Page 16 of Offside for Christmas
"Shit," he muttered to his reflection.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out. Unknown number.
MAC:This is MacKenzie, Eagles captain. Coach gave me your number. Heard you survived PT without quitting. Team drinks tonight, O'Brien's at 7. Mandatory.
Cole stared at the message. He didn't know this guy. Didn't know any of these people. And the last thing he wanted was to spend his evening in some small-town bar pretending to care about a team in a city he'd never wanted to come to in the first place.
He typed:Not interested.
Then deleted it.
Typed:I'll think about it.
Deleted that too.
He left it on read, shoved his phone back in his pocket, and drove home. Back to his empty rental. A place that felt too small, too quiet, too far from everything.
But ten hours later, at 6:58 PM, Cole found himself walking through the door of O'Brien's Pub, telling himself it was just because he needed a beer and definitely not because some small, traitorous part of him wanted to come.
A broad-shouldered guy with dark hair spotted him immediately and stood, breaking into a grin.
"You must be Hansen." He crossed the space in three strides, hand extended. "Mac. Captain of this circus." His handshake was genuine. "Ellie said you made it through your first session. That's saying something—she doesn't go easy on anyone."
"Yeah, I noticed," Cole muttered.
"She's the best." Mac clapped him on the shoulder and steered him toward a table crowded with guys in Eagles gear. "Come on, I'll introduce you. Fair warning—this crew talks too much and drinks too little." He raised his voice. "Boys, this isCole Hansen. New forward. Be nice or Coach will make you run suicides."
The greeting was warm, easy. The kind of small-town hospitality Cole had been dreading.
This was going be a long six weeks in Evergreen Cove.
4
ELLIE
Ellie checked her watch for the fourth time in six minutes: 8:05 AM.
Cole Hansen was late.
She sat at her desk in the training room, tablet open to his PT plan, equipment already set out and organized by exercise sequence. Everything was ready. Everything except her patient.
The coffee she'd made at 6:30 AM had gone cold. The motivational playlist she'd queued up—carefully selected to be energizing but not annoying—played to an empty room. Even the fresh Christmas cookies her mother had dropped off yesterday sat untouched in their festive tin, filling the air with the smell of gingerbread and disappointment.
8:10 AM.
Ellie's jaw tightened.
She pulled out her phone and typed a professional text:Good morning. Your PT session started 10 minutes ago. Please confirm you're on your way.
She hit send, set down her phone, and waited.
One minute. Two minutes. Three.
No response.
8:15 AM.
The annoyed simmer in her chest started boiling toward actual anger. Ellie didn't get angry. Angry wasn't professional. Angry meant losing control, and she'd built her entire career on being the calm, competent one who never lost her cool.
