Chapter Four
Tristan
I have mixed feelings about leaving Minnie alone in the house. Yes, she has Kepler, but what if she has another panic attack? I hate the idea of her going through that alone. I wish one of my sisters or my mom lived closer. But they’re a country away.
Despite my concerns, I don’t reach out to her while I’m on the road for an away game. Our only contact comes in the form of very brief texts from her with direct questions about where things are kept in the house, and my equally impersonal responses.
On the plane ride home, I scroll through my messages while I chomp my way through a bag of beef jerky. It’s stupid how fast a few words from her can light up my phone—and my chest.
Minnie: Where do you keep the detergent?
Me: On the wire rack above the washing machine.
Minnie: Do you keep spare lightbulbs in the house?
Me: Check the top right of the hall closet.
Minnie: Do you own a vacuum sealer?
Me: Is that something for cleaning?
Minnie: For food.
Me: Oh, gotcha. No, I don’t have one.
“You’re texting a lot,” Viktor observes as he peeks over my shoulder in search of blackmail material, I can only assume.
I place my whole hand over his face and push him back. “Personal space, dude.”
He squawks in protest, then licks my palm.
“Gross.” I wipe my hand on his shirt. “And no, I’m texting Minnie. You know, my assistant? The woman who lives in my house?”
“You’re banging your assistant? Even Dante knows you never shit where you eat.”
“No. She’s asking me about lightbulbs, for fuck’s sake.” I shove the phone up under his nose. “Happy?”
To my consternation, Viktor takes the phone from me and scrolls through the messages. “These are quaint. Very domestic. That’s wifey shit right there.”
He pushes the phone back toward me. My stomach dips, because for half a second, I picture it—her in my kitchen, her voice in my house—and that shouldn’t feel good.
And I guess he’s… kinda not wrong. I mean, he’s extremely wrong about my relationship with Minnie, but not about the part where I invited a stranger to live through my house and paw through my stuff.
I never lived with any of my exes, but I’ve already talked Minnie through a panic attack and left her unsupervised with all my earthly possessions.
Viktor takes my silence for agreement. “Ha! You are banging your assistant!”
“Knock it off, or I’ll tell your wife you were harassing me on the job.”
Viktor immediately backs off, though he makes a big show of sulking.
I shake my head at his nonsense. “Tell me, Captain Abbott, what’s it like to be married to the only woman you know who could, and does, kick your ass on a regular basis?”
I expect him to launch at me with a comeback, but instead, his eyes go dreamy and unfocused. “Honestly? It’s fantastic.”
Well, shit, and now I’m jealous. Maybe someday I’ll end up in the kind of relationship that makes me half as happy as Viktor’s marriage to Knova makes him.
My phone buzzes again.
Minnie: You’re out of salt.
Minnie: And garlic powder.
I smile down at my phone. She’s practically a stranger, but it’s a pleasant novelty to know that I have someone waiting for me at home. Someone who is… cooking? She’s touching my things. Using my kitchen. Acting like the space is hers, too. And somehow… I like that.
Me: No problem. I’ll pick up more tomorrow.
* * *
It didn’t occur to me to ask exactly why Minnie was going through my herbs and spices, so when I open the front door later, I’m not prepared for the sight of my kitchen.
“Sorry.” She looks up from what I take to be my new vacuum sealer. “I lost track of time.”
I take in the pile of individually packaged snacks stacked on my kitchen island, the pot simmering on my stove, and the smell of drying apples wafting from the oven. “No problem. This is more action than the kitchen has seen since I moved in. What am I looking at?”
“You have a lot of processed crap and instant food in the pantry and freezer. Don’t worry, I didn’t throw anything out, but… you’re an athlete. Nutrition is important. For everyone, obviously, but being physically fit is part of your job. Here.”
Nobody’s ever done this for me. Not my exes.
Not anyone. Not like this. She holds out a ball of, shit, I don’t know, it kind of looks like it came out the back end of an animal.
I accept her offering and seriously consider tossing it in the trash.
But she’s watching me intently, waiting for my reaction, and given how many hot dogs I’ve eaten over the course of my life, it’s not like whatever she’s made is beneath me.
I bite it in half and roll it around in my mouth.
“Oh,” I mumble. “Shff. Aff goof.” I hold up one finger, chew, and swallow. “Sorry, shouldn’t talk with my mouth full. But that’s good. What’s in there?”
Minerva ticks her answers off on her fingers. “Dark chocolate, beetroot powder, honey, salt, collagen, almond flour, and love.”
I pause with the other half raised halfway to my lips. “Love? Is that a euphemism for something? Is this like…the healthy equivalent of a pot brownie?”
The cutest lopsided smile sneaks onto her face. “No. It means what I said. I bake with love.”
My chest goes warm at that—too warm—and I pretend it’s from the beetroot. “Got it. These are great. Thank you, Minnie.”
“I’ve been careful to balance the micro- and macronutrients on all these snacks, and I’ve made a spreadsheet so that you can track what you’re eating during your away games, with suggested meals for the times you go out to eat with the team.
At home, of course, I can be more involved in making sure that our meals are both nutrient-rich and delicious.
I’ve done a lot of research. Also. Do you mind calling me Minerva?
Um… does it bother you to have to say that many syllables?
I know the team mostly goes by nicknames. ”
“Is that your full name?” I ask, surprised.
She nods, her eyes trained on her cooking project rather than my face. I know she’s usually single-minded about her tasks, but I suspect that she’s also avoiding eye contact. Does she think I’d refuse?
“It’s pretty. And it suits you.” She wants to be called by her full name. Not smaller. Not minimized. Good.
“Because I’m pretty.” Her voice is flat, like she’s calling me out for some bullshit, even though I wasn’t trying to throw an empty compliment her way.
“Because Minerva was the goddess of intellectuals, right? In Greece or Rome or whatever.”
Minerva raises her head and blinks owlishly, which is also thematically appropriate, given the goddess’s sacred bird. “Minerva was the Roman name.”
“And the Greeks called her Athena, right?” I test my luck and sneak another of those tasty chocolate-and-beetroot balls. “She was the goddess of machines and innovation, but also of guarding the home, if I remember my high school history correctly. So, yeah, it suits you.”
Minerva’s cheeks turn pink. “That… is a very nerdy compliment.”
The way she blushes makes something low in my core tighten. I pick up one of the baggies and point to the label, on which she’s scrawled ENERG-8. “Are you really calling me a nerd?”
“We can both be nerds,” she murmurs, but she’s smiling.
“And here I was afraid we’d have to fight to establish nerd-dominance.”
She considers this. “It would have to be a nerdy fight, though, wouldn’t it?”
“You, me, Trivial Pursuit, after dinner?”
“I’d like that,” she says.
“Let me grab a shower, and we’ll make it happen.”
We sit down to the game two hours later, after I’ve cleared and washed the dishes from dinner, and Minerva has changed into pajamas. Kepler drapes himself across her shoulders like a scarf while we play.
To nobody’s surprise, Minerva kicks my ass. But it doesn’t matter. Because when she smiles at me that way, I feel stupidly proud of myself.
* * *
By the time our next away game rolls around, I can already feel a difference in both my body and my performance. I’ve been killing it during practice, and I can tell tonight is going to be my best game of the season so far. While we change for the game against the Redhawks, I sneak a pregame snack.
Sneak might not be the right word, actually. I’ve barely peeled back the plastic when Knight pops up at my elbow.
“Whatcha got there, buddy?”
“A pre-game boost.” I do a body-block on my stash. “It’s not what you think.”
“Really?” Knight cranes his neck to get a better look. “Because I think your assistant hand-made something tasty just for you.”
“Oh, then maybe it is what you think.” I know when I’m beat. The other guys are already crowding around, having sensed that I’m holding out on them.
“What are they?” Viktor asks. Without giving me time to answer, he reaches out to grab one from the open package.
I roll my eyes at him. “No, really. Help yourself.”
Viktor swallows his, the way I imagine a python would shotgun a helpless baby bird. “These are good. What’s in them?”
“Collagen, almond flour, dark chocolate, beet root…”
Camden snorts. “Seriously? We should rebrand the team as The Vegan Venom.”
“They’re really good, actually,” Viktor says.
“Oh, and love.”
He cocks his head at me. “What?”
“The other ingredient is love.” I point to the printed ingredients label that Minerva printed off for every vacuum-sealed bag. In case you want to share, she said. I didn’t plan to, but that’s Viktor to a T.
Viktor’s lips move as he reads the ingredients.
He laughs when he sees the last one, which is, indeed, love.
“I was not expecting that.” He takes advantage of my distraction to snag a second treat from the open package.
At least he slows down enough to chew this time.
He sighs in rapture. “I want an assistant.”
“And I want to be there when you tell Knova.”
Knight opens another bag of my treats. Sneaky bastard, I didn’t even see him reach into my duffle. “I don’t want to be there. Leave the curtains open so I can watch from a safe distance.”
“If I bring popcorn, can I watch, too?” Owen asks.