5. CHAPTER FIVE
GIANNA
Donovan texts me as I walk out of Sport Law.
Donovan: Come down when you can.
That is not a reassuring message.
I spend the entire walk to the rink going through everything I did on Tuesday and all the possible ways I screwed something up. I logged the sticks. I logged them with numbers and dates and not on a sticky note. I hung the practice jerseys. I did the tape. I—
The socks.
Something with the socks.
By the time I get down the hallway behind the locker room, I’ve convinced myself I’m about to receive a lecture about socks.
I push open the equipment-room door and immediately stop.
Cole is sitting on the skate bench with his elbows on his knees, and his hoodie zipped all the way to his chin. His face is pale, his eyes are glassy, and he looks like death.
I gasp, “Oh my God.”
“Don’t come near me,” he croaks.
I put both hands up. “I wasn’t going to.”
Donovan comes around the shelving with a clipboard and doesn’t slow down. “Gianna. Can you travel?”
“What?”
He waits. Then my brain catches up.
Minnesota.
They leave this afternoon for two games, Friday and Saturday. I built the travel list. I spent two hours going through last year’s version line by line and found enough mistakes that I stopped trusting anything on it by the end.
“He’s not getting on a plane,” Donovan says, pointing the clipboard toward Cole. “He’s going home. Evan isn’t cleared to travel and has a lab practical tomorrow. You’ve worked eleven home games, you know the room, and you built the list. I need somebody who already knows what’s in the bags.”
My stomach drops in a completely different direction. “Yes.”
Donovan pauses. “I didn’t finish.”
I put up my hands. “I know. Sorry. Finish.”
“You’re a student before you’re staff. You email every professor today and tell them exactly which sessions you’re missing. Athletics will send documentation for the absence. That does not mean your work stops being due.”
I nod. “Okay.”
“Say the last part back.”
I try not to smile. “Whatever’s due is still due.”
“Good. Be back here at twelve-thirty.”
He walks away, so I look at Cole. He gives me a weak thumbs-up. Then I check the time.
I have less than forty minutes.
“Oh my God.”
I’m halfway to my apartment before I finish emailing my professors. Statistics homework is due Sunday night, so that’s manageable. Finance is fine. Sport Law is fine.
SPM 240 is not fine.
We’re supposed to bring our one-page event pitch to Friday’s session and get it torn apart in groups. I email Professor Ives while I’m speed-walking through the cold and explain exactly what happened.
She answers before I get home.
Bring it Monday. You’ll workshop it with me instead of a group, which is worse for you.
Great.
Lucy looks up from the couch when I fly through the apartment.
“What happened?” she asks, worried.
“I’m going to Minnesota.”
She follows me down the hall. “What?”
“Cole’s sick. Donovan needs somebody to fill in.”
I pull my backpack from the closet, throw it onto my bed, and start grabbing clothes without thinking very hard about what matches.
Lucy smiles. “That’s huge.”
I smile back. “I know.”
The words come out too fast. I stop with a sweater in one hand. “He picked me.”
Lucy’s smile gets softer. “Yeah. He did.”
I look back into my closet because for some reason that feels better than looking at her. “I have thirty minutes and no travel-size anything.”
“Take mine.”
I huff. “You’re a saint.”
I pack like somebody is timing me.
On the way back to the rink, I text Mara to tell her I’m bailing on the frat party we were supposed to go to tomorrow.
Except I accidentally send it to the group chat.
Me: I’m going to the away games with the team. Cole’s sick, so I’m taking his spot.
Mara: WHAT!
Mara: THERE ARE LIKE TWENTY HOT MEN ON THAT TRIP!
Me: They’re disgusting. I’ve seen their laundry.
Mara: I would eat their laundry.
Mila: Mara.
Mara: I would, and you know it.
I put my phone away, smiling.
Not because of anybody’s laundry.
Because I get to go.
By one, I’m on the equipment-room floor with the travel checklist on a clipboard and Donovan moving around me twice as fast as normal.
We go through the game jerseys, socks, stick tubes, repair kit, skate tools, helmets, backup equipment, medical supplies, and everything else that apparently has to cross state lines because twenty men are incapable of existing without an entire rolling hardware store behind them.
The important part is that I know the list. I know what should be there.
When Donovan asks me how many spare cages we packed, I don’t have to check. When he sends me back for replacement buckles, I know which drawer. When the cases start going onto the truck, he puts me at the back and has me check off every single one.
By two-fifteen, I’m standing beside the bus with my backpack over one shoulder when Benson spots me. He stops.
“Why do you have a bag?” he asks, looking at it.
I clutch at it and say, “I’m running away.”
He stares.
I inhale. “I’ve thought about it a lot. Vegas.”
He grows annoyed. “G.”
Donovan passes between us carrying a case. “Cole’s sick. She’s filling in. Paperwork’s done and I need her.”
Benson turns back to me immediately. “Do you have your classes handled?”
“Yes.”
“All of them?”
“Yes, Benson.”
“Stats?”
I raise my brows. “Handled.”
His jaw moves like he’s still looking for something else to object to.
Then he says, “Sit near the front on the plane.”
I stare after him as he gets on the bus. I have no idea what sitting near the front is supposed to accomplish.
Blue and Rowan walk up next.
Rowan glances at my duffel. “First road trip?”
“Apparently,” I say happily.
He says, “Minnesota’s a good one.”
“Good how?”
He steps onto the bus. “You’ll see.”
Blue follows him. “Aren’t you from there?”
Rowan nods once. “Exactly.”
Then they’re on the bus.
I stand there for a second. That explained nothing.
The bus takes us to the airport. The charter takes us to Minneapolis. By the time we land, I’ve learned that a hockey team on a travel day is completely different from a hockey team anywhere else.
They’re quiet.
Not silent, obviously. Stanley still exists. But quieter.
Nobody is throwing anything. Nobody is yelling across a room. Percy has headphones on before we leave the gate, Blue sleeps almost the entire flight, and Benson spends half the trip moving between seats talking to people.
At one point, I watch him crouch beside Owens for several minutes, speaking low enough that I can’t hear him. Owens nods. Benson squeezes the back of his neck and moves on.
I hate that I understand him slightly better afterward.
Fine.
Captain Benson makes more sense than Brother Benson.
I’m seated with one of the assistant athletic trainers while Donovan works most of the flight. Rowan is a few rows ahead with headphones in, looking out the window.
The players go to the hotel when we land.
Donovan and I go straight to the rink. Minnesota’s building is enormous.
Their equipment manager meets us at the loading dock, and he and Donovan spend three minutes talking about skate sharpeners and another two discussing somebody’s kid like they’ve been seeing each other twice a year for twenty years.
Then we work.
Donovan takes odd numbers. I take even.
We unload. Set up. Hang jerseys. Arrange equipment. Check sticks. Check skates. Recheck everything.
Two and a half hours later, my lower back hurts, and I’m hungry enough to be angry about it. I also love it.
That realization happens somewhere between finishing Rowan’s stall and finding a missing helmet clip in the wrong case.
When Donovan finally tells me we’re done, we go back to the hotel. The lobby is busy when we walk in, and I see the Hawthorne guys standing near the elevators with a group of people I don’t recognize.
Benson sees me first. “G.”
I glance at Donovan. He waves me off.
I walk over to my brother.
Rowan turns slightly when I reach them. “Mom, this is Gianna Reeve.”
The dark-haired woman beside him immediately smiles and pulls me into a hug. “Oh! Hi.”
I freeze for half a second, then hug her back.
She says, “You keeping these boys in line at Camden?”
I nod. “Somebody has to.”
She laughs. Then she looks between me and Stanley.
“You’re Stanley’s sister?”
“No,” about five people say at once.
I laugh.
Rowan says, “This is Benson’s sister.”
There’s nothing wrong with that. That’s how she would know me. Still, after spending the entire afternoon with Donovan and people who only needed me to know what was in the equipment cases, I notice it.
Mrs. Laurens turns to Benson. “The captain.”
Benson grins. “Unfortunately.”
She points at him. “Big guy.”
Then Stanley says something ridiculous about being her favorite, which somehow ends with the two of them doing a terrible little dance in the hotel lobby.
Rowan turns red. Actually red.
I stare at him.
I’ve never seen him embarrassed before.
Annoyed, yes. Tired, constantly. Mostly he looks exactly the same no matter what’s happening around him.
His mother dances with Stanley for four seconds, and Rowan suddenly looks like he wants to crawl into a cave. I like knowing that more than I should.
“Okay,” Rowan says, stepping between them. “We’re done.”
His mom laughs and smacks his arm.
“Can’t you boys leave the hotel for an hour?”
Benson shakes his head. “Staff rules. Game tomorrow.”
“That’s rubbish,” she says, and I like her.
Stanley immediately offers to fly her to Michigan sometime.
She looks at Rowan. “You hear that? I’m invited to the Hawthorne House.” She mocks that, and I smile.
Rowan sighs. “You’re always invited, Mom.”
He wraps an arm around her. “I’ll catch up with you guys later.”
She waves at all of us. “Good luck tomorrow, wolves.”
“Nice meeting you,” I say.
She smiles. “You too, sweetheart.” Then she turns to Rowan and pats him on the head. I watch for a moment, and then I walk with the rest of the guys to the elevators.
Halfway up, I remember the thing I’ve been avoiding since we left Michigan.
“Benson?”
He looks over.
“Can I have Rowan’s number?”
There is a pause in the elevator for a moment. Mostly from Benson.