“You’re hot for her,” Kaden said.

“Yeah, so? You’re hot for the mystery woman.”

Kaden scowled, but that shut him up. Steele said nothing. He didn’t throw me under the bus like he could’ve, mentioning I’d been kicked out of Caro’s condo.

“I’m still a brother. I’ll always be a brother, even if I’m no longer single. We’re all buddies, right?”

“Yeah, right,” they mumbled and nodded as one. We held up our beer bottles in a toast to each other.

“Besides,” I added. “We’ve decided to cool it for a while so she can concentrate on her education and I can concentrate on my game.”

All eyes studied me skeptically. They didn’t buy what I was selling. I shrugged. They could take it as the truth or leave it. Didn’t matter to me.

“Is being in love grounds for being kicked out of the Puck Brothers?” Kaden mused.

“We didn’t discuss that point,” Steele said with total seriousness. “I knew we need to write that shit down, like our rules and stuff.”

A collective groan reverberated around the table.

“I’m not losing the bet.” Not yet, anyway. “And I’ll still be a Puck Brother. We’re all brothers on the ice, and we play with a puck. And Kaden is just as guilty of monogamy as I am.”

No one disputed my statement, and I successfully diverted their attention to Kaden.

“So, Kaden…” Cave turned the attention to my roomie, and I sat back to watch the fireworks. “Who is this mystery woman?”

Kaden’s smile faded, and he closed off completely. “No one you fuckheads know.”

“Why the secrecy? You bringing her to Ice’s New Year’s Eve party?”

“I don’t know. I’ll ask her. She doesn’t like parties much.” Something in his eyes indicated he was lying, and one of the guys jumped on it.

“How the hell did you ever meet her then?”

“At a club in Portland.”

“She lives in Portland?” Ziggy asked.

“I don’t know.” Kaden took a long pull on his beer and avoided our astonished gazes. He didn’t know where she lived? His response was mind-boggling.

“What’s up with this woman? Is she in witness protection or something?” Cave asked.

“She’s very private. I don’t ask too many questions, and neither does she. She doesn’t even know I play hockey or my real name. I probably don’t know hers either. This is fun and secretive and sexy. That’s all.”

We exchanged glances with each other and dropped the subject.

~~Caroline~~

The next few days were tense, but finally the kids worked their way out of their funk, and I was no longer public enemy number one.

“When is Easton coming back?” Heath asked me at the dinner table, as he shoveled in enough spaghetti to feed two teenage boys, or so it seemed to me. Mona lay under the dining table at Heath’s feet. She’d figured out pretty fast the kids spilled stuff and slipped her goodies during their meal.

Heath’s question surprised me. Neither of my children had mentioned Easton since the phone call with Fran. I’d broken Fran’s heart with my selfish actions, and I hated myself for it. She’d never been anything but good to me. This holiday had to be hard on them after the death of their son, and I’d spent the day without giving them or their son a thought, while fucking Easton that night.