Chapter 10 - Landon
Landon
“Oh, good. You’re still here.”
I froze in my doorway where Nicole had suddenly appeared wearing nothing but a towel cinched high. Little effort was made to stop my gaze from tracing the shape of her bare legs. It wasn’t as if I’d made her show up like this.
“Dare I ask?” My eyes were back on her face, and I’d caught the hint of a smile before she buried it.
“You dare, but it’s nothing interesting. Just urgent.”
She started to push past me, and I responded by blocking entry into my apartment. “What are you doing?”
“I just said it was urgent,” she huffed, looking at me as if I were the crazy one. “My water heater broke, and I really need to use your shower.”
“No,” I said with a shocked laugh. “No, you don’t.”
“Landon—”
“Shower at work.”
“Ew, gross, no.”
She was inside my apartment before I could clock the disgust on her face, and already halfway to my bathroom when my brain finally caught up with what was happening.
“Hey.” I dropped my gym bag and hurried after her. “I didn’t say—”
The bathroom door slammed in my face and within seconds, the shower burst to life.
Pipes protested the way they usually did, then settled.
But my heartbeat didn’t do the same. I stood there with my mouth half open, staring at the closed door as if it would offer some kind of explanation that made sense.
What the hell just happened?
My plans for the morning were limited to getting up early and getting to the arena gym for a workout before any of the other guys showed up. I hadn’t made provision for my neighbor barging in half-naked.
I backed up to increase the distance between myself and the hot water coasting over her bare skin, and paced the narrow stretch between the couch and the kitchen counter. My apartment felt different somehow, every sound magnified. The steady stream of water running, splashing, humming—
“Humming? Are you kidding me?”
I walked back over and banged on the door. “This isn’t a spa. And I thought you said you were late. You don’t sound like someone who’s in any kind of rush.”
The humming had stopped, but she didn’t offer any sign she’d heard me.
“Great. Ignore me,” I said, my mouth right up against the bathroom door. “Use my shower without permission, and then ignore me. That’s just great.”
My pacing carried me back to the living room where I tried focusing on anything other than a naked, wet Nicole in my shower. Phone, check. Wallet. Had I remembered my K-tape? I crouched by my bag and patted down the side pockets. Everything in its place.
But nothing stuck.
Because she was naked in my shower.
I stopped outside the bathroom again and again, banged hard on the door. “Sixty seconds and I’m leaving. Locking you in here, and going on my merry way. Don’t think I won’t. In fact, I dare you to—”
“I’m rinsing.”
I swallowed a groan. That mental image did more damage than the first. Now I had to contend with soapy suds sliding over her bare skin, all the way down…
“Well, rinse faster.”
This was fine. Normal, even. We were just neighbors helping each other out the way neighbors did.
No big deal. My eyes tracked a crack in the paint along the doorframe, and I found myself inhaling slowly, deeply, as her fresh, clean scent wafted on the steam that billowed through the little gap under the door.
Then it went quiet. Sudden enough to make me startle and backtrack until I was right up against the wall.
Warm air spilled into the hallway as she opened the door, and smiled at me.
The towel was back, but this time her skin had a rosy, flushed glow to it and her hair was twisted up in another towel.
“Is that mine?”
Not quite what I’d planned to say, but it was where my mind went first.
Nicole patted the small tower balanced on top of her head. “I’ll have it laundered and returned before you miss it. Also, you should switch your shampoo. That stuff’s horrible.”
A laugh escaped me before I could stop it, short and surprised. “You break into my apartment and then criticize my things.”
“I’m saving you,” she said, moving toward the front door again. Her warm, damp feet left heat prints on the hardwood as she walked. “You just don’t know it yet.”
“Forgive me for being a little skeptical,” I called after her.
But she’d already gone.
My apartment settled back into the empty quiet it had before she’d breezed in, the smell of my body wash hanging thick in the air. The effect was novel though, because it was a smell that clung to her, not me.
I stood there longer than necessary, staring at the empty doorway.
The thought of gym and the game tonight crept up on me, and my stomach did a weird thing I wasn’t all that familiar with.
Disappointment, maybe? Because if Nicole were heading off to work, that meant she wouldn’t be at the game later.
I grabbed my bag and headed out, pulling the door shut with more force than required.
The drive to the arena passed in a blur of red lights and familiar turns, my thoughts refusing to stay where I put them.
I pictured her rushing through Mission Valley in her scrubs, hair still damp, hands steady as ever.
The memory of her pulling me aside in my Santa suit slid in uninvited and refused to leave.
By the time I pulled into the lot, my mood had taken a downward turn of note. There was still more than enough time to get my solo gym session in, but it almost didn’t matter anymore.
I slung my bag over my shoulder and headed inside, telling myself to get my head back in the game. Telling myself a lot of things that sounded reasonable if I didn’t examine them too closely.
*
San Jose Sharks loomed mean and ugly, and their fans were loud.
“I’d tell you to block them out,” Coach said, pulling us in for a quick huddle before puck drop. “But I know it’ll be in your best interest to hear ‘em loud and clear. Let that sound push you harder. Push you to not give them so much as a goddamn inch. You hear me?”
“Go, Surge!” we yelled in unison, then broke.
First period, and the Sharks were already in my head, moving fast, pressing tight.
Despite Coach’s efforts, the guys looked like they were waking up from a nap.
Nobody was clicking, and I could feel it in the way Shawn threw a lazy pass across the crease like he was tossing a snack instead of a puck.
“Wanna watch that angle,” I barked at him.
“Why don’t you bite me, Cross?” was his superb response.
It lasted barely five minutes before Coach pulled him, and Mason was now on my right. I heaved a sigh of relief after the change. We were always a stronger pair, and I was sure it would be the thing to switch us up from moving through sludge to getting this game going.
The result wasn’t quite that.
I forced a play, but Mason came in late, cutting diagonally through the neutral zone like he had a plan nobody else could see.
“Where are you going?!” I hit my stick against the ice a few times. “Hey! I’m open!”
He didn’t answer, just winked, which made my patience fray in real time. And his momentary distraction cost him possession, which caused a pained groan to float around the arena.
“What the fuck, Cross?”
“Me? You’re the one who lost it.”
Grayson skated between us and aimed a slap to the back of both our helmets. “This isn’t the junior leagues so quit playing it. Get your shit together. Now.”
But the game had felt off from the drop.
My passes were too stiff, too obvious, and my single shot on goal had more drama than accuracy.
Every time I tried to compensate, there was too much on it and my receiver ended up fumbling.
Which made me compensate again, forcing them to pick up the slack and catch up to the game I wanted to play.
Middle of the first and I had another shot.
Stole the puck clean off Grayson’s stick—my own player, but he would’ve fucked it up, I was sure.
The puck kissed my stick in short, controlled bursts as I weaved through one, two, three Sharks with ease.
Expectation rolled through the crowd, growing louder the closer I drew to the last person between me and the back of that net.
I faked left and when their goalie committed, I scooped the puck and flipped it in an overhead arc to bury it in the top right corner.
But I had way too much on the flip and the thing went careening way out of play, slapping harmlessly into the glass on the other side. Embarrassment burned hot on my face, but I grit through it and kept moving.
The fans’ anticipation turned to deafening disappointment as I watched the opposition pounce on the open play with fervor.
“All flash and no follow through,” a Shark muttered as he skated past.
I flung my stick aside and barreled after him, only to be peeled away by Tucker and Mason. A series of boos rumbled low, and I caught the unimpressed glare from Coach before I finally stopped resisting my teammates’ intervention.
“Please can we pick this up to teach them a lesson?”
Tucker grabbed a handful of my jersey and pulled me in until we stood chest-to-chest. “You need to calm down, rookie. Maybe that’s the problem.”
“I’m the only one doing anything out here,” I replied without hesitation. “That’s the problem.”
“Landon, Tucker, roll!”
We turned to see Coach calling us to the bench, our replacements getting ready to jump the boards.
“See what you did?” Tucker shoved me hard with his shoulder as he skated back.
I stayed rooted for a second longer, challenging Coach with a look that said everything. I didn’t want off. I was more effective right here, doing what I did best. If The Surge stood any chance at a comeback, it would need me at the center of it.
“I said roll!” Coach’s nostrils flared, and for a second it looked like he was about to come out and drag me from the ice himself.
An ocean of jeers ushered me toward the bench, and I glared at the man who’d caused it.
“They’re not pulling their weight out there, and it’s—”