Page 11 of The Player's Club

Robert “Bob” Mackenzie was a mega-church leader that boasted tens of thousands of members despite being located in a tiny community. I watched a few YouTube videos of their services, blinking in surprise when they even had people zip-lining down to the stage, like some Vegas act.

Bob Mackenzie had a booming voice and an intimidating presence. As he spoke of thunder and brimstone, I shivered, feeling a bit like I needed to go to church and repent right away.

I discovered that Mac had two sisters and a brother. His mom, Judy Mackenzie, was a homemaker. She was on stage with her husband a lot, her hair blond and perfectly coifed, looking not a day over forty despite being in her midsixties.

I eventually found a copy of a yearbook from Mac’s high school and smiled as I flipped through the digital files. Mac was just as handsome then as he is now but in a sweet, boyish way. His hair was long in a lot of the photos, which I had to imagine his dad probably hadn’t liked.

He was pictured more than once with one girl, including at prom. Dawn Morrison,the caption said.

My curiosity led me down another path, and it didn’t take long to find out where this Dawn Morrison had ended up. She’d moved away from Idaho soon after high school and now lived in Malibu. She owned a pottery studio and was married to a woman now. Interesting.

I noted the pottery studio website, wondering if Dawn would talk to me about Mac.

The morning inched into afternoon, and I forced myself to take a break to eat lunch. But I was quickly back in sleuthing mode, going through old newspaper articles from Mac’s high school days.

I discovered that both of his parents were in photos at his hockey games, but by the time Mac had reached his senior year, his parents had disappeared. Then looking at his college photos and his current photos at various Blades games, his parents were nowhere to be found.

That’s strange, I thought. Sure, Idaho was far from LA, but I had a hard time imagining that his parents just stopped attending his games entirely, never lending their support to his amazing career.

But when I read through Bob’s biography on the church’s website, there was no mention of Mac’s accomplishments. Just that Bob and Judy had three children—

I stilled. Mac had three siblings. So they had four children, right?

I wondered if it was just a typo, but something tingled deep inside my brain. The fact that his parents had seemingly stopped attending his games, acting like their eldest son no longer existed . . .

You don’t know that for sure. The idea was solely based on conjecture. For all I knew, his parents had tried to attend as many of his games as they could, but it was probably expensive to travel that much. And the church website bio could just be a typo. Sometimes my imagination went a little wild.

I returned to Todd’s apartment, feeling strangely energized. I didn’t know if what I’d dug up was enough information to keep Roy happy, but it was something at least. And if Dawn would talk to me, well, that’d be amazing.

I started dinner, mostly because I felt guilty that I’d been ignoring Todd earlier that morning. And because I needed to stop thinking about Mac and his mysterious history.

Todd arrived home with a bouquet and a smile on his face. And I felt happy to see him. He kissed me, turning the kiss into something long and slow, and I let myself enjoy it.

“Sorry about earlier,” I said when we parted, taking the flowers from Todd to put them in a vase. “Did you handle whatever you needed to get done today?”

Todd shrugged. “Mostly. One of my coworkers is on maternity leave—Julie, remember?—and it’s been a clusterfuck since she went offline. I get that she’s on leave, but she can still answer critical emails, right? She’s the only one with the data we need—” Todd kept talking, only needing me to nod and cluck when appropriate. By the time we sat down to eat, it seemed he had purged himself of work and looked more relaxed than he had since I arrived.

When he asked what I’d spent today doing, I explained, “Just researching Cole Mackenzie. You know, the hockey player?” I swallowed the lump in my throat.

“Never heard of him,” Todd said.

I gaped at him. “Seriously? He’s one of the biggest players in the league right now.”

Todd laughed. “Since when do you care about hockey?”

I grumbled, but he had a point. I didn’t care about hockey last week—and neither did Todd. So instead of trying to explain away why anyone would care about a wholesome forward with a hidden dark side, we talked about other things.

Todd kissed me when we went to bed, whispering in my ear, “How about you put on that lingerie I found earlier?”

A panic came over me. Normally, I’d be happy to wear something sexy to bed, especially if Todd wanted me to. But the thought of wearing that lingerie, the same bra and panties Mac had seen me in, devoured with heat in his eyes—I swallowed. “I need to wash them. Besides, they’re all wrinkled up now.”

“Then I’ll just get you naked,” was Todd’s reply. “Even better.”

I let him caress me and kiss me even as I struggled to stay focused on the moment. But when Todd reached for the waistband of my pants, I pushed his hands away.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Um. I forgot. I started my period today,” I lied.