Sparkling Hope (The Eastburgh Devils Series Book 1)

It was uncomfortable for me, and Luna noticed that immediately.

You could usually tell from her facial expression what was happening in her little head and what she was thinking. Based on her skeptical expression and her raised eyebrows let me know that she wasn’t too thrilled about it.

The tip of her nose and cheeks were slightly pink, and I saw a delicate glittery gold hue on her eyelids. Her thick eyelashes were so long that they almost touched her eyebrows.

Why was I starting to study her face? This must look really silly.

‘Can’t you see I’m working?’ She brought me out of my thoughts with that.

I would love to reply: Of course, I see that, and I don’t really care.

Before I could get a sentence past my lips, she turned her attention to the entire tray and walked past me toward the counter. I couldn’t even blame her for not wanting to talk to me.

She hasn’t spoken a single word to me since Wednesday and didn’t give me a glance or a brief eye contact.

Nothing.

As if I was air. Nothing more than air. I didn’t like that she ignored me like that, but it was my own fault, and I had to fix it somehow, but I didn’t quite know how yet because I’ve never apologized to a girl. Luna and I had talked briefly in the morning, only the most necessary things, but at least more than now.

Sometimes she had even indirectly tried to steer the conversation to ice hockey to allow me to tell my father about the training.

She didn’t do that anymore.

My father didn’t think it was terrible.

No unnecessary information that he had to listen to in the evening, as he always said. Everything interested him more except my sport and my performance in ice hockey. Even that Camilla was drinking a coffee in town and suddenly bit on a coffee bean interested him more.

A shitty coffee bean.

‘Captain Bad-tempered is finally here. Did you get lost or what?’ Henry greeted me, with Aria sitting on his lap and an arm around his neck.

‘Shut the fuck up, and don’t call me that,’ I retorted, taking half of his bagel and biting into it.

‘You’re a pervert,’ I chewed on the bitten-off piece of bagel and felt the spiciness spread across my tongue with the mix of avocado.

‘Mustard with avocado is like a good porn. Enjoyable and leaves you wanting more,’ he laughed, and Aria shook her head.

The two portrayed their relationship as a fuck friendship, but I’m just waiting for them to announce their official relationship.

‘What did you want from Luna?’ asked Trevor, nodding toward Luna, who was just standing behind the bar talking to Landon and laughing so hard.

I still thought Landon sucked.

I’d bet that guy jerked off at least once because of her, the way he looked at Luna. When I watched a little longer, the funny thing about it was that Luna was absolutely not into how he was flirting with her.

He was definitely flirting.

‘Stop looking at her like that,’ Carter whispered, nudging me with his elbow.

I cleared my throat and looked at Trevor, who was still waiting for my answer to his question.

‘Oh, uh, it was just something about dinner tonight,’ I lied so severely I was sure that bad lie was oozing out of my pores.

Dinner tonight? That was a shitty lie.

Trevor looked at me confused but didn’t ask further. Aria smirked and rolled her eyes before getting up and walking over to the two, still laughing.

I hoped she had some taste and won’t give him what this guy wanted.

‘Dude, stop,’ Carter rammed his elbow against my crossed arm again.

Only now did I realize that Luna wasn’t even standing next to Landon anymore, but behind Henry, and I was staring at that ass the whole time.

He looked at me stupidly with raised eyebrows, and I turned away. Not a dollar would he ever get as a tip from me. I’d rather throw that dollar down the drain.

This was probably some real smart-ass who searched newspapers and magazines for spelling mistakes and then wrote to the companies to point them out.

I turned my gaze to my friends and watched Henry, who rummaged out of his sports bag something that, according to the colors, had been our jersey.

What was he doing with that here in the café?

‘You’re awesome. Now we can cheer for you at the game later,’ Aria gloated like a little kid as she unfolded a Jersey, and in capital letters, SINCLAIR and his number thirty-four decorated the back of the Jersey.

‘Just for you, baby,’ Henry replied, receiving a kiss on the lips from Aria.

In what fuck friendship manual did it say to act like a kitschy high school couple?

‘Now we’re your two exclusive supporters in the bleachers with your number,’ Aria smiled.

Henry grinned and exchanged glances with Charles. Carter next to me also bit his lip slightly to stifle a smirk.

I understood absolutely nothing and didn’t bother to understand any of it because I wasn’t in the mood, and Trevor didn’t understand their looks too.

Aria had also handed Luna her red and blue jersey, and when she unfolded it, she immediately exchanged glances with Aria, who then looked at the jersey.

‘Oh,’ Aria crossed her head and switched her gaze between the two jerseys.

‘Thank you,’ Luna called out to Henry, smiling intimidatingly before looking at me.

I hated to admit it, but I was interested in what was on her jersey that she wasn’t happy about. Before I could ask, Charles nearly panicked as he looked at his smartphone.

‘Come on, you pussy lovers. Get your well-toned asses to the arena.’

The arena was full. Like really full.

Just about every seat was taken. Everyone was wearing red and blue clothes or jerseys of our team.

That feeling was insane, knowing that all those people were there because of us as a team, cheering us on. We would bring home the win today for us and all those in the arena.

The male voice of the announcer started to tell a few facts about our team before calling my name after Charles.

‘Back number eleven, Weston Sinclair, center forward and assistant captain for the Eastburgh Devils,’ he enumerated the information about me as a hockey player, and I slid my skates on the freshly polished ice for the first time after warm-up practice while golden rain went off at the entrance.

I slid across the ice and made a sharp stop at the blue line separating the neutral zone from the other team’s offensive zone, the Vancouver Falcons.

Who was perfectly arranged like birds on a branch on the other blue line?

The entire team was on the ice, and after a few minutes, some left the ice again. Five stayed there and Henry skated toward the goal.

Coach Henderson stood behind the bench, and we watched as the game started.

‘Look who’s here,’ Carter leaned toward me and pointed to Aria and Luna, who were just a few feet from the partition separated by Plexiglas.

I turned my gaze to the two of them, and Aria waved at us or  at Henry while Luna, with her back turned to us, talked to someone in the back row.

God, she looked beautiful.

She wore her hair down, gold creoles adorned her ears, and when I saw the back of her jersey, I realized the problem had been in the café. Her jersey had the name SINCLAIR on it, but not Henry’s number like Aria’s.

   It was my number.

Number eleven.