The Penalty Box (A Vancouver Wolves Hockey Romance Book 3)

SNIPER BARKED ONCE, letting me know Mica was home. My heart pounded fiercely, but then almost came to a stop when he walked in the door. My hands covered my mouth and I couldn’t speak when I saw the shape he was in.

“Mica,” I breathed, my voice breaking.

Two sad blue eyes looked at me, and he walked into the bedroom. I grabbed some single-use ice gel packs from the freezer and followed him. He lay on the bed with one hand over his eyes.

I crawled onto the bed, kneeling beside him. Not sure if he would reject my care, I slowly lifted one big hand and put a gel pack on his knuckles.

He responded by sighing. A deep, heavy sigh fraught with so much pain. I carefully lifted his other hand off his face and put another gel pack on that hand. I didn’t even know where to start with his face.

“Where do you hurt?” I whispered.

He swallowed hard and looked at me. “Everywhere.”

I knew he wasn’t talking about his face. Tears streamed down my face, because that seemed to be my MO these days. I gingerly placed another pack on his swollen cheekbone.

“Please don’t cry.” His voice was hoarse.

“I hate seeing you hurt.”

I lay down beside him on my side, feeling so helpless. Tears leaked out of me. When he rolled over and wrapped me in his arms, I only cried harder.

“I’m sorry.” Those were the only words he spoke.

I WOKE up in the middle of the night. Mica sat on my side of the bed, watching me sleep. I knew something was wrong.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m moving out for a while.”

I thought I’d misheard him at first. It took a few moments to compute what he was telling me. The shock was so big that it numbed me. “Where are you going?”

“A hotel.”

I didn’t move a muscle. “Can we talk, please?”

“I need to sort myself out.”

Ten heartbeats before I finally had the courage to ask, “Are you coming back?”

“I’m going to try.”

There wasn’t much to say after that. I knew at that moment that there was nothing I could say or do to change his mind.

“Will you text me or call me?”

His voice sounded pained. “Can you give me some time?”

I thought about him in a hotel. Was this marriage over? Had this baby killed everything good between us? Would we ever come back from this? I couldn’t even face the idea of this marriage ending.

I asked the question that I wasn’t ready to hear the answer to. “Is this your way of leaving me?”

“You’re still my wife.”

But for how long? I didn’t understand any of this. I didn’t understand his response. He wasn’t just pulling away from me—he was running as fast as he could in the opposite direction. The worst-timed words blurted out of me.

“I love you.”

He rubbed his chest with his fist, like my words had punctured something. “I have to go.”

I waited until I heard the front door close before I burst into tears again.

TWO UNBEARABLE WEEKS passed while I waited for Mica to come home. He didn’t call. He didn’t text. The only time I got a glimpse of him was on TV when he was playing hockey.

Somehow this man had become my everything. And now, with surgical precision, he was separating us. The pain was overwhelming. I was hormonal, in denial and unable to come to terms with the fact that I was pregnant. None of this felt real. I didn’t have the energy to think about how much this baby would alter my life. All I cared about was Mica.

I didn’t understand what was happening with him, but there was more to this than him not wanting to be a father. There were some strong emotions driving him away. Emotions I didn’t understand.

Finally, desperate for answers, I called Yelena.

“What’s wrong?” She instantly heard the pain in my voice.

“Mica left me.”

She made a sound in her throat. “Talk to Yelena. Tell me what is going on.”

“I’m pregnant.”

“Ahhh,” she exhaled. “I understand.”

I needed her to help me understand. “He won’t talk to me. He left and he won’t communicate with me.”

“I was hoping he’d tell you this himself.”

I could hear the begging tone in my voice. “Tell me what?”

“It starts with my story. If you can be patient and listen.”

I was all ears. “Yelena. Tell me everything.”

“When I met Mica’s father, I was a young girl with stars in my eyes, and his wealth dazzled me. I wanted the diamonds and the parties and the exciting lifestyle. And for the first few years, he gave that to me. It was a magical time.”

I listened intently.

“After Mica was born, my husband expected me to slow down. He moved us from Moscow to a local village because he thought it would be a good place to raise a child. We had so many fights. I wanted to party. I didn’t want to stay home with a fussy baby while all my friends were living a lifestyle he now forbade me from joining. Finally, my husband hired Nadia as Mica’s nanny. We hired her to help me, but I used her as an escape so I could jet off with my friends to places like Morocco and Spain.”

She sighed. “Mica grew bigger, and I grew more distant. Soon I became the mother that would swoop into town to take him to the zoo or go to the ocean, but Nadia was there with him for every tear and every step. I knew my marriage was over, but for the sake of Mica, his father and I tried to keep up pretenses. But when I found out that Nadia was pregnant with my husband’s child, it was time to end it. I kicked up a fuss, mainly because of my pride, but I agreed to a divorce. I knew how to throw a party, but she knew how to make a home. And who can compete with that?”

“What happened?” I breathed.

“There was an accident. My husband was out of town, and Mica was out skating. Nadia, still pregnant, slipped and fell on the ice.”

I covered my mouth, trying not to react out loud.

“At first it seemed okay, but then it wasn’t. Mica was alone with her, in the middle of a storm, in the middle of the night, when she started to experience terrible complications. He was with her when both she and the baby died.”

“Oh my God.”

“The cooks found him in the morning. They said there was so much blood it looked like someone had been murdered. And he was sitting on the bed next to her body, holding that dead baby. For two weeks after that, my son didn’t speak. Not one word.”

“Yelena.” Tears streaked down my face as I imagined what Mica had endured.

She continued her story. “Worse, in his grief, my husband blamed Mica. Questioning him again and again about the fall on the ice, asking him why he didn’t go for help immediately. Mica was ten. He was a child. And Nadia was the adult making the decisions that night. My husband’s foolish blame caused irreparable damage to their relationship. Mica refused to speak about the incident and would not let anyone mention her name. He threw himself into hockey, and my husband retreated into his work.”

Her voice sounded so resigned. “They both loved Nadia, and they both mourned her. Their life, their home, their happiness had died with her. They were so sad. No one could touch that sadness. I did the only thing I could do. I moved back home and took my place as wife and mother. But we were all broken. My husband lashed out at me, and I let him. Penance for my sins. And I lashed back, because someone had to pay for all this pain and hurt we now lived in. And Mica? He absorbed all of it into his heart. The damage we did to him I feared was irreversible.”

My voice trembled as I blurted out my own trauma and fear. “He left me. He doesn’t want me or this baby.”

“He’s scared, Charlie. More scared than he’s ever been. Those memories have become his worst nightmare. After that night, he told me he would never get married and he would never become a father. Now he is married and you are pregnant. I understand his fear.”

I did too. “I love him.”

“My son loves you more than life itself.”

“So what do I do?”

“You go and talk to him and you make him come home. And together you conquer this fear of his.”

We sat silently together on the phone for a long time.

Finally, I managed to say, “Thank you for sharing, Yelena.”

“I was a shit mother, but believe it or not, I’d do anything for my son.”

IT TOOK me two days to process everything she had told me. I had to sit with her words and envision what ten-year-old Mica had experienced to understand the extent of his fear. His refusal to marry, his determination never to have a child, all of that made sense in light of what he had endured. Now his reaction to everything made perfect sense. No one who lived through that, would ever want to risk living through that again.

“Are you coming back?”

“I’m going to try.”

He had asked me to take the morning-after pill. To make sure I wasn’t pregnant. I had glibly determined it would probably be okay. He had been trying to prevent his worst nightmare, and I had taken a chance that it might not happen.

What I couldn’t figure out was why we had unprotected sex. I had been the one to suggest a condom, but he had seemed almost indifferent to the risk. We had both made choices that day that had come back to haunt us, and now we were dealing with the fallout.

I didn’t feel pregnant. Other than some nausea and tighter bras, I felt like myself. I had been so distraught over Mica’s reaction that I hadn’t yet come to terms with the fact that I was going to have a baby. None of this seemed real. All I knew was that I wanted my husband back.

GETTING Mica to talk to me was proving more than difficult. Mainly because he wasn’t answering his phone and I had no idea which hotel he was staying in. No one, not even Ryan, knew where he was. I was about to start stalking the arena, but then Zoey had a brilliant idea.

The Valentine’s Day Charity Gala.

Zoey found out through Ryan that Mica had been volunteered to attend. So she bought tickets for me, Ryan and herself to attend. Would he be willing to talk to me? Would I find the right words to make him want to come home? Did he even want to come home, or had he completely walked away from this marriage? Did he really love me? Could we find our way through this?

“You need to look like a knockout,” she advised.

I chose my dress carefully. I picked a sleeveless light purple dress that had a fitted bodice and softly flared into a wide tulle skirt at the hips. Big tulle flowers seemed to float on the skirt.

I didn’t speak when Ryan and Zoey came to pick me up. I was too nervous.

Zoey kept reassuring me. “It’s going to be okay. Mica’s going to take one look at you and everything will be fine.”

I loved her confidence, but I wasn’t sure this plan would make any difference.

IN THE FRONT foyer of the hotel, there was a bar set up where a hundred patrons stood around drinking in their finest. I stood at the doorway and my eyes searched the room.

There he was.

He stood off to the side. He looked so fucking handsome in his tux. It reminded me of that fateful first day when he had changed in front of me.

Then I saw Sabrina. She wore a blood-red fitted dress that should have clashed with her hair, but it only added to her glow. She angrily talked at him. He stood watching her with hooded eyes, no reaction on his face. My stomach did a queasy flop. Were they together? Was I too late? Is that why he hadn’t called me? Was my marriage already over?

“Come on.” Zoey tugged at my hand. “Don’t worry, I’ve got this figured out.”

I felt stupid for being here, chasing a man that didn’t want to be chased.

“Do you think Sabrina is his date?”

Zoey scowled. “No, Mica has way better taste than that.”

“I don’t think he wants to see me.”

She gave me a look over her shoulder. “Just trust me, okay? Let’s get through dinner. I have a plan.”

A familiar voice called me. “Charlie.”

I inwardly winced as I turned to look at Andrew, striding towards me with a huge smile on his face. “Oh hi, Andrew. What are you going here?”

He smiled. “I’m here because of my job.”

We stood there awkwardly for a long moment. I was too distraught over Mica and everything else to have any energy to direct towards Andrew.

He gave me a little smile. “Did I ruin our friendship with my Christmas gift?”

I couldn’t lie to him. He had crossed a line. “That gift made my husband uncomfortable.”

“You can tell him I have a new girlfriend,” he offered.

“That’s great, Andrew.”

“I’d love to introduce you to her one day.”

Where was Mica? I worked not to look around for him. “I’d love to meet her.”

He gave a nonchalant shrug. “She’s not here tonight, but Sandy loves her. We’re still working on Henry.”

I felt like I was going through the motions. “I’m thrilled for you.”

“I need to get to my table. Maybe we can catch up on a walk someday?” His smile broadened. “Maybe with my girlfriend?”

“That’d be nice.”

“Great. Have a great night.”

He turned and walked away from me.

Zoey looked at me. “How are you doing?”

I felt terrified. “I’m freaking out. Do you think he saw me?”

“Not yet.”

“I think this is a mistake. Mica doesn’t want to see me.”

“Don’t worry.” She promised. “We can discuss my plan while we eat.”