4. Maren #2
He watched me for a beat with an expression doing several things at once, none of which were strictly professional, then stood and picked up his water bottle, and the treatment room shrank somehow.
I dropped my gaze to my clipboard. I definitely didn’t watch his spectacular muscles flex as he put his shirt back on.
“Monday,” he said from the doorway.
“See you then,” I confirmed, and stared at my clipboard until I heard his footsteps disappear down the hall.
I stood there for a moment.
I had my hands on him for twenty minutes.
And that was going to happen every Thursday for the foreseeable future, and also whenever else his shoulder tightened up, and also possibly his hip flexors and his hamstrings and whatever else decided to need attention over the course of a full hockey season.
This was fine. This was completely fine.
I was a professional and this was my job and I was going to be absolutely fine.
I envisioned myself as the dog in the meme, drinking his coffee while surrounded by flames, saying, “This is fine.” Nothing about having my hands on Ryan Lindqvist’s body was fucking fine. I heaved a labored sigh.
I had drinks with my best friend Paige that evening, which was the most important item on my calendar.
Paige arrived with wine and a look that said three weeks of secondhand updates had officially run out.
“Okay,” she said, dropping onto the couch and tucking her feet under her. “I need everything. Go.”
“Hello to you too.”
“Mare. I have been living vicariously through your text updates for almost a month. I need the full picture. Start with the facility. Then tell me about the sexy ass hockey players.”
I started with the facility. Then I kept going, because it turned out I had a lot to say.
The treatment rooms, the staff, Dr. Reyes, Dom, the Tuesday meetings, the joy of building something from the ground up and watching it work.
Paige listened with her chin in her hand, fully invested, not missing a word.
“Okay but,” Paige said, when I paused for wine, “let’s talk about the actual working environment. Day-to-day. Because Griffin sent me a photo from training camp and I have eyes. That is a good-looking bunch of men. Like I’m gonna have to go to games.”
I laughed. “It’s a lot.”
“It’s a lot.”
“Like—okay, I knew going in. I work in sports medicine, I’ve been around professional athletes my entire career, short as it may be, so I was not walking into this blind.
Athletes are good-looking,” I gestured broadly.
“But Paige. It is a lot of very large, very fit men in a very small building and I say that as a medical professional who is completely unbothered by it.”
“Completely unbothered?”
“Okay. Mostly unbothered. It’s fine. You get used to it.
” I took a sip. “Cole Westbrook alone is a legal hazard, I don’t know how that man is allowed to exist. He has this golden retriever energy and a toothpaste commercial smile, and he is just fun to be around.
And Eli Kovac barely talks but he’s six-foot-three and has this whole brooding thing that’s kinda sexy and gruff.
The rookies are adorable, and so young, some of them are basically children, the veterans are—” I stopped.
“It’s fine. It’s a great work environment. ” I was rambling.
Paige was grinning. “And the captain?”
I pointed at her. “Is my colleague.”
“Who is also built like a—”
“Paige.”
“I’m just asking what the roster looks like up close. For my own information.”
“He’s Griffin’s best friend.” I refilled my glass. “He’s been coming to Sunday dinners. He’s at the facility every day. He is my colleague and my brother’s best friend and I am handling that extremely well.”
Paige tilted her head. “He came in today, didn’t he.”
“His shoulder’s been tight for two weeks and he finally came in.”
“So he was in your treatment room.”
“Yes.”
“On your table.”
“That is where I treat people, yes, on the treatment table—”
“And you had your hands on him for…” She trailed off, awaiting my answer.
“Twenty minutes, it was a standard shoulder assessment, I have done this hundreds of times—” I addressed the ceiling.
“Okay it was a little bit… I don’t know.
I’m human. I’m not made of stone. He took his shirt off and sat on the table and—” I stopped and set down my glass.
“I am a professional. I behaved like a professional. I gave him an exercise sheet and told him to come back Thursday.”
Paige was trying very hard not to smile and failing completely. “He’s hot though, right? On TV, he looks like a tall Viking.”
“He’s Swedish American.”
“Same energy.”
“It’s not the same—” I laughed despite myself, dropping my head back and groaning. “God. Yes. He’s hot. Like ridiculously hot. Are you happy? Is that what you wanted?”
“I just wanted you to admit it out loud so you’d stop carrying it around like a secret you’re keeping from yourself. Let me remind you, I know about your almost kiss with him back in college. You told me all about it.” Paige topped off both glasses, sat back down, and grinned. “You like him.”
“I work with him.”
“Both things can be true.”
“Griffin would lose his mind.”
“Also true. But that’s a problem for future Maren.” Paige settled back. “What happened at Sunday dinner? Because Griffin mentioned you two did the dishes and then didn’t say anything else.”
My expression shifted. “Griffin needs to learn to keep his mouth shut.”
“Griffin is my greatest resource and I protect him accordingly.” Paige leaned in. “Dishes, Maren.”
“We did the dishes. It was my turn and he insisted on helping. Griffin disappeared to the garage, we washed and dried and talked, and then the coffee maker beeped and I reached past him to turn it to keep-warm and the kitchen is not that big and for two seconds—” I stopped.
Paige went very still and with wide eyes, stopped raising her glass to her lips and waited, unblinking.
“Nothing happened,” I said. “Griffin called from the garage and it was—nothing happened.”
“But.”
“But it almost did.” I said it quietly. “I think. I’m pretty sure. It was a moment. That’s all.”
“Does he know you think that?”
I stared into my glass. “He was there.”
Paige made a sound that was not a word but was also a complete sentence.
“He’s Griffin’s best friend,” I said. “And I work with him. I will have my hands on his shoulder every week for the foreseeable future and—” I pointed at Paige. “I am a professional. I am handling this.”
“You are handling this,” Paige agreed, in a tone that meant she believed that approximately forty percent.
“I am.”
“Okay.”
“I am, Paige.”
“I said okay.” She smiled into her wine. “Monday should be very interesting.”
Monday came. He was there at eight and he’d done the exercises.
I could tell before I even touched him, from the way he held the shoulder, the tension pattern was different, looser.
I worked it for thirty minutes and he asked two questions, pointed and measured, and I answered them and kept my hands on the job and my thoughts somewhere clinical, and I mostly succeeded.
We hadn’t small-talked, in fact, we’d barely talked which wasn’t as awkward as I’d have expected. I worked in companionable silence.
Mostly.
I was finishing my notes when a knock came at my open door. Not Griffin’s knock. Griffin didn’t knock, he materialized.
Sawyer Shaw stood in the frame in a dress shirt with his sleeves rolled, a man who looked like he’d come from three meetings, had three more to get to, and had stopped anyway because it was on his to-do list.
“Got a minute?”
“Of course.” I set my pen down.
He came in but didn’t sit, standing with his hands in his pockets taking in the treatment suite the same way I’d taken it in myself on the first day. He was assessing, noting, measuring it against whatever he’d imagined when they’d built it. “How’s it working for you? The setup.”
“Better than I could have imagined,” I said brightly. “The equipment inventory took three days but everything we asked for is here.”
He nodded and his expression settled. “We wanted it right the first time.” He glanced at the treatment table, the supply wall, the protocol binders I’d filled with three weeks of notes. “You’ve been hitting the ground running.”
“That’s the job.”
“It is.” He pushed off the doorframe. “Anything you need, staffing, equipment, and whatever might not be working the way it should, you come to me directly. Not Calloway. Me.” He paused, easy and unhurried.
“We spent a long time finding the right person for this department. Glad you’re here.
” I had been a little nervous when he arrived unexpectedly, but this was a welcomed visit to be sure.
I held his gaze. “I appreciate that.”
“Have a great day, Maren.” He gave me a single nod and left, moving on to wherever he was going next before I could reply.
I sat with his visit for a moment. Then Griffin appeared in my doorway radiating grievance, and the moment passed.
“The boys,” he said, “are being idiots.”
“About what?” I got back to work, only half listening to him.