In It to Win It (Wynn Hockey)

by Kelly Jamieson

  I purse my lips. I muster up a weak denial. “There’s no fire.”

  “I think you’re protesting a little too much.” She leans forward. “But I don’t get why you’re mad at him. Seems to me he did nothing wrong.”

  She’s right. Why did that fight upset me so much?

  I drop my gaze to the table. “I was scared,” I admit. “I was afraid he was going to get hurt.”

  “Ah-ha.”

  “And I felt guilty. Because it was all my fault. I felt responsible for what happened. I did want Manny to know I was leaving with JP, but I never intended it to turn into a brawl!” I beg for forgiveness with my eyes and Lacey shakes her head, smiling.

  “I don’t want anything to do with guys who get into fistfights at weddings. So don’t worry. If I ever see JP again, it’ll be fine. And hey, I’ve been back on the dating app and there are a few guys who seem interesting.”

  JP

  “Sorry about the wedding.”

  Grandpa shrugs. He’s pruning a shrub with bright orange and yellow flowers in his backyard. He and Chelsea live in a big Spanish-style two-story house on a huge lot, not far from the arena in Santa Monica. Grandpa has developed a fondness for gardening and the backyard is spectacular, the shimmering turquoise pool surrounded by paving stones and a perfect green lawn, palm trees, shrubs, and flowers lining the perimeter. It’s a bit of a trek from my place to his, but I made the drive this sunny Sunday, a day off for me and for him as well, I assumed.

  “Not my wedding,” he says. “Is that why you’re here?”

  “Yeah.” I hate it that Grandpa thinks less of me. He was pissed about me dating Théo’s ex-girlfriend, and I don’t want him to be pissed about this too. “What is that plant?”

  “Lantana.”

  “I like it.”

  He gives me a look laced with skepticism. “Really?”

  I don’t have a clue about plants. “Sure.”

  “Why’d Martinez start that fight?”

  I sigh. “I didn’t realize he and Taylor were going out.”

  Grandpa drops his shears and fixes me with a hard stare. “Jesus Christ, JP. You have to stop hitting on other men’s girlfriends.”

  “I wasn’t!” I hold up my hands, then drop them and bow my head. “I didn’t know, I swear.”

  “She didn’t tell you?”

  “No.” My words are bitter. “Women.”

  He lets out a gusty breath. “True. What really happened with Emma?”

  I’m kind of surprised he remembers her name. “She told me she and Théo had broken up.”

  “You never mentioned that before.”

  “It didn’t exactly come up in the conversation.” We’re both thinking of the family party Mom and Dad held to welcome Théo to California after he took the job managing Grandpa’s team. Grandpa had given me shit for dating Théo’s ex. “And it didn’t matter. I shouldn’t have gone out with her, even if they did break up. But I didn’t steal her from him.”

  He scrunches up his face. “Are you sure?”

  “What the fuck?” I gape at him. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  “You and Théo were always close, but there’s also a rivalry between you.”

  I stare at him. I don’t like the thought that he knew that; that he knew I always felt like I couldn’t live up to Théo. “Okay,” I acknowledge quietly. “Maybe I did like the fact that Emma was interested in me.” Ugh. I hate myself. “But I didn’t go after her.”

  “And you didn’t know that bridesmaid was dating Martinez?”

  I frown. “No. I swear. She wasn’t there with him the night before the wedding.” She came up to my hotel room and we banged all night. “She wasn’t wearing a ring. I’m not a complete moron.”

  Grandpa barks out a laugh and trims another branch. “No, you’re not. You just don’t always think through the consequences of what you do.”

  “I already got this lecture from Théo.”

  “Good.”

  “I just wanted you to know that…aw fuck, I hate even saying the words.”

  “What words?”

  “It wasn’t my fault.”

  He cocks his head. “You may not make the best decisions, but you always take responsibility for them.”

  I lift my chin. “Yeah.”

  He eyes me shrewdly. “Sometimes you take responsibility when it’s really not your fault. I know you were trying to protect your teammate when you got in that fight last year.”

  I nod slowly. “I’m trying to do better, Grandpa. Really. I’m trying to make better decisions, on the ice and off. I screwed up with Théo and I’m not going to do that again. I really didn’t know there was anything between Taylor and Martinez, and he started that fight out of the blue. I mean…I had to fight back.” I grimace.

  “Of course.” He nods. “Also, you cleaned his clock.”

  I shouldn’t like it, but damn, I do enjoy his approval. “And I’m trying to do better on the ice, too. Control my emotions better.”

  “Passion is a good thing. But it can also be a curse.”

  I wait for him to say more, wanting his words of wisdom. Grandpa may be old and Théo worries about his decision-making lately, but he’s learned a lot over the years.

  “The same kind of drive that leads to success can also be destructive,” he continues. “You can be so passionate about what you’re doing, you end up wrapping your whole identity in it and losing sight of the real reason for why you’re doing it in the first place.” He pauses.

  I frown and nod slowly. “Because I love the game.”

  “Yeah. We all love the game. But the best athletes in the world are at the top because they can control their emotions rather than their emotions controlling them.”

  “Thanks, Grandpa. I guess I have some stuff to think about.”

  His chuckle is dry. “You’ve already been thinking about them. How about lunch?”

  “Okay.” We head inside, where Chelsea’s in the kitchen.

  She looks different than when I usually see her, with her hair and makeup perfect, dressed in expensive clothes. Today she’s wearing jeans, a tank top, and flip-flops, and her face looks even younger with no makeup. She smiles at me when Grandpa tells her I’m staying for lunch. “Great.”

  We eat out on the patio. Chelsea serves a salad with lots of healthy greens, chicken, and avocado, and pours us glasses of fresh juice that’s orange in color but is actually orange, pineapple, and carrot juice.

  “Tons of nutrients,” she says, setting a glass in front of me.

  “Good, I need that.”

  Grandpa and I talk about my summer in Montréal and the workouts I did to stay in shape. He shakes his head. “Times have changed,” he mutters. “Training camp used to be when we got back in shape.”

  “Can’t do that now,” I say. “If you show up at training camp fat and lazy, you’re gonna be in trouble.”

  “They shouldn’t even call it training camp anymore. Did you know it was Conn Smythe who invented training camp?”

  “No. No, I did not.”

  “That was back in the twenties, after he bought the Maple Leafs. Well, they weren’t the Leafs; he changed the name to that. Made the players do a bunch of workouts and hikes and calisthenics. Guys complained, but they did it. Those guys didn’t even take their skates home with them at the end of the season!” He chortles. “In my day it started changing; they started doing more scrimmages as a way to see who should make the team.”

  I’ve heard some of his stories before, but I still enjoy them. “Didn’t you refuse to sign up one year?”

  “Yeah.” He grins and pokes his fork into a piece of avocado. “I thought I was worth more than they were offering. It was the day of the first game of the season when Joe Black,
the Leafs’ CEO, met me in the lobby of Maple Leaf Gardens before the game and said if anyone recognized me, he’d give me what I wanted. No one did.” His grin goes crooked. “So I signed the contract, an hour before the game started.”

  I laugh. I love hearing these tales of how hockey used to be, and Grandpa’s full of them. “Was that before expansion?”

  “Yeah. There were only six teams and not many spots for rookies. What the hell was I thinking?” He shakes his head.

  “You were thinking you were a good player,” Chelsea says. “And you proved it.”

  Grandpa snorts, but he and Chelsea exchange a look, and I’m struck by the affection between them.

  A lot of my family thinks Chelsea married Grandpa for his money. But they’ve been married almost thirty years and have four kids together, so it has to be more than that. Grandpa’s still pretty fit for an old guy…Ugh. I don’t want to think about Grandpa’s sex life.

  After lunch, I drive back home, but as I’m passing Marina del Rey, I impulsively take the exit off the 405 that leads to Théo’s place. I have no idea if he and Lacey are even home, but since I’m close, I decide to stop in.

  Nobody answers the doorbell, but I hear voices on the beach, so I step onto the sand. Shading my eyes from the sun, I stare across the sand. Yeah, that’s Théo over at one of the volleyball nets. And Lacey. And Taylor.

  Damn.

  Théo spots me and waves both arms in the air, then gestures for me to come over. I’m not dressed for beach volleyball, in jeans, loafers, and a long-sleeved T-shirt. I lower my sunglasses to my nose, kick off my shoes, and trudge through the soft sand toward them. The sun is bright but not hot, a cool autumn breeze blowing in off the ocean.

  “Hey, man, what’s up?” Théo calls as I get nearer.

  “Not much. Just had lunch with Grandpa and Chelsea, and since I was passing by, I decided to stop in.”

  “Cool.” Théo slings an arm around my shoulders. “I’d ask how Grandpa is, but I just saw him yesterday.” He pauses. “And Chelsea. She spent most of the afternoon in Grandpa’s office.”

  “Huh. That’s weird.” I like Chelsea, but the rest of the family doesn’t trust her. “She do that often?”

  “I’ve seen here there a few times.” Théo shrugs. “Wanna play some volleyball?”

  Taylor is on the other side of the net. She’s not wearing a bikini, but even so she looks amazing in a pair of short shorts and a tank top, her legs long and bare. Her volleyball partner is a kid…a girl about eight or ten years old. “Looks like you have four players already.”

  “You can play with three,” JP says, meaning I can join Taylor and the girl.

  “This is Ava,” Taylor says, setting her hands on the girl’s shoulders. “She lives next door to me.”

  “Hi, Ava.”

  “Ava, this is JP.”

  Ava smiles. “Hi.”

  “I’ll just watch,” I say, although I’d definitely rather play.

  “I’m not very good,” Ava says, wrinkling her nose. “You can play with Taylor.”

  Oh yeah…I’d love to play with Taylor.

  “You’re just learning,” Taylor objects. “And you’re doing great. You made a great save.”

  Ava’s smile beams as she turns her gaze back on Taylor. Cute kid.

  “I’ll come over there,” Lacey says, ducking under the net. “Boys against the girls.”

  “Okay, then.” I join my brother and we high-five. “Like this is going to be fair,” I mutter to him.

  He grins and bends over, hands on his knees.

  Taylor has the ball. She moves into position and tosses the ball a couple of times, eyeing us across the net. I smile.

  She serves with a graceful arc of her arm and the ball comes toward me. I move with arms outstretched to bump it and it soars back over the net. Lacey gets it, bumping it into the air, and Taylor rushes the net, leaps up, and spikes the ball with vicious force straight into the sand at my feet.

  I stare at it.

  Chapter 8

  JP

  I look up at Taylor, taking in the grin splitting her face, then glance over at Théo. He shrugs.

  The girls are all slapping hands.

  “Lucky!” I call over to her.

  She laughs. “Come on, Killer.”

  Lacey serves this time, and we do a few more back-and-forth rounds with similar results to the first one. Frustration mounts in me and when I finally get a chance to drive the ball down for a point, I hit it too hard and too far…and it’s out.

  More girl hand-slapping.

  “Jesus,” I say to Théo. He’s having a hard time not laughing. “What happened to your competitive streak? Come on, man. You can’t take it easy on them just because one of them’s your wife.”

  “Take it easy on them?” His eyebrows fly up. “In case you haven’t noticed, we haven’t had a chance to take it easy.”

  I scowl.

  I’m sweaty now, in my jeans and long-sleeved shirt. I reach for the hem of my tee and peel it up and over my head. I toss it aside and turn to face Taylor.

  She’s ogling my chest.

  Well, if this gives us an advantage, I’m all for it. In it to win it.

  I tighten my abs and straighten and bend my arms a few times to prepare, flexing my biceps.

  Her gaze follows my movements, her lips parted.

  Heh.

  When Taylor misses the ball, I mentally congratulate myself. Maybe I should take my pants off, too.

  But my self-laudatory moment is short-lived when she once again drills the ball. I dive for it and end up rolling in the sand.

  “That’s it!” Taylor shouts. “Game!”

  “Shit.” I spit out sand.

  “You did great, Ava.” Taylor gives the girl a hug.

  “You’re awesome.” Ava stares at Taylor adoringly.

  “Hi, girls!” A voice calls from across the sand. I see a woman approaching, carrying a toddler. “How’s it going?”

  Ava runs toward her. “Mom! We won against the boys! Taylor’s fierce.”

  The woman grins. She’s a little older than us, I’m guessing late thirties. She sets down the toddler, a cute blond boy, who immediately rushes to Taylor.

  Taylor bends and scoops him up. “Carter, you handsome man, you.”

  He pats her face and babbles.

  She props him on her hip as we all walk over to Ava and her mom. “Elizabeth, I don’t know if you know JP? JP is Théo’s brother. JP, my next-door neighbor, Elizabeth.”

  I shake Elizabeth’s hand with a smile.

  “And this is Carter.” Taylor bounces him.

  “My man.” I hold out my hand for a fist bump.

  He frowns at me.

  Taylor laughs and lifts one pudgy little hand to tap it against mine.

  “Grandma’s here now,” Elizabeth tells Ava. “You have to come home.”

  “Okay.” Ava bounces up and down, then hugs Taylor. “ ’Bye!” She waves at us all and takes off across the sand.

  “Thanks for keeping her busy,” Elizabeth says to Taylor.

  “Hey, no problem. See you later. ’Bye, Ava!” She turns to the rest of us and cocks her head. “One more game?”

  “I’m done,” Lacey says. “I need a drink.”

  “Me too.” Théo throws an arm around her shoulders. “Let’s go have lemonade.”

  I eye Taylor. Well, I’m not going up against her myself. She’d probably nail me in the face with that ball. “Sounds good.”

  She shrugs and we all walk over the sand toward Théo’s place, where Lacey serves us glasses of cold lemonade and sets out a bowl of snack mix.

  “I need to work out more,” Lacey says, sprawling out in a chair
on the patio.

  “I told you…come to yoga with me.” Taylor grins at her friend.

  “Yoga’s not a workout,” I scoff.

  She gives me a chilly look, but her tone is mild and polite. “Sure it is.”

  “Phhht.”

  “Have you ever done yoga?”

  “I stretch all the time.”

  “That’s not the same.”

  Lacey’s eyes are ping-ponging back and forth between us.

  “Lots of hockey players are doing yoga,” Théo says. “Some teams have hired their own yoga instructor. I’ve talked to Eddie about it. He says it’s good for hockey players.”

  “Have you done it?” I ask him.

  “No.” He shrugs. “I’m not playing, remember? But I’d try it.”

  “You can all join me for paddleboard yoga,” Taylor says with a grin. “But then again, maybe you should try it on dry land first. Not that there’s anything wrong with falling in the water.”

  “It can’t be that hard.” I narrow my eyes at her.

  “Saturday morning. Ten o’clock at the marina.” She tosses her hair back. “I bet you can’t do it without falling in.”

  A challenge. It’s on. Yoga’s not that hard and I have good balance. I play a demanding sport on blades that are a tenth of an inch thick. I mentally review our schedule, and we’re home next weekend. “Might have a practice,” I reply.

  “Sure, sure.”

  My jaw tightens.

  “Maybe the next Saturday,” she adds, in a tone of voice that clearly indicates she thinks I’m making up excuses. Then she pulls out her phone and checks the time. “Oh hey, I better get going.”

  “Right, you’ve got a date tonight.” Lacey stands, as does Taylor.

  Date?

  Is Martinez in town? I don’t know the Preds’ schedule. My back teeth grind even more.

  “Nice seeing you again, JP.” Taylor bares her teeth at me and flaps a hand in a casual wave as she walks out, followed by Lacey.

  Théo gives me the eye. “You’re a little salty. Did Grandpa piss you off about something?”