Icing the Puck (New York Empires Book 2) (32 page)

The last thing they needed was another major injury.

“I’m fine,” he assured them again. He really was.

An hour and what felt like a thousand questions later he left the practice rink.

“Care to explain what happened on the ice today?” Kyle asked, wearing one of his signature shirts. Today’s said, “Keep a dentist in business. Play hockey.”

Fuck a duck. He should have known they wouldn’t leave without demanding answers.

Kyle and Alexei were leaning against the doors to the rink, just out of sight. Their bags at their feet, they crossed their sticks preventing Reiner from leaving. He would have done the same if it had been either of them being knocked out, even if it was only for a second. But there was no way in hell he was going to tell them what had happened while he was out.

“Not really, no.”

He still wasn’t sure what had happened, and he wasn’t about to dwell on it either. Not when he had a gorgeous woman coming over in a couple of hours for dinner.

“How about what happened after we left the party last night?”

“Not that either.”

“He’s hiding something.”

Ignoring his friends, he pushed through their sticks and makeshift blockade, and made his way to the subway station. The only downside to living in Brooklyn was the long commute to the practice facilities on the other side of New York City. Which he normally didn’t mind.

Today, however, was one of those days he wished he lived closer.

“You know you want to tell us.” Kyle cajoled.

“
Nie
,” he said, reverting to his native tongue.

Kyle and Alexei pestered him until they reached their stops, and then he had the subway to himself.

There was something about Emma that had him not wanting to share her with even his best friends. It wasn’t just that; he never invited women to his place. It was his sanctuary, the one place in the world where no one expected him to be a hockey superstar or aware of what was going on around him.

The only women who’d been inside of it were either related to him or his housekeeper, who came in once a month to do a major cleaning of his apartment.

But he wanted Emma in his space.

More so after that dream, whatever it was after his head hit the ice. More than the fact that Emma had been pregnant and there were rings on their fingers, what struck him most, had him anxious to see her again, was he could feel like love he had for her pulsing in his veins. Love? Shaking his head, he realized that he did love Emma. So much. He really wanted that dream to come true.

It scared him how much he wanted that…he was going to go with dream. Yesterday he’d been happy in his life; with the choices he’d made; today he wanted more.

No, he wanted Emma.

Now he just needed to figure out how to get and keep her. Dinner tonight was a great place to start. Maybe she’d go with him to the Family Skate coming up for the team.

He left the subway and pulled out his phone. First order of business was making something besides steak or fish and veggies. Which meant he needed to talk to someone who knew Emma.

His finger hovered over his mom and his sister’s contact icons. If he called his mom and asked her what Emma’s favorite food was, she’d ask a million questions about why he wanted to know. On the other hand, Astrid would only ask a thousand. But Astrid would ask if was planning on sleeping with her, whereas his mom wouldn’t, and he could play it off that he’d reconnected with her a charity event and was treating her to a thank you for a great event dinner.

Mom it was.

He calculated the time difference, it was coming up on nine in Setså his mom was still up. He pressed her icon and waited. He didn’t have to wait long.

“Reiner, this is a nice surprise.”

He couldn’t help but smile at her greeting. She said it every time he called. Considering he called her at least once a week, and she had caller ID, it cracked him up.

“
Hei, mor
. Do you have a minute?”

“For you my son, I have more than one.”

The only downside to being in the NHL was the fact his parents lived in another country. He’d offered to move them to the U.S. after Astrid had graduated from college, but they’d said no. Norway was their home, and while it pained them that their children had left it, they took comfort in the fact that both he and Astrid went home every chance they got. There would always be room for them in his parents’ home.

“What’s Emma’s favorite food?”

There was a pause and he wondered if he’d dropped the call. “
Mor
?”

“Do you mean Astrid’s Emma?”

“
Ja
. Astrid’s Emma. I ran into her last night at a charity event she was putting on. I gave her a ride home, and I want to make her something as a thank you for an amazing day and night.”

“Chocolate, and ice cream. Oh she loves your
bestemor’s pinnekjøtt
.”

He defied anyone to not love his grandma’s
pinnekjøtt
. “I don’t have time to make
pinnekjøtt
.” But he could do something similar. He had time for that. “Thanks,
mor
. I know what I’m going to do.”

“Good. Now catch me up on everything else. We caught the game the other night. Is Dobrynin OK?”

That was one of the many things he loved about his parents. They might choose to remain in Norway, but they knew each one of this teammates and their families, and cared about them. He got her up to date, and she regaled him with the goings on from the neighborhood and his family back home.

By the time he hung up with her, he was at his favorite neighborhood market. In the three years he’d lived in the neighborhood, he’d never not found what he was looking for there. Moving through the market, he picked up the items he needed, plus a few he didn’t typically buy. This would go well; it had to. Tonight mattered.

He was putting the finishing touches on dinner when a buzzer sounded. He hit the open button and forced himself to wait for her to knock instead of waiting for her in the hallway. Opening the door at her first knock, he was floored once again by his reaction to Emma. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

“Come in,” he stepped back so she could enter.

“Something smells good.”

He took her coat and hung it up. “Thanks. I made lamb chops with grilled vegetables.”

“Yum. I love lamb. Though no one makes it as well as your grandma.”

“Hopefully you’ll like mine as much as hers. But first, this.”

Pulling her into his arms, he tipped her head back, and kissed her. Fuck, he loved her mouth. He could spend hours kissing her.

Reiner pulled the lamb from the oven and plated it along with the vegetables and directed her to the side of the counter where he’d put out placemats.

“I’m sure I’ll love it.”

“What do you want to drink? I have beer, wine, water.”

“Water is perfect.”

Grabbing a couple of bottles of water from the fridge, he joined her at the counter. They ate in silence, but it wasn’t awkward, it felt…natural.

“How was your day?” he asked as they were cleaning up.

“Good, I was able to get caught up on all the paperwork I’d pushed aside while I was working on the event for last night. It went over well, and I had a good time, but I’m glad it’s over. Thanks again for what you did for Kenny. His mom called and told me he hasn’t stopped talking about you.”

“He’s a great kid.”

“Yeah, he is. The first time I met him he told me, just because his body doesn’t work doesn’t mean his mind is broken.”

Reiner laughed, “He said the same thing to me. What’s his family’s situation?”

He couldn’t imagine it was cheap to have a kid with the amount of medical issues that Kenny had.

“It could be better. Most families who have severe needs kids are on a lot of assistance.”

Reiner considered himself one of the lucky ones when it came to contracts and had already made more money between his contract with the Empires and his endorsement deals that his great-grandchildren wouldn’t have to worry, unless someone mismanaged his money. He could more than afford to help a family like Kenny’s.

“Can you get me a list of what their immediate needs are?”

Emma paused, her water bottle halfway to her mouth. “Excuse me?”

“I want to help them. So can you get me the information?”

“Um, yeah. I think so.”

“Good.”

“You’re a good man, Reiner Jahr.”

They finished eating, and Emma helped him clean up, and then they were settled in his living room on the couch.

“How was your day?” she asked.

He’d never shared his day with a woman not his mom or sister, but the compulsion to share what had happened to him at the rink was overwhelming.

When he was done talking, she was staring at him like he had three heads. She was probably freaked out about his vision. “What?”

“You didn’t get hurt? At all? Like not even a headache?”

“Nope.”

“That’s like freaky crazy. Have you ever had that happen before?”

“All the time. I’ve never so much as gotten a scratch.”

He waited for her to freak out about his dream, vision, whatever the fuck it was.

“Must be nice. I’m a grade-A klutz, as you well know.”

Fucking A, he was going to have to bring it up. “What about my dream-slash-vision?”

“What about it? Have you talked to your parents about it? Or your grandma. I’m convinced that woman knows everything.”

“No, why would I?”

“You might not be the only one in your family who has this.”

He was floored. She wasn’t freaked out about this at all. “Why aren’t you?”

“Freaked out?”

“Yeah.” He was.

“I don’t know. I guess I’ve always wondered, hoped, that the stories about people who had these things happen to them were real.”

She didn’t really believe that did she? From the look on her face she did. He said, “So you think I…”

“Should talk to your parents. Or your grandma. Go call them now. If you’re like Astrid, you won’t be able to relax till you know what’s going on.”

He really didn’t want to go call his parents or his grandma, but Emma was right. He wouldn’t be able to relax and enjoy Emma unless he knew what was going on. It irked him more than a little that it hadn’t occurred to him to ask his mom when he’d had her on the phone earlier too.

He left her to go to the bedroom and called his parents. When they didn’t pick up any of their phones, he called his grandma.

“My, Reiner, what has you so upset?” she said instead of a greeting.

Emma was right, she did know everything. For the first time in his life, he wondered how she always knew what everyone was feeling, and if maybe what was happening to him came from the same place.

“How do you always know?”

She was quiet for so long he didn’t think she’d answer when she finally spoke.

“Why do you want to know?”

He told her about what had happened at practice, leaving nothing out.

“Did he contact you?”

More confused than ever he asked, “Did who contact me?”

“Your birth father. He swore an oath to never contact you unless you asked him to.”

“My what?” he forced out.

His dad wasn’t his dad? No, he wouldn’t believe it. There was no way his mom would have cheated on him.

“Oh, dear.” His grandma sighed. “Listen to me, Reiner, you need to contact your parents now. It isn’t what you might be thinking.”

Yeah, because thinking your mom had had an affair and you were a product of it wasn’t what he was thinking.

“Grandma, I need to go.” He didn’t give her a chance to respond before he hung up and walked back out to the living room where Emma was waiting for him.

“Did you find out anything?”

“Yes and no.”

Before he could say anything else. his phone rang. Glancing at it, he saw his mom’s name. He ignored it.

“I know we were supposed to have…” At this point he didn’t know what they were supposed to have, all he knew was that he needed to be alone. To deal with everything that had happened, was happening.

He felt like a complete ass kicking her out, especially when a quick look outside showed the snow storm they’d been predicting all day had started.

His phone started ringing again.

Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck.

This wasn’t how tonight was supposed to have gone.

“I think you need to leave.”

Emma slammed the cab door closed and pulled out her phone. Opening her favorite contacts, she tapped Astrid’s number.
Come on, pick up
, she chanted to herself.

Astrid didn’t pick up.

Emma called again. On the fifth ring, just when she was sure it was going to roll over to voice mail again, Astrid’s voice came on the line.

“Do you have any fucking clue what time it is here?”

“Yeah, yeah, middle of the night, sorry and all that, but this is important.” She took a breath. “I think I fucked something up with Reiner,” she told her.

There was a pause and shuffling on the other end, Emma forced herself to breathe while she waited for Astrid to say something. Patience was never her strong suit.

“
Say something
.”

“First, what where you doing with Reiner, and are we talking about my Reiner?”

“Yes, we’re talking about your brother, and we hooked up last night at the event you were supposed to come to.”

“Define ‘hooked up’ for me?”

Emma slunk down in the seat, her head resting against the back of cab. She’d been hoping by the time she told Astrid about her and Reiner, it would be in the form of asking her to be maid of honor. Not telling her she’d just had a one-nighter with him, and well, screwed up any chance of anything ever happening long-term.

“He came to the charity event I put on last night, we connected, or reconnected, however you want to put it, he hit on me, I hit back, and then he came home with me.”

“Yes!”

She pulled the phone away from her ear, staring at her phone screen, wishing they’d been on video chat. She would have loved to see Astrid’s face. Instead, she waited for Astrid to calm down.

“Don’t celebrate too soon. I messed up already, and he told me he needed to be alone.”