As I skate back to the bench, I lift my eyes, letting my gaze travel up fifteen rows to see Brooke clapping and screaming for me.
I sit down on the bench and smile to myself. Tonight has been fucking awesome.* * *—
I exit the showers with a towel wrapped around my waist and make my way over to my locker.
“Bishop.” I hear the gravelly voice of Coach Perron.
Looking over my shoulder at him, I raise my eyebrows in question.
“Give me a minute of your time,” he says, and I feel like that has got to be the weirdest way a coach has ever asked me for a postgame talk. I have no clue whether or not I’m getting a coach or an overprotective father when I walk toward him. I have a feeling, though, that he purposefully waited until I came out of the shower and was wearing nothing but a towel to put me at my most vulnerable.
When I reach the coach, who is standing in a quiet corner of the locker room, I’m surprised when he holds his hand out to me. “You played a hell of a game tonight. You keep that up and you’re going to be one of the league leaders.”
He shakes my hand with a few hard pumps and releases me.
“Thank you, Coach,” I tell him.
Figuring that’s all there is to the conversation, I start to turn back toward the lockers. His voice stops me. “I have to admit it’s nice watching you and Brooke together on the plane and during the team meals.”
I try to keep my shoulders loose and relaxed as I turn back to him fully, taking a step closer so our conversation is not overheard. It’s one thing for my teammates to hear him praising me, but quite another for them to be privy to a personal conversation like this.
“Any thoughts on the engagement?” he asks me in a genial voice.
My entire body locks tight and my stomach cramps into knots. I’m in dangerous fucking territory right now because I don’t know all of the conversations that Brooke has had with her father on the subject.
So I try to be vague. “Well, we haven’t had much of a chance to really talk about it given the fact we had training camp and then hit the road for our first game.”
“What’s to talk about?” Coach Perron says, and there is no mistaking the slightly aggressive tone in his voice. “I don’t even understand why you two are continually discussing this. My understanding is you’ve discussed it. If you want to get married, you buy a fucking ring and you propose to my daughter.”
I’ve got nothing.
Have no clue what the fuck to say to that, because as old-fashioned as it sounds, he’s exactly right. If I were to ever get married, I couldn’t even imagine having discussions about it. The whole point of a proposal is the surprise.
“Is there something you’re not telling me?” Coach growls as he gets in my face. “Are you not in love with my daughter?”
God, it fucking kills me to have to lie to him, but I let it fly anyway. “Of course I am. Your daughter is everything to me.”
Huh.
That lie didn’t hurt as much is I thought it would, because while I am not in love with Brooke and she is not my entire world, I find that I really like her a lot.
Coach’s face relaxes and that causes me to relax…somewhat.
His voice isn’t as aggressive when he asks me, “Am I missing something here, because Brooke told me that you two were engaged when I walked into her office that day. Then she backpedaled a bit. And all of a sudden it’s that you’re both now ‘discussing marriage.’ But anytime I bring it up to either you or her, both of you put me off. And I have to wonder, are you taking advantage of my daughter?”
My eyebrows shoot sky high and my shock over his question must seem genuine, because his face softens slightly. I assure him, “Coach…I would never take advantage of Brooke. Ever. I am not going to hurt your daughter.”
I feel safe making those statements. Because my absolute intention is that when we walk away from this, both of us will do so without regrets.
Coach Perron doesn’t respond to me, but lets his eyes stay on mine for a few moments as if testing whether or not I will crumble before him and admit to all of our phoniness in this relationship. I merely hold his gaze and wait.
Finally, he nods and mutters, “Again…Great game. Want you to do the same tomorrow.”
He’s walking off, but I manage to call out after him, “Will do, Coach.”Chapter 15BishopIt’s almost 1:30 in the morning by the time we get to Brooke’s. After beating San Francisco, we flew out that night to Los Angeles to take on the Demons, which is one of two teams in LA. We won that game 2–1, and after quick showers, took a bus to the airport where we boarded the awesome, kickass team plane back to Phoenix. I was riding so fucking high off back-to-back road wins—as a member of an expansion team—that I was too wired to even sleep on the flight home. Brooke, on the other hand, spent the entire flight with her head lying on my shoulder and snoring softly. I was content with this and listened to music.