Page 147 of Icebound Hearts
“Good luck!” Jake and I say at the same time, and Jake giggles.
Sawyer holds his hand up again and tugs up the sleeve of his jersey. He’s wearing the hair tie I gave him for good luck a while back. I didn’t even know he kept it, but I love that he did and that he’s wearing it now.
He grins at me. “I’ve got all the luck I need.”
“I forgot I gave you that,” I tell him, nodding at the hair tie.
His smiles warms. “Well, I didn’t. I’ve worn it during every single game since you did. I told you. It’s my good luck. And I like having a reminder of you on the ice with me all the time.”
I swallow past the sudden lump in my throat, and he holds my gaze for a moment before the screech of a ref’s whistle tears his attention away from me. The ref waves him off the ice, but before he goes, Sawyer turns back to me and puts his hand on the glass one last time.
“I love you,” he mouths.
“Love you too,” I mouth back and rest my hand on the glass against his.
“Go get ’em, Daddy!” Jake calls, and Sawyer grins at him before he turns and skates away.
I carry Jake back to our seats and get us settled in. He insisted on getting a foam finger on our way into the arena, and I couldn’t tell him no, so I help him get it back on his little hand and can’t help laughing when he starts waving it over his head. It’s almost as big as he is.
It’s not hard to believe the Aces made it to the playoffs this year—they’ve been playing amazingly—but it’s kind of wild that the season is almost over already. It feels like it just started.
But when the lights dim and the announcer starts introducing the team, I scream at the top of my lungs along with Jake. And by the time the Aces shutter their opponents 4-0, I’ve been screaming so much that my voice is hoarse. Sawyer takes a victory lap with the rest of his team, all of them pumping their sticks in the air, and when he spots me, he beams.
Jake and I hurry to the family and friends lounge after the game to meet the guys after they get cleaned up. They strut into the room one-by-one, clearly feeling themselves after such a blowout win. Sawyer approaches Jake and me with a playful grin, then scoops Jake up in his arms and shakes him like a pom-pom until he giggles.
“How about your old man, huh?” he asks Jake over his giggles, and I can’t help laughing along with the kid as Sawyer lowers him and props him on his hip, then reaches to pull me in for a three-way hug. We squeeze Jake tight, and my heart floods with happiness as I rest my head on Sawyer’s sturdy shoulder. When my gaze drifts up, my eyes meet Reese’s. He’s standing across the room watching us, and he smiles and nods approvingly at me.
It took a while, but Reese has come around to Sawyer and I being together, just like I knew he would. Sawyer treats me like a queen, and Reese knows it—especially after he found out Sawyer bought a house on my word alone.
“You ready to get out of here?” Sawyer asks as he pulls away.
“I want to stay!” Jake insists, waving his foam finger.
“I don’t think so, buddy. It’s a school night, and it’s already almost past your bedtime,” Sawyer says, tugging the foam finger off Jake’s hand.
“Do I have to go to school tomorrow?” Jake whines, fixing me with his puppy dog eyes as if he thinks I’m going to overrule his dad while he stretches and reaches for the foam finger that Sawyer is dangling over his head.
“Yes, you do,” I tell him and tap his nose affectionately. He frowns and slumps against Sawyer’s shoulder, looking defeated. “But I’ll pick you up tomorrow and we can do something fun. How does that sound?”
“Yeah!”
“But that’s only if you get to bed on time tonight and behave tomorrow,” Sawyer adds, and Jake nods emphatically.
“I will, I promise!”
“Alright, then let’s get this show on the road,” Sawyer says and gives Jake back his foam finger.
The little boy puts it on in a hurry and the two of them start making the rounds so they can say goodbye to the rest of the team and their families. Everyone knows it’s a school night so none of them give Sawyer a hard time for ducking out early.
Jake hums the Aces theme song and waves his giant finger all the way back to the car and doesn’t stop even when Sawyer gets him buckled up in his booster seat. He closes the door softly and turns to me. “He’s going to pass out back there before we leave the parking lot, watch.”
I chuckle because I don’t doubt him, then climb into the passenger seat. Jake’s still singing in the back, his foam finger flashing in the rearview mirror as he waves it. But his energy wanes as we hit the road, and after about ten minutes, he’s out just like Sawyer said. His head slumps against the window, bobbing with every little bump in the road.
Sawyer smiles at me and reaches for my hand. “Told you,” he whispers and links his fingers with mine, then rests them both on my leg. We drive the rest of the way to our new house on the north side of town quietly, so we don’t wake Jake up, but like he’s got some superhuman sense for it, he jolts awake as soon as we pull in the driveway about twenty minutes later.
Sawyer carries him inside and I follow them to Jake’s room to tell him goodnight, but Jake insists on his dad reading him a bedtime story, so Sawyer gives in. I head back to the living room and sit to wait for Sawyer on the couch, listening to his soft words drift down the hall and admiring the work I’ve done in the house. Sawyer insisted that I decorate it exactly the way I wanted it so it can be our house in every way, so that’s what I’ve done.
It feels likehome. And it’s been years since I’ve been able to say something like that.