Picks & Pucks (10 page)

I groaned and pocketed the list, thinking about all the stairs in the building. I’d tried to count them before, but my brain usually went numb and the numbers blurred together.

“Stop by my office after practice. I need to talk to you.”

I groaned again, because I didn’t feel up to having a heart-to-heart with my dad tonight. I gave him a noncommittal nod.

“All right, gentlemen, suit up,” Coach shouted when he pushed open the locker room door. “On the ice in fifteen.”

“Yes, Coach,” they answered. In less than three minutes, a large stampede of sweaty bodies raced down the hall toward the ice. Shouts of “fuck yeah” echoed through the halls. The players were always a little worked up on the first official day of practice.

“Fuck, I hate hockey players,” I mumbled.

Eli snorted. “I think we’ve established that fact. You have fun running up and down all those stairs. I’m going to class to sit on my ass and daydream.”

“I hate smartass best friends too,” I said but let him hug me before he trotted down the hall and disappeared behind the Zamboni.

I sighed and started to close the door, when a guy I’d never seen before waved at me. He was wearing a Blackhawks cap backward, with dark aviator sunglasses hiding his eyes, making him look like a total badass. He had a large hockey bag and a pair of skates slung over his shoulder. The closer he got to me, the more I stared. I swear my eyelids were frozen wide open. The guy looked like he had stepped out of one of my dirty dreams.

“Excuse me,” the guy said.

He moved his glasses down his nose and peered at me with the most gorgeous dark eyes in the entire world. His chiseled, scruffy jaw made my knees go weak, and I hadn’t even run the stairs yet. I managed to nod without throwing myself at him. My normal cool demeanor had turned into nervous sweat.

He smiled, and the action drew my gaze to his plump, slightly chapped lips. “Could you tell me where to find Coach Corrin?”

“Um, what?” I said, sounding like a fool.

“Coach Corrin,” he repeated. “Where can I find him?”

“You’re late,” I said as my brain kicked into gear.

“Yeah, my plane was delayed. I’m Colton Daly, but everyone calls me CJ,” he said, shifting his bag so he could offer his hand to me.

“Oh right, you’re the transfer kid,” I said. My dad had talked about this guy before. He was the reason my dad had been working so hard with his assistant coaches. He’d said something about rearranging the offense to work this kid into his scheme. Apparently the guy had a shot like a laser. I still didn’t understand how he could play this year. Usually, when you transferred so quickly, you had to sit out a year.

“You on the team?” CJ asked.

I chuckled. “Nah, just allowed to use these fine facilities for my workout. I’ll show you the locker room.”

“Great,” he said.

It would have been simple to point the way, but my brain decided my body needed to follow him and make sure he made it to the locker room safe and sound. When he sauntered ahead of me, I decided my brain was brilliant. I discreetly checked him out. Too bad the bag he was carrying hid his ass and all his other clothing covered the muscles I was certain were hiding under his jacket and jeans.

I shook my head, silently scolding myself for looking at the guy. He was a fucking hockey player. I’d just gotten rid of one. I certainly didn’t need to pine after another one. He probably had a girlfriend or a stable of hockey whores. I wasn’t going back into the closet, and this guy didn’t need to be harassed by his new teammates for talking to me.

I also didn’t need any more complications. In a few days, my life was going to be owned by a small dark-haired woman who could send shivers down my spine with one stern look. She had a job to prepare me to take over the skating world. I wanted to win this year, not come in fourth place again. Winning meant a spot on the Olympic team, and I wanted the gold medal. US figure skating belonged at the top. I needed to stay focused on my goals. Danny had already managed to throw me off-balance.

“Through there,” I said, pushing on the men’s locker room door.

“Thanks,” CJ said. “I never caught your name.”

“That’s because I didn’t tell you,” I said and turned my back on him.

“It was nice not meeting you!” he shouted as I hightailed it into the weight room for an hour of stretching and light lifting. I put on some music and cleared my mind. It worked for about ten minutes, because Colton Daly and Danny Jackson kept barging into my thoughts. It was way too crowded, so I pushed them both out. The demons chuckled and whispered sweet nothings in my ears. I turned the music up louder and concentrated on the steps of my short program. My phone alarm finally beeped, telling me it was time to move forward with my workout.

I wasted another ten minutes messing around with my shoes before I smoothed out the list my dad had given me earlier. The only word I could see was stairs. It had been fun when the hockey team had to do them with me. But when it was only me against the stairs, it sucked. I had no way to avoid the things, and I was pretty sure Marina had spies embedded in the arena to make sure I did everything on her list.

On the ice, hockey players slapped pucks at the net and smashed each other into the boards. I chanced a glance and spotted him immediately. Colton Daly was flying around the rink, sidestepping guys before they even noticed he’d gone by them. He was smooth and fast, and it would be easy to stare at him for hours. I blinked and noticed Danny watching me. He followed my gaze and scowled as CJ whizzed by him.

I turned my attention to the stairs in front of me, ignoring all the drama on the ice. Hockey boys were off limits.

By the time I finished running, my clothes were wringing wet and my body was totally worn out. I dragged my aching bones back to the small locker room and grimaced when I looked at the rest of my day. Shower, lunch, two hours of ice time, five mile run, rest, dinner and more ice time. Marina had put an asterisk by the final ice time, meaning it was optional. In Marina-speak it translated to just do it and quit whining. As I was discarding my sweaty clothes, the door flew open.

“Hey, hurry up,” Eli said. “I’m starving.”

“Give me a minute to get the stink out,” I said.

“Good idea,” he said, pinching his nose. “Make it quick or I’ll eat your lunch.”

The hot water felt wonderful on my aching muscles—until I noticed the faded bite marks on my hips left behind by Danny. I frowned and turned the water off, then quickly dried my body. The demons snorted at me and poked at the bruises. I snapped a towel at them.

“What the hell are you doing?” Eli shouted when I came out half-dressed. “We’re losing valuable eating time.”

He tossed my shirt in my face and clicked his lip ring impatiently. I finished getting dressed and trudged behind him as he swung the small cooler Janae must have sent with him.

“Where are we going? I thought we were eating?”

“I want to check out the new team,” Eli said. “We can eat in the rink.”

“Eli,” I whined. “It’s men’s hockey. There are no girls in the arena, and you already saw enough of them this morning.”

“I’ve been thinking about expanding my horizons and trying out for the other team.”

“What the hell are you talking about? You can’t mean… what?” He cocked his head, giving me a shy smile. “Oh holy shit.” I choked and sputtered and mumbled about him being a moron and if he didn’t spill his guts right now, I was going to chop valuable parts off his body using my skate blades.

“Oh, all right,” he said. “I’ve been trying to tell you for weeks, but you insist on taking the limelight away from me by having a meltdown over some fucking hockey boy.”

“Sorry, next time I’ll be sure to schedule my nervous breakdown at a more convenient time for you.”

“You do that,” he said and led me into the chilled air of the rink. The shrill noise of whistles blowing assaulted my ears. The first day of on-ice practice was always interesting for everyone involved. Coach would let the guys mess around for about an hour. At the sound of the horn blaring through the arena, the coaching staff would appear. The players lined up on the blue line, waiting for instruction. They were twitchy, shuffling their skates and tapping their sticks on the ice, looking for permission to bang the shit out of each other and swat at buckets of pucks. Even the returning players clung tightly to their sticks in hope that this year it would be different. I knew better. My dad was a creature of habit.

The moment Coach Corrin put a skate blade to the ice, all eyes turned to him. For some reason, he commanded your attention, and no matter how hard you tried to ignore him, you eventually failed and gave him your rapt attention.

A few sports writers compared my demeanor on the ice at competitions with his behavior behind the bench. Nothing rattled him. People thought nothing bothered me, that nerves weren’t an issue. They asked me what secrets my father had shared with me. I always answered that the secret was told to me in confidence and I was not allowed to divulge the information, for fear of having my car taken away or getting grounded or some other goofy tidbit. They would laugh and scribble down the quotes.

In reality, it had been my mother who taught me how to handle the stress and not show my nerves when competing. Even now, I could still feel her presence. Sometimes, when the nerves were about to break me and I didn’t think I could handle any more, a gentle touch on my shoulder or a brush of warmth across my cheek would settle me. I couldn’t explain it, but I knew it was her.

She had always been in my corner, and I had wanted her there. My dad and I existed in the same space because it was a necessity, not a choice.

Coach blew a series of short shrill blasts, bringing me out of my stupor. I watched as the returning players skated across the ice and dumped their sticks beside the bench. The new players soon followed. The pucks were quickly rounded up and placed in a bucket behind the bench. The only things allowed on the ice for this practice were orange cones.

The older players solemnly lined up, followed by the newbies, who looked incredibly nervous. Coach smirked and his other coaches chuckled. This was his way of getting a feel for his new team. His philosophy behind a good hockey player revolved around the ability to skate well. Good skaters were better hockey players, and he always recruited the best skaters. Both my brother and I learned to skate before we were handed a hockey stick.

I tried to stay focused on my lunch, but my gaze floated across the ice, and landed right on Colton Daly. He was easy to spot. Eli bumped me with his knee.

“I thought you had a rule,” Eli said. He flicked the ring in his lip with his tongue.

“I was watching my dad,” I said defensively.

“Mm-hmm,” he said. “It looked like you were checking out the guy wearing number seventeen.”

I stuffed a forkful of salad into my mouth and ignored him.

“Is that the transfer kid?”

“Don’t know,” I lied.

“You do so know,” Eli said and swatted me in the head. I almost spit my lettuce on the ground.

“Will you quit hitting me!”

“Will you quit lying to me!”

“Fine. His name is Colton Daly, CJ for short. But that’s all I know,” I said and poked Eli with my fork. “He was late for practice and asked for directions.”

“And did you give him directions?”

I rolled my eyes. “I was polite.”

“You don’t really know how to be polite,” Eli said. CJ skated by us and Eli waved. I kicked him in the shin.

“Ow, now I’m going to have a bruise, and when I find a boyfriend, he’s going to think I like it rough.”

“Stop saying shit like that,” I begged. “If you’re trying to drive me crazy, it’s working.”

Eli shrugged and stuffed a handful of potato chips into his mouth. “I’m curious, and not everything is about you.” He waggled his eyebrows and winked at me.

“I will not be your experiment,” I said firmly.

“How do you know I couldn’t teach you a thing or two?”

“Can you?”

He clicked his lip ring against his teeth again. “Maybe.”

“Spill,” I said sternly. “Now.”

He blushed and my mouth fell open. Eli never blushed over anything. It had been my lifelong ambition in high school to embarrass the shit out of him. All my plans had been failures and usually ended up embarrassing me. I’d finally decided he had some sort of weird disorder that kept him from blushing. And now, talking about boys, Eli was as red as a glob of ketchup.

“Well, it was an accident really. I was at a bar and went to take a piss. A guy started talking to me. Normally, I fucking hate when someone strikes up a conversation when I’m taking care of business, so I turned to give him an icy glare, and fuck me, he had these brown eyes that made my knees go weak. I almost pissed on my shoes. Before I could think, I was leaving the bar with him and making out with him in his car.”

“Holy shit,” I murmured.

“Yeah, holy shit is right,” Eli repeated. “It was hot and heavy, and over before it got started. Came in my fucking pants dry humping some dude. Freaked me out. You weren’t here, and I didn’t know what to do.”

“You could have called,” I said.

“That’s not a phone conversation.”

“And an ice arena is the place for this conversation?”

“When is your next day off?”

“Saturday.”

“Great,” he said, stuffing the rest of his sandwich in his mouth. “Friday night we’re hitting it hard. I know once Marina gets here, you’ll be on a short leash.”

I could already feel the choke chain tightening. The competitive season was right around the corner and my long program still wasn’t right. The short was okay, but needed some fine-tuning. The Olympics made everything more important this year, from the music to the costume to where my blade was on the ice.

“Earth to Justin,” Eli said. He flicked my ear with his finger.

“Hey,” I said, rubbing the spot he tweaked. “What was that for?”

“You’re not paying attention to me,” he whined.

“I’m in shock,” I said. “You just told me you liked boys. I’ve been home for a month and things are all weird. Marina will be here on Monday. I’m positive Janae told her my programs aren’t that great and I still don’t have the quads and, fuck, you like boys.”