It did not escape me that I looked—and felt—like a certain prince who had experienced some life-changing moment only to be run out on and left holding a fucking slipper. This one wasn’t glass, and it wasn’t a slipper, but the comparison could be made just the same.
I had no clue what to do next. My phone alarm reminded me of what was on my agenda next. Locker clean-out day. Like right now. Oh yay.
I carried the slipper—aka Prada sneaker—to my car, dropped it onto the passenger seat, and hauled ass to the barn. Once inside the Cali Natural Gas Arena I bolted to the first men’s room I could find to wash up. Face all bloodied was not how I wanted to greet the press and/or my teammates, and I’d already had curious chuckles from security. Staring at my hair I sighed because I’d run oily hands through it, and it was a slicked back mess of waves. So, I doused my head, pulled my fingers through it, and prayed for the best.
Sneaking into the dressing room didn’t go well. As soon at the guys saw me they all called my name, shook my hand, and chatted it up. Which was nice, sure, because this was the last we’d be seeing of each other for a few months. Most of the men went home in the off-season. Many to other countries. A few lingered in LA as it was their home, like me, but took vacations, and I would spend several weeks back in Arizona where I had a small condo near my folks’ place.
Reporters cornered me near my cubicle, most eying my wild hair but having the good grace to not mention it.
A tall guy with a thick mustache began the stupid questions.
“How are you feeling now that a few days have passed since you lost?” he asked.
I so wanted to expound on just how shitty I felt.
“Feeling a little better every day,” I replied instead, falling back on all the years of being taught to be polite and humble. The hockey players’ creed was never be a jerk. All of us puck pushers saw what some professional footballers and baseball players did both on the field and off. Very few hockey players engaged in asinine stunts. Like they say, play stupid games, win stupid prizes. I did not like stupid prizes. So why I’d allowed myself to play that moronic game with Finn and the massage table I had no clue.
I’d been this close to throwing out a cheesy line and wrapping my hand around his cock.
Head back in the interview.
“We’re gaining some perspective now on what we did wrong and what we need to work on for next season.”
“The defense on this team has taken a lot of hits. Would you like to comment on that?” a female reporter named Lisa asked. She had asked me out once, but I had declined. Dating a reporter was asking to be flame-roasted when things went south.
“Our defense was amazing. I’m not sure why people are bad-mouthing the defensive core, but we couldn’t have asked more from them,” I replied with honesty. The D-men had played balls to the wall. We all had. We’d all given up our hearts, souls, and bodies for the Cup.
Every member of the press corps stared at my hair while we talked. No one asked.
Shame my fucking teammates didn’t share that courtesy.
Prez ambled over as did Charlie, both eyeballing me as if I had a couple of ferrets wrestling on top of my head. The press had moved on to other players, many gathered around our goalie Phillippe asking him if he was going to retire now. The rest were hovering around Michael—or Zeetoo as we called him on the team given he was Charlie Zhang’s little brother—one of our alternate captains. The media was peppering him with questions about why he did this or that. Zeetoo looked like he wanted to punch everyone out, but he’d quickly get over that—he always did.
Prez sat down beside me as I dumped a bag of butterscotch hard candies into my dark purple Storm duffel. Charlie dropped on my left, stole a candy, and unwrapped it. Our captain narrowed his eyes at me, then began sniffing the air like a bloodhound.
“You sucking on a mint, Cam?” Prez asked as he watched the crowd around Phillippe and Zeetoo with a predatory air. Our captain did not like people pushing his men into tight corners by asking personal questions. Particularly when one of them was the little brother he worried about—not on the ice, but definitely off the ice.
“No, I stopped on the way to the barn to get a massage,” I lied like a rug. It wasn’t a complete untruth. There had been massage motions taking place. For a few minutes. Christ, I had boned things up with Finn. I had to find a way to fix things, but I had no idea how to do that. I rarely chased people who exited my life. If they chose to go, well, they could go.
“She massaged your head too?” Charlie asked around his hard candy. He was a cute guy, speedy as fuck, one of only a few Asian American players in the league, and this was his fifth year as captain of the Storm.
“Yeah, duh,” I snapped, then crammed a Storm hat on my head to hide the evidence of my fuckery.
“I never get a head massage,” Charlie lamented then nudged me with his knee. “I’m hosting the end of the season party at my place this year. It’s in a few weeks. You’ll still be in LA then, right?”
“Yeah, totally.” I had made no plans yet. I did have a weekly date with the kids of CC’s Club, but I assume since Finn had run from me screaming, that my teaching gig was up, and now I was footloose. Just the way I liked it. Just call me Pinocchio. He of the lack of strings and all that.
It didn’t worry me that I wouldn’t be seeing Finn again.
Right?
“Cool. Everyone will be there then they’ll start flying home. The theme this year is Viking Chic, which is all Little Mikey’s idea.”
I blinked at Charlie because a) Michael hated being called Little Mikey, and b) Viking what now? Prez huffed about the press way too loud. They were asking our poor goalie some shitty questions, and Prez was hovering ready to beat one of them up from the look of him.
“What the hell is Viking chic?” I asked.
Charlie gave me one of those smiles that made his dimples appear. “Mikey says we need to look it up, Romeo. And please bring someone. That way you won’t be flirting with everyone else’s dates.”
I gasped. As if I ever did that. Please.
It caught my attention that Prez was muscling his way through to Phillippe to break up the endless pokes and jabs at our veteran goaltender from the media, and I readied myself to jump in if things got heated.
Zeetoo on the other hand had gone past being pissed and straight onto arctic temperature calm—just like he did when he was on the ice with the Storm. He had a way of closing down the bad stuff and putting hockey front and center, which I admired. Zeetoo and Charlie might be related, but they were so different—particularly given that they were stepbrothers, and Charlie’s darker hair contrasted with Zeetoo who was pale, red-haired, and freckled. Like freckled all over—because hell, we see everything in the locker room, and I swear Zeetoo is an exhibitionist. Probably because Charlie frowned every time he exposed himself.
“I’ll find someone to bring,” I reassured him, relaxing as the media left Phillippe alone at last. Probably intimidated by a brooding Prez hovering right next to our poor goalie. “I can’t help it if people find me charming and sexy.”
Charlie pretend-gagged on his butterscotch then gave my knee a rap with the side of his fist. Staring around at the empty cubicles made me feel shitty. Even though every fiber of my being knew I needed some down time to heal not only my body but my soul, I hated to leave every year, and this year was depressing as we’d come so fucking close. Double shitty to be honest. The fiasco with Finn was chewing on me. Somehow I needed to make things right with him, I just had no idea how to go about doing so while still holding onto my pride.