Total pages in book: 25
Estimated words: 24377 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 122(@200wpm)___ 98(@250wpm)___ 81(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 24377 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 122(@200wpm)___ 98(@250wpm)___ 81(@300wpm)
Follow the Coyotes players and the women they love as they navigate life over the decade following the end of The Fall. The twelve main characters from the series each check in with a chapter from their point of view.
Through the highs and lows of marriage, family, hockey and life, the teammates’ bond only gets stronger with time.
Who got traded to a new team? Which couple has five children? Did Mila ever mellow out?
Get all the answers you didn’t know you needed in this heartwarming conclusion to the Colorado Coyotes series.
Please note that Coyotes Ever After is not a full-length novel. This novella is about half the length of the novels in the series.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
CHAPTER ONE
THREE YEARS AFTER THE END OF THE FALL
Stella
“Ahhhh!” I hike my leg up onto the back seat of Mila’s Range Rover. “Is it crowning? It has to be because this hurts like fuuuuuck!”
She gapes at me, her uniformed driver giving me an alarmed look in the rearview mirror as he presses his foot down on the gas pedal, speeding toward the hospital like a racecar driver.
“What? I’m not checking if that’s what you’re thinking.” She gives me her patented look that’s somehow a combination of disgust and indifference. “Just keep breathing. We’ll be at the hospital soon.”
On the one hand, I’m elated. Ben and I tried for almost a year to get pregnant the first time, and I lost the pregnancy at eight weeks. After I recovered, it took thirteen anxiety-inducing months to get pregnant again, and at thirty-nine weeks, it’s now safe for me to deliver our baby.
But I didn’t imagine it like this, with Ben in Tampa for a road trip, all flights out of the city grounded by a hurricane. When I realized I was in labor and frantically messaged the group chat for the Coyotes players and spouses, only Mila responded that she was on her way.
No Ben. No Cam. No Tess or Shelby. It’s just me and the team’s hotheaded Russian owner. Well, and her driver, Carl, who seems like a nice person but was not part of my carefully-designed birth plan.
“Look at my vagina!” I scream at Mila, frantic. “You have to guide the baby out if it’s crowning!”
She lowers her brows, scowling. “For fuck’s sake, Stella, it’s not crowning. This is your first baby and your contractions are still five minutes apart. I was in labor for nineteen hours with Anastasia and thirteen with Irina.”
I yell out a long, single syllable, about to lose my shit. This is the worst. Ben didn’t want to go on the road trip with me this pregnant, but he had no choice. So now contractions are ripping through my body and I don’t have my birth partner. Cam is my back up, and she’s trying to secure a babysitter so she can get to the hospital.
Angry tears spill from my eyes. “Mila, I swear to God, if you don’t look at my vagina right now, I will never forgive you! I’ve waited a long time for this baby and I’m scared.”
She shakes her head, her glare softening. “Fine. I’ll look. But I’m not touching your underwear.”
There’s a low, electric humming sound as Carl raises up the dark partition that separates the front and back seats of the car.
At least I’m not alone. Mila isn’t an outwardly warm person to anyone but her family. Her love language with everyone else involves writing checks, and she’s generous. She always tells her players to put family first, and she backs them up when they do.
I put my foot back on the car floor. My maternity pants have a loose elastic waistband, so I grab it and my underwear at the same time, grunting as I arch my hips up off the car seat to slide my clothes down.
“I’ll just...donate this car to charity or something,” Mila says crisply.
I’m in no mood.
“Fuck you, Mila,” I snap. “You’re the one who offered to take me to the...oh fuck! It’s another contraction! Get down there; you might need to deliver the baby!”
“Breathe, Stella.”
She helps me get my clothes from around my ankles. Moving one foot back up to the car seat, I pant and moan my way through a rising contraction as Mila gets to her knees on the floor.
“Jesus, I’ve never been this close to another woman’s vagina,” she mutters. “And I was right, the baby isn’t crowning. You’ll make it to the hospital just fine.”
“Oh God! It’s like someone’s stabbing me in the stomach with a machete!”
Mila moves back into her seat, answering her phone. “Hey...yeah, I’m taking her to the hospital.”
She moves her mouth away from the phone to talk to me. “Colby says Ben borrowed a car from a Tampa player and he’s driving to Atlanta to get a flight to Denver.”
“Ben,” I say frantically. “Can I talk to him?”
“Colby’s not with him, but he’s on his way.”
She goes back to the call. “Call Quentin and tell him to arrange a chartered flight for Ben...yeah, tell him to get a pilot on standby...thanks, love...okay, I will. Bye.”
I take a deep breath as the contraction winds down. “I have a birth plan. It’s in the planner in my bag.”
She laughs, genuinely amused. “I don’t get birth plans. You’re going to deliver a baby. What is there to plan?”
“Who will be in the room with me, whether I want an epidural, whether my pubic hair is shaved.”
She scoffs. “Did you read a birth planning book from the 1980s? They don’t shave women’s pubes anymore.”