Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 103621 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103621 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
What follows is everything good hockey should be. Fast, brutal, unrelenting, beautiful. We trade chances with the Outlaws, both teams flying. The crowd loses its mind with every hit. Parker’s everywhere at once, relentless on the forecheck. Blue plays like a man possessed, reading every rush before it forms, sticking his big frame in the passing lanes. And Nix, cool and surgical, picks off two odd-man rushes that could have ended ugly.
Even Torrance, after a shaky first shift where he whiffs on a clear and nearly coughs up a goal, settles down. By the end of the first, he’s stepping up, pinching at the blue line to keep pucks alive, feeding me slick little passes down low.
When I score off Parker’s incredible feed midway through the first—threading it through two defenders right onto my tape—I swear I can pick out Mimi’s scream from thousands of others. The goal comes at the perfect time. We’d been hemmed in our zone for nearly two minutes, the Outlaws swarming like angry wasps, testing if we’d crack. But we didn’t. Martineau stood on his head, swallowing pucks like a damn black hole. We bent, we scrambled, we threw our bodies in front of pucks like grenades—Jean-Louis sprawled out to block a one-timer that had goal written all over it—and when Blue finally chipped it up the boards, I was already flying. Trusting he’d find me.
He did. He always does.
The second period gets nastier. The Outlaws realize we’re not going to roll over, so they start taking liberties—a slash here, a sneaky cross-check there. Trying to get under our skin. Jean-Louis takes a questionable boarding call that has me screaming at the ref, but we kill it off with Parker selling out to block three shots in a row. He limps back to the bench like a warrior, chest heaving.
“You good?” I ask as he collapses beside me.
“Fuck no,” he gasps, grinning through the pain. “But we’re winning this fucking game.”
And we do. When Parker buries one late in the second—a greasy goal off a scramble in the blue paint—I catch him pointing up at the stands. His family’s all here, split into different sections, but still united in love for their boy.
The third period is pure grind. Protect the lead, weather their push, trust our structure. Nix and Blue are a wall, keeping things simple, hammering clears, punishing every Outlaw who gets within ten feet of Capo. Our goalie is locked in, swallowing rebounds, tracking every puck through screens like he’s got X-ray vision.
It’s organized chaos when their coach pulls the goalie with two minutes left. Sticks clash, bodies crash, the roar of the crowd surges and fades like the tide. But we trust each other. Everybody knows their job. Everybody does it. When I get the puck on my stick with thirty seconds left and a clear lane, there’s no hesitation. I bury the empty-netter from center ice.
We win four to two, a statement victory that says we’re not just happy to be here. We’re here to compete.
We’re here to laissez les bons temps rouler.
After the handshake line—every one of us dripping sweat, half-smiling through exhaustion—and after the three stars ceremony (I’m second, Parker first, Blue third), I shower in record time. Practically jog to the family waiting area, adrenaline still buzzing, the post-win high making everything sharper, brighter.
And then I see them—my girls—and the high gets a little sweeter. Mimi’s the first to spot me and launches herself in my direction like a tiny missile.
“Gee, you were so good!” she squeals as I swoop her up into a hug. “I cheered so loud when you scored, did you hear me?”
“I sure did, chère,” I assure her as she pulls back to smile at me. “Loudest cheer in the whole arena.”
“She did her best to give our section hearing loss,” Elly says with a laugh. “I was so proud of her. And of you! God, that second period when you were dead on your feet but stayed out for that whole shift! That’s what won this game, for real. It was so good, Grammercy. So, so good. Just beautiful hockey and so much fun.”
Her cheeks are flushed from cheering and the joy of a great game, and all I can think is…God, how lucky am I? To have found a woman who loves this sport as much as I do?
“Seriously, you guys could not have delivered a better season open,” she adds in a giddy voice, and then her arms are suddenly around both me and Mimi, and the joy of the night is complete.
She smells like arena popcorn and her sweet magnolia perfume, and all I want to do is keep her here. Right here, by my side, with our happy little girl giggling between us as she hugs us tight.
It feels so right, so precious, so much like family that I’m not really surprised when a voice calls out in a very familiar drawl, “Grammercy Germaine Graves, où tu es, mon garçon? Ça c’est mon bébé! Maman est fière à mourir!”