Unthinkable

Jack Leroy plays hockey as an enforcer, and he is divorced with two children. Love is not on his list. Then his daughter and her best friend land in trouble at school, and he ends up in the principal's office, where he meets the friend's mother, Mara O'Connell.

Mara is a single parent too, but her situation is harder. She manages several chronic illnesses, has no NHL salary and no co-parent to share the load. Jack and Mara team up, an alliance neither expected.

When Jack's fourth nanny in a row quits, the nanny agency bans him. He proposes a fix that covers her healthcare and his childcare: they marry, and they act in love so the kids do not worry about what is going on.

This is a marriage of convenience romance with two single parents at its centre, set in the world of professional hockey. Mara uses a mobility aid, and chronic illness is part of the story. Jack insists love is not for him, yet he will do anything to protect their new family. His bluff is tested when Mara gives him something he has always wanted and never had.

It is the second book in the Ohio Rusties Hockey series.