Chapter 4 #2
I cleared my throat, took the mic, and smiled.
“On behalf of the Fairfax, Virginia, Animal Shelter, we hereby award the Tigers team with this commemorative plaque for your ongoing support of our annual adoption drive.” I handed the mic off to the arena official, and the captain and I both held onto the wood and brass award while we posed for a photographer.
Hattie was done with the ceremony, though. She barked and jumped up, sniffing his glove, making us hold the plaque at an awkward angle.
“What is your dog doing?” Eli asked.
“Hattie down. Get down. Want a treat? And she’s not mine, but you can adopt her.”
“Just hold the plaque steady and level, will you? I haven’t got the shot yet,” the photographer complained.
Hattie ignored my treats and growled. She jumped again and licked his glove all over.
“Hey, make her stop.” Eli frowned.
“Hattie. Down. There must be something smelly on your glove. She can’t get enough of it,” I complained.
Suddenly, some of his teammates laughed behind us.
“Initiated,” one of the guys shouted.
Another said, “I think your glove has had a round in the supply closet, Cap.”
Hattie suddenly chomped on the glove, as if she intended to eat it.
Eli groaned. “Oh, no.”
“What is going on?” I hissed.
“I think the guys pulled a prank on me.”
“The C stands for more than just captain,” another teammate yelled.
“What does that mean?” I demanded. “Hattie, no!”
The usually mild-mannered dog growled, clamping its jaws fully around the glove, fighting to get it off of Eli. I took a big whiff. “Wait. Does your glove smell like sex?” I grimaced, finally getting the horrible joke.
“Fuck!” Eli’s face went scarlet and was in a tug-of-war with Hattie now. The crowd laughed as if we were a comedy act for the night. “It’s not mine, I swear.”
I recoiled. “Sure. Just get it out of Hattie’s mouth!”
“I couldn’t find my glove before coming out here, and finally someone handed me this one, and I didn’t have time to spare to get on the ice. You see, one guy was doing his girl in the supply closet of the locker room, and he must have been using my glove. I think in prank terms, the C stands for—”
“Please stop. I get it.” I squinted my eyes.
Finally, Hattie tore the glove off and ran away down the ice, chewing and shaking her head with it in her mouth, all fun and games to her. Mortifying to me.
The team roared with laughter, chanting “Initiated. Initiated.” They took off after Hattie and chased her around the rink a few times. The crowd went nuts, laughing and pointing.
“Damn college kids,” the rink official complained, rolled his eyes, and carried the mic off the ice.
The refs finally blew their whistles, and eventually things got back under control. I was able to coax Hattie off the ice with the treats, and I swore I’d never show my face at a Tigers’ game again.
As I left the ice, Eli skidded to a stop, sending shavings of it at my feet. “The glove wasn’t mine, I swear,” he shouted, eyes locked with me. “I just got named captain. The guys were messing with me, that’s all.”
“This has been the weirdest night. I cannot believe this happened.” I dragged Hattie away, cheeks burning.
The next day, when I parked at the animal shelter to report for my volunteer duty, Eli surprised me, waiting by his car for me.
He jogged up. “Hi. I was hoping you’d be here today. I wondered if we could go for a coffee?” His thumbs hooked in his belt loops as he leaned against my door frame, too darn cute for me to resist. “I can’t have you thinking I’m that weird guy with a sexed-up glove.”
“I absolutely thought you were that guy wearing a sexed-up glove.”
“Well, how about you give me a chance to prove you wrong?” he asked, a full smoldering smile locked and loaded, aimed right at me.
I hesitated. After finally being free of Jerrod, it was good to be single again. But Eli Lewis could make one heck of a rebound.
“You know,” he continued, rubbing the back of his neck, “I owe Hattie a thank-you.”
I arch a brow. “For destroying your glove?”
He grins. “On my first night as captain, I ended up with a hat trick. I scored three goals.”
I blink. “So?”
“If I’d kept that stinky glove, I’d have smelled it all night and played like shit.
Hattie saved me by ruining it. Coach got me a new glove, and I scored big.
I couldn’t miss, all night long. Go figure.
The dog’s name is Hattie, and I got a hat trick.
Get it?” He chortled, but I gave him a blank stare.
“Anyway. Knowing you were there watching the game also made me want to play my ass off to show off for you,” he continued with a wink.
“Oh, I didn’t stay and watch the game,” I said with a straight face.
His smile fell. “No?”
“Just kidding. A few of my friends and I absolutely stayed and watched the game, even though people recognized me as the ‘girl with the dog and the glove.’”
He snorted. “Did you cheer for me?”
“Maybe?”
“What’s your name?”
“Stella.”
“You know, I kind of like you, Stella. I mean, we survived a battle on the ice with a vicious dog together.”
“She’s hardly vicious.”
He laughed. “Well, I think after last night, we could be friendly, don’t you?”
“Are you just saying that to get into my pants?” I fluttered my eyelashes at him.
“Is it working?”
I shrugged. “Ask me again tomorrow… Yes, you can take me out for a coffee and prove to me you aren’t a weirdo.”
A giggle erupts from my chest unexpectedly about the way we met—even to this day. But that was then; this is now. Many years and a divorce later, I’m not that na?ve college girl who thought a man was all she needed.
With a heavy sigh, I already know in my heart that if Eli offers more free hockey lessons, I’m going to let Aiden do this. He’s a good kid and doesn’t get a lot of the things his friends do. He deserves it, even if it means I try to avoid Eli at all costs.
Aiden’s happiness is what I live for as a mother.
“Eli is nothing more than a random hockey player running a nonprofit clinic,” I mutter under my breath. He’s a guy from my past, and that’s where he’ll stay, even if my son thinks he’s a bona fide hero.