Hunter’s eyebrows drew together. “Do you think it’s too much too soon?” he asked. I knew it was his old insecurities talking and that it would take time for him to see that we were the real deal.
“I’ve just never felt so much for someone before,” I admitted. “It sometimes feels overwhelming.”
He took my hand and placed it over his heart. “I’ve never felt this way before either.”
“Good, because I want to be with you, Hunter,” I said.
“I’d ask you to move in with me, but I think that may be moving too fast for your dad,” he said, surprising me.
“Hunter, I love my father with all my heart, but I can’t and won’t wait for his approval on everything I do. I’m a grown woman, and I’m able to make my own decisions,” I retorted.
“Does that mean you want to move in with me and Isla?” he asked, looking so hopeful.
“As much as I would love to, I think we should wait. It could complicate things with my internship, and I also need to finish my research with the team. That may take as long as Christmas. But I want to take Taylor up on her offer to rent the spare roomin her apartment. I need to have my own space. As much as I loved the gesture of you picking me up for our date tonight, it was a little much having my entire family there.”
“That makes sense. I can come across the hall and get you off before bed every night,” Hunter said with a wink.
I laughed. Then he kissed me, and in that kiss, I knew we were going to be all right.
CHAPTER 33
Catherine Celia
By mid-September, I had officially moved in with Taylor, unofficially memorized the inside of Hunter’s apartment, and learned that falling in love with a single dad meant my calendar now included school, residency prep, research hours, exhibition games, and very serious ice cream negotiations with a ten-year-old.
My official internship with the Blaze was done. I was still at the arena twice a week for my research project, but the boundaries were cleaner now. Dr. Patel supervised my research. Wren supervised my sanity. Dad stayed out of anything that had my name attached to it, and Hunter and I didn’t hide. At the arena, he was still Captain Russell. I was still Catherine Davis, fourth-year medical student, trying to finalize my residency application without having a nervous breakdown over personal statements, reference letters, and the fact that my entire future apparently needed to fit into a polished little paragraph about why internal medicine mattered to me. But away from the arena, he was Hunter. The man who texted me good luck before early hospital rounds. The man who showed up after exhibition gameswith tired eyes, damp hair, and bruises blooming along his ribs but still wanted to make me dinner. The man who kissed me in his kitchen like he had been waiting all day to breathe.
Tonight, I sat beside Isla in the family section while the Blaze played their third exhibition game. She wore Hunter’s jersey over a long-sleeve shirt and had glitter stickers on both cheeks because her grandma had very little self-control in team stores.
“Do you think Dad can see us?” Isla asked.
“He knows where we are,” I assured her.
I glanced down at the ice, where Hunter was circling near center, black helmet low, stick loose in his gloves. As if he felt me looking, his gaze flicked up.
Isla gasped. “He just looked at us.”
Hunter tapped his stick once against the ice. Isla waved both hands like she was directing an aircraft, which made a stupid smile bloom on my face. His eyes stayed on me for one extra second before he turned back toward the faceoff circle, and my stomach did something deeply embarrassing.
“Catherine,” Isla whispered.
“What?”
“You’re smiling weird.”
“I’m not.”
“You are. It’s your dad smile.”
I looked at her. “My what?”
“The smile you do when you look at my dad,” she noted. Yup. I had it bad for Hunter.
Sloane leaned over from Isla’s other side. “She loves him, honey. It’s a good thing.”
My cheeks must have turned a hot shade of pink. I had known Sloane Russell since I was a kid. It was weird that I was now in a serious relationship with her son and hanging out with her and her granddaughter like she was my own. The game was sloppy in the way preseason hockey always seemed to be. Newguys trying to prove themselves. Veterans trying not to get hurt. Coaches looking calm while radiating stress. In this case, I knew all my dad’s tells. The way he gritted his jaw. He also gave Isla and me a chin tilt and a wink. Hunter played limited minutes, but every time he was on the ice, the whole team seemed to settle around him. That was the part I had not fully understood before. I knew he was good and an important part of the team. But watching him in season mode was different. He wasn’t just Isla’s dad or the man who made me coffee and kissed my shoulder while I studied. He was the center of something bigger. A captain. A leader. The person men looked to.
And after all of that, after the final horn and the press and the showers and whatever pain he would pretend didn’t exist, he still texted me before he left the locker room.