“You scared me.”
“What happened?”
“Exhaustion. Dehydration.”
He frowned.
“And apparently former world champions are still human.”
Monique smiled weakly.
“Don’t tell anyone.”
The door opened.
Richard Voss entered.
Behind him came Henrik.
And a woman Monique had not seen in years.
Coach Diane Keller.
Former national team coach.
Monique sat up.
“Diane?”
The older woman smiled.
“Captain.”
Monique had not heard anyone call her that in a decade.
Diane placed a folder on the bed.
“The Harbor City Lynx need a captain.”
Monique stared.
The Lynx were the city’s new professional women’s team.
Their first season started in three months.
Monique laughed.
“You’re serious?”
“Very.”
Richard added:
“The Wolves need a skills coach too.”
Monique looked between them.
“I’ve been driving an ice machine for six years.”
Diane shook her head.
“You’re a world champion who drove an ice machine because her family needed her.”
There was a difference.
Monique looked toward Malik.
He smiled.
“You told me losing something doesn’t mean it’s gone.”
“When did I say that?”
“About twenty times.”
Henrik leaned against the wall.
“I want the rematch.”
Monique looked at him.
“You stopped zero out of five.”
“I’m getting old.”
She laughed.
For the first time in years, hockey no longer felt like a painful memory.
It felt like a door.
Then Richard became serious.
“There is something else.”
Monique looked at him.
“When the board examined Briella’s finances, we found payments involving the ice department.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What payments?”
“Your mother’s foundation.”
Monique frowned.
“My mother didn’t have a foundation.”
Richard handed her a document.
A nonprofit organization had been established eight years earlier.
THE TATE FAMILY YOUTH ICE FUND
Monique stared.
The founder listed on the document was her mother.
Before becoming sick, Evelyn Tate had quietly created a small fund to help low-income children pay for hockey equipment.
Monique had never known.
“What happened to it?”
Richard looked ashamed.
“The arena was supposed to match donations.”
Malik leaned forward.
“Did it?”
“For three years.”
Then payments stopped.
Briella had redirected the arena’s charitable budget toward premium-event marketing.
The Sunday program Monique had been fighting to save had originally been partly funded by her own mother.
Monique covered her mouth.
All those mornings driving the resurfacing machine.
Watching children skate.
Helping them tighten borrowed equipment.
Fighting to keep the program alive.
She had unknowingly spent six years protecting something her mother had started.
Malik began crying.
“Mom knew.”
Monique reached for his hand.
“No.”
She smiled through tears.
“Mom planned.”
That was different.
But Richard had not finished.
“There’s one more document.”
Monique looked at him.
The original nonprofit paperwork listed two trustees.
