Chapter 1
Reid
Present Day
Media day was my least favorite day of the year as a coach.
I’d only been coaching professional hockey for three years—two years as an assistant coach, and now this year as the head coach of the Port City Badgers, one of the better teams in the league.
I’d come a long way from being a college coach and a high school one before that, but media day still sucked at every level.
Long hours spent being told what to do by photographers and videographers and social media experts, having makeup brushed over my face, lights flashed in my eyes—all the while I was not doing anything productive.
Sure, it was important, obviously, and the fans loved the kind of shenanigans we got up to on media day that they could see throughout the year on their television.
I understood its importance. That didn’t mean I didn’t hate every minute of it.
I wanted to be in my office, meeting with my assistant coaches to discuss our strategies.
I’d rather be visualizing plays or reviewing the games from previous seasons so I could get to know my players, learn their strengths and weaknesses.
There was a lot for me to do as the new coach on the team, the most important of which was getting to know my players.
As of right now, I hadn’t met a single one of them in person.
At least I was on the ice.
And this wasn’t even the true media day.
This was simply a photoshoot to announce that I was the new head coach, as if the news hadn’t been leaked hours earlier.
None of the big news outlets were picking it up because it wasn’t official, and any speculation could come back to bite them in the ass if it wasn’t true.
Someone had caught wind of the news, and a blogger had broken the story.
Me being the new coach of the Port City Badgers was no longer a secret.
“All right, we’re going to have you on the ice with our badger mascot, Benny. Just stand there. Look serious. He’s going to be silly all around you. We’ll get some video, and then we’ll do photos.”
Great. Mascots were one thing I didn’t quite understand—another thing that the fans loved but really didn’t add much to hockey in general. At least not from my perspective. I was interested in the game, not the entertainment.
But alas, it was all part of the job.
The mascot was already on the ice when I got out there, skating around, warming up, doing some antics.
He looked like maybe he was practicing some kind of skit.
I didn’t know who he was, but the kid clearly knew his way around the rink.
He was faster and more graceful than many of the other mascots I’d seen.
A lot of them could barely hold themselves up on skates or they wore those fake booties that were just shoes.
This guy was in a pair of actual hockey skates.
He seemed to know what he was doing. A former player maybe?
I likely wouldn’t bother to find out. It wasn’t like we would run in the same circles.
I spent a few minutes skating around, getting warmed up, even though I really didn’t need to. It was nice to just be on the ice, even if there were fifty different people surrounding me, setting up the cameras and whatnot.
Finally, the photographer and the social media manager, Josh, called us over.
“Coach Garrison, we’re going to have you stand on this mark here. I want you to stand tall, hands at your sides. We’ll have Benny skating around you, being silly. It’s important that you keep a straight face. We want you to look serious.”
That shouldn’t be difficult. I could care less what the mascot did, whoever he was. He could stand on his head and do backflips and I wouldn’t care.
Actually, backflips while wearing ice skates would be pretty impressive. And in a heavy mascot suit? I’d probably have to do a double take.
“No problem,” I said.
I kept my face neutral while the badger, whose name was Benny—or was the kid in the costume named Benny?—skated around me. He held up two fingers to give me bunny ears, he skated circles around me and pretending to throw punches at me.
He never spoke out loud. It was one of the rules of being a mascot—no talking while in costume.
Instead, his handlers spoke for him. He had two.
A quiet omega named Kier and an alpha named Jason who carried a clipboard.
The two of them seemed to be working closely with the videographers on what to capture.
It was a lot of orchestration for a few photos.
“Are we about done here?” I asked after an hour.
The badger next to me never broke character.
He put his paws on his hips and tapped his foot, as if he was still in clown mode.
Then he lifted one arm and tapped his wrist with the other, while staring at the crowd in front of us.
There had to be twenty people with cameras pointing at us right then.
Great. I was being mocked by a man in a white, furry badger costume.
“Just a few more minutes.”
I let out a sigh. It was part of the job. It had been a hell of a day, though.
The badger used his paw to pat my shoulder in a “there, there” gesture. I shot him a look, one brow raised in question. I couldn’t see anything through the thick mask.
His fur was black and white. Two thick black rings circled his eyes. He wore a blue helmet with ears that stuck out the sides. The strap clipped under his chin. His jersey was the same as the players’ jerseys, only his number was fifteen.
I gestured to the shirt. “That was my college number,” I said.
He looked down at his shirt and back up at me.
He jumped up and down and clapped his paws like that was the most exciting news he’d ever heard.
That time he did get me. I couldn’t help but grin.
Of course, that set him off even more. He pointed at my face, then covered his mouth with one hand, doubling over in laughter.
He then pointed at the cameras so that they would see.
They were snapping away. Flashes popped, blinding my eyes.
All the while I kept the grin, since that was apparently making the photographers happy.
“I think we’re set here, Coach. You and Benny can hit the showers.”
Benny elbowed me, and when I looked at him, his eyebrows waggled suggestively. I didn’t even know they could move. There must be a button or control somewhere in the costume that he could move them. They looked like large, back caterpillars over his big eyes.
“Benny, we have a few more shots we need of you skating around before you’re done for the day,” the alpha with the clipboard said.
Benny nodded, then skated away from me. I watched him move. He clearly had played before. He held the stick like a player, and handled the puck like one too.
I dragged my gaze away from him. I had work to do. A lot of it if I wanted to be prepared for my team.