Chapter 6 #2
Number three, Axel Warner, breaks free, his skates tearing up the ice as he crosses it toward the goalie’s net.
My guys defend him with everything they’ve got as he passes the puck to Levon, who gives up chirping to set up his shot.
The Dragons’ goalie strains to block it, and my breath freezes as he knocks it out of his net.
Holy fucking shit. The buzzer feels as if it’s a scream as I stand there numbly, and then shake my head as I realize how damn close things were. My gaze cuts toward Coach Curtis, and I have a moment of confusion as I see instead that Caelia is quickly leaving with someone sticking close beside her.
It almost seems as if she’s running away.
Pushing the thought away, I watch as my players console our goalie for our loss. They all tap each other’s helmets as they skate off the ice, but I’m still proud of them. It was very close. Headed toward the lockers, I think about how fucking hard this game was played.
“You fought to the end! I don’t think I’ve ever seen you work together so well” I yell.
“Coach?” Marilyn asks, her hand over her eyes as she pushes her way into the locker room.
“Yes?” I drawl, smirking since my players are already in various forms of undress.
“I need Levon and Julius to talk to the press,” she says. “It won’t be long.”
“Yeah, that’s fine. Levon and Julius, you hear that?” I yell out.
“I’ll be out soon,” Levon calls out.
“Let’s give them space to get showered and changed,” I tell Marilyn, easing her back outside. “You can wait here.”
Marilyn drops her hand, nodding. “I found Levon’s date,” she says suddenly. “If he’s in a relationship, I’ll want that person to attend as well. I don’t believe in keeping secrets, it’s bad for their image.”
“Ah, Levon and this person are going to need to make a trip to Human Resources first,” I say. “It’s a relationship that’ll need to get cleared before they can go public.”
“You’re trying to give me a heart attack, aren’t you?” she breathes, clutching her chest. “I can’t handle him getting kicked off the team after such an incredible game.”
“That won’t happen,” I deny. Levon wouldn’t be performing so well without Santo. There’s something about them together that seems to even Levon out.
His mind is sharper, and he picked his fights tonight with precision. I’ve worried about him for a while. Marilyn has worked her ass off to keep him out of jail, along with our legal team. His smart mouth tends to get him into trouble both on and off the ice.
“As his coach, I hope that’s true,” Marilyn grumbles. “I will figure out this date. I just need to get her to say yes now.”
“Excuse me? Is there a possibility that she won’t say yes?” I ask, surprised.
“Believe it or not, not everyone likes hockey players,” she sniffs. “We may think they’re God’s gift to the world, but that’s not always an attractive feature.”
“Does that really seem like someone Levon should go out with?” I ask. “The guy is as taciturn as you can get some days. He is not a people person.”
“He’s gotten better,” she hisses defensively as people walk around us.
It’s always busy after a game, and since we brought so much staff with us, it’s even more so. Everyone is darting around to get their work done before heading back to Nashville.
“You’re right,” I agree. “He’s also a big part of why we almost won tonight.
He sacrificed himself so that others could run the puck down the ice.
However, his teamwork tends to end once a game is over.
It would be really shitty if he walked because the girl you hooked him up with picked a fight with him. ”
“That won’t happen. Besides, you’ll be there to keep him in line,” she reminds me.
Fuck, I feel like I’m talking to a wall. I often end up in this position. Marilyn is stubborn as fuck once she knows what she wants.
It’s her funeral.
“Alright,” I grunt, pushing off the wall to walk. I need to get out of her bubble before I say something I shouldn’t. I’ve learned that removing myself from a situation can sometimes be the best thing I can do.
I’m not paying attention to where I’m going, nodding to staff and players as I pass by them absently. Soon, there are less people around, and I’m glancing into an open office door.
“You,” I grunt, staring at Caelia sitting at the desk. The plaque says this is Coach Freedman’s office. “Why bother to come to a game if you’re on the phone most of the time?”
I used to tease her here and there when I was a player on her dad’s team, but it was never in a mean way.
I remember my teammates couldn’t stop talking about how she smelled the night Coach left, but I didn’t have any idea what they were talking about.
I caught a fist to the nose early on in the game, so I couldn’t smell fuck all that night.
I also remember that her dad yelled at the team to stop bugging her because she had just presented as an omega the night before. I was disgusted with the game and my teammates, so I left in the middle of Coach’s tirade.
I was planning to apologize to him the following day. I never got the chance to.
Now, I can smell a hint of her sweet scent despite her covering it up with a blocking spray that is meant to absorb and hide it, and I can’t move. It feels as if I’m seeing her for the first time, and this is really really bad.
“Cute,” Caelia mutters, her fingers pressed against a deck of colorful cards. What is she doing? Is she playing solitaire? “I’m working, and you shouldn’t…be here. I’m waiting for my dad. Please, don’t come any closer.”
Swallowing hard, I watch as her fingers clench around something tensely, and her cherry scent sours.
“Are you afraid of me?” I ask, confused. “I got turned around as I was walking, and ended up here. I won’t come closer, okay? Why are you freaking out?”
“I hate all hockey players, even the retired ones,” she breathes. “You’re all the same, taking what isn’t yours.”
My foot moves closer without realizing it, wanting to soothe her. It’s as if I can smell all the layers of her scent, my brain trying to parcel through what’s hers and what’s the lie.
“I’m the same person today as I’ve always been,” I shrug. “Your father is the one I have a problem with. He abandoned his team.”
A shudder rocks her system, and she gags at my words.
“You shut your filthy fucking mouth about my father,” she gasps.
I take another step forward, concerned about her.
It’s not every day you meet your scent match, and I’m having a hard time trying to wrap my head around what this means.
Her father hates me, he has to. We glare at each other across the hockey rink several times a season while our teams go for each other’s throats.
This feels like some hardcore regurgitated hate if I’ve ever seen it.
My nostrils flare as I smell the chemical scent of the spray she must have doused her body in, but I also smell…patchouli? It’s such a new age scent, yet it also works hard to override her natural one.
Someone is hiding.
“Why do you hide, Little Omega?” I croon, taking another step forward.
Caelia shoves back in the chair, and it knocks into the wall as she pants. Lifting what’s in her hand, she brandishes a stun gun at me, pushing the button so I’ll hear the crackle of it.
“Why do you need that?” I ask, dumbfounded.
The cards spilled when she shoved herself back, and I realize they aren’t playing cards, but tarot. I know nothing about her anymore. She’s all grown up.
I haven’t spoken a word to her in the six years that spread between the time that I was a hockey player on her father’s team and now.
A hand slams into my chest, pushing me back until I hit the wall, which is as far as I can possibly be from Caelia. Ripping my gaze away from her, I see Curtis Freedman’s angry face.
“Are you back to continue what your old teammates did to her?” he asks, his voice almost unrecognizable. “They destroyed my baby girl. Did they tell you that while they fucked with my reputation?”
“What?” I ask, having a hard time processing that information. All I can think about is that Caelia is supposed to be mine, and I can’t see her anymore. Not to mention, Curtis very obviously hates me as much as I hate him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about?”
“Do you understand the word ‘no’ when someone says it to you?” Curtis asks. “Or do you take what’s not freely offered?”
“No,” I sputter. “No means no. Full stop, do not continue past.”
“Then maybe you should have taught your teammates that,” Curtis growls, moving backward toward his office door, as if he thinks I’m going to rush past him.
My instincts are riding me hard as horror fills my veins.
They’re telling me to protect my scent match, but I’m already too late.
“They had a real hard time with that word six years ago.”
The words echo in my head as I shake it. I was friends with these guys, I still see them around and greet them occasionally when my team plays theirs. This can’t be happening.
“Who?” I croak out, my hands pressed against the cool paint of the wall to ground myself. “Who hurt her?”
“It doesn’t matter where you’re concerned,” Freedman mutters.
“Daddy?” Caelia whimpers, making me flinch as if I was shocked with her stun gun. There’s so much sadness, fear, and pain in that one word.
I desperately want to be the one she calls for, but she doesn’t fucking know me, not really. I was with the team for six years while Freedman coached the Devils. Watching someone grow up from afar, doesn’t mean shit when her father has clearly been there for all the hard parts.
“Leave her alone,” Freedman whispers. “Please. She’s all I have.”
The door slams in my face as I stare at it. I can’t get myself to move away from the wall, not when a piece of me I didn’t know I was missing is so close by. I’ve watched people meet their scent match, but I never thought it would feel like a punch to the knot.
I lose track of time, startling when a hand touches my shoulder.
“I’m sorry, sir. Coach Freedman would like to take his daughter home now. I need you to leave this area so that he can do that.”
Turning my head, I see that there’s a security guard beside me.
“Yeah, I’ll go,” I grunt, pushing away from the wall.
I’m stuck in my head as I make it back to the lockers, unsurprised to find that they’re empty. Checking my phone, I find a text that the buses are loaded, and they’re waiting for me. Pushing out an exit, I walk to where the buses are.
Climbing on, my eyes search for Levon. Every footstep feels heavy as I walk, stopping beside him.
“What’s up, Coach?” he asks, searching my face.
He’s not going to find the reason why my entire world has been rocked, because I’m not going to tell him.
“Make sure you present yourself to Human Resources tomorrow. You need to tell them about your current relationship. Marilyn has a bone she won’t let go of, and wants him to attend any dates you attend,” I grunt.
I’m sure I could have couched that in a softer way. Instead, I ignore the draining of any color in his face as I find a seat up front and plant my ass in it. If I have to be miserable, at least I can share the love.
Why did it have to be her?