Chapter 7

SEVEN

Logan

I can't look away from Annie's face, no matter how uncomfortable this whole thing is. The smooth curve of her cheek, her small nose, her slightly pointy chin…and big blue eyes that a guy could lose himself in. She's an appealing package, no doubt about it.

Her mouth is soft, but those blue eyes are wary. I don't think I've totally convinced her. But I guess I deserve this, too. I swallow a sigh and take a mouthful of coffee.

"Okay, good." She gives a businesslike nod. "I'm glad you agree. Also…" She hesitates. "Thank you for talking to Jake." After my first day when Jake called me "little coach," Logan apparently had a word with him.

"Idiot." He rolls his eyes. "Let me know if he's a problem."

"I can handle it myself, if he is."

"Yeah, I saw that." My lips quirk.

She makes a face. "Too much?"

"It got the message across. You shouldn't have to deal with shit like that."

"No, I shouldn't. But I live in the real world." The corners of her mouth lift. "It's happened before. It'll happen again. I'll deal with it."

I'm starting to suspect there's more to this woman than sequined costumes, pink hair bows, and polished nails. I study her across the table, and then the waitress arrives with our sandwiches. She sets them in front of us along with a bottle of ketchup, refills our coffee cups, and chirps, "Anything else I can get you?"

I lift an eyebrow at Annie. She shakes her head.

"We're good, thanks," I tell the waitress with a smile, then look back at Annie.

Okay…what now? We've sort of made our peace.

Except I don't think there can ever be peace between us. There's still that humming tension sizzling around us.

We gaze at each other across the table, neither of us moving to eat our lunch. Then I say, "Why didn't you play hockey? Since your whole family does."

"I can't play hockey. Look at me." She dips her chin.

I look at her. God help me, I look. She's fully clothed, but I've seen her naked. And seeing her out of her baggy sweatsuits today, in a pair of dress pants and snug sweater, shows me that tight and toned body. Petite, yes. She definitely doesn't have big hooters, which I admit I'm a fan of, but I discovered that night years ago that firm and small could be sexy as fuck.

"I mean, I'm small," she adds hurriedly, as if sensing my dirty thoughts. "Small girls can play hockey—I did, for a while, and with my brothers—but it's hard to win puck battles. And anyway, I didn't want to try to compete with my brothers. I wanted to do something totally different. I'm much more suited to figure skating."

I nod and tear my gaze away from her. I swallow. "Why do you want this job so much?" I ask, referring back to her earlier statement.

She drops her gaze to her plate and picks up a knife and fork. "That should be obvious. It's a job in the NHL. All my brothers play in the NHL."

I pick up a French fry. "So it's your way of keeping up with your brothers?"

One corner of her mouth lifts wryly. "Wow. Why do you think I have to keep up with my brothers?"

"You're competitive."

She sighs. "Okay, yes. Obviously I couldn't compete with them playing hockey. I was doing pretty well at figure skating and then…well, that ended."

"Why?"

"I got hurt." Her forehead creases and her eyes shadow.

"I'm sorry."

She lifts one shoulder. "Shit happens."

I nod slowly. "Yeah. Still sucks, though."

"It was hard," she admits, looking down. "But I survived and I'm building a new career."

"What happened? How did you get hurt?"

She pops a bite of sandwich into her mouth, chews, and swallows. "It wasn't just one thing. I had a few concussions."

My mouth drops open. "Oh. Wow. That's not good."

"Tell me about it." She looks up and her eyes are full of such heartbreak, I feel my lungs squeeze. "The first couple I recovered pretty quickly. The last one took longer." She pauses, fighting emotion. "I had killer headaches and felt sick all the time. I was exhausted and I couldn't focus, and then I got depressed." Emotion makes her voice quiver.

"I'm sorry."

She gives a quick nod. "Thanks. It was a deep, black hole for a long time. I ended up dropping out of school."

"University of Michigan."

"You remember that?"

"Yeah." She told me that night years ago she got a skating scholarship there and was studying sport management.

"I never did finish my degree. I had a hard time focusing. Things got better, but it scared me. I had long talks with doctors and therapists and my family, and everyone seemed to think I should quit skating. Everyone was worried about more brain injuries and long-term effects."

"CTE," I say quietly, referring to chronic traumatic encephalopathy , which is a kind of dementia. "Yeah, I've heard that talk, too."

"You've had concussions?"

"One or two. I'm a hockey player." I give her a rueful smile. "Luckily they've been mild. But the risk of developing a neurodegenerative disease later in life is still scary."

She eyes me searchingly. "Do you worry about it?"

I don't answer right away. I deny it to most people, but she's been honest and vulnerable with me, telling me about that. "Sometimes," I admit. "It's been a while since I've had a head injury." I play differently now than I did when I was a kid, when my dad was constantly urging me to get out there and fight. "How did they happen? Falling on the ice?"

"Yeah. I've had so many injuries. Broken arm. Meniscus tear. Cut by a skate blade."

I wince. I've seen that in hockey and it's brutal.

"I got stitched up and went back on the ice," she continues matter-of-factly.

I'm holding my sandwich in two hands, staring at her.

"And I've had so many sprains, strains, and bruises you couldn't keep track of them all." She pauses, then adds, "I'm…I was a pairs skater."

I nod slowly. I don't know a lot about figure skating, but I've seen couples skate.

"It's probably the most dangerous of the four skating disciplines because the girls go so high in the air. Like, we get thrown three times as high as singles girls jump, and we're still expected to land on one foot." She smiles wistfully. "I loved it."

My jaw goes slack. "Three times as high…you get thrown in the air," I repeat.

"Oh yeah. I love that flying feeling. Also held upside down, tossed in the air?—"

"Jesus Christ." I stare at her. "You love being tossed in the air."

She grins. "Yeah. Have you ever seen a death spiral?"

"Um…maybe?"

"The guy pivotson one foot while the girl holds his hand and stretches out almost parallel to the ice and circles around him with oneskateon the ice."

"Okay."

She grins. "You need to see it, I guess. Then there's the headbanger. It's not legal in competitions, but we learned to do it anyway. Ivan—my partner—would pick me up by the ankles and spin me around, going up and down, with my head coming close to the ice."

"Holy fuck." I set down my sandwich, my gut clenching.

"It's not as scary as it sounds." She waves a hand. "I wasn't fully facing the ice, so if I ended up touching the ice it would be with my shoulder."

"Oh. Okay then."

She laughs at my sarcasm. "You definitely have to trust your partner."

"Obviously. Holy shit."

"Once we did a twist where he throws me up and I turn three times and then he catches me. He caught me and pushed me out and I fell straight backward and hit my head."

My mouth drops open and my stomach twists.

"There was blood all over the ice."

"I think…we might have to change the subject." I swallow an accumulation of saliva in my mouth.

Her eyes widen. "What? Oh…sorry! Okay, yeah. Hockey players get injured a lot, too, though. You must be used to it."

"I've been hurt, yeah." But not by doing crazy, reckless shit like that. That's asking to get hurt. Also, I wear a lot of protective gear. Figure skaters are out there throwing themselves around basically naked. Jesus. "When it happens to me, it's fine, when someone else gets hurt I get a little squeamish."

She gives me a long look across the table. I can't read her expression. Then she drops her gaze again. "Yeah. Let's change the subject."

I cast about for a different topic. "How's your sandwich?"

"Good! Yours?"

"Yeah, it's good." I look down at the pastrami. "I need a minute."

"The weather's great for this time of year, isn't it?"

I laugh. "I guess."

"Do you have any pets?"

"Yeah. I have a dog."

Her eyes brighten. "Oh, what kind?"

"We think he's a foodle."

She blinks.

"Probably fox terrier and poodle."

"Oh! That sounds cute."

"He's very cute. Although he always looks kind of a mess. Just the way his fur is."

"What's his name?"

"Teemu."

She chokes on her laughter. "Aw! That's adorable."

I pull my phone out and open my photo gallery. "It's not hard to find a picture of him. My whole camera roll is pics of Teemu." I hold out the phone to show her one.

She beams with delight. "I love him!"

Anyone who loves my dog is definitely in my good books. I set down my phone and resume my eating, now that she's distracted me from blood and gore. In particular, Annie's blood.

"He's fun," I say. "Lots of energy, but he's okay being alone."

Her forehead creases. "What do you do when you travel?"

"I have a dog sitter. Millsy's wife runs a dog walking and grooming business."

"Right! I just met her earlier."

"The guy who comes and helps is great. Teemu loves him."

"That's great then."

"You like dogs?"

"I do. Maybe one day I'll be able to have one. I haven't really felt settled in one place long enough." She flashes a nonchalant smile.

"Where were you before this? Oh, Bayard University, right."

"Right. Before that I was coaching figure skaters at home in St. Paul, but I knew I wasn't going to be there forever."

"Bigger and better things," I say.

"Right."

"So you can compete with your brothers."

She sighs. "Why do you keep saying that? It's really not like that."

"Okay." I don't believe her, but whatever.

"So, both our dads played hockey. Remember, we wondered if they played against each other?"

"Yeah." Christ. I hope my dad didn't fight her dad. That would be another reason to hate me.

"Did your dad pressure you to play hockey?"

"Oh yeah."

"Really?"

"I wanted to play hockey. It's not like he forced me to. But he definitely had strong opinions about hockey and how I should play."

She tilts her head. "How so?"

"My dad's kind of old school. He thinks hockey should be rough and tough, mixing it up."

"Aaaah." She purses her lips and nods.

"He thinks hockey's gotten too ‘soft.'"

"Too reliant on skill and speed," she says knowingly. "Yeah, I've heard that. Not from my dad," she adds hastily. "But others."

I nod.

She sinks her teeth into her bottom lip, biting back a smile. "I'm guessing your father wouldn't approve of a figure skater teaching the boys how to skate better."

My jaw loosens. Then I bark out a laugh. "Yeah. You're probably right. I haven't talked to him about this."

"Like father, like son."

Now I wince. I don't want to be like my dad. But I have been, looking down on figure skating, skeptical of Annie's ability to make us better skaters. And I know that the game is faster and more skillful these days. That season opener where I fucked up, turned over the puck and couldn't catch the guy showed me that. "Shit," I mutter, rubbing my beard.

She gives me a curious, look, then says, "Hockey hasn't changed enough . There's still so much wrong with it."

I'm instantly defensive of the sport I love. "If you don't like it, why are you working in it?"

She eyes me placidly. "I never said I don't like it. I love the sport. But I can love it and see there are problems with it."

"Like what?"

Her eyebrows elevate. "Racism. Abuse. Sexism. Xenophobia. Autocratic coaching methods?—"

I hold up a hand. "Okay. I get it."

"Do you?"

I sigh. "Yeah. I've seen all those things. And I hate them, too."

Her gaze is steady on my face. "Well, figure skating also has those issues."

"Ignoring them isn't a good strategy, huh?"

She smiles wryly.

"I've always hated the things my dad stood for—the old boys club, that whole hockey code. He always told me never to question anything the coach says. The coach is the boss, and if you question him you're not a team player. You get labelled a ‘whiner' or a ‘locker-room cancer' and so much for your career. But that kind of thing is what led to one of my college coaches getting fired, because he was such a dickhead to a Black player the guy ended up quitting hockey. He couldn't complain about it. To anyone." I shake my head, regret like a rock in my gut. I meet her eyes. "A few years ago we had a problem here, with our coach. I don't know if you heard about it."

She shakes her head slowly. "No. I haven't followed the Bears that closely."

"Our coach was an asshole. He was abusive. When he was ranting and yelling, it was one thing. But he started singling out a couple of guys and he called one of them a homophobic slur. He benched players out of spite. He reamed guys out for a mistake in front of the whole team. He freaked out if anyone tried to question him. Millsy tried to talk to him, and he got scratched. Then he called Jammer stupid and used the N-word?—"

She gasps.

"Yeah. And he kicked him."

"Oh my God." Her eyes widen.

He nods. "Millsy, Jammer, and J-Bo ended up going to talk to the GM about it. They were taking a big risk. But in the end, Simmons got fired. That's how we ended up with Gary. He's tough, but he's not a dictator. He listens to us."

"That's good. I wouldn't be working here if I thought he was an asshole."

"Was there sexism at Bayard?"

"Oh yeah. I was their first skating coach. I worked with the women and the men's teams, but some of the men thought I should only be working with the women. I overheard one of them say to another that I was only there for the dick."

I jerk in shock. "Jesus."

She shrugs. "I got called a puck bunny, which is so stupid it's laughable. And there was more." She drops her gaze. "It was hard, but I can stand up for myself."

I fucking hate that for her. But like she said…that's the real world. And I'm ashamed of some of my dickish behavior that first day she had us on the ice. "Why hockey coaching? You said you coached figure skaters…why'd you move to hockey?"

She tilts her head. "I've always loved hockey. When I used to watch my brothers' games and I'd see one guy skating funny, and I'd think, oh if he just did ‘this,' he'd be better. I didn't know why they didn't work on their skating as much as other things, since it's such a big part of hockey. It would make their game so much better. I could see the things they could improve."

"Cool. So now you have a chance to make that happen."

"Yeah."

We've both been finished our sandwiches for a while now. But talking to her is easy. And fun. Even if it's opening my eyes about some shit I'd rather not see. But I want to be better than that. It's my whole goal this year.

The waitress brings the bill and I hand her a credit card, waving aside Annie's objections. "I invited you."

She accepts graciously. "Thank you. And thanks for the apology."

"I'm not a total dick," I say ruefully. "But I may have stuff to learn."

She smiles. "Don't we all?"

Our eyes meet again with a flare of heat and awareness. Shit.

I'm in fucking awe of this woman. And…I like her.