn’t have to open his mouth for Vasily to know that. There was something lurking in his eyes, which had molded into an innocent expression.
“You don’t have to answer that. I know we haven’t met, but I’ve lived most of my life with a guy like you, so I know.”
“I highly doubt you’ve lived your life with a guy like me.”
The conversation was ridiculous. Why was Vasily giving this kid the time of day? He should have ignored him. He should have told him to get lost.
“You think?” His head tilted to the side, causing his shaggy hair to fall over one of his eyes. “I’m pretty sure you know my dad, since you took his place on the team.”
That caught Vasily’s attention. His eyes squinted as he considered the words. The statement would explain a lot and make the kid not quite as delusional as he seemed.
“You’re George’s kid.”
Vasily did not know George Wilson personally, but he knew of him and his reputation. Vasily saw no problem being a ladies’ man. In fact, he recommended it.
If you weren’t already married.
He didn’t pretend to know George’s story, but the evidence that he wasn’t free to play around with women sat across from him. The kid’s attitude made more sense.
“Unlike my dad, my mom is faithful, so sadly, there’s no doubt who my father is.”
The kid acted nonchalant, but Vasily saw the spark of anger in his eyes. The gold flecks in his otherwise blue eyes reminded Vasily of fire for a brief second.
&nb
sp; “So what? You pissed that your dad left because of me?”
That wasn’t how it worked. As far as Vasily knew, neither man asked to be traded. Things like that just happen. Towards trade deadline, teams looked to get ready for the final stretch before playoffs. Neither Vasily’s nor George’s team made it far into the playoffs, so they clearly didn’t help their respective teams that much.
“Yeah, right. My dad was gone from my life long before the trade. I know my mom doesn’t think I know what an idiot he is, but I know. I caught him messing around with my babysitter when I was seven. Him leaving is the best thing that ever happened to my family.”
Vasily was taken aback by the claim, and the honesty in it. The reason the kid was there made a little more sense. Even with his “uncles” in his life, he needed all the help he could get. That did nothing to explain what he was doing talking to Vasily. He wasn’t a role model, especially not the kind this kid needed.
“What exactly are you hoping I can do for you, Kevin?”
Whatever proposition the kid had, Vasily was ready to move on. He wasn’t about to get on the bad side of his new-ish teammates. Since they were done playing for the year, he didn’t see them every day, but he knew without a doubt, they would not appreciate him leading the kid astray, which is the only thing Vasily knew how to do.
Not that he hung out much with kids. He just knew he wasn’t the influence this particular kid needed in his life.
“I’m hoping you can show my mom a good time.” The kid’s voice was low, understandably just above a whisper.
Vasily felt the laugh bubbling up in his chest and tried to keep it in. Of all the things the kid could say, that was not one that crossed his mind. Not in a million years would he have thought he was about to hear a proposition involving the kid’s mom.
“I’m not sure you understand what you just said,” Vasily said.
He’d kept the laugh in, which was damn near a miracle. The kid had said he walked in on his dad and babysitter, but he couldn’t know what he was asking. Kevin was older than the other kids in the room, but at most he could only be thirteen. He couldn’t know what he was asking, Vasily repeated to himself.