Delayed Penalty (Empire State Hockey #5)

Chapter 20 – Harris

Chapter Twenty

Harris

A very, Kelly, and I all walk into Hudson’s twenty minutes earlier than I told everyone else because I wanted to make sure we got our usual spot and that we were the first ones here. I’m not sure why but I feel like if we were to walk up to the table together, we’d immediately have a sign above our heads telling all of our secrets right off the bat, and honestly, I’m a little excited to be the one to tell them.

Especially Sawyer, I’m almost positive that girl will shit a brick the second I introduce my pregnant wife—even if it’s way more complicated than that.

Hell, maybe I should’ve had someone record this.

“Do you two want to go snag that table over there, the big one in the corner while I go grab some drinks?”

“Yeah,” Kelly says. “Would you grab me a beer? Anything in a bottle.”

“Not a problem,” I say, turning to Avery. “Is lemonade okay? With extra, extra lemon, of course?”

Avery smiles—her real, true smile that she doesn’t hand out all willy-nilly—and I can’t help but give myself an imaginary high-five for being on the receiving end of that smile.

Who would’ve guessed that remembering a girl’s drink would be enough for a smile like that?

“Thanks, Harris,” she says, smiling as she heads to grab the table with her sister.

I’ve been wondering why I feel so nervous, why I feel so anxious about this whole situation with Avery. But as I watch her walk away with her sister, I realize it’s because whether I’m ready to admit it or not, I don’t want a single part of this marriage to be fake. I don’t even want to pretend it is, but I don’t know how to convince her. Until I figure that part out, I’m just going to take it slow and hope she comes to terms with it all on her own.

Grabbing a couple of pitchers of beer and a lemonade for Avery, I make my way back over to the table right as most of my friends are walking over. Trevor and Ellie somehow snuck past me and are already sitting at the table. Setting the drinks down, I pass Avery her lemonade and immediately see Sawyer and Rex smirk at each other before she turns to me and winks.

She’s way too fucking intuitive.

“Ruin my surprise and I promise I’ll make it my life’s mission to make sure they never stock margarita salt here again,” I say quietly as I take the seat in between Sawyer and Avery.

Sawyer just giggles, a giddy, excited giggle and I knew I was right—she’s loving this.

“I thought you said Stella was coming?” Trevor says, thankfully changing the subject.

“She’s here,” Rex grumbles. “She’s just out talking to her lovely boyfriend. Which probably means she’s standing there talking to him while he’s on his phone, but who am I to judge.”

“Ooh, by the sounds of that, is it safe to assume we aren’t his biggest fan?” I ask.

“Not by a long shot. He didn’t even take his eyes off his phone to shake my hand,” Rex adds.

“Yeah, I have to agree with Rex on this one, but she seems happy enough.”

“Happy enough is bullshit,” Miles says, his eyes on the entrance. “If happy enough was actually enough, I’d have stopped fucking around ages ago.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t exactly feel like bringing it up when he’s around so I’m just hoping to get Stella to come over for dinner without Stewart,” Rex says.

“As much as I’d love to hear you bitch about them for the rest of the night, I’m way more interested in why Harris dragged us all out to the bar. Not that I’m complaining when it’s an open bar,” Cassie says as she snuggles up next to Max. I’m sure Max is getting a kick out of Rex’s discomfort, but Cassie is right.

It’s time to tell them our news.

“Uh, yeah, about that,” I say, looking down at Avery who’s now blushing. “As most of you know, Avery and I used to date. Well, after her engagement ended, we hung out… and well, one thing led to another… and now, come January there will be one more baby added to our group.”

The excitement is everything I wanted from them and more. As soon as the words are out Sawyer immediately yells out that she called it and I can’t help but laugh. Everyone got loud with excitement, jumping up to give hugs and congratulate us, and I can’t help but look down at Avery and notice her absolutely glowing from the attention, from the love.

I was nervous it would be too much, my friends can come on a little strong but it’s all because they treat everyone like family, but Gwen is already asking a million questions and Avery is soaking it all in.

I look over at Kelly, who’s sitting next to Ellie, and I can see how happy she looks watching her sister and I just hope this happiness has something to do with me. I want to bring her this level of happiness—the sort of happiness she’s always brought me.

Except for when she cheated.

But I don’t even want to think about that anymore. It doesn’t seem relevant after everything else we’ve been through. We all make mistakes, I made the mistake of not fighting for her. Of seeing those pictures of her and Peter and bowing out—granted, a lot of that had to do with his threats to ruin both of our careers. I should’ve at least talked to her about it.

I will, soon.

“Um, is there more to the story or are my eyes deceiving me?” Gwen asks quietly, her eyes down on Avery’s as she grabs her lemonade, diamond on full display.

“Oh, yeah. We sort of… also got married last night.”

Cue the madness in 3… 2… 1…

“Married? Like husband and wife sort of married?” Gwen asks, her eyes bouncing between the ring and me.

“Is there another sort of married?” I say, earning a glare.

“Explain, Danielson,” Gwen says, and I want to laugh, but I can feel everyone's eyes on me.

So, I do. I tell them the whole story, Avery helps this time especially with the parts about Peter and the doctor’s office. We skate over the details about what happened with the team years ago when we first broke up, telling them just enough so they understand Peter thinks he has power. It helps that Cade remembers our old coach, I just connect the dots with him being Peter’s dad and a friend of our current coach.

“Okay, I get it. But I still want to smother you in your sleep for not inviting us,” Sawyer pouts. “But I’m not worried because if you haven’t told your mother yet, there’s still hope for a bigger party. She’s gonna be piiiiiiiissssed. ”

“Ugh,” I groan, looking down at Avery who just shrugs. “Yeah, we’re going to have that conversation next week. They actually just told me they’re coming into town next week; I guess there’s no better time than that to tell them.”

“Guess I should get ready to have that same conversation with my parents, not that they’ll even care. I mean, they will, but they won’t. I’ll call them next week.”

“I vote we just stop by, pay them a visit and tell them in person, really make sure they know the situation, since they obviously only listen to your ex.”

She looks up at me and smirks, her eyes full of mischief as she nods. “I like it.”

“Me too,” Kelly says. “Now, what do you all say about the non-pregnant people taking some shots? Lots of celebrations.”

“I’ll go grab some drinks.”

“Ride the flagpole.”

“Boink.”

“Funny business.”

“Beast with two backs.”

“Hide the sausage.”

“Smash.”

“Ride the bologna pony.”

“For fuck’s sake, what did I just walk into?” I ask as Rex and I return to the table with more drinks, Avery and the girls are all sitting around the table in a circle with Miles, Max, and Cade playing some sort of game.

“Cassie wanted to play this game like Scattergories, but you come up with a topic and then everyone has to have an answer. You go around until someone messes up then they have to take a shot,” Max says with a smirk.

“And this category was what?”

“Ways to say sex without saying sex.”

“Like horizontal tango? Or clapping cheeks?” Rex says as he passes Sawyer her margarita, giving his sister another one as she sits next to her boyfriend who’s been glued to his phone the entire night.

“Exactly,” Ellie says with a laugh. “I wanted to do pet names. Figured it might be fun to see how many different names we can come up with because everyone always calls each other something different.”

“That would have been fun,” Cassie says.

I grab a chair and squeeze in behind Avery, passing her another lemonade in the process.

“Yeah, but instead you ladies decided to think of every way to talk about fucking?” Miles asks incredulously.

“Yeah, we figured we’d make it easy on you since it seems to be your favorite pastime,” Stella quips, and I can’t help but laugh.

I’m not used to her spicy side, but it’s fun to see it come out every now and then. It does seem to happen quite a bit around Miles, but I doubt he’s even aware of it.

“What are you saying, trouble?” he says back.

“That we thought it’d be easy for you to come up with words for sex since you fuck a new woman almost every night.”

“Nah, it’s not a new woman every night. I quite often have repeat customers,” Miles says back, his tone more clipped than usual but with his typical grin in place I’m sure no one else has noticed.

“I’m surprised, women are usually too smart to return back for a mediocre fuck,” Stella deadpans.

“Oh, babe, mediocre has never been used to describe the way I fuck. I’m more than happy to provide evidence… or first-hand experience if that’s what it’d take.”

“Anywayyy, what do you two call each other?” Sawyer asks, changing the subject thankfully.

But of course, it’s directed at us .

She is always the one so curious to know about people's relationships… but not in a weird way. She’s genuinely happy to learn about how people fell in love, and having it directed toward Avery and me, especially with everything they’ve learned today, it sort of makes sense. I mean, we’re sort of married with a baby on the way.

“What do you mean? I call her Avery or Ave if I’m shortening it?” I ask stupidly.

“No, you buffoon, like your nicknames for each other. Your pet names,” Gwen interjects.

“I’ve never had one for her,” I say, not missing the way Avery looks down, a flash of disappointment in her eyes.

Leaning back, I rest my hand on her thigh, squeezing just enough to make sure I have her attention specifically before I look back at Sawyer.

“The only thing I’ve ever wanted to call her is my wife, everything else seemed too pedestrian for what she means to me.” I shrug, feeling everyone’s eyes on me, but I’m not paying attention.

My eyes are now locked with Avery who’s looking at me like she’s seeing me for the first time. For the first time in years, she’s looking at me like I’m something special, not like she’s counting down the moments until she can run far away from me.

“So, how long have you guys known each other?” Stella asks, breaking the moment.

“I met Harris when I was touring the campus for college in like, June or July. He was a junior and had a cute little puppy he was walking that was basically walking him. I had to stop and say hi. After that he gave me his number and said if I ever needed anything to give him a call. We started texting the next day and pretty much didn’t stop.”

“Avery and I dated right before I joined the Cyclones.”

“Hold up… right before?” Miles asks, and I see the wheels turning.

“Yes.”

“Does this mean what I think it means?” He smirks, his eyes wild with amusement, and I know exactly what story he’s thinking about.

Motherfucker.

“I hope you choke on a dick and die, Danielson. You’re as good as dead to me.”

“It does,” I say, looking over at Avery who’s now confused.

“So, you’re the girl who left the voicemail telling Harris to choke on a dick and die?” Miles says through laughter, tears now streaming down his cheeks and the rest of the guys now must catch on because they start laughing.

The only one who’s known it was her the entire time is Cade, but that’s just because we were living with each other.

“I thought he was lying when he told us that,” Miles adds.

“Nope, I definitely remember him getting that phone call. I was there,” Cade jokes.

“Yup, I remember the phone call as well,” Avery adds, and I’m shocked. “That phone call happened right after I was given the letter of you breaking up with me. It was just minutes after getting that fucking letter, printed and fucking signed, breaking up with me.”

“What fucking letter are you referring to?” I ask, anger flowing through me at her words.

She looks confused, but explains. “The letter you taped to my door, breaking up with me, only to have Peter's dad talk to me to let me know you were on vacation to clear your mind and you didn’t want me to try and reach out. I made my one phone call then let you rot,” she spits out, each word becoming more and more angry as she obviously is remembering it all. Only it sounds like she’s got it all sorts of fucking twisted.

“On vacation to clear my mind. You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me,” I hiss, ignoring the guys still sitting around us as I feel myself start shaking. I can’t let myself get this worked up…it’s never good for anyone. “I wasn’t on a fucking vacation… I was picking up the fucking ring I was going to propose to you with. The same ring you’re wearing right now.”