17. Lila

Chapter 17

Lila

"Okay, you've been on another planet lately." Faith dropped onto the couch and eyed me. "What's going on?"

"What?" I laughed. "I'm good. I blew that shot at practice, but I was—"

"No, no, no, no, no." She shook her head emphatically. "I don't mean when you're playing hockey. I mean just… you. In general. Whenever you're not on the ice or working out, you're…" She gestured like something flying away. Shooting me a pointed look, she added, "I'd tell you to be straight with me, but…"

I tossed a throw pillow at her.

She laughed, caught it, and wrapped her arms around it. "Okay, seriously. I need you to level with me—what's going on? Because you've kind of been a mess since you found out you were coming to Pittsburgh, and you're a different kind of mess now."

"I feel like a better mess," I tried.

"Uh-huh. But still a mess. What's going on and why do I think it has to do with McAvoy?"

The heat that rushed into my face meant there was no pretending she hadn't found her mark. I had to be as red as the goal light, and her cackle made me groan.

"I knew it! I knew it!" She nudged me with her bare foot. "I totally knew it."

"Shut up," I muttered.

She giggled, but then studied me. "What happened, anyway?" She lowered her chin a little and eyed me. "One minute, you couldn't stand her and wanted her launched into the sun. Now you're suddenly…" She flailed a hand at me. "Very much not wanting her launched into the sun."

I avoided her gaze and chewed the inside of my cheek.

"If you've got a crush on her," Faith mused, "you can tell me."

Groaning, I buried my face in my hands. It wasn't like I could hide anything from her, and I had no idea why I bothered trying.

"I figured as much," Faith said, but she sounded sympathetic. "I'm just surprised. You know, because of the whole wanting her launched into the sun thing. What changed?"

I ran a hand through my hair and exhaled. "She's attractive as hell, okay? I mean, have you looked at her?"

"Enough to know she's a hundred percent your type, yes."

Renewed heat rose in my face. "Do I have a type?"

"Um, yes?" My friend eyed me like I'd lost my mind. "Tall and femme with a butt that doesn't quit? Hair that spends more time in a messy ponytail than not? And like, you've got a serious competency kink, and you spend every day seeing exactly how competent she is at hockey." Faith cocked a brow. "Did I miss anything?"

I let my face fall into my hands and groaned. "Oh my God, I am so fucked."

"Or, well… not fucked. Which seems to be the issue."

I gave her the finger, prompting a giggle. Raising my head, I said, "But she's a teammate. Getting involved with a teammate is—"

"Oh, stop it." Faith gestured dismissively. "There are two married couples on your team and another that's this close to getting engaged. Literally no one cares if you get involved with a teammate."

I pressed my lips together. Okay. Fine. She did have a point. Even as I'd said it, I'd known it was a weak argument. Hell, the forward who'd assisted on our gold medal game-winning goal at the Olympics married the goalie she'd scored on like two months later. The men's league still got the vapors if they found out a player was gay, but in ours, lesbian and bisexual women were not exactly a rarity.

"All right, so no one cares if I get involved with a teammate." I grimaced. "But let's not kid ourselves—she's not going to be interested in me. I was an unholy bitch to her when we got here."

"You were, and I don't think I'm the only one who's noticed that that's changed. Like, dramatically changed." Faith laughed. "In fact, it was such a dramatic change, I'd bet money that the only person on the planet who doesn't know you're into Sabrina McAvoy is Sabrina McAvoy."

I chewed the inside of my cheek. "You don't think she knows?" I didn't think she did, but it sure would make things easier.

"Of course she doesn't." Faith waved her hand and reached for her drink. "Have you ever met a woman who can tell when another woman is into her?"

I managed a laugh. "Fair point."

"Which is probably how you haven't caught on that she is absolutely into you ."

I choked on nothing. "She—what? What are you talking about?"

Faith rolled her eyes. "See what I mean? Everyone on the planet can see it, but neither of you are going to catch on until one holds up a sign that says ‘ Hey, stupid, I'm into you. '"

I laughed, but it came out kind of high. I was still a little off-guard by her suggestion that Sabrina was into me. Yeah, yeah, I was always slow on the uptake when it came to figuring out if a woman wanted me, but… Sabrina? No way.

"Okay, so no one on the team will care if we're together," I said. "But… the last time I dated a teammate, it was a disaster. And it was distracting on the ice."

"Do you think it'll be any more distracting than all this sexual tension you idiots keep ignoring?"

"Maybe? With Leann, it was bad . I'm lucky I didn't get thrown off the team."

Faith rolled her eyes. "You were sixteen. Everything is ten times more dramatic and distracting when you're sixteen."

Ugh. Fine. Once again, she was right. Attraction and breakups were still enough to short circuit my brain now, but not like they had been when I was a teenager. I was an adult now. As much as I was and always would be a hothead on the ice, I was a professional, and I'd played through all kinds of things that would've had teenage Lila crying in the showers.

"But what about the whole thing where we didn't get along at first?" I groaned. "God, I was such a jerk to her."

"I'm glad you recognize that," Faith said. "What changed?"

"Besides me not being a jerk to her anymore?"

"Well, I'm assuming there was a reason for that. Aside from, you know, you realizing it was uncalled for."

Trust her to be blunt and to the point.

"Okay, okay." I waved a hand. "I realized it was uncalled for." There was a lot more to it—a lot of things I hadn't known and still felt like an asshole for assuming—but that wasn't my story to tell someone else. "The way things are now… I mean, what should I do? I've never been good at approaching women."

"And? She's into you. Flirt back a little. Ask her to get drinks or dinner. And, you know, maybe tell her it's a date because if she's anything like me, it'll be your twelfth date before she realizes what's going on."

I laughed, because yeah, I'd done the same thing. "Okay, okay. I'll try. Maybe. But like, if I flub this, I'll still have to see her every day."

"So what if you do?" Faith shrugged. "Haven't we all made asses of ourselves with a woman, and then laughed about it with her in bed later?"

I didn't know why that made me blush, but it did. "It's not just me?"

She barked a laugh and shook her head. "Oh Lord, no. I was so ridiculously awkward with Elena when we met, and look at us now."

"Eh, good point."

"Hey. You're not supposed to agree with me."

I shrugged unrepentantly, earning me an eyeroll.

"Anyway. Speaking of my lovely wife…" Faith pushed herself to her feet. "I need to go FaceTime her and the kids."

I nodded. "Tell them all I said hi."

"Will do. And you'll figure this thing out with Sabrina." She squeezed my shoulder as she walked behind the couch. "Talk to her. Ask her out. If you'll check her into the boards during practice just because you don't like her, you have to be able to ask her to get drinks because you do ."

"You know it's not really that easy," I called after her.

She just cackled, and I laughed as I rolled my eyes. She made a good point. A lot of them, actually. I still didn't quite buy that Sabrina was into me, but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained. And honestly, I didn't see how asking her out could make things any more excruciatingly awkward than they'd been during training camp. I cringed just thinking about that.

I'd talk to her, then. Maybe. Eventually. I could work up the nerve, couldn't I? I'd done it before.

Not with someone as hot as Sabrina.

Not with someone I'd already screwed up this badly with.

Yikes. This won't be easy.

Worth a try, though.

In the next room, I heard Faith's kids squeal in delight over the phone, their voices distant and tinny, and I smiled to myself. I envied the marriage and family she had.

On the other hand, I had no idea how they did it. Elena was playing for Seattle while Faith worked for Pittsburgh, so they spent the season living apart. The kids stayed with Elena because her parents lived locally and could take them whenever she was on the road. Neither of them had any family in Pittsburgh, so they wouldn't have that support network here. Keeping the kids in Seattle was a no-brainer.

They seemed to do all right with that arrangement, but it had to be hard as hell. I'd never done a long-distance relationship, and I wasn't so sure I was wired for it. Then again, if I was in a relationship with someone and our circumstances changed… Well, I'd either have to rewire myself for the long-distance thing or let her go. I couldn't imagine Faith letting go of Elena, and their separation wouldn't be forever. So maybe LDRs were one of those things you didn't necessarily sign up for—you just dealt with it if the circumstances arose, kind of like how I dealt with my knee problems now that I had them.

It occurred to me that if I pursued Sabrina, and if I somehow managed to pull a miracle out of my ass and charm her into hooking up with me or dating me, we might have to do the long-distance thing at some point. Hockey was a fickle thing, and there was no guarantee either of us would stay in Pittsburgh. Trades. Free agency. Anything could happen. There wasn't even any guarantee we'd both see the end of the season with this team; there'd been an absolute storm of trades last year right before the trade deadline, and that could happen this year, too.

There was also another expansion coming in the next couple of years, and the team would only be able to protect so many players. They'd probably put Sabrina on the protected list, but me? I kind of cynically wanted to think no one would snatch up me and my knee for their expansion team. I was still amazed Pittsburgh had signed me at all, so I wasn't banking on that lightning striking twice, either as a UFA or during the expansion draft. But if it did… where would that leave me and Sabrina?

It was so much easier to not like her, but now I did like her. I liked her a lot. I'd misunderstood things about her, and I'd unfairly disliked her, and now… God, my tune had changed about her, that was for sure.

It didn't help that I was painfully attracted to her. And, I mean, okay, Faith was right about Sabrina being my type, but there was more to it than that. Sabrina didn't just check all my boxes—she was like the gold standard of all of them. Now that I wasn't determined to despise her, I was lucky I could think around her, never mind speak or skate. When I'd still hated her, I'd been annoyed by how much the camera loved her smile. Now, I completely understood why the camera was so infatuated with it. Who wouldn't be?

The competency kink Faith had mentioned—I couldn't deny that either. Both that I definitely had one, even if I hadn't realized that was what it was, and that Sabrina personified the kind of competency that made my pulse race. Now that I wasn't watching her through resentment-colored glasses, and now that I knew the truth about her rise to hockey stardom, it was impossible not to see how incredible she really was.

Even if her father had connected her to the best hockey coaches on planet earth, genes and mentors could only take someone so far. The way Sabrina saw the ice? The way her mind worked? You couldn't teach that. I'd been so angry that her name had given her an express ticket to the top of this sport, I'd never stopped to realize that Sabrina truly was a generational talent. Not a dynastic one—her gift had nothing to do with her father and everything to do with her hockey IQ and her work ethic.

That level of competency? Oh, yeah. That did it for me.

And now that I knew just how much of an uphill battle it had been for her to get here? How little had been handed to her and how much she'd been held back? How intensely stubborn and fiercely determined she had to be to fight through all of that to earn her place as a hockey star?

Oh, hell. There was no pretending I didn't admire that… or that I wasn't ridiculously attracted to it.

I swore into the silence of the living room and rubbed my eyes with the heels of my hands. Hating her for what had turned out to be nothing had been easy. Being this stupid for her? How the hell was I supposed to function like this?

And what was I supposed to do with it? Approach her? Have… Well, have faith in Faith that she knew what she saw and that this attraction was mutual?

The thought made my heart race. I wanted to do that. I wanted to know what Sabrina looked like when she was flirty. When she was flattered. When she was so turned on she didn't know which way was up. I wanted all of that.

But… was I setting myself up for heartbreak? Either because she wasn't as into me as Faith somehow thought she was, or because we'd wind up on different teams and wouldn't be able to weather the distance? What if we got together and then—

Yo. Lila. Get a grip.

I took and released a deep breath. I was getting ahead of myself. Way, way ahead of myself.

Instead of thinking about all the reasons Sabrina and I would inevitably break up, I needed to think about being teammates with her. Being friends with her. Making up for the incredibly bumpy start we'd had because of my stupidity. See if she actually liked me after the novelty wore off that I wasn't being a complete asshole to her.

Then, and only then, maybe I could see if I was imagining this spark.