One minute you're at the top of your game, and the next, you receive a hit that knocks your skates out from underneath you.
Still reeling after an unexpected loss, Ryan Nyberg not only finds himself back in his beachside hometown of Neptune Bay, bu...
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As the days passed, I found myself thinking long and hard about returning to hockey when I was alone. Like I'd told Derrick, it was something I wanted—if I could figure out how to balance my responsibilities with Bowen—and I knew if I had some of the logistics figured out, or hell, even a rough idea of how things would work, I'd feel better broaching the topic with my parents.
And after some preliminary calls to teammates and my agent to suss out information, I'd built together some semblance of a path forward. Though I wanted to run it by Sloane first.
On Thursday morning, as I pulled into her father's driveway to pick her up sans Bowen, internally I was psyching myself up to talk to her. Before I even stepped out of the car though, she came bounding down the steps and climbed into the passenger's seat, leaning over to give me a quick kiss.
"In a hurry?" I mused, throwing a wave to her dad, who sat out on his front porch, as I backed out of the driveway.
We were going on a hike. A way to get out of the bustling, tourist-filled small town and exchange it for a bit of forested isolation. And while her energy would definitely come in handy, she hadn't exactly been chock-full of excitement when I'd suggested the date idea.
She rolled her eyes. "No, just happy to see you," she said, before glancing into the back and lifting a brow as her gaze fell back to me. "No Scout today either?"
I reached over to grab her hand and squeezed gently. "Nope. Just us today."
Seemingly satisfied with my response, we lapsed into a comfortable silence, the radio providing background noise and our surroundings giving us a picturesque view as I drove us about ten minutes outside the town line. When I pulled into the gravel lot at the start of the hiking trail I frequented over the years, where only two other vehicles were parked, I turned off the ignition and glanced sideways to see Sloane shake her head in amusement.
"What?" I asked, a mix of wariness and mirth.
"Remember the night I went out to The Watering Hole with my friends and ended up coming over to talk to you at the bar?"
"Yes." I quirked a brow, wondering where this was going. "What about it?"
"Well right before I walked over to you, Jenny had told us she'd gone on a hiking date with a guy and the rest of us ended up laughing at the fact it ended up being a lot more difficult than she'd hoped," she mused. Waving a hand out towards the trail, she continued, "And now a mere month later, here I am, on a hiking date."
I chuckled. "I can promise you we're taking the easy trail," I said, leaning over the center console to kiss her cheek. "But if you get tired, let me know. I'll give you a piggyback the rest of the way."
"You think you can carry me while hiking?"
I flashed her a smug look, noticeably flexing my biceps in the sleeveless shirt I wore. "You think I can't?" I drawled in return.
