Icebreaker Read Free

keep meaning to stop by and have a meal. I promise I will when I get the chance.”
    “That would be the twelfth of never,” her mother muttered under her breath.
    Eventually it was just Sinead and her mother alone in the kitchen as Natalie went off to annoy Quinn with questions about football.
    “You know, I noticed something at dinner,” her mother continued.
    “What’s that?”
    “You didn’t hold Charlie. Not once.”
    “I’m not good with babies, Ma, okay?”
    “I think you’re afraid to hold him.”
    Sinead swallowed painfully. “Could we not talk about this?”
    “Maggie misses you.”
    “Stop meddling, Mom. Please.”
    “I just worry about my girl. You seem so unhappy.”
    “I’m fine, Ma. Honestly.”
    “But you must be getting a bit lonely, no?”
    “Don’t start,” Sinead begged. “Please.”
    “Don’t you think it’s time to find a good man?”
    “I’m not sure there are any,” Sinead lamented. “And I’m certainly not going out looking for one.”
    “Stubborn thing. You’ve always been a headstrong, stubborn thing. You and your sister.”
    “Gee, I wonder where we get that from.”
    “Is it because you’re afraid of getting hurt again?” her mother pressed on. “So you made a mistake. Big deal. Live and learn, I say. Onward and upward and all that. Every pot has its lid, my mam used to say. I want you to find yours.”
    “If it’s meant to happen, it will, Mom,” said Sinead, hugging her mother tight. “Now stop fretting and hand me that dish.”

    “Guys, I’d like you to welcome our new captain, Adam Perry.”
    Adam stepped forward from where he stood between the New York Blades’ GM, Ty Gallagher, and head coach, Michael Dante. Nodding curtly, he glanced around the locker room.
    To say Gallagher and Dante were disappointed with the team’s play in the prior season was an understatement. In Ty’s estimation, they’d gotten soft. Michael believed their previous successes had led to the loss of the burning hunger needed to propel a hockey team forward. Ty and Michael both felt the Blades needed a strong physical presence on the ice; someone whose will to win would carry the team through the moments when skill wasn’t enough. Someone who would inspire effort in his teammates and fear in his opponents.
    “Adam? Anything you want to say?” Michael asked.
    Perry had a league-wide reputation of being a man of few words who only spoke when necessary. He didn’t disappoint. Once again he glanced around the locker room, as if searching for something inside each of his new teammates. The tension was thick. Finally he spoke. “I’m here to win a Stanley Cup,” he declared firmly. “I hope that’s why you’re all here. Nothing else is good enough.”
    The looks on the faces of the other Blades ranged from awe to fear. Perry was known for more than just being taciturn. A powerfully built back liner, he’d won the rookie of the year award for his offensive production as well as his defense. But over the years, he’d evolved into a primarily defensive defenseman known for being the hardest hitter in the league. His specialty was a dying art: the open-ice body check. It was a hit he delivered with such force and ferocity that more than a dozen players had suffered concussions when their heads met Perry’s shoulder at the blue line. Adam’s hits were perfectly legal but always ferocious. No one had retaliated against him in years, thanks to his reputation for being just as brutal and effective when he dropped his gloves. In a sport in which players prided themselves on their fearlessness, the one person players readily admitted to each other that they feared was Adam Perry.
    A brief moment of awkward silence followed Perry’s pronouncement as everyone waited to see if he would say anything else. When it was clear he was done, Michael Dante spoke up, breaking the tension. “Right, let’s get dressed for practice.”
    Ty Gallagher left, and Adam sat down and began