Chapter 24
Present Day
In the morning, I put the creepy note out of my mind and spend another few hours scouting with ButterScorch, followed by several hours in my hotel room writing up my reports.
On the plus side, I’m editing these reports while dining on a fifty-dollar room-service lunch. I’m stirring my Ritz coffee with a literal silver spoon.
My job is a little weird and a little wonderful. I only hope I can hang on to it.
Things get even better a few hours later when I slip into a plush pedicure chair at the nail salon that Darcy has found for us. The faint scent of lavender wafts around me as warm water bubbles around my lucky feet.
I can’t really afford this splurge, but it sure is nice.
Across from me sits Kim, a young nail technician with sleek black hair swept into a bun. She’s arranging her tools on a tray with the precision of an artist. “Is there any particular shape you prefer for your nails?” she asks.
I’m a jock who rarely makes time for a pedicure, so I just shrug. “Do whatever you think is best.”
She frowns. “Did you choose a nail color?”
Oops.
“How about I choose for both of us? For luck.” Darcy holds up a bottle. “See?”
The nail polish is in Legends blue. “Good idea. Why be normal when we can be superstitious?”
“Right? And if we win tonight,” Darcy says, “we’ll have to get new pedicures in the same color every two weeks for the rest of the season.”
“Maybe we can even expense it.”
We both laugh, and the nail technician squints at us, but she doesn’t say anything. She goes to work on my right foot, while the left rests in a warm bath.
Darcy sighs happily beside me. “This is the highest use of my dinner break.”
“Yeah,” I agree, sinking a little deeper into the chair as Kim’s skilled hands massage my arches. “I’m grateful you’re wasting it on me.”
“Totally worth it,” Darcy agrees. “I’ll spend my per diem money on food at the stadium.”
Ten minutes later, Darcy and I are having a very important discussion about whether or not skinny jeans are back when the salon door swings open to admit my nemesis.
Steve Sailor.
“Oh shit,” Darcy whispers, raising her magazine to hide her face. “He tracked us here.”
“How?” I demand. Unfortunately I don’t have a magazine to hide behind.
“My phone belongs to the Legends, and when we’re traveling, anyone in management can see my location.”
“Well, that’s a terrible deal,” I mutter.
Sailor glances at the customers seated at manicure tables and frowns. But then he gets a clue and raises his gaze to the row of pedicure chairs in back.
“Busted.” Darcy sighs.
The manager at the reception desk gives him a glare, but Sailor swaggers in our direction anyway. “Evening, ladies!” Without asking permission, he jumps onto the dais and plops down in the empty pedicure chair beside mine.
“Can I help you?” the manager asks, her voice chilly.
“Just here for a quick chat.”
“Steve,” Darcy says primly. “You can’t take the seat of a paying customer. If you want to sit and talk with us, you’ll need to get a pedicure.”
I mentally high-five Darcy as Sailor frowns. But then? He leans over and pulls one of his shoelaces. “Fine,” he says curtly. “I’d like a pedicure, please. At least my boyfriend will appreciate it.”
“Well played, sir,” Darcy says.
“You really thought you’d get rid of me that easily?” he asks, removing his shoes and socks as another technician hurries over to take charge. “I’m a tough competitor.”
“I see that now,” Darcy admits. “Even so, you’re crashing girls’ night, Steve. We came here because we thought it was safe from interruption. You’re going to have to make it up to us.”
He sighs. “Ma’am, could we have three of your mocktails, please? And put it on my bill. Nothing says I value your time better than a watermelon-ginger shrub. Right, girls?”
I snort, but Darcy nods. “Yes. You’re doing much better now.” She whips out her phone and snaps a quick picture of Steve with his feet in the tub. “For blackmail later,” she says. “Now what did you need to discuss with me?”
He leans back, hands behind his head. “You can’t blackmail a happy man, Darcy. And tonight’s business is with Zoe.”
My stomach drops.
He waits to elaborate until the manager brings us three tall glasses on a tray. The mocktail is pink, with a jaunty sprig of mint at the rim. It’s too pretty to ignore, so I take a fortifying gulp and wait to hear Sailor’s demands.
He takes a sip and smiles. “Delicious. We should do this more often.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Darcy says. “Just put Zoe out of her misery already. She looks like a prisoner on her way to the gallows.”
“Okay, it’s like this,” he says. “Before the playoffs begin, we’ll have our annual charity jamboree benefiting the owner’s favorite cause—Save the Children.”
My eyebrows lift. “That’s a great charity. But what’s a jamboree?”
“Oh, it’s a fun time,” Darcy explains. “They sell out every seat in the practice rink, plus standing room. That’s over a thousand tickets at five hundred bucks each. People come early for pictures with the players, autographed swag, and free drinks…”
“Free?” I gasp. “Don’t you mean five-hundred-dollar drinks?”
“Accurate.” Sailor grins. “After the cocktail hour, the show starts. There are some three-on-three matches, but with all the players in the wrong positions. You get to watch the goalie score on the center. Or sometimes it’s three on three with the right players, but the puck is a beach ball. Or the stick is a pool noodle.”
I smile in spite of myself as I try to picture Chase swatting a beach ball into the net with a pool noodle.
“There’s usually a mascot fight,” Sailor adds. “And raffle winners can put on skates and try to score on the goalies during intermission.”
“Yeah, okay. That sounds like fun,” I admit. “But I don’t see what that has to do with me.”
Sailor’s smile turns cunning, and I’m instantly on guard. “You’d be the star attraction, Zoe. You and Chase will do your thing.”
“Our thing,” I repeat slowly. “We don’t have a thing.”
“The internet disagrees!” he cackles. “I need you and Chase to perform a figure skating number. You’ll raise the profile of the event, which means higher-priced tickets.
We can even auction off the last hundred seats.
Zoe, you could help us raise a hundred thousand extra dollars for charity. Don’t let the children down.”
“Oh, Steve.” Darcy shakes her head. “You manipulative bastard. So if Zoe doesn’t want to spend a month rehearsing a sport she left behind with a hockey player who’d rather be anywhere else on Earth, then she’s harming sick children? Do I have that right?”
“Sick and hungry children.” He shrugs. “I don’t make the rules.”
I groan. Loudly.
“She’d also be harming Chase,” he adds. “That man needs to get back into the fans’ good graces, and Zoe should help him. It’s her fault that the internet thinks he punched a fan. I mean—what better way is there to make him lovable again?”
“Just devil’s advocate,” Darcy says, sipping her drink. “He could win some damn hockey games. That’s what the fans really want.”
“Not all the fans,” says my pedicurist abruptly. “As far as I’m concerned, he could fall down a flight of stairs instead.”
I gasp, and for the first time since he arrived, Sailor looks alarmed. “Wow. Aren’t nail salons supposed to be soothing?”
“This is Toronto,” the young woman says. “What would you expect?” She looks up at me suddenly. “That said, I’m going to need you to skate with Chase Merritt again, because that was hot. Even Toronto fans enjoyed the hell out of that video.”
Et tu, Kim?
“You see?” Sailor crows, and his smug tone of voice makes me want to stab him with the straw from my drink. “The whole world thinks you should do it.”
“Not the whole world,” I insist. “Chase won’t. He needs to focus on his game. He’s fighting for his life this year and you know it.”
Sailor waves away my argument with a flick of his hand. “How hard could it be to skate pretty for three or four minutes?”
My head goes thunk into my hands.
“Oh, Steve,” Darcy says with a shake of her head. “You were doing pretty well until right this second.”
“This is a terrible idea,” I moan. “Chase will hate it. He’ll never do it. He shouldn’t, either. It would only be a distraction.”
“We’ll see.” Sailor calmly sips his mocktail. “How about this—I’ll put you down as a yes, so long as Chase is onboard. I know you want a real contract with the Legends again next season. This would be a fine way to show management that you’re a team player.”
God, I want to scream. But Chase would rather walk across hot coals than skate with me. So he’ll shoot this idea down, and I won’t even have to be the naysayer. “Sure. Okay. If Chase says yes, I’ll do it.”
“Good deal, Zoe,” he says. His phone pings with a new notification, and I watch as he gets distracted, texting and checking the team’s social media accounts.
Everything is fine, I remind myself. Bess will tell Sailor to take a long walk off the wing of the team jet, and Sailor will move on to his next stupid idea.
I relax again into the chair. As my toes are filed to perfection and then polished in a shiny shade of Legends blue, I give myself a pep talk. Chase is going to skate well tonight, and management will be happy with both of us for all the right reasons.
Then I’ll get a new contract on the merits of my coaching. The way it should be.
Sailor’s phone pings with another text just as I’m admiring my second coat of polish. “Ah, Zoe. Take a look at this.” He holds up his phone to show me a conversation with Chase.
Sailor: So we’re on?
Chase: Sure. Whatever you need.
I gasp.
“Holy shit,” Darcy says with awe in her voice. “The internet is going to lose its mind.”
If I don’t lose mine first.