SYNOPSIS:
A minor penalty that is not called until the offending team gains control of the puck. As long as the non-offending team maintains possession, the referee allows play to continue and signals a delayed penalty by raising his arm.
I’m Evan Mason, an NHL hockey player for the Chicago Blackhawks. I spend my nights roughing up two hundred pound defensemen and, at times, spend more time in the penalty box than I do on the ice.
That’s my job.
One night changed everything I thought I once knew about my life on, and off, the ice.
A girl.
A brutally beaten girl left to die in an alley.
I don’t know why or how but something made me stay that night after taking her to the hospital. I didn’t know her, nor did I have an obligation to stay but something inside of me rooted me there telling me I should stay. Saving a life is worth something. At least I thought so. And I wouldn’t have been me if I just simply left her there.
Any man who put his heart and soul into a game of hockey couldn’t just walk away when someone needed them. She had no one else right now. The same guy who saw determination where there was desire, now saw hope where there was once despair.
I couldn’t leave. That wouldn’t be me. No, not a man that put all he had into something some called just a game. I couldn’t walk away from her holding onto life, weak and powerless to something she had no control over.
So I stayed. In a room full of family members praying for their loved ones to pull through, I prayed for a girl I didn’t know and had never met before, to have a beating heart. While others’ sorrows turned to grieving pain, I sat waiting on the words of the unknown.
My thoughts after reading...
This is a unique love story between Evan Masen and Ami Sutton... I say unique because its not everyday that we read books about a professional NHL player fall in love with a stranger he finds in a dark alley, whom he saves from the brink of death...literally.
Ami Sutton was raped, beaten to a bloody pulp and was left to die in a dark alley near a biker bar in downtown Chicago. Lucky for her Evan Masen was passing through when he heard her whimper in pain. She was practically in a coma when he brought her to the hospital. She stayed there a couple weeks.
Drew stayed with her when he didn't have a game or practice. He foot the bill for her whole hospitalization... followed up on her case...He worried for her...Got angry for her... So why was he doing above and beyond what was normally expected?? He doesn't really know why...Well, initially of course... He just felt drawn to her...felt the need to protect her and be there for her.
I was totally thrown off the curve when I learned who the asshole that raped and beat-up Ami. He wasn't whom I expected... It was such a thrill reading through the story and trying to figure out who the culprit was, while falling in love alongside Evan and Ami... And lemme just say that, that asswipe should just rot in jail. Just because he is who he is, doesn't mean he can just go around beating women and thinks he is above the law... I understand that when you are a superstar of some sort, you are kinda given a free-pass or treated in a special way...but still, beating women up because they refused your advances and bruised your delicate ego isn't the way to go...and certainly isn't worth going to jail for. But of course I realize that when someone does that, there is a psychological defect in that person and should get help... Or at least the person around him should help him get help. And to those who are physically and emotionally abused, should also seek help and talk to somebody. Not everybody gets over a trauma easily...Some even take years to deal with it.
I loved this book! It has suspense, drama, romance and a bit of comedy. The author thought about all her readers and made the book easy to understand and visualize, although I would've wanted to read about them actually getting married or starting a family of their own written in the epilogue... maybe there's a part 2 or a novella in the midst?😉 So beautifully written by Ms. Shey Stahl. I'd recommend it.
"No bond is stronger than the ones you’ll bleed for..." - such a meaningful passage/line written by Shey Stahl.
