Mile High

What's inside (7 sections)

1. The plane where they spar
2. Penthouse neighbors and a quiet deal
3. Family scripts that do not quit
4. Cameras, contracts and the breakup
5. The repair and where they land
6. Key takeaways
7. FAQ

I picked up Mile High because I was tired of hockey romances where the sport is window dressing and the couple fights about nothing for three hundred pages. People online kept saying this one was different, longer and sappier but also more serious about bodies and nerves and bad family scripts. That mix sold me. This is Liz Tomforde's 2022 novel, the first book in the Windy City series, 570 pages in the Hodder and Stoughton edition I read. It follows Evan Zanders, a Chicago pro hockey player famous for being hated, and Stevie Shay, the new flight attendant on his team's private plane. What follows tells the whole story in order, ending included.

Stevie has been flying for years. She is good at the job, quick with passengers who are rude, loyal to coworkers who help. Her new assignment puts her on the crew for Chicago's pro hockey team. On paper it looks like a perk. Better pay, set routes for road games, a small tight crew. In practice it means dealing with huge men who act tired and entitled at 7 a.m. and flirty by boarding.

Zanders boards like he owns the air. In Chicago hockey he plays the villain and he knows it. Plenty of penalty box minutes, plenty of tabloid photos with a new woman on his arm after road games, plenty of quotes that sound worse out of context. Teammates say he leans into it. Opposing crowds boo him and he grins. That first flight, he treats Stevie like room service with wings. She tells him to get his own drink from the cooler in the back. His best friend Eli Maddison laughs out loud because no woman talks to Zanders that way.

Indy Ivers, another attendant on the crew, saves Stevie that day with extra lime wedges and a look that says welcome to the circus. Indy becomes the friend who tells the truth fast. She jokes, she covers, she sees when Stevie is rattled. Maddison, married with kids and steady in a way Zanders is not, watches the exchange with interest. He has known Zanders since they were kids in Indiana, rivals first, then friends after both stepped away from college hockey for a stretch to work on health and head stuff with therapists. That history matters later.

Stevie is not impressed for reasons that have nothing to do with playing hard to get. She dated an athlete before. Brett, her twin brother's best friend, burned her. She made a rule after that. No athletes. No exceptions, no matter how sharp the jaw or how smooth the voice. She repeats it like a seatbelt demo. Zanders hears the rule and takes it as a dare at first. He pushes the call button to bug her. Then he keeps pushing it because he likes when she shows up.

The plane where they spar

The early flights set the pattern. Zanders sits in the exit row and pretends he missed the safety talk. Stevie calls him on it. He asks for things he could get himself. She hands them over with a flat smile because Indy is watching and it is day one. In the galley Indy mouths sorry and passes limes. Maddison tells Zanders he is being an ass. Zanders says Stevie is cold. Maddison says no, she just does not care who he is, which is new for him.

What I liked here is how physical the work feels. Tomforde writes galley space, drink carts, turbulence, late boarding, dry airplane air. Stevie stows bags, counts heads, calms a nervous flyer, then has to smile at a guy who wants her to fetch ice while making eye contact. It is not glamorous. It smells like coffee and cleaner. Her feet hurt. That detail helped me buy the power gap. He is the star client. She can be fired for snapping. He can be rude and get laughs.

They keep colliding on the road. Denver, away rinks, hotel lobbies. Zanders texts women in each city out of habit, then does not follow through. Maddison begs off to call home. Zanders drags himself out anyway and feels flat about it. On the plane back he watches Stevie work. She is kind to rookies, firm with drunks, tired in a normal way. He starts asking real questions between teasing. Where she lives. How long she has flown. Why she switched to the team charter. She gives short answers. He remembers them.

Stevie lives with her twin brother Ryan Shay in his penthouse. Ryan plays pro basketball, famous in his own lane, protective in a brother way that sometimes lands as control. After Brett, Ryan feels guilty and hovers. Stevie loves him and also needs air. Eli and his family live in the same building. Zanders lives across the street and visits the Maddisons all the time. So home games mean hallway run-ins, elevator small talk, shared grocery carts. Chicago feels small.

The Maddison house is the warm center. Eli, his wife Logan, their kids Ella and MJ. Noise, snacks, kids climbing on Zanders like he is furniture. Zanders is uncle-ish, soft in a way he never shows at the arena. Stevie sees it and files it away. This is not the guy from the headlines. This is a man who knows bedtime routines and brings the right juice boxes. Logan is welcoming without prying. Eli teases them both and means it kindly.

Penthouse neighbors and a quiet deal

The middle stretch is built on proximity. Stevie and Zanders do not plan to date. They plan to avoid each other, then to bicker, then to talk. Late flights turn into long talks in empty cabins after everyone else sleeps. He tells her the bad boy thing started as role and hardened into contract. Fans expect it. Media pays for it. The team tolerates it while he scores. He hates parts of it but does not know how to drop it without losing edge. She tells him the athlete rule and a trimmed version of Brett. No self pity. Just facts.

They start a secret thing because the stakes are plain. If the team finds out she is involved with a player, she could lose the charter job. If his front office thinks he is a distraction, it hurts his next contract. Chicago is deciding whether to re-sign him. Coaches want production without drama. So they hide. Separate cars. No photos. Texts under fake names. Indy figures it out fast and covers. Ryan does not know. Eli suspects and keeps quiet until he has to speak.

Road trips blur the line they drew. Zanders stops chasing other women without making a speech about it. He just stops replying. He waits to sit in Stevie's section. He learns how she takes coffee on early flights. He notices when her smile goes thin around certain passengers who stare at her body. Stevie starts to see past the act too. He checks on rookies. He tips crew well and learns names. He calls his therapist. He shows up for Maddison kids when Eli has back to backs. He is still cocky, still loud, but the cruelty is missing when no camera is on.

The heat builds in this section and the book is frank about it. This is open door romance with explicit consensual scenes. Tomforde writes a lot of them, often tied to reassurance. Zanders is fixated on telling Stevie she is his first choice, the one he wants in a room full of options. For Stevie, whose mother picked at her weight for years, that focus lands hard. She wants to believe him and flinches at the same time. He learns to slow down, to ask, to stay after. She learns to say what works and what does not. Readers who want closed door should skip this one. Readers who want spice with a lot of talk around it will get plenty.

Body image sits at the center, not the side. Stevie is plus size and used to being looked through or looked at too long. Strangers comment. Her mother comments more. Old boyfriends made jokes. Even kind people say clumsy things. Tomforde does not make it a single speech. It shows in small cuts. A dress that fits wrong before a team event. A photo angle she hates. A passenger who asks for the thin attendant instead. Zanders gets it wrong once by trying to fight everyone, which helps nobody. He gets it righter by listening, by complimenting in specific ways, by backing her in public without making her a cause.

Anxiety sits beside it. Both of them carry it. Zanders has panic around performance and image, around letting people down, around his father. Stevie has anxiety around work and family judgment, around being too much and not enough at once. They both have therapists, which I appreciated. Therapy is not a rescue scene. It is maintenance. Eli's history mirrors it. He and Zanders both took time away in college to heal and talk. That shared past is why Eli can call Zanders out without breaking trust.

Family scripts that do not quit

Parents loom. Stevie's mother is the worst kind of critic, loving in words and cutting in practice. She remarks on food, clothes, photos. She compares Stevie to thinner women. She frames it as health or help. Stevie has heard it so long she hears it when the woman is not in the room. Her father is quieter, less present. Ryan tries to shield her and sometimes smothers her instead. He means well. He also likes control.

Zanders has his own tangle. His father is a hard man to please. There is a late conversation between them that many readers single out, and I get why. No big speech fixes years. It is more like a door cracking open. His mother has her own issues and has not been safe either. Zanders built the party boy shell young. It kept attention on the surface. It kept questions away from home. Dropping it feels risky even when keeping it hurts more.

The Maddisons show another model. Loud, affectionate, boundaried. Logan runs a full house and still notices when Stevie goes quiet. Eli tells Zanders when he is out of line. The kids adore Zanders and also interrupt him, which is good for him. Found family gets used a lot in blurbs. Here it earns it because the Maddisons have their own stress. Back to backs, injuries, parenting, money and time. They do not exist to fix the couple. They have a life the couple gets to borrow for a while.

Hockey detail stays present without taking over. Practices, video, travel schedules, penalty kills, sore hands, ice baths. Tomforde knows the rhythm of a season. Home stands, long road swings, trade talk as noise. Zanders plays on edge and pays for it in the box. Coaches want him effective, not ejected. Teammates want him locked in. Maddison is the steady line mate in life as well as hockey, the guy who stays home, lifts extra, texts good night to his wife from the plane.

Stevie's work detail stays sharp too. Seniority fights, passenger types, red eyes, delays, crew rest rules. Indy and Stevie trade horror stories and snacks. They cover for each other with swaps. They learn which players nap, which want quiet, which want to chat. The plane becomes a small town. Everyone knows who sat where. Secrets are hard. That pressure cooker explains why hiding gets exhausting.

By midseason they are basically a couple without the label. Cooking at his place when Ryan thinks she is with Indy. Morning flights where they pretend to be polite strangers. A shared look when paparazzi hover outside hotels. Zanders wants to claim her. Stevie asks him to wait. She likes the job. She likes Indy. She does not want to be the flight attendant who slept with the star. He hates waiting but agrees because he knows what it costs her.

Cameras, contracts and the breakup

Fame breaks the seal. Paparazzi catch them together off the plane, close enough that denial looks silly. Photos run. Comments pile on. Some target Stevie's body. Some call her a climber. Some drag Zanders for settling or for slumming, ugly words that show how people talk about women who date famous men. The team asks questions. The charter company asks sharper ones. Stevie feels the floor tilt.

Zanders panics in the way anxious avoiders do. He decides he is the problem. His rep will stain her. His contract fight will drag her into stories. Better to cut her loose before it gets worse. So he ends it, badly, with lines about protection that sound like rejection. He tells himself it is kind. It is not. It is fear wearing a suit.

Stevie does not beg. She is gutted and clear. If he can drop her to save face, she has her answer. She quits the charter job before they can push her out. She keeps flying commercial briefly, then steps back. She makes plans to move to Seattle for a fresh start and quieter skies. Indy hugs hard at the airport and cries. Ryan is furious at Zanders and then at himself for missing how deep it went. Eli tells Zanders he messed up in plain words. Logan tells him what it cost Stevie, which lands harder.

This third act split runs long. I will be honest, I skimmed some airport hotel brooding. Tomforde wants you to feel the drag of weeks without each other. Games, flights, empty penthouse, missed texts. Zanders plays angry and takes dumb penalties. Coaches bench him for stretches. He talks to his therapist, talks to Eli, talks to his father in that cracked door call. He keeps showing up for the Maddison kids because they ask for him. That steadiness is the start of change, not a big gesture.

Stevie in Seattle orbit starts over in small ways. She volunteers at a dog shelter and finds she is good at it. Calm with scared dogs, patient with paperwork, liked by staff. Dogs do not care about camera angles. The work gives her days shape while she job hunts. She sleeps better. She still misses him. Missing and knowing she deserves better can sit side by side. That felt true.

The hockey climax runs on parallel track. Chicago pushes into the postseason and grinds toward the Stanley Cup Finals. Zanders has to play disciplined to stay on the ice. He does, barely, with help from linemates and a coach who finally trusts him in key minutes. The team wins. The city erupts. Confetti, hugs, cups raised. Zanders smiles and scans the crowd for a face that is not there. Winning without her feels thin.

He goes to find her. Not with cameras. He tracks the shelter, shows up awkward with no plan, and asks to talk. She does not melt. She asks hard questions. Will he hide her again. Will he pick image when pressed. What changes with the team. He answers without spin. He loves her. He was scared and wrong. He will tell the team, the press, anyone. He believes what she says and will keep believing it. It is earnest and a little clumsy. She cries. The dogs bark. They agree to try again without the secrecy tax.

The repair and where they land

The repair is practical, not magic. Chicago re-signs Zanders after the Cup run, with clearer expectations around conduct and availability. He agrees because he wants to stay and because the structure helps. He tells the front office about Stevie on his terms before rumors do it for him. The Raptors organization starts backing the dog shelter with funds and visits, which gives Stevie a path to full time work she actually likes. She moves in with him after honest talks with Ryan about space and independence. Ryan hates losing his roommate and supports her anyway. Indy visits with stories and steals his snacks.

They keep therapy. That line matters more than the epilogue kiss. Zanders keeps working on panic and people pleasing hidden under swagger. Stevie keeps working on internalized shame around food and photos and worth. They visit families with limits. Shorter stays. Hotels instead of spare rooms when needed. Phone calls with end times. Her mother still comments. He steps in once, then learns to ask Stevie how she wants it handled. His father stays a work in progress. No clean fix. Just steadier contact.

The final chapters give the payoff the series promises. Soft domestic beats. Cooking, dog hair on good pants, road trip calls, Maddison kids fighting over who sits by Zanders. Stevie chooses work that fits. Zanders chooses honesty even when it costs him a headline. They say they love each other without hedging. They plan a future that includes hockey but does not orbit it. The last image is home, not arena. That choice felt right for a book named for altitude. The high was never the point. Landing was.

Fair criticism, because length is the story here too. My edition runs 570 pages and some printings run longer. You feel it. Scenes repeat. Another flight, another hotel talk about hiding, another reassurance loop, another explicit scene that makes the same point about trust. I get why readers who love living with a couple do not mind. I minded in the middle. Tighter would hit harder. The breakup fight also leans on miscommunication that could clear with one honest call. Tomforde knows it and tries to earn it through anxiety, but I still wanted to shake them.

Pacing aside, the couple carries it. Banter is strong without turning into quips. The friend group helps. Indy is a standout and her setup for the next book is clear without hijacking this one. Ryan reads as a decent brother learning to loosen grip. Eli and Logan give the book its spine. If you want hockey texture, crew life, plus size rep that is not a lesson, and mental health talk woven into plot rather than parked in one chapter, this delivers.

Who should pick it up. Readers who like long contemporary sports romance with open door heat, found family, secret dating that goes public, and emotional repair arcs. Readers who liked the vibe of college hockey romance but want pros with jobs and rent and therapy bills. Who should skip. Readers who want under 350 pages, closed door, or no third act split. Content notes from the author list explicit sex, mentions of anxiety, and body shaming. I would add paparazzi harassment, strained parents, panic on page, and a lot of talk about food and weight that could sting even though it aims to heal.

I closed the book thinking about the call button gag. Early on he rings to annoy her. Late on he does not need to. She is already there, by choice, not assignment. That shift from service to partnership is the whole arc in one image. Long road to get there, but the landing sticks.

FAQ

What is Mile High about?

Chicago hockey player Evan Zanders falls for team charter flight attendant Stevie Shay. They hide the relationship to protect her job and his next contract.

Is Mile High spicy and who is it for?

Yes. It has explicit consensual scenes with a lot of talk about bodies and anxiety. It suits adult readers who like long sports romance and found family.

When was Mile High published?

It was first published on June 4, 2022 independently. The ISBN cited here is the Hodder and Stoughton International Edition of 570 pages from August 17, 2023.