Boldly by Elise Faber

Chapter Four

Hazel

A weekafter their first session, and Hazel was ready for the knock.

Meaning, she didn’t make him wait for her to answer the door, nor did she stare at him, though he was absolutely beautiful with the light from the hallway shining down on him, caressing the strong lines of his cheekbones, his jaw, his nose, made sexier for the bump that was in the middle of it.

But she was prepared for this session.

She didn’t have a headache.

And she hadn’t had a run-in with Trevor that morning.

Plus, she had a game plan.

Ignoring the sexual attraction she felt for him.

See? It was a good plan. A great one, even. Because she wouldn’t be taking a turn on one of those fucked-up rides in Fucked Land.

She stepped back, smiling at him. “Come in,” she murmured. “It’s good to see you. Are you well?”

There. That was perfect.

Warm with the perfect amount of patient-doctor politeness.

Though she should probably refrain from questions of wellness, based on the way his eyes tightened at her inquiry.

“Fine,” he said, and moved by her, striding to her desk, and dragging her chair over to the couch, so it was centered exactly like last time. Then he sat on the sofa and opened his mouth.

She was prepared for his distracting questions this time.

“Have you started your new position?” she asked before he could jump in.

His gaze went to hers, held for a moment, probably judging to see if she could be distracted again, could be pushed off her plan to talk about him. She wouldn’t be, so Hazel lifted her chin, stared back at him. And waited.

Something flickered in his eyes. He shifted slightly on the couch, and then he spoke in that quiet, easy voice of his. “I just finished the training course Luc wanted me to take.”

Success!

Careful now.

She asked casually, “And was the course helpful to get you over your anxiety of taking the job?”

Brows raising, he leaned back into the cushions.

She elaborated. “Luc shared that you felt like you were under-qualified for the role.”

“I am.”

Said baldly.

“Why do you think that?”

Did this have to do with his injury?

A shrug. “I don’t have any coaching experience. I would think to coach players, I would need to have a baseline amount of it, especially since we’re talking about coaching in the NHL.”

He had a point there, and there didn’t seem to be any self-pity. Just resolution and reality, and she got the notion that this man was markedly well adjusted after what had happened to him.

Though she supposed he’d had time to come to terms with that.

But…did anyone ever really come to terms with such a thing?

She wasn’t sure.

Oliver had experienced a violent attack, premeditated and completely outside the bounds of play. Mark Shelby had gotten himself banned from the league for it, was currently fighting criminal assault charges.

Because the hit that had so severely broken Oliver’s leg had been egregious.

After the buzzer.

After the game-winning goal had been scored.

Mark Shelby had ended Oliver’s career and didn’t even seem to be sorry for it. Oh, he’d done the media apology—“I’m sorry he got hurt,” and “I’m sorry it turned out that way for him”—but never once did he take accountability for his actions.

He didn’t reach out, at least not according to Luc.

He didn’t apologize to Oliver directly, again coming from Luc.

And all the while, Oliver had been focused on his recovery, on healing, and he’d been a rock, apparently. Hell, she’d seen that firsthand when she’d nearly passed out in his hospital room and had run away. He hadn’t held it against her the next time she’d seen him (i.e., last week). In fact, he’d been polite, kind, then had fixed her computer from making that god-awful whirring noise.

Even.

Accepting.

No rage. No anger. No self-pity.

Again, those revelations had come from Luc, and she trusted the GM. Luc had spent a lot of time with Oliver.

So, if he said that she needed to talk to him, felt it was important enough to require it as part of his contract, then Hazel was going to do her part to help him slay any demons that might be floating around his mind.

Even if that meant starting with his lack of coaching experience.

Especially, if it meant starting with his lack of coaching experience.

Because it was something personal, somewhere he didn’t feel like he was measuring up, and it might be a start to get to the other things, the turmoil she’d just barely gotten a glimpse at the week before.

“While you don’t have any coaching experience, you have a lot of player experience, and I would think that those in the development program would benefit from a player’s perspective, especially if you bolster your experience by learning different methods of coaching—” She paused, lifted a brow. “I’m assuming that was the purpose of the course you mentioned earlier.”

A nod.

“So, the barrier, or at least part of it, has been removed. Do you feel better about taking the job?”

He was quiet for a long time. “I think I can be helpful to the team.”

That was it.

“Are you excited about finding a new role?”

Those blue eyes held hers, and she couldn’t get a read on a single emotion. Just…placid.

It was unnerving. Unnatural.

Then he softened. “I’m happy to be of use. I don’t know what my life would be like if I didn’t have hockey.”

Hmm.

But also, he’d worked his whole life to make it to the NHL. He was twenty-nine. He should have had years ahead of him in the league. So, it wasn’t exactly a surprise that he’d feel lost without it.

“What about your family?”

Luc hadn’t mentioned them.

“Dead.”

She blinked.

The word wasn’t clipped out. But it did have a tinge of cold on the edges. “How did they die?”

He shrugged. “Overdose. I went into the system. Eventually got a foster family that adopted me. They’re gone, too.”

Staccato.

Short.

Bare facts recited.

She weighed for a moment how to proceed. “How old were you?”

“A baby when my bio parents died. Ten when I got to that foster family. Twelve adopted. Nineteen when they passed in a car accident.”

Sympathy welled in her, but she didn’t let it show.

That wasn’t what Oliver needed in this moment.

“Did they support you playing?”

He nodded, seeming to relax when she brought up hockey. “My dad was the one who dragged me onto the ice that first time. I was lucky. I started late but had natural ability and people who supported me. There was no way that I should have made it as far as I did, but…things aligned. I loved it. Lived, breathed it.”

And now, it was gone.

She also didn’t miss that he’d referred to his adopted father as his dad. That certainly was understandable, but it was also another trauma.

“Did you play in the minors?”

A nod. “Just over a season. I was one of the lucky ones. Made my way to the league quickly and luckier still to stay here.” He shifted his gaze away from her. “So, why that painting?”

Deflection.

But he’d given her something, so deflection was something she was going to give him. At least for a few minutes.

“My parents bought it for me. They have a winter house in Florida now. On the beach, and I love to go down there when it’s ridiculously cold here and watch the waves.” She smiled when he looked back at her. “I literally just sit on the sand and stare at the waves.” A shrug. “There’s something about them rolling in, slow and steady and unchanging, that I love. It’s my happy place and part of why I like living near the ocean. Though I wouldn’t say I’m tempted to put my feet in the water, at least not here.”

“Too cold?”

“Florida’s water is too cold for me.” His lips tipped up and hers followed suit. “I’m more of a bathtub and hot tub kind of girl.”

“Or just a tub kind of girl,” he joked.

Her brows drew together, honestly thinking. “Are there other types of tubs?”

He paused, seemed to be considering that. “I can’t think of any…oh, organizing tubs! That’s a thing, right?”

Laughter danced on her tongue, but she swallowed it down. “It’s a thing,” she agreed then swept a hand around her office. The furniture shoved against the walls, her messy desk, the papers and books stacked on every flat surface. “Though, I can’t say that I’ve had cause to use them.”

Humor.

In the lines of his face. In his eyes.

She liked that a hell of a lot better than the deflection, the staccato from before.

“So, waves,” he prompted.

Hazel nodded. “Ocean waves, though I’ll take them on the lake, too, or even a river sliding over rocks.” She paused, turned the conversation back to him. “What’s something you enjoy?”

That seemed to halt him in his tracks.

He went stiff. His jaw clenched.

She waited for implosion—well, if she were being honest, she braced for an explosion. Because that glimpse of emotion roiling beneath the surface was no longer hidden below it.

That turmoil was there. In the open.

And—

He shot to his feet.

She stayed still.

He paced to the punching bag, lifted a fist, and…rested it against the black leather. Then his forehead.

“I used to love the feel of the air in the rink.”

“And now?” she breathed, not daring to give any strength to the question.

“Now it’s torture.” A long pause, his shoulders rising and falling. Slowly. Measured. “Now it’s still the best fucking feeling in the world, even though I can’t get back out on the ice—or at least not in the same way as before.” Still inhaling and exhaling slowly, purposefully.

Then he turned to face her. “Why is your fiancé an ex-fiancé? I remember seeing him with you last year at one of the games. He was majorly in love with you.”

Hazel didn’t think he meant that as a blow.

But it felt like one.

So, she didn’t answer.

Oliver walked back to her, settling himself on the couch, and she tried to turn the subject back to him. “How else are you going to prepare yourself so that you’re ready to get on the ice as a coach?”

Silence.

“Do you mean logistically or emotionally?”

“Which have you considered?”

A twist of his lips. “Both.”

“Do you want to tell me about them?”

“Do you want to tell me about your ex-fiancé?”

She clicked the pen she held, not that she’d brought it to the notepad. She’d been too riveted by Oliver to jot anything down, too swept up in the web of him—male, confident, sexy, conflicted, just shy of tortured. Kryptonite. “I don’t want to tell you about him, namely because this is about you, but also because he’s an ex for a reason.”

“Ah. He broke up with you.”

Irritation welled in her veins. “No, actually. I dumped him.”

“Hmm.”

A sigh filled her lungs, but she forced herself to release it slowly, incrementally, letting it wash away her anger. Did she want to battle him on this? No. Did withholding this piece of information make any bit of difference considering she’d already told Lexi about the piece of shit her ex had been (though not nearly as shitty as Lexi’s ex had been) and it was probably common knowledge amongst the Breakers’ front office and support staff, which meant that it wouldn’t take any bit of effort for Oliver to find out, if he really wanted to? Also, no.

Did some part of her want to tell him because, despite the deflection and semi-placidness, he seemed nice?

Okay, maybe yes.

And that maybe yes was why she found herself telling Oliver everything, when normally she would never talk about her personal life with a client.

But Oliver wasn’t a normal client.

Of course, he wasn’t.

She wanted him.

He was there as a requirement of his contract.

She’d already blurred the lines between them more than a half dozen times, and they’d had one session together.

So, this wasn’t going to be traditional. This wasn’t going to be her helping a player get some mental clarity because he wasn’t producing as he thought he should. This was building some connection that would help him release that tension he continued to try to bury.

This was her helping him.

And if she had to bare her soul to do it, expose her weaknesses to the light…then she would.

Because Oliver was worth it.