They’d finally made it to the Lost Harbor ice rink for Dylan’s first hockey lesson. Darius had started to suspect that his son was avoiding the rink, but how could that be possible? What could be more fun than hockey?
“You skipped the part where I get good at skating,” Dylan grumbled.
“I’m surprised your mom didn’t teach you. She and I used to skate at a rink in El Paso. She was great on skates. She used to dream about being a figure skater.”
“I didn’t know that.” Dylan slipped and clutched at the boards. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay. Take your time. Get your skates under you, as they say. I’m gonna go say hi to some folks.”
Dylan nodded, his attention on the patch of ice right before him. Darius struck out across the rink to join Nate and Zander and a few others from the amateur team.
Maybe he was rushing it with this hockey thing, but he was just so eager to find a surefire way to bond with the kid.
“How’s it going, Dad?” Nate asked as Darius swirled to a stop next to them.
“Not too bad.” He glanced back at Dylan and winced as the boy wobbled again. “Skating might not be our thing. But we’re getting on okay. I want to get him into school, but it’s too late for this year. I need to line up a summer tutor so he can catch up.”
Zander paused in the midst of wrapping tape around his wrist. “So he’s staying on through the summer?”
“Maybe. I’m working it out with his stepfather back in Texas. Buck’s glad to have Dylan off his hands, at least for now.”
“And he wants to stay? He doesn’t miss his friends?” Nate asked.
Darius didn’t know the answer to that. Should he? Why didn’t Dylan talk about that stuff? “He doesn’t say much about what he wants. Zander, you know about boys. How can I get him to talk to me?”
Zander was raising his two younger brothers. Now that he’d gotten engaged to Gretel Morrison, he had help; but for years he’d been on his own.
Zander mulled that over as he tugged on his gloves. “You could bring him up to our place sometime. We just set up a basketball net. Sometimes things slip out.”
Darius smiled gratefully at the younger man. Zander was an ex-Marine and still had that posture that screamed military. He had a lot of respect for what the guy had done, leaving his career and taking on the care of his brothers. “We’ll do that. I’ll talk to Dylan about it. You guys are right, he could use some friends.”
Nate tap-tapped his stick on the ice in one of his warmup exercises. “I know S.G. likes him. A lot. I believe it’s a first-crush kind of situation.”
“No doubt. I don’t ask about that.”
Nate gestured for him to take a position a few yards away, and they began passing the puck back and forth. “Darius, I gotta warn you about something. I’ve overheard some talk at the firehouse. A few of the volunteers aren’t happy about…well, about Dylan.”
“What do you mean?” Darius slapped the puck back to Nate, who had to scramble backwards to stop it.
“They feel like he’s getting off easy with just community service. He admits that he set all those fires. We were lucky no one got hurt.”
Darius’ stomach clenched with tension. He didn’t give a crap about people’s opinions about himself. But when it came to Dylan—that was different.
“He’s a minor. He’s doing community service and restitution. Hasn’t missed a day. What do they think should happen?”
“I’m just letting you know that I’ve heard some whispering. That’s it. Don’t jump down my throat.”
Darius shook off his anger. Nate was right. He shouldn’t shoot the messenger here.
A crash from the other side of the rink made them all turn around. Dylan was sprawled face down on the ice as a younger boy skated away from him. Darius recognized him as the son of one of the volunteer firefighters. That kid was an ace hockey player who played on the peewee team. He was too skilled to have tripped Dylan by accident.
“Hey!” Darius skated across the ice toward Dylan and crouched next to him. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” He planted his hands on the ice and pushed himself up. Darius took his hands and gently turned them palms up. They were scraped and bloodied. “Whose genius idea was it to ride on top of a pair of knife blades?”