by Mignon Mykel
Copyright © 2018 by Mignon Mykel
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a media retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the publisher of this book, excepting of brief quotations for use in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblances to actual persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.
Cover Design and Formatting: oh so novel
All images have been purchased
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Epilogue
Final Words From Mignon
About Mignon Mykel
Prologue
December 23rd
Nine Years Ago
Euphoria.
That’s what this was.
The rush, the adrenaline.
And with a team that took a mid-season risk on me.
Me.
A kid from nowhere-Nebraska.
Sure, on paper, I was a semi-good bet. I played hard. Fought harder. I didn’t have the support at home, with a dad who could give two shits what his sixteen-year-old did in his “spare” time—and by “spare,” I meant the time I hadn’t been working at the local grocery store, to help pay bills…and to support his beer habit.
But I never let the lack of someone in my corner, deter me from being the best player I could be.
Seventeen.
The first year that my life was set to change.
A month after my seventeenth birthday, I was drafted to Canada’s Ontario Hockey League. While the league is considered Junior league hockey for all intents and purposes, the United States calls it semi-professional. By choosing to play in Canada on a Major Juniors team, I was giving up my eligibility to ever play NCAA hockey.
I wasn’t all that upset. I did, however, decide to play in hopes that maybe my dad would appreciate me, cheer for me…shit, maybe even just give a damn about me. Here his kid was, playing top level hockey!
Yeah.
No such luck.
Not even when I was drafted to the NHL the following June.
I wouldn’t be able to tell you the last time I had a conversation with my dad, other than before he signed me off to Canada, but the draft and OHL had been my ticket to a better life. It was in Canada that I met my wife.
The Gagnons, my host family, were close to the Perri family, and even though I was working on playing professionally and Trina Perri was finishing up her final year in high school—secondary school, excuse me—it was easy to fall for the pretty blonde with a slight French accent.
We were married sixteen months after meeting, only four months after her seventeenth birthday.
A few months after that, I finally earned my permanent spot on the Quebec roster.
Life was fucking glorious.
For three seconds, anyway.
I didn’t see a lick of NHL playing time. Sure, a few minutes every few games, but that’s not what a guy looked for when it came time to play in the Show.
Times at home were starting to get stressful. Two young kids, on their own, newly married. Needless to say, the honeymoon period ended fast.
Ended even faster with the realization that we were expecting a baby.
Trina wasn’t working. I wasn’t actually playing. I never thought that I’d have to be a penny-pincher, not if I had an NHL contract, but when you weren’t playing the minutes you wanted, and you didn’t know if you were going to be re-signed, and you didn’t have a non-hockey playing career to fall back on…
You pinched those pennies.
My teammates laughed; my contract and signing bonus had more zeroes behind a single digit than I knew what to do with, but without a degree, without a job to fall back on…
I wanted to be sure I was doing the right thing for my family.
Anderson was born on a sunny day in May, to parents who were hardly more than babies themselves, at all of twenty-one, and a month shy of nineteen.
I was re-signed just two weeks later.
Life seemed good; I had a new three-year contract, a little more per year than the previous years. Enough to keep us more than comfortable if, heaven forbid, something happened, and I couldn’t play.
We hadn’t been expecting the call downs and the call backs and the waivers. So many damn times, this last year and a half. Due to an oversight on the GM in Quebec’s part, I played too many NHL games before being sent back to my OHL team my draft season, and thus, my professional career had begun during my first contract—marking this year as the year waivers kicked in for me. In layman’s terms, waivers meant that any other team could grab you and take over your contract, while you were going between your contracted team’s AHL and NHL teams. If you were a nobody, you were generally safe to return to your team.
If I’d been just any kid, I didn’t think waivers were such a big deal. It sucked, yeah, to be called up and sent down; not knowing if you were playing, or when you were playing, or, shit, where you were playing.
But here I was—newly married, with a new baby, and I had to leave Trina in Quebec while I went wherever the hell the higher ups wanted me to go—which had been St. Paul, Minnesota. This last season, though, we got smart; we rented a condo in St. Paul so we could be together during my lengthy call-downs.
Two weeks ago, though, on my way back up on the ladder of hockey, I got the news.
I was picked up on waivers.
Now, some guys hated those words just as much as the word ‘trade’, but if it meant I was going to start playing, shit, I was all about it—and San Diego held promise. They liked my playing style, and wanted to help mold me into a bigger, better player.
And they wanted my wife, son, and me to “get comfortable.”
Trina and I splurged, finding ourselves a tiny oceanside condo, rather than a rental, just outside San Diego. Cute. Little. A mortgage that wasn’t going to break the bank, and one I could make work if something were to happen to my career.
The last two weeks, even though a whirlwind, made the last years seem like a bad dream.
Every home game this week, Trina and Anderson had been up in the seats, cheering the team on. They watched as I had my first major, consistent ice time—I played no less than nine minutes a game, which was a huge difference from Quebec. I had a couple hits, some note-worthy playmaking times, and even an assist.
They weren’t here tonight though, and I was disappointed that I’d made my first professional goal when they weren’t witness to it. With Christmas just two days away, Trina and Anderson flew back to Quebec a few nights before, and I’d join them in the morning.
…and I was going to bug the shit out of her with YouTube videos, the moment I had my wife in my arms again.
“You fucking did it!” Trevor Winksi yelled, standing up as I skated toward the bench, my gloved fist out as I prepared to g
o down the bench for customary post-goal fist bumps. I found a mentor in team assistant captain Trevor Winski, and it was, no doubt, because of him and his patience, that it was me who just lit that red light.
“Way to fucking go, kid!” he yelled again when I stepped into the bench, a grin stretched across my face. Winski grabbed my padded shoulders and shook me around. “Knew you fucking could.”
I was only six years younger than him, but I didn’t mind being called kid, not when I had a tough-as-shit player being my team BFF. He was buddy-buddy with our captain, Caleb Prescott, and therefore, with the team’s goaltender, Jonny Prescott, too. ‘Prescott’ ran hockey here in San Diego, and I had to admit—being accepted into the personal fold, even if it was through Winski, was a pretty big accomplishment.
I didn’t imagine that being Winski’s friend was going to be the deciding factor on if I was staying here or shipping to Beloit, the farm team for the Enforcers club, but I didn’t think it hurt to be close to those guys.
I laughed, back in the moment, as I pulled my glove off and reached for a water bottle. “It was fucking beautiful, wasn’t it?”
He elbowed me as I brought the pop-top bottle to my mouth, nodding up at the Jumbotron. “I don’t know, kid; you tell me.”
Tilting my head back, I watched the replay, finally focusing in on the fact the arena was still yelling out cheers. Some classic rock song was blaring on the speakers, but my attention was firmly on the Jumbotron.
Hard battle in the corner. I got the puck out, but lost it. Jordan Byrd managed possession, clearing it to the other side of the zone. Bodies moved around the ice; the boards and Plexiglas rattled when players were thrown into it.
Suddenly, the puck landed by my feet.
Quick thinking. That’s what the moment was.
Quick, on your feet, thinking.
I pushed the puck around the back of the net, slipping it in on the other side, just between the goalie’s skate and post…
The play happened in seconds, but remembering it…
It was in slow-motion.
The type of slow-motion that had you excited and waiting for more.
I was going to remember this game for the rest of my fucking life.
***
“Leeds, back with me,” John Mitchem, the team’s equipment manager, said, as he reached for my elbow. We’d just walked off the bench, the team heading to the locker rooms between periods.
Two down, one to go.
“Yeah, sure,” I replied, pulling off my helmet as I lumbered on my skates, behind him. I couldn’t imagine what he needed me for, but I racked my brain anyway.
I didn’t break a stick, and skates were moving fine.
I glanced down at my shoulder; maybe there was a snag or rip that needed to be mended from a hit I took against the boards.
Nothing.
Huh.
John walked me past the locker room, just a bit further down the hall. From here, you could still hear the excited echo of fans up above. The atmosphere was ridiculous.
It was easy to feel a high, when you played with a team with fans like San Diego’s.
“What’s up, John?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder as the last of the guys headed into the locker room. I wasn’t sure why we’d stopped here, and not in the locker room, or, hell, even in the training room. Why in the hall?
“You need to shower and dress.”
My frown was automatic. “What do you mean, I have to shower and dress?” I’d been doing well. Where the hell would the team be sending me, the day before break? Why would I be leaving in the middle of a game? Why—
“There was an accident.”
***
The moment the plane’s wheels touched down at Quebec City Jean Lesage, I turned my phone off airplane mode. I hadn’t stopped bouncing my knee the entire flight; hadn’t slept a damn wink, either. I needed to be in Quebec, and not in San Diego; I needed to be in communication with the Perris.
I wasn’t sure what was worse—being the only person on the team plane, alone with my morbid thoughts and unanswered questions; or if I’d just hopped a commercial flight. At least then, I’d have been surrounded by people.
I could have connected to the WiFi.
I could have called home. Talked to someone.
But I was so fucking helpless, trapped on this plane. I couldn’t do anything from up here in the sky.
Thank God the team plane wouldn’t have to take a fuel stop. I would get to Quebec in the early morning hours.
Still hours too late.
God, Trina and Anderson had to be okay.
Please let them be okay.
The pilot landed the plane softly, and I was itching to get off. I flipped off airplane mode on my phone, knowing that I was going to have to be in contact with someone. Figure out how to get to the hospital.
If the pilot could taxi a little faster…
Finally, we were pulled to gate. The seatbelt lights were hardly off, and I was unbuckled and standing from my seat, antsy to get off this fucking metal bird.
I needed to get off…
I needed—
My phone pinged, announcing messages, now that my data was turned back on. I glanced at the screen, taking in the quick influx of names:
Trina’s parents.
Luc Gagnon, the man who was more a father to me than my own had ever been.
Sam, his son, and therefore, my pseudo-brother.
Molly.
I swallowed hard at seeing Anderson’s nanny’s name on my screen.
Hell, ‘nanny’ was just the term we used for her when it came to my accountant.
Molly was Trina’s friend.
One of her only friends in the states.
Truly only unless you counted the hockey wives and girlfriends she’d gotten to know in the last year.
Trina and Molly met when I was playing in Minnesota, right before Anderson was born. When my wife brought up hiring Molly as a nanny, I was put-off by it. Not because I didn’t like the girl, but because we didn’t need a nanny. Trina was home, and it wasn’t like I was gone all of the time. But, when Molly came out for an informal interview, I realized that it wasn’t so much a nanny that Trina wanted, but a close friend who was around—and that I could support.
I had an entire locker room of guys I could befriend. Trina had no one, knew no one, other than me. She was in a new country with a new husband and a new baby…
The least I could do was let her find a girlfriend.
So, at the laughing expense of my wife, I moved money around in our budget, so I would feel comfortable ‘affording’ her, and contacted our accountant. The next day, Anderson was born.
Molly was as much a part of his life, as Trina and I were.
Because Trina and Molly were damn near connected at the hip, she went up to Quebec with Trina and Anderson for Christmas. I wasn’t sure why she didn’t go home to her own family, but again, it made Trina happy, so I was for it.
Now, though…
My thumb hovered over Molly’s name. She’d tried to get ahold of me the most times, and because of that, I was absolutely terrified of what she was going to say.
All that I’d been told before leaving San Diego, was that Trina and Anderson had been in a car accident, and that I needed to get to Quebec.
Now, I stood, nervous energy coursing through me, as I pleaded in my head for the attendants to open the door. As soon as it was, I was off the plane and rushing through the airport, thankful for my permanent resident card. My messages were the last thing on my mind. I didn’t want to see them.
I didn’t want confirmation of my fears.
I couldn’t…
Fuck. I couldn’t live with myself if I knew something bad had happened to either of them.
They’re fine. They’re fine. They’re fine.
In my hand, my cell began to vibrate with an incoming call. As I rushed through the people, I opened the call, not bothering to look at who it was from.
It could only be from Trina’s parents, the Gagnons, or Molly.
“Mikey.” Molly’s voice came out in a whoosh.
My steps faltered, but I pushed on. “How are they? Tell me they’re okay, Molly. Tell me…” I swallowed hard, looking to my left, my right, then heading down the left hallway. My dress shoes clicked against the polished floors, slipping in some spots.
“I’ve got a car in the pick-up line, right outside,” she said, avoiding my questions.
“Molly.” My blood was roaring through my ears. “Molly, just tell me.” The feeling in my gut was horrible. Something was terribly wrong.
Why wasn’t she telling me anything?
“We have to get to the hospital,” she managed, and I could hear the slightest of cracks in her voice. “Please, just hurry.” Then she hung up on me.
Molly hung up on me.
Growling my frustration, I pocketed my phone in my sport jacket and tried to focus on the anger, the unknowing…
But when I got through the sliding doors and the cold winter air hit my face, when Molly’s face came to view…
I just knew.
“No.” One word. The only word to pass my lips the moment I saw Trina’s only friend. Molly’s normally young, jovial face—the one that made her look more like fifteen than twenty—was ashen, her eyes puffy, her brown hair falling out of a badly placed ponytail. I stopped in my spot, still easily fifteen feet between us. “No. They’re fine. Molly, tell me they’re fine.” I could not be a twenty-two-year-old widow, who lost both his wife and his son. I couldn’t be.
A sob broke from her lips as she lifted a woolen mitten to her mouth, her eyes filling with tears.
“Molly, tell me!”
My feet were glued to the concrete.
I couldn’t move if I tried.
For the second time in twelve hours, my world began to move in slow-motion. The sounds of cars moving and loading, planes taking off, people chatting, a solitaire bell being rung outside the small airport…it all faded out. All I saw, all I could fixate on, was Molly’s face as her shoulders folded in, tears falling from her eyes, and her head…
Shaking no.
Chapter One
Present Day, November 22st