Chapter 7
This was going to end badly.
It was less than ten minutes into practice, and Stefan was stretching along the boards.
Which wasn’t the problem, though the fact that he felt a little stiff and sore from his early-morning workout was concerning. Namely, because it showed that he was getting old.
Thirty years on the planet, and he was on the downward side of his career. Not that he wasn’t going to be hanging around for the next five or six seasons—hopefully—but hockey was truly a young man’s sport.
Stefan had already been in the NHL for nine seasons: six with the Calgary Flames, one with the Ducks, and the last two with the Gold.
He was lucky in that he hadn’t had to fight his way up from the AHL.
It had been dumb luck, really, paired with a couple of unfortunate injuries for some teammates that Stefan’s opportunity to play in the NHL had come at the beginning of his first professional season.
But after that, it had been his work ethic that had secured the position.
He’d taken the opening and worked like hell to fit right into the Flames’ lineup. Then the Ducks’.
He’d been happy in Anaheim. Secure. Figured he’d hang around there until his retirement. But the Gold were located in San Francisco—a place his mother had always wanted to live—so he’d requested a trade.
Ducks’ management had understood, obliging his request and allowing him to be traded to the Gold. He’d moved his mother out from Minnesota, jumped into forging a new place on a new team . . . upon which he’d been thrust into a shit-show of epic proportions.
Backstabbing. Laziness. Poor coaching.
The switch had become instant regret.
But that wasn’t the current problem, or at least not the one that was troubling him at the moment. The Gold were on a better track this season and had a real chance at redeeming themselves to the general public. What was making tension shoot down his spine was the fact that the guys were taking it easy on Brit, and that with every soft wrist shot slung her way, Stefan could see her frustration level rising.
He was surprised there wasn’t smoke coming out of the ear holes in her helmet.
It was his duty as captain to make sure everyone came together, worked as a unit. To that effect, he couldn’t help but wonder if he should go over there and rip a shot, just to set the tone, to let the guys know it was okay.
But would that cross the line with her? Step on her toes? Or—
He agreed with Brit’s decision to come into the locker room. Female or not, she was a teammate and deserved a space with the team. Further than that, the team wouldn’t take it easy on a male goalie in practice, so they shouldn’t do any different by her.
But . . . what if he hurt her?
Which was probably a stupid thought, because it wasn’t like Stefan’s shot was that hard, not by NHL standards.
Still, it went against his vein to even chance hurting a woman, and he knew that most of the guys—with the sole exceptions being Stewart and a few other idiots—felt the same.
There might as well have been a tightrope strung across the ice.
On one side was how they would normally react. The other was what they were doing now. How were they supposed to navigate it?
Turned out he—they—didn’t need to.
Another shot fluttered toward the net, barely making a sound as it hit Brit’s leg pads.
She chucked her glove, blocker, and stick on top of the net then yanked back her helmet.
Her strides were rapid but quiet as she skated toward the top of the circles. Her words, when she got there, were not.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Brit shoved the player hard in the chest. Chad was one of their forwards, a second line right-winger, and the push meant he had to scramble to stay on his feet, barely escaping a fall straight back onto his ass. “I can shoot harder than that in my sleep. How the fuck am I supposed to get some fucking practice if you won’t shoot the fucking puck with any-fucking-power? Are we in peewee fucking hockey or the fucking NHL?”
The string of f-bombs unleashed impressed Stefan—and a few others on the team, judging by the bemused expressions emerging on their faces. She was well-versed in using hockey’s favorite curse word as both adjective and verb.
Chad, for his part, appeared equally shocked and awestruck.
When Brit paused for breath, he nodded, said, “Okay.”
Man of few words . . . that was Chad.
Brit narrowed her eyes at him, and he nodded again. She whipped her glare to a few of the others before skating back to her crease—the blue half circle directly in front of each goal.
Helmet down. Blocker and glove on. Stick in hand as she reached for the water bottle on top of the net.
Stefan saw what was going to happen before anyone else did. He burst to his feet and—
“Watch—”
Too late.
Crack. A stick collided with the ice. The puck flew through the air and collided . . . with Brit’s back. It hit with a sick thunk—the noise akin to a pumpkin cracking in half—and she went down to one knee.
Here was the thing about goalies. All their padding was in the front. Their backs had basically no protection. Players knew that, which was why rule number one in hockey was never shoot the puck when the goalie wasn’t looking.
Fucking five-year-olds knew it. Dumbass, twelve-year-old boys knew it. And certainly professional NHL players knew it.
Mike Stewart knew it.
He was also a giant bastard.
Stefan was just about to launch himself at the no good son of a bitch who was wearing a smirk the size of Mona Lisa’s, when there was the sharp trill of a whistle.
“Take five!” Frankie hollered as he skated toward Brit.
Before Frankie reached her, Brit shoved to her skates and picked up her stick. She pointed it at Stefan and nodded.
He hesitated midstride. Did she want him to—?
She banged her stick on the ice, a sharp tap that caught his attention. Nodded again.
Okay then, Brit wanted him to shoot. And . . . what? He shouldn’t? He should?
After a moment, he figured he’d at least better make it count.
Stefan wound up and ripped a shot at the net. Not a simple one either. A far side, lower-corner slap shot that . . . she stopped easily.
He grinned.
“I’ll be damned,” Max, his defense partner and one of his best friends muttered. “She’s good.”
“Of course she’s good, you moron,” Frankie said, with a whack of his stick to back of Max’s calves. “Now show the rest of the team that.”
Max took a slap shot. His was one of the fastest on the team, and it bounced off Brit’s pads with a thud that reverberated through Stefan’s stomach and the empty arena.
One of the guys whistled in surprise, and then they were off, the break forgotten, more shots, more surprise . . . more respect gained for Brit’s ability.
By the time Bernard called them all into a mid-ice huddle before dispersing them into their individual groups, Brit looked to have earned more than half of his teammates’ approval.
Including his.
He watched her out of the corner of his eye: her helmet propped back onto her head, her cheeks slightly rosy from exertion, one tendril of blond hair having escaped her ponytail to curl around one cheek.
She looked like an angel.
Stefan almost snorted. Okay, no angel. She looked tough and serious and fierce and . . . like every single one of his hockey wet dreams come to life.
She was also his teammate. And he was captain.
So he needed to forget that she had smelled like roses when he’d walked into the arena next to her, forget the way her pale brown eyes had flashed with hurt when she’d seen the room management had wanted to stick her in.
He also really needed to forget the sight of her naked breasts. Forget they were just the right size to fit in his palms—
Bernard gave a puff on his whistle, and the team stood, skating to their assigned locations.
Stefan hadn’t heard a single word his coach had said.
Good thing he always studied the drills for the next day’s practice the night before.
He joined Max and sent a small but fervent prayer to the hockey gods that Coach hadn’t changed anything up on him.