Chapter 3
King
“You are your own worst fucking enemy!” A vein on coach’s forehead stands out, ready to burst as he throws a folding chair across the equipment room with a clatter.
The team physician’s assistant stands next to me, stitching up the cut on the side of my head from the beer bottle that little brunette landed before she jumped on my back like a rabid spider monkey. But it’s not her I’m thinking of. It’s the killer redhead that scurried out of there before I could pin her down.
Coach jabs a finger my way. “You’re lucky the police called me to come pick your ass up!”
“I feel lucky.” I wince as the needle pierces my scalp. The sharp poke, then the slick sensation of the thread being pulled through aren’t enough to distract me from the gnawing need to run back to the bar and find out whatever I can about the redhead.
“There you go.” The curved needle makes a soft click as Terrance, our team PA and all-purpose mess-cleaner-upper, drops it onto the stainless-steel tray next to a few drying crimson droplets. “You know the drill, keep it clean—”
I wave him off, hopping down from the table, my tennis shoes squeaking as they hit the glossy laminate flooring.
I nod as coach goes on about my suspension and how the team comes first.
I’m barely listening as I grab my phone from my back pocket, the screen filled with notifications, most of which I will ignore, especially tonight, because I know pictures and video of me knocking that guy out are circulating on phones and computers all over metro Detroit.
Anyway, I have more important things in mind. Like tracking down the beauty from the restaurant.
“What’s the King of Chaos gotten himself into now?” My best friend and the team goalie, Victor Kozlov, comes striding through the door with a smirk and a wink. “Another hole in his head won’t make no difference. Now, a good smack on the other side of that nose might help.”
“Fuck off,” I grumble as Victor does a Rocky Balboa style double punch to my gut. “Let’s go, asshole.” I nod toward the door.
“Rude. I interrupted a perfectly good threesome to come babysit you.”
I grimace. “Jesus. When was the last time you were tested?” I ask, shoving my phone back into my jeans pocket, then acknowledging Terrance. “Thanks again. I’ll bring that first edition of Stone Fox I found to practice tomorrow, tell Jakey I’m rooting for him.”
It’s his son’s favorite book. He’s recovering from his third surgery for a congenital heart defect, and I spent three hours at King books yesterday trying to find something that would cheer him up.
“Not a problem. And thanks, man, he idolizes you.” He gives me a half-smile with a jerk of his head toward coach, who is cross-armed and tight-lipped, watching me from his position against the wall under the team roster for our next game.
Which doesn’t include me.
“Very fucking touching,” coach says with an eye roll. “If only we could get video of you scouring the aisles at King Books for first editions for sick kids instead of knocking out cheating husbands, maybe you’d be back on the ice before the season is over. And you,” he points at Victor, “should be in the weight room.”
“What? I keep all my muscles in shape year-round.” Victor grabs his crotch on a smile that shows off one missing upper incisor and the lower one made out of 14K gold, then curls his lip in distaste, jerking his thumb toward me. “This one’s season-long no pussy rule would break me.”
“I don’t want to talk about what you do with your dicks,” Coach snarls, jabbing his finger my way. “The only reason you’re not sitting in county right now is because this town loves you, I know the chief of police, and that couple didn’t want their dirty laundry aired all over the city. You get your shit straight.” He turns to glare at Victor. “You keep his ass outta trouble, or I’m gonna take it out on you, too.”
“Me?” Victor feigns horror. He’s not scared of anything. What most don’t know is his family is fairly high-level Bratva, and on occasion he’s used his connections to take care of problems that didn’t want to go away. He runs his hand down the front of his System of a Down t-shirt with an impish look. “What am I supposed to do if he sneaks out to throw himself into a catfight in the elementary school pickup line?”
“I’m not fucking around!” Coach barks, pushing his shoulders off the wall, jaw clenched as he glares at me. “I told you to do everything that doctor tells you to do, and if you’re lucky, he’ll get you back on the ice in two games instead of five. You don’t straighten the fuck up, you’ll get a permanent suspension. Or jail time.”
“The asshole had it coming. He’s lucky I stopped when I did.”
The image of her standing there wide-eyed as he called her a whore has rage bubbling in my belly.
I’ve been angry at the world since birth. My fuse is microscopic and if I’m not careful, it’s going to be the thing that not only helped me get to where I’m at in my hockey career, but also the thing that ends it.
The first glimpse of her in that dress will live rent-free in my mind for the rest of my life. I’m getting stiff thinking of her tits and hips and that mane of fire that brushed over the creamy skin of her shoulders.
“I don’t give a shit,” Coach roars. “For the next week, you lay low. Stay off the radar of any media unless you are helping a little old lady cross the street or saving a goddamn kitten from a tree. You go to therapy, you work out, jerk off, and that’s fucking it!”
“What the fuck is an empath any-fucking way?” I throw up my hands, wanting this whole shit show to be over so I can get back to that bar and put some screws to whoever is necessary to get the information I need. “And emotional IQ? Who the fuck made that up? I need to be cuddled about as much as I need a fucking babysitter.”
Victor pokes the side of my head over my newly sewn together scalp as I cock back and take a swing, but he darts out of range.
Coach looks like he’s about to have an aneurysm. “That’s fucking it! I’m done with this conversation. You get to that therapist in the morning. You do whatever the fuck it is a professional cuddler tells you to do, and you get your ass back in play. Or, you’re not going to like our next conversation.”
I don’t like this one.
He turns on his heel and stomps out the back doors of the training room, kicking a stainless-steel table over as he goes, but all I can think of is her.
I hate what happened. Down into the marrow of my bones. She deserves to be someone’s queen, not some shit stain’s side piece.
The only upside about it is I don’t have to go deliver the bad news to a boyfriend that she’s no longer available, explaining in whatever way necessary that I’m replacing him. Starting right fucking now.
“Come on, dipshit.” Victor straight arms though the door to the back hall that leads toward the team parking lot, jerking his head for me to follow. “I’m ready for a sleepover with pillow fights and scrolling insta.” He says in a high-pitched voice, tossing his imaginary hair back with a flick of his hand.
“Fuck off,” I answer, punching at my phone screen then raising it to my ear as I follow him down the hall and through the back door. The early spring evening air does nothing to cool my fury.
“Don’s On Main,” a cheerful female voice answers.
“Yeah, I was there earlier. This is King Hertzof.” I don’t like to name-drop for favors, but in this case, I’d offer up my left nut to get the information I need.
There’s a soft gasp, then, “Yes, Mr. Hertzof. We are so sorry about what happened here earlier. What can I do for you? The manager said he already offered you—”
“Yeah, I need information on the woman that was involved.”
“The police report has the other parties involved on record. The man and his wife—”
I interrupt her again. “No, I don’t care about them. It was the girl, the one that left. Wearing a red dress and black boots.”
My dick throbs as I describe her. I never get a hard-on during the season. I’ve trained myself not to. I also never touch pussy from the first practice of the season until we play our last game. I play better frustrated, and right now I could win the fucking championship single-handed.
“I’m not sure,” she says. “I wasn’t here, I just heard what happened, but I can ask if anyone knows her.”
“Yeah, do that. I’ll be there in a half hour. I want to know everything,” I snap as we walk through the parking lot in the chilled mid-April night.
“No, he won’t!” Victor yells into the dark sky, squeezing the key fob to his Ford F250 Raptor.
“Yes, I will,” I confirm with the hostess, flipping him off, then finish, “Tell the manager I’m on my way. I want to see the security footage, too.”
I click off, walking toward Victor’s truck as my temples and my cock throb in unison.
“Don’t even start.” I glare at Victor. “We are picking up my truck at the bar.”
My tone leaves no room for discussion. He frowns with a disappointed scowl, then swings open his driver’s side door as I climb into the passenger seat. As I settle in, my mouth is dry and there’s a hollow, knocking feeling in my chest. I know I should go straight home but seems it’s my other head that’s running the show right now.
And that never ends well.
“That was a fucking bust.Come on, let’s go to my place,” Victor says as I stomp out the front door of Don’s, my dick harder than when I walked in.
No one there knew the redhead, but the manager let me watch the grainy security footage of her walking in, standing with the asshole, then, yeah, the rest of it, and then her high-tailing it out the door.
“I’m not sleeping in your guestroom,” I snap. “God knows what’s gone on in there. You wanna babysit me? You do it at my place.”
Victor narrows his eyes at me. “Fine, whatever. We got a shot at the cup this year. We need you on the ice, man. Do whatever you gotta do, keep your no-pussy bullshit superstition going, I don’t care, but the team needs you. The team comes first, right?”
He points at me until I nod, then returns the gesture.
“Hey!” I shout, before he hops into his truck and I unlock my navy-blue Ford F250. “If anyone can find someone, it’s you. Ask your uncle. I’ve got the footage.”
“After the playoffs. After we win the cup. Then, I’ll ask. Until then, you’re keeping your dick in lock down. I’m not risking you getting inside some crazy redheaded pussy.”
I hate that he’s right. I play better when I’m keyed up. Frustrated. My abstinence pisses the puck bunnies off, but they’ve never been my enticement to begin with.
“Gonna have to simmer down,” I tell my hard-on as I start up the truck and head out onto Woodward, with Victor following behind. I try to comfort myself with the knowledge that if anyone can find someone, it’s his family.
But waiting is going to kill me.