When I first moved to Laketown, it seemed weird that the entire town called me Coach, but now, years later, it felt foreign when someone used my real name, Dean. “Hi, Cindy. Thanks for looking after Chloe for the night.”

  “No problem, you and Kira enjoy your anniversary.” Like a lot of the Laketownies, Cindy’s eyes seemed to smile and have pity for me at the same time. No one had dared talk to me about Kira’s affair, but I wasn’t naïve enough to think that the whole town didn’t know about her indiscretion. If it wasn’t for Chloe, I would have kicked Kira to the curb, but we had a history and a daughter. The past year and a half had been rocky, to say the least, but we were both working towards putting her affair with Troy Sneer behind us.

  “Cindy,” I paused before I put the car in reverse. “Kira gave Chloe a phone.”

  “A cell phone?” she furrowed her brow.

  “Yeah.” I nodded my head.

  Cindy looked like she was going to say something, but closed her mouth. I knew exactly what she was going to say, that Chloe was too young and I agreed. “I told her she has to give it to you and she will get it back tomorrow. If she gives you a hard time about it, you let me know, okay?”

  Cindy nodded. “Will do, Coach.” She patted the window frame. “See you tomorrow.”

  “Thanks again.” Cindy was already heading into the house, no doubt to confiscate the offending piece of electronics. I put the car into reverse and caught a glimpse of myself in my rear-view mirror. Even behind my sunglasses, my eyes looked tired. Over the last year, I swear I aged ten.

  As I headed home to celebrate my eighth wedding anniversary, a cloud hung over me. Sure, I had a romantic night planned, I had cooked Kira’s favorite meal, chicken parmigiana, and rose petals sat in a basket next to the bathtub, ready to be scattered, but it just didn’t feel right. And, I was pissed about the phone thing, but bringing it up tonight would definitely ruin our evening.

  Our reconciliation had been bumpy, but I held out hope. Kira had changed. Hell, I guess I had changed too, but every so often I saw the softness in her eyes that had drawn me to her in the beginning. But little things seemed to stop me from letting myself fully trust her again. I wondered if she made those little mewling sounds when Troy touched her. Did she think about him while lying next to me? I wished there was a way to build some desire to touch her. It was our anniversary, I had to find some way to make my cock hard for her. Kira’s sex drive was way stronger than mine, and I steeled myself for the evening ahead. We had only made love, I guess you could call it, once since we agreed to try to work things out. And I don’t think it was that great for either of us.

  I parked the Jeep beside her Camry and shut the engine off. The minutes passed, I couldn’t say how many, just that it had been dusk when I pulled in, and when I finally got out of my car, darkness had set in.

  “Kira?” I stepped into the house, flicked on the light, and was met with silence. I set the gift bag on the kitchen counter and poured a glass of water from the tap. I started to head upstairs to find Kira, who I assumed would be waiting in some black lacy lingerie thing, but something on the glass and chrome kitchen table caught my eye.

  An envelope.

  I picked it up and saw that there were actually two envelopes. One with my name and the other with Chloe’s.

  “Kira?” I shouted and bounded up the stairs. I flicked on the light and the bed was as I’d left it that morning. The corner of the envelope dug into the flesh of my palm, but I felt no urge to open it. I didn’t have to. I knew it.

  Kira was gone.

  I crumpled the unopened Dear John letter into a ball and threw it as hard as I could against the wall, but its wimpy crumpling sound didn’t reflect the rage that was burning inside my chest. I needed loud. Crashing. I picked up our wedding photo and threw it at the wall. The smash of glass and tinkling of shrapnel on the shiny black dresser satisfied the raging animal inside me.

  With the smash of our wedding photo, I felt a weight lifted from my shoulders. But Chloe. That little girl was going to be crushed. I lumbered down to the kitchen and tore open the envelope with Chloe’s name on it. A single slip of lined paper with rough edges that looked like it had been hastily torn from a spiral notebook fluttered onto the table.

  It said: “Check your phone.”

  “Dammit.” I slammed my fist on the table. That’s why Kira gave her the phone.

  Now it made sense. I dialed Kira’s number and she immediately ignored the call. Or her phone was off.

  “Fuck you, Kira. You’re going to make me read that letter, aren’t you?”

  She didn’t have many friends in town, so I assumed she’d gone to live with her family that lived in Idaho – but how could she have gone anywhere without her car? Did this mean that she wanted Chloe to stay with me? Was I keeping the house? Where the hell did she go?

  As the questions swirled through my brain, I dialed her phone one more time. And again, my call went straight to voicemail. I trudged upstairs and begrudgingly uncrumpled the envelope.

  It was worse than I had imagined. The Kira I had once known didn’t exist anymore. The woman that had replaced her was cruel, cold, and a terrible mother. Yes, she was leaving me. I was ready for that. I was also ready for her to try to take everything that I owned. What I wasn’t ready for, was the fact that she was totally abandoning our daughter.

  Three

  Amber

  Six Months Later

  Forty-one degrees. I shivered as I left the house. I’m a southern girl, and the only time I voluntarily expose myself to sub-zero temperatures is when I’m putting them in my mouth – preferably in the form of a daiquiri or a margarita. I rubbed my hands together and ran to the back of the moving truck, stepping on the three-legged stool I had placed on the ground. I grunted as I managed to haul myself inside the truck and clicked on the flashlight. The black garbage bag with my favorite throw pillows was missing and I couldn’t go to bed until I knew that they had made it safely from Florida to Laketown. I stood on my tiptoes and reached my hands into the overhead compartment, patting the cold metal. My breath swirled in the beam of the flashlight as I exhaled from the exertion. Bingo. I whispered as I heard a crinkle and my fingertips brushed the edge of the missing bag.

  Wishing my arms were one inch longer, I strained, reaching with all of my five-foot-seven self, but my fingertips just brushed the end of the bag.

  Exasperated, I blew on my hands and rubbed them together. The easy thing to do would have been to go back into my new house, find something I could stand on that wouldn’t be dangerous, put on a pair of gloves, and retrieve my missing plaid throw cushions. But, I didn’t do that. I bent down and then leaped as high as I could, my frozen hand a talon ready to pluck its victim from the overhead compartment. This time the bag slipped through my fingers, but I had managed to jerk it a little closer.

  “Arrrrgh.” My NBA-worthy vertical leap was enhanced by a guttural screaming and this time, my fingers clutched the bag – ripping it.

  “Dammit.” I wasn’t going to give up. Once again, I prepared to leap.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Oh, my God,” I gasped. Instead of jumping up, I spun to face the open door backing away until my shoulders met the cold metal wall. I strained my eyes to see who was looking in at me.

  “I didn’t mean to frighten you.” A man’s voice came from the darkness. “I’m your neighbor. I saw the truck rocking and then heard some… sounds. I thought there might be an animal trapped in here.”

  I didn’t move. “No. No animal.” It was dark and it was my first day in Laketown. Might as well add ‘get murdered’ to the list of crappy things that had happened to me in the last six months. I stepped forward to grab the flashlight. “I was just trying to reach the last bag up there.” I shone the light to the upper storage area and then into the night air. All I could see was a white logo on a baseball hat flush with the deck of the moving truck.

  “Want a hand?” The voice was low and warm, like honey melting into a pot of Earl Grey tea. He certainly didn’t sound like a murderer.

  “I almost had it.” I gave one more attempt. This time without the weightlifter scream.

  The man chuckled. “Here, let me help you.” He hoisted himself into the truck in one smooth movement, his boots barely making a sound as he landed like a cat. He brushed his gloved hands together and then extended a hand to me. “I’m Dean. I live next door.”

  “Amber.” My hand disappeared into the warmth of his leather glove. Even though the light was dim, I could see that Dean was a good-looking man with a strong jawline covered in a well-kept dark beard. He towered over me. For a second, the rational part of me was pissed at the trusting part of me, for allowing this huge man, who could easily overpower me in seconds, into such close quarters with me.

  Dean easily pulled the bag down without even standing on his toes. “Here you go.” He handed the bag to me.

  “Thanks.” I went to take the bag from him, but he pulled it back from me. “Are you okay?”

  I looked down and realized that my hands were shaking and I couldn’t feel my fingertips.

  He didn’t give me time to answer, he pulled off his gloves and shoved them onto my hands. Then he jumped out of the truck, disappearing into the night. I wondered where he had gone and edged closer to the rear of the truck. My breath hitched as my eyes met his. He set the bag down and his arms were outstretched towards me, the steam from his breath puffing out as he spoke. “Let’s get you and whatever is in this very important garbage bag, inside.”

  My eyes flitted between Dean’s very large hands and the very large drop from the back of the moving truck to the ground. “I have to shut the door.” I reached from the rope that dangled above my head.

  “I’ll get it,” Dean chuckled.

  I wanted to let myself slide into this handsome man’s open arms, but instead, I sat on the edge of the cold metal opening, but the ground seemed impossibly far away. The toppled stool, its legs up in the air, seemed to be mocking me. “I can do it.”

  “Suit yourself.” Dean took two steps back and raised his hands like he was in a stickup.

  I rolled onto my front and my coat slid up my ribcage, exposing my belly to the impossibly cold metal of the truck, and my legs dangled into the abyss. “Can you put the stool there?” I croaked and flailed my feet, hoping that the toes of my shoes would scrape the pavement.

  “I can’t stand here and watch you twist your ankle on that little death trap.” Dean’s voice had a touch of exasperation. Before I knew what was happening, his hands were on the bare skin of my waist and his strong fingers dug into the flesh above my yoga pants as he gently lowered me to the ground. His hands, even though they had been hot on my skin, left goosebumps trailing up my breastbone when he let go. I shivered and pulled my jacket over my exposed skin.

  Dean picked up the garbage bag and gestured to the front door of my house. “What about the door?” I pointed to the open moving truck.

  Dean shrugged. “Nothing to steal in there. And in this neighborhood, people would be more likely to unload your boxes and put them inside, than steal them.”

  “Really?” I glanced back at Dean as I unlocked the front door. I didn’t come from a bad neighborhood, but would never dream of leaving the house, even for a minute, without locking it up. “Your door isn’t locked right now?”

  Dean followed me inside the house and set the bag of pillows between us. “I couldn’t even tell you where the key is.”

  “Wow, I guess this is another world.” I couldn’t decide whether Dean was reckless, or Laketown was truly a picture-perfect small town.

  “Where are you from?” Dean lingered in the open doorway.

  I glanced at the sea of moving boxes in the kitchen. “Florida. Would you like to come in for some tea? I’m pretty sure I can find my kettle somewhere in here.”

  Dean smiled and leaned on the doorframe. “I’ll take you up on that when you get settled. I’d invite you to my place, but it looks a lot like yours. I just moved in too.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and my eyes couldn’t stop drifting down to the tightness across the thighs of his jeans, his thick quads were defined even through the thick denim. All of a sudden, I didn’t want my hot neighbor to leave.

  “Where did you move here from?” I asked.

  He laughed and slipped one hand behind his neck and a hint of redness crept along his jawbone underneath his beard. Was he blushing?

  “Vinelin Lane,” he laughed.

  My brow knitted. “What’s so funny about Vinelin Lane?” I asked.

  “It’s two streets over…”

  His smile could be on a pamphlet for a teeth whitener and before he could answer I blurted out. “Your teeth are perfect.”

  I clamped my hand over my mouth and realized that I was still wearing his gloves. I extracted my hands from their warmth and handed them to him.

  The pink along his jawbone turned crimson. He was definitely blushing. “Ah, these old things?” He tapped at the front of his smile with his fingertip. “They’re fake.”

  “Fake?” I stepped closer to Dean and peered at his smile. “That makes sense. They’re the most perfect teeth I’ve ever seen.”

  Worried that I’d embarrassed the man, a croak escaped when he tried to speak and he cleared his throat. “You’ll see a lot of these chiclets in town.”

  “Chiclets?”

  “Where did you say you were from again?” This time his brow was furrowed.

  “Sunny Florida.” I smiled.

  “That explains it,” he smiled, but this time kept his mouth closed. “This is a hockey town, ma’am. You’d be hard-pressed to find a man here who doesn’t have a fake tooth or two.”

  “Is hockey bad for your teeth?” I knew it was a stupid question, but I had never once seen a game. “And don’t ever call me ma’am again.”

  This time his laugh came from his belly and he rested the hand holding his gloves on his abs. “You’ve never seen a game, have you… Miss.”

  “Better.” I was barely in my thirties, I wasn’t ready for ma’am just yet. “And I’ve never seen a game.”

  “Well, neighbor.” He took the baseball hat off his head. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting underneath it, maybe some thinning hair, a bald patch, a bunch of gray, but the only thing hiding under Dean’s hat were thick chestnut waves. He handed the hat to me. “Consider this your welcome package.”

  Tracing my finger over the logo, a white O with two crossed hockey sticks behind it, I wondered if it was still called a baseball cap if it had a hockey logo on it. “You’re giving this to me?”

  “I guess a plant would be a better housewarming gift, but if you’re going to live in Laketown, you have to go to at least one Otters game. Everyone in town will be there. It will be a great way to meet people and you will get to see what hockey is all about.”

  As a courtesy, I slipped the cap on my head and it settled just over my eyebrows. “Thank you, Dean.” I looked up at him and it slipped further down, covering up my eyes. He nudged the brim with his index finger and the involuntary contraction of my abdomen sent ripples of excitement through my body. “I look forward to seeing you play.”

  Dean’s hands returned to his pockets and his eyes seemed intent on studying the laces on his boots. “I’m not a player. Not anymore.”

  “Oh.” I didn’t know what else to say.

  “I’m the coach.” He stood and straightened his sweater. “I should get going. I have to pick up my daughter from her figure skating lesson.” He stepped out of my house and paused on the front step.

  I held the doorknob tightly and couldn’t believe I had been so stupid. His hands were back in his gloves, so I couldn’t check for a wedding ring.

  I took the hat from my head and tucked my hair behind my ear. The furnace clicked on and I realized that Dean and I had been heating the outdoors as we stood in the open doorway. I shivered and Dean did too. “Thanks for your help.” I gave him a wave with the hat in my hand. “I’ll be sure to check out a game.”

  “Welcome to the neighborhood.” This time he didn’t smile, he threw out his arm in a half-hearted wave and jogged into the darkness of the night.

  With the door shut and deadbolt turned, I rested my back against it and tried to figure out what had just happened. Up until that moment, I had told myself that butterflies weren’t real, that they were something romantic saps made up. Never once had my stomach flipped and clenched like that with Chad.

  I took another deep breath, shook my head, and then rushed upstairs to grab a thick pair of socks. My to-do list was huge. And now I had a NOT TO DO LIST, like fall for my hot, probably married, next-door neighbor.

  Four

  Dean

  The only sounds in McManus Place that morning were the buzz of the fluorescent lights and the gunshot sound of pucks hitting the boards.

  Some people have their church, some people meditate, for me, an empty ice rink is all I need to set my mind straight.

  As the last puck ricocheted off the goal post I turned to see the Otters filing onto the ice surface. Never had I viewed my players as competition. My hockey days were done. I used to see my players as brothers, younger guys who looked up to me to guide their journey to the national league. Now, as I pushed into my late thirties, I realized that some of them saw me, no longer as a brother, but as a father figure. And I was okay with that, or at least I thought I was.

  When one of my players, I hated to even utter his name, slept with my wife, the betrayal changed me. It turned coaching from a passion into a job. If one of the more talented guys made it to the next level, that was great, but if I was being honest to myself, I didn’t care what the guys did when they left McManus Arena.

  Pacey, my assistant coach, was running plays with half the team while the others worked on strength, skating with mini parachutes clipped to the back of their hockey pants.