CHAPTER 1
Mia POV
I didn't expect to find anyone in my father's office at eleven o'clock at night. The arena was empty. That was the whole point.
My father had complained about being sick and I was supposed to have dropped his medication hours ago on his table but I'd spent twelve hours in the hospital. Too busy to attend to anyone.
All I wanted to do was drop them, grab my keys that I'd left in his drawer and drive home without talking to anyone.
But the light was on and the man in my father's chair wasn't my father.
He had his feet up on the mahogany desk. A suit jacket draped over the back of the chair, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and my dad's laptop on his lap.
Cole Ryder. Everyone in this city knew that name. Three Stanley Cup rings, two MVP seasons. The kind of player that made crowds stand before he even touched the puck.
And then, eighteen months ago, he was just gone, no farewell game, no press conference. One day he was on the ice and the next, he was my father's assistant coach, walking with a limp nobody dared ask about.
He was the kind of handsome that made you angry at yourself for noticing. I'd spent two years building walls so high that no one could get near me, and this man made them feel thin every single time he walked into a room.
What could he be doing in the office? I took in a breath and shoved the door open.
He raised his head, his steel blue eyes landed on mine and stayed there. Not on my body, not on my lips, but on my eyes like he was deciding something.
The words I had planned to say hung in my throat immediately.
"Office is closed," I forced the words out, crossing my arms. "What are you doing here?"
His brows raised. "What are YOU doing here?"
I rolled my eyes. "I'm the coach's daughter, I have every right to be here."
"That's not the flex you think it is," he mumbled, jaw tightening.
I blinked. "Excuse me?"
"You've been coming in through the side entrance for three weeks," he said, not breaking eye contact with me. "You leave your keys in the third drawer every time, you always forget them. You're not here for your father, you're here because you don't want to go home."
The accuracy of that hit like cold water, I crossed my arms tighter. "You don't know anything about me."
He chuckled. "I know you haven't said a word to your father in two weeks. I know you worked a double shift today because Ramirez called in sick. And I know the medication on that desk has been sitting there since Tuesday."
My mouth went dry. "Have you been watching me?"
Something moved across his face, not quite a smile. "It's a small arena.” He shrugged.
"You need to leave. Now." I stepped closer. My heart pounding in my chest. If Coach Vance, my father, found him in the office then he would find out that I hadn't dropped the medication he had asked me to.
The order was to lock the door after I had dropped it and that was what I was planning to do until I met him.
I wasn't ready for another long tale of how I was.
He didn't move. Instead, his lips curved into a lazy smile. "Or what? You'll tell daddy?"
I felt my jaw tighten. "Or I'll call security."
A lie.
"You mean Gary? The sixty-eight year old who was snoring through the third period last Tuesday?" He swung his legs off the desk and stood.
The room changed. That was the only way to describe it. He didn't move fast or make noise, he just stood up and suddenly there was less air. He was tall in the way that made you aware of your own smallness. Not threatening, just his... present like he took up space on purpose.
He walked around the desk and kept walking towards me until my back hit the wall.
The air left my lungs, I forgot how to breathe and then remembered I wasn't supposed to want to. My back was flat against the wall, nowhere to go. My brain was telling me to shove him, but my body was not listening to my brain.
He planted one hand on either side of my head, his palms flat against the wall, he didn't touch me not once. But I could feel the heat coming off him like standing too close to a fire. He smelled like whiskey and clean soap and something underneath both of those things that I didn't have a name for, something that made my pulse do something embarrassing.
"You're not supposed to be here," my voice cracked. Damn it. "If Coach Vance sees..."
"And you're not supposed to be a spoiled rich kid..." He cut off, tilting his head. "Playing doctor while hiding behind your daddy's name but here we are."
‘Spoiled rich kids,’ I scoffed, trying to push him away but he was stronger. Just felt like I was hitting rocks.
He had no idea, he had no fucking idea about the bruises I used to cover with concealer.
No idea about the restraining order I kept folded in my wallet. No idea that "daddy" hadn't paid my rent in three years and never once asked if I was eating.
"You don't know shit about me," I whispered. "So don't come here and tell me that..."
"Shh," he said, his finger pressed lightly against my lips and I was so surprised by the gentleness of it that I stopped talking. I searched his face for one second, just one, something that looked like real worry moved through his expression. Like whatever was about to happen, he didn't want it to happen to me.
Then I heard it, footsteps echoing in the hallway.
"Why is the light still on?" A voice barked.
Oh no. That was my father.
Cole moved fast. His warm calloused hands found my wrist, surprisingly gentle as he pulled me toward an old media booth
Oh God.
My hands flayed in front of my face, trying to get the cobwebs away from my hair.
The door closed just as my father's shadow passed under the main office door.
Good, I turned to face him in the dark.
‘Wrong move,’ I thought.
There was no space, his chest was against mine, warm through the thin fabric of his shirt. I could feel his ribs expand when he breathed. His chin was above my head. His breath moved through my hair and I stood very, very still, like if I didn't move, none of this would be real.
My hands were flat against his chest, I could feel muscle and bone underneath my palms, and beneath all of that, a heartbeat.
Fast, too fast for someone who was standing perfectly still and pretending to be completely unbothered. His heart was pounding just as hard as mine was, he was just better at hiding it on his face.
I could feel every inhale he took, every exhale. His hand stayed on my lower back, holding me still.
"Don't move," he breathed.
I couldn't if I tried.
Then my father's voice echoed through the wall, “Agreed to the trade. Harrison is pushing hard, but Marcus comes with baggage."
Another voice. The assistant GM. "Baggage we can manage. He scores. That's all anyone cares about."
My blood went cold, Marcus?
Cole's thumb brushed my lower lip. I should have pulled away, any reasonable person would have pulled away.
"You have no idea what you're doing to me," he murmured, his voice barely above a breath.
I looked at his mouth. Then I made the mistake of looking at his eyes. Dark, steady and patient, like he had all the time in the world and nowhere else to be. But my chest ached with something I didn't have a name for.
I almost told him.
Then my father laughed outside loud, the way he only laughed when a deal was closing. "Perfect, finalize it. Marcus is exactly what this team needs."
Marcus.
It was a common name. It could be anyone. It had to be anyone else.
Cole felt my body change before I could stop it. Every muscle pulled tight, my hands curled into fists against his chest.
"Hey." His voice shifted, the softness from a second ago was still there but something else moved underneath it. His hand cupped my jaw. "Look at me."
I couldn't, my ears were ringing.
