Chapter 17 Sienna
SIENNA
Mara's office smelled of dog and coffee and the faint, institutional scent of arena carpet.
Goldie lay in her usual spot beside the desk, her golden muzzle resting on her crossed paws, her tail giving a slow, thumping beat against the floor as Sienna sat down.
The coffee Mara had poured was strong enough to strip paint, served in a chipped Valkyries mug, and Sienna wrapped both hands around it and let the heat seep into her palms.
"She's ready," Sienna said. "Full range of motion, strength testing passed, no instability. I've cleared her for contact."
Mara nodded. She was leaning back in her chair with her own coffee, her greying blonde hair pulled back, her blue eyes sharp and assessing as they always were before a game.
The team sheet was pinned to the corkboard behind her, handwritten in Mara's looping script, and the changes were there.
Lex's name in the starting lineup at centre. Elise's name below, on the bench. Sub.
"She'll come on in the second period," Mara said. "Give Lex the first, rotate them through the middle, let Elise find her feet. I don't want to throw her into a sixty-minute game after eight weeks off."
"That's sensible."
Mara's mouth twitched. She took a sip of coffee and set the mug down and regarded Sienna with an expression that Sienna couldn't quite read. Part professional assessment. Part affection.
"I want to say something," Mara said. "And I want you to hear it as a friend, not as your boss."
Sienna's stomach tightened. She kept her face neutral, the professional mask she'd perfected over years, but her fingers gripped the mug harder.
"I'm grateful to you," Mara said. "For getting Elise back. Not just physically. She's been different these last few weeks. Lighter. More present. The team can see it. I can see it." She paused. "And I know why."
Goldie's tail thumped against the carpet, slow and steady, indifferent to the enormity of the moment.
"Mara..."
"I don't need details. I don't want details. But I want you to know that I know what's going on between you and Elise, and it's not a problem. Not from me. Not from the club."
Sienna's breath left her in a rush she hadn't known she was holding.
The relief was physical, a loosening across her chest and shoulders, the release of a tension she'd been carrying for weeks.
She'd prepared arguments. She'd rehearsed justifications.
She'd imagined this conversation going badly in a dozen different ways, and Mara was sitting across from her with warm blue eyes and a chipped mug and telling her it was fine.
"I was worried about the professional boundary," Sienna said. Her voice was steadier than she expected.
"I know you were. And I respect that you take it seriously. But Sienna, I'm dating a player. I am the absolute last person who is going to judge you for falling for someone on this team." Mara's eyes crinkled. "We're a mess, the lot of us. Beautiful, winning mess."
Sienna laughed. It came out shaky and relieved and she pressed the back of her hand against her mouth. Goldie's tail thumped harder.
"Thank you, Mara. I mean that."
"Don't thank me. Just keep her healthy and happy. That's all I ask." Mara drained her coffee and set the mug on the desk with a firm clunk. "Now. We have a game to win. Let's go to work."
The medical room smelled of antiseptic and adhesive tape.
Sienna's kit was laid out on the treatment bench: rolls of strapping tape, scissors, skin prep, foam padding.
The ritual of it calmed her. She'd done this hundreds of times, for dozens of athletes, the muscle memory of her hands working independently of the noise in her head.
Elise walked in and the noise got louder.
She was already in her base layer, the compression top and shorts that had first scrambled Sienna's concentration in this exact room eight weeks ago.
Her dark hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail, her jaw set, her eyes bright with the intensity she always got before a game.
The number seventeen jersey hung over her arm.
"Hi, Doc."
The old nickname, the one she used when the medical room was a professional space. Sienna smiled.
"Sit down. Let's get you taped."
Elise sat on the treatment bed and extended her left arm. Sienna pulled her stool closer and began applying the skin prep, the cool liquid drying quickly on Elise's shoulder. Elise's pulse beat beneath her fingertips, fast and steady, and the skin beneath her hands was familiar.
"How are you feeling?" Sienna asked.
"Terrified." Elise said it flatly, without drama, as she said most things.
Sienna smoothed the skin prep with her thumb. "You're going to be brilliant."
"What if I'm not?"
"Then you'll be good, and good is more than enough for a first game back.
" Sienna tore a strip of tape and began applying it in overlapping lines across Elise's shoulder joint, the familiar lattice pattern she'd developed over weeks of rehabilitation.
Her hands were steady. They were always steady when she was working.
"I've watched you in the gym this week. Your movement is strong.
Your reactions are sharp. Your conditioning is better than it was before the injury because Kylie worked you harder than any game would. "
"Kylie is a sadist."
"Kylie is very good at her job." Sienna smoothed the last strip of tape and pressed it firmly into place.
She rested her hand on Elise's shoulder and felt the solid heat of it, the muscle and bone and repaired tissue beneath her palm.
"You're ready, Elise. I wouldn't have cleared you if you weren't."
Elise looked at her. The nervousness was still there, but beneath it was trust. Absolute, steady trust in Sienna's judgment. It settled on Sienna's shoulders and she bore it gladly.
"Thank you," Elise said. "For all of it. Not just the tape."
Sienna held the scissors still for a moment. "You don't need to thank me."
"I'll always thank you." Elise held her gaze a second too long, past professional and not quite into suspicious.
Her eyes were steady. Whatever nerves lived behind them were held in check by trust, and it settled in Sienna's chest. Eight weeks ago, Elise had been furious about being pulled from a game.
Now she was sitting on the same treatment bed letting Sienna tape her shoulder and looking at her as if Sienna had given her back more than just her playing career.
Elise pulled on her jersey and stood. She paused at the door. "See you out there, Doc."
"Go. Before I tape your mouth shut."
The grin that crossed Elise's face was bright and sudden and gone as she ducked through the door.
Sienna stood in the empty medical room with the scent of adhesive tape and Elise's coconut shampoo and her own heart beating too fast for someone who was supposed to be the professional in the building.
The arena was full. Not capacity, not for a mid-season Thursday game, but full enough that the noise was constant, a wall of sound that rose and fell with the play. Sienna sat in her usual seat at the end of the team bench, her medical bag at her feet, and watched.
Lex was playing brilliantly. The first period belonged to her, every shift electric, her speed and power creating chances that the opposition couldn't contain.
She scored once, a wrist shot from the top of the circle that beat the goalie clean, and the arena erupted.
Sienna watched the replay on the big screen and admitted, privately, that it was beautiful.
The second period opened and Mara made the call. Sienna heard it through the headset that connected the bench to the coaching staff.
"Moreno. You're on."
Elise stood up from the bench. Her jaw was tight and her hands were gripping her stick with white-knuckled intensity. She glanced at Sienna. One look. Brief and loaded and private in the crowded arena.
Sienna nodded. Just once.
Elise stepped onto the ice.
She was different immediately. Not better or worse than Lex, but different.
Where Lex was explosive and unpredictable, Elise was fluid and intelligent, her movement a constant recalibration of angle and position that opened the ice for her linemates.
She won her first faceoff cleanly. Her first touch was a crisp pass to Frankie that started a breakout.
Her positioning was instinctive, years of experience overriding eight weeks of absence.
Sienna's hands were clasped in her lap and her knuckles were white and she was not breathing.
Elise played ten minutes in the second period and was magnificent.
Not flashy, not highlight-reel, but solid, intelligent hockey that coaches built systems around.
She won faceoffs. She made smart passes.
She tracked back on defence with discipline and covered spaces that Lex never bothered to cover because covering spaces wasn't glamorous and Elise didn't need glamorous. She needed useful.
She came off the ice at the end of the second period.
The other players banged their sticks against the boards as she passed, the universal hockey salute, and Lou caught her arm, grinning, and Elise grinned back.
She was breathing hard, her face flushed, her ponytail damp with sweat, and her eyes were shining and the joy on her face was wild and pure, a woman who had been given back the thing she loved.
Sienna's throat ached. She'd been steady through the entire second period, hands clasped, watching from the bench, and then Elise smiled and all of it gave way.