Chapter 7
SEVEN
Logan
“Mantei, drills at the net,” Coach yells my way.
I give him a mock salute and skate toward where he directed me. I get in the position and skate loosely for a bit before we work on the actual drills. Every time he blows the whistle, I move, always at the ready to block a puck.
By the time he lets me take a quick break, my thighs are on fire, and I am a bit out of breath. That’s not a determent though. I grab my bottle to squirt some water in my mouth before getting back at it.
The next three hours go about the same, with more drills, some more specific than others, followed by a scrimmage. Sweat pours down the sides of my head, under the helmet, as I make my way off the ice.
“Good job, brother!” Sebastian puts his glove up for us to fist bump. “We look pretty good, if I say so myself.”
I chuckle at the proud tone in his voice.
“Yeah,” I agree. “Hopefully it will translate in the game next week.”
We’ll be on the road, and it truly sucks losing on the road. Actually, I’m not sure which one would suck worse, a loss on the road or at home.
Once we made our way to the locker room, I walk over to the bench in front of my locker and start taking my gear off. By the time I am done, I feel fifty pounds lighter. My muscles are tense, longing for an ice bath that will be followed by a hot shower.
Sebastian seems to have the same idea because he follows me out to the ice tubs. No sooner we are settled in, I drop my head back, closing my eyes and relaxing my body.
“You know,” his voice snaps me out of it. “You should talk to your agent about looking for a team who needs a first line goalie.”
I turn my head and look at him in surprise. “I’m trying to work my way toward that.”
“Yeah,” he shrugs. “But I think you could get there faster if you’re actively looking.”
Self-doubt makes me question what he’s telling me. “Do you think I am good enough to play first line?”
“If you weren’t, the Aces wouldn’t have considered you at all.”
I nod but don’t say anything more about it.
Just the fact that I am good enough to play professionally is huge.
All my dreams came true when the Sliders called me up.
And now that I am with the Aces, I am one position higher than before, putting me only one step behind the final goal, no pun intended.
Maybe Sebastian has a point, I think to myself.
“Time’s up.” He taps me on the arm as he gets out of the ice tub. I follow suit, and we walk together toward the showers.
“Don’t go if you’re done before me,” he says. “I got questions.”
I snicker at the way he says it, like we’re in high school. “Questions about what?”
“Last night,” he says right before stepping into his shower stall.
My heart slams against my ribs almost instantly, wondering if he saw me leaving with Elizabeth. And now that he put her in my head, I can’t stop thinking about her.
Earlier this morning, after I spelled out to her all the reasons why we couldn’t go public with whatever we had between us, I could see her obvious disappointment.
It’s like we’re starting over from square one, except that this time, it would be her who could get in trouble if they found out about us.
The thing about that is that I’m not sure how much she actually cared about it. I guess she has something to fall back on if she loses her job here. Going back to her father would be the easiest thing.
That puts a whole lot of weight on me. It’s me who is hesitant to take the risk and go public with her. What happened in New York affected me a lot. I am not willing to jeopardize my career, especially not when it is on the right track. It’s a much better track than I was on before coming here.
With that said, guilt eats at me. I am pulled in two different directions, and I’m not quite sure which one is more important to me.
Elizabeth’s beautiful face floats through my head, making me question everything. The fact that she followed me here tells me how much she cares about me. In fact, she told me last night that she still loved me.
“Fuck,” I mumble to myself.
Deciding that I will come up with a good plan for both of us, I rinse off the soap coating my body before stepping out of the shower.
There’s a large white towel waiting for me on a small stool right outside of it.
I grab it and start drying off, then wrap it around my waist. When I glance in the stall next to me, I see that Sebastian got out before me.
With a little bit of luck, he left the arena already as well.
My wet feet make a flip-flopping sound against the rubber slides I got on as I make my way back to my locker. The room is fairly quiet, with most of the guys either out in the ice room or in the showers. There are only a few in here. One of them is Sebastian.
“I was waiting for you.” He grins at me, and I flip him off.
Not in any rush, I take my time with getting dressed. When finally done, I glance at Sebastian, noticing how frustrated he looks with my lack of enthusiasm to chat with him.
“The fact that you’re dragging your feet about talking to me is very intriguing, so you know,” he informs me. “I was going to drop it, but now, no way.”
Finally realizing that I won’t get out of this, I drop all my stuff in the gear bag and zip it up with one aggressive move. I yank it off the floor and turn around to face him.
“After you, princess.” I bow down and motion for him to walk ahead of me. The move manages to attract the attention of the other players in the room. They snicker and cat call while we make our way out.
Once in the parking lot, my eyes instinctively go over the cars I see out there, hoping to spot Elizabeth’s car.
When I do, my heart picks up a little, hoping that I catch a glimpse of her.
I was totally focused while at practice, but now that my brain has time to think, it is obsessed with wondering what she’s up to and if she misses me.
Thankfully, Sebastian decides to unknowingly interrupt my train of thought. “Let’s go to that pizza place by my house.”
“I’ll follow you there.”
I make my way to the truck and throw my bag in the back. Just as I am about to open the driver’s door, I decide to scan the parking lot one more time. No Elizabeth, at least not that I can tell through my squinting eyes.
The drive to the pizza place is long, but only because of the traffic and not because it’s far. I park my truck next to Sebastian’s large SUV, then make my way inside the restaurant where he’s already secured a table.
“The sun is wild,” I comment when I take a seat across from him while I push my sunglasses high on my head.
He nods in agreement. “Dude, I literally see spots when I’m out without sunglasses. I sure hope I’ll get used to it. But it sure is bright. I had to pay extra for some heavy-duty curtains on my windows so it doesn’t feel like I am under sun surveillance at all times.”
“Sun surveillance,” I laugh. “That’s a good one. And it sure feels like it.”
A waitress approaches our table, and we take a minute to go back and forth about what we want on our pizza. We end up deciding on an extra large, with half of it containing what I want, and the other with his weird stuff.
“Who the fuck puts pineapple on pizza?” I ask once the waitress is out of ear shot. “It makes me gag just thinking about.”
“For your information,” Sebastian points a finger at me, “pineapple is very healthy for you.”
“On a pizza?” My voice comes out higher than intended.
He just shrugs. “I’ll make sure to ask the new junior nutritionist about it when I see her.”
And just like that, all my amusement dies.
“Very smooth in the way you brought her up,” I comment, hoping that I am not giving anything away.
Sebastian leans over the table, like he’s a little kid. “I actually thought it would be harder for you to get where I was going with that. But now that we are on the same page, so to speak, I’ll get right to it.”
“Please do.” I roll my eyes at him, aware that he probably knows a lot more than I thought.
He smirks at me. “You really make this too easy for me,” he says. “But anyway, to make a long story short, I saw you two this morning.”
I frown at that, because it doesn’t make any sense. “This morning? How?”
My new house is in the opposite direction from the place he rents, so not like he would just happen by on his way home.
“When you dropped her off at the pub,” Sebastian explains. “For her car.”
I play stupid. “What car?”
And now it’s his turn to roll his eyes at me. “The one she walked toward after she got out of your truck. That would also be the only car left in the parking lot there overnight.”
I drop my head back and rub my hands up and down my face.
“I was on my way to the arena,” Sebastian continues. “And imagine my surprise when I see you two kissing like you’d never see each other again.”
“What did you do?” I ask. “Pull over to watch us kiss? Is that the only excitement you get nowadays?”
The waitress picks that exact moment to come with our order. She places the very large pizza in the middle of the table, making sure we each get the half we ordered.
“Hey, you remembered,” Sebastian winks at her. “That’s an extra tip for you.”
“I never forget the customers who ask for pineapple on their pizza,” she teases back. “It’s weird.”
He puts both hands over his heart. “You wound me,” he says. “I won’t take the extra tip back, but still, not nice.”
While they flirt back and forth, I grab a slice from my half and take a big bite out of it before placing it on the paper plate in front of me. By the time they’re done talking, I am ready for slice two.
“Anyway…” Sebastian says around a bite of pineapple pizza as soon as the girl leaves. “I know you think this just distracted me from the reason why I wanted to talk to you, but no luck.”
I roll my eyes and continue eating my pizza. “What the hell do you want to know?”
Apparently, that’s all Sebastian needs to hear. He finishes his first slice, then grabs the glass of water sitting next to his plate and finishes it in two large gulps. He grabs another piece of pizza and gets ready to interrogate me.
“That’s the girl from back in New York, right? The daughter of the Sliders’ owner.”
I don’t think there’s any reason to lie to him. “Yes.”
He fires his next question. “And you didn’t know she’d be at the bar last night?”
“I didn’t know she would be in Texas, period,” I confess.
That seems to throw him off. “You told her to follow you here but didn’t know she’d do it? Maybe she wanted to surprise you.”
I shake my head. “I didn’t ask her to follow me here.”
“You didn’t?” He frowns at me.
Shaking my head again, I continue eating my pizza. Sebastian doesn’t look like he can’t focus on his food anymore.
“I’m confused,” he finally says.
That makes me laugh. “I can tell.”
“So, she got you in trouble back in New York, then she followed you here without you asking? Like a stalker?”
I don’t like hearing that about Elizabeth. In my head, I see her sweet face, looking all worried about being here with no warning.
“She’s not a stalker.”
Sebastian shakes his head at me, his eyes looking like they’re about to fall out of his head. “I thought you weren’t with anyone since you moved to Austin.”
“I wasn’t.”
The wheels are turning in his head. I can tell that he has lots of questions that he doesn’t know how to put into words, so I decide to give him a helping hand.
“We were together for a few months before I left New York,” I explain. “After that, there was a lot going on. I was in negotiations to transfer here. I tried calling her, but, apparently, her father had blocked my number with the phone carrier.”
Sebastian nods along like he understands what I’m telling him while it’s obvious that he’s still confused.
“So you didn’t talk to her in, what, months?”
“Six months,” I confirm.
He chokes on his pizza. “You haven’t talked in six months, and she just decided to move here for you?”
When he puts it like that, it does make seem a bit, what’s a good word for it here, unbalanced, maybe.
“She needed a new start in life,” I shrug. “It’s not like her life would be over if things didn’t work out between us.”
“Wow…” Sebastian is at a loss for words. He takes another bite of food, obnoxious in the way he chews.
“She’s a really nice girl,” I insist. “And I was happy to see her.”
That makes him to rush when he swallows so he can speak. “You didn’t look so happy about it last night. And you didn’t even tell the guys about her. If she’s your girl, they should know. They’re all chomping at the bit to ask her out.”
My jaw clenches at hearing that. “They can’t ask her that.”
“Why?” he scoffs. “Jealous?”
“No,” I scowl at him. “There are rules about staff fraternization. She could lose her job.”
“Not if she goes out with a player,” he rushes to say with a mouthful.
I swear to God, I think I saw food flying out of his mouth when he mumbled the words. But he does have my attention.
“What do you mean?”
Sebastian taps his chest with his fist when he looks like he is about to choke on his food. An almost silent burp follows.
“When I walked in this morning,” he explains, “I ran into the HR lady. I asked.”
“What the fuck,” I mutter. “Asked what exactly?”
“I asked if players were allowed to date the office girls,” he shrugs.
My jaw goes slack as I stare at him. “Just like that?”
“Yeah,” he shrugs. “What’s the big deal?” He grabs a napkin to wipe at his hands and mouth. “She said it’s no issue. The staff does have a fraternization clause in their employment agreements, but only for other office staff. There’s no mention of the players.”
I blink at him, unsure of how to process what he just told me.
“Feel free to warn everybody off your woman.”
He puts his arm up for us to high five. I just stare at it, wondering how I should proceed going forward. I had just decided that it should all be under wraps for a while, for Elizabeth’s benefit.
Apparently, there’s no reason for secrecy.
What do I want?