Total pages in book: 122
Estimated words: 114951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 575(@200wpm)___ 460(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 575(@200wpm)___ 460(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
It ground on me like pumice stone.
I wanted to apologize. I wanted to have the chance to explain. But then I’d ask myself… explain what? Was I actually sorry for asking about her happiness?
No.
But I was sorry for upsetting her.
I was sorry for how I’d left her.
I was sorry I’d stayed away.
I was a sorry piece of shit, basically, but she didn’t want to hear it. And I couldn’t blame her.
So, like I always did, I threw myself into hockey.
It was easy to do. The season was fully underway, my schedule packed with travel and practices and games. Currently, I was at the arena well after hours, which wasn’t anything new. When everyone else had gone home — players, trainers, PR, even the janitorial staff — I stayed, eyes glued to the monitor in my office as I reviewed video from our last game.
Tonight, it was Ben Sandin who had my attention.
Daddy P’s hip had been acting up again — just enough to pull him from the last couple of games, which didn’t sit right with me. I knew the hip was tender, but not tender enough for this. He was doing the PT, staying on his regimen, taking what the docs gave him… and still gritting through pain he couldn’t explain.
And so, Sandin had become less of a backup and more of a routine player for us.
I watched him guard the net on the screen, replaying the moment he missed a block I’d seen him stop a thousand times — in practices, in scrimmages, in the AHL, even here in The Show. It was muscle memory for him. A layup. A routine save.
But he didn’t make it.
I slowed the playback, rewinding and pausing as the puck flew in. I watched his eyes track it, watched him drop into the crease and slide his leg out perfectly.
And still… he missed. He didn’t slide wide enough, the puck slipping past the blade of his skate and right into the net.
The Detroit team swarmed in celebration. Sandin hung his head, grabbed his water bottle off the net, and took a long drink before resetting.
I searched for any sign of something — pain, hesitation in his push-off, a misread.
I found nothing.
I sighed, leaning back as the video kept rolling, though I wasn’t watching anymore. I didn’t know what the hell I expected to find.
He’d missed a block.
So what?
Daddy P had plenty of goals scored on him and I never poured over tape like this. Sometimes a puck goes in, even one that should’ve been stopped.
But I couldn’t shake the suspicion clawing at me. And it wasn’t just Sandin.
There was the rookie Nathan rostered when he put Wood on waivers — Ivan Baranov. Annoyingly, the kid was playing like a damn all-star. And that shouldn’t have annoyed me; I was his coach. But it did. Because Nathan had handpicked him, and now that he was performing, Nathan looked like some all-seeing genius with prophetic hockey intuition. Everyone trusted him implicitly.
Baranov was quickly becoming someone we could rely on to score. Twice now he’d earned star of the game.
But he’d also fucked up when it mattered most.
When I finally pulled Carter Fabri after he’d been stuck on the ice for nearly four exhausting minutes against Toronto, thanks to penalty kill chaos that wouldn’t let him change, I sent Baranov over the boards. Within twenty seconds, he lost the puck in our own zone, coughing it up right inside the blue line.
Toronto jumped on it instantly. And Sandin failed again.
We’d gone from up by three to tied with a team we should have walked all over, and then lost in a shootout after a scoreless overtime.
Was it a shit-luck game? Yeah. Did it happen? Of course.
But my something-is-off radar wouldn’t shut up.
I didn’t voice it. I reminded myself of everything I’d learned from my years in college and my decades of coaching — how life bleeds into performance, how even the most reliable guys have off nights. I checked in with my players, centered them, and did my job.
But inside, I was stewing. And I felt insane because everyone else seemed to be under Nathan Black’s spell.
Staff loved him. They thought he was a genius for shaking things up, giving us an edge Richard Bancroft had lost years ago. He was “fresh” and “fun” in their eyes, and they ate up everything he served.
Players respected him — even the ones I hoped would see through his shit. But Nathan had brought in sponsorships and more money, which meant better equipment, upgraded recovery systems, and new therapy amenities. Hard to hate a guy who gives you cutting-edge hydrotherapy and a cryo chamber.
And the fans practically worshipped him. He’d launched the “fan of the game” program, sending PR out before puck drop to pick a lucky fan from the crowd outside — a crowd that grew bigger every game as people dressed up and camped out for their shot at rink-side seats and a spotlight during second intermission.