Game Breaker (Portland Storm Book 14)

by Catherine Gayle

  “Often enough,” he said. “Anyway, my lawyer is keeping a close eye on a few of them and talking to the police to see if we can file any sort of official reports against the worst offenders. Online harassment or something. I’ll let you know what he says. But, in the midst of all my research, I stumbled on some tweets between Golston’s teammates about the two of you.”

  “What kind of tweets?” Maybe I should break my own rule and take a look at what was happening on social media more often instead of leaving it all to Tim. If I had, I might have known what my father had found. It wouldn’t have prevented this conversation, but it could have prepared me for it, if nothing else.

  “The kind where they talk about him being, and I quote, your lover boy. So I want to meet him.”

  “He’s not my lover boy.”

  “So you didn’t fall asleep with your head on his shoulder on the plane last night?” Dad asked, his tone full of teasing. This was worse than him attempting to pull off Dad Jokes. “And before you try to lie about that, one of them posted a picture.”

  “Who did?”

  “Riley Jesus or something like that.”

  “Jezek,” I corrected him.

  “That’s the one. So when am I going to get to meet this Golston?”

  “I don’t— We’re not—” Augh, this wasn’t at all what I’d intended to talk to my father about this morning. And if the guys on the team were posting pictures of me and Nate all over social media, then any chance I might have once had of keeping my job—however slim—was now gone. No doubt, my boss would be calling me first thing tomorrow morning to tell me I’d been fired. Or at least that I would be as soon as the season came to a close, one of the two.

  “Looked like you two were nice and cozy,” Dad said.

  “I don’t know what we are.”

  “Has he taken you on a date?”

  “Coffee. And dinner,” I amended. And hours of talking.

  “Has he kissed you yet?”

  Again, I was grateful that my cheeks didn’t really turn pink when I blushed. At least he’d only asked about a kiss and not anything beyond that. “Not yet.”

  “But you want him to,” Dad said with a great deal of certainty.

  “Maybe.”

  “That could prove to be problematic with your job, couldn’t it?”

  I shrugged. “There’s no chance I’ll still have this job next season, anyway, so does it really matter?”

  “You tell me. I was under the impression that you wanted to prove you could do this as well as any man. That you wanted to make your mark in sports journalism. You were all gung-ho about paving the path for other women to follow, but I don’t know how that can happen if you throw it away.”

  “I’m not throwing anything away! And to hear that coming from you, of all peop—”

  “You know I don’t think that,” he cut in, hands up in surrender. “But that’s the picture they’ll paint. That’s the story they’ll try to sell.”

  “Well, I have my own story to tell.”

  Dad nodded thoughtfully. “I know you do.” Total and complete acceptance, without a moment’s hesitation. That was how Dad had always been with me—the complete opposite of my mother. It was nice to know some things didn’t change, even if I wished so many others would.

  “I just don’t know if I’m doing the right thing,” I whined.

  “What do you mean? With Golston?”

  “No. Not exactly.” I reached for my coffee, but apparently I’d already drained the whole thing.

  Dad picked up the pot and refilled my mug, patiently waiting for me to continue.

  “It’s just…” I sighed, wishing it were easier to put into words. “If I get involved with him, how can I present an unbiased picture of him for this show? I don’t think that’s possible. And the closer I get to him, the closer I’m getting to his friends on the team, so there’s no way I’ll be able to be unbiased in how I’m editing them. And it is editing them, not just putting things out there like it’s strictly journalism. This is more of a documentary. There has to be a story—a beginning, middle, and end, rising action, climax, and falling action, all of the things they talk about in fiction and screenwriting. So I can’t just present the events as they unfold, can I? I have to put some sort of narrative twist on everything that happens, which has left me trying to find other stories to follow beyond Nate and the racist stuff, but now I’m running into the issue of things cropping up that should be private. They shouldn’t be filmed and shared with the whole world. I know these people all signed release forms and whatnot, but were they counting on me breaking the news of their infertility or a family member maybe coming out of the closet? I don’t think they were, but I’m still leaning toward using that kind of footage when I get it, because it’ll take the heat off Nate. But is that right? And am I only doing it in a sick, twisted effort to salvage a job that I’m probably going to lose anyway?”

  I finally stopped speaking only because I was about to choke up and start crying, and the last thing I wanted to do was cry in public. The only times I’d ever broken that rule had been stupid, academic things, like when I’d lost the spelling bee in the fifth grade after misspelling errand, one of the simplest words offered in the whole event.

  I tried to settle my nerves by sipping from my coffee. When I looked up at Dad again, he was just staring at me. Not in judgment. Not in disappointment. Just staring.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Did you get it all out yet?”

  I nodded. “I think so.”

  “Okay.”

  “So?”

  “So what?”

  “So what do you think I should do?” I demanded.

  “I think you need to follow your gut. It’s always led you down the right path before.”

  “Not with—”

  “Even with your mother, it’s led you to the right answer for you. It might not be the right answer for her or for your cousins. But it’s the right answer for you and your sanity. Your gut led you to your college major. It led you to your first job after college. It got you this position, which, as you’ve said before many times, no one your age gets offered, and definitely not a woman. You’ve got the job. It’s yours. Maybe not for long, but for now, it’s yours. So what story is it you think you need to tell while you’ve got the platform? That’s what I think you should do. Tell your story, and tell it the way you think it should be told. Ignore all the rest.”

  “But what if…?”

  “What if you get fired? Sounds like that’s already going to happen anyway. Might as well make the most of the opportunity in front of you.”

  ANY TIME SOMEONE asked if we’d rather face the Kings or the Blackhawks in the next round, there was a correct reply. Both teams would be worthy opponents, and we were more concerned with making sure we were rested and ready, no matter who we faced—something along those lines. In other words, a non-answer was the only appropriate response to the question.

  In truth, those two teams were both formidable opponents, in many of the same ways. They’d each won the Cup in recent years, and the core of their Cup-winning teams remained intact, meaning they had the skill and experience to do it again. Not only that, but those guys knew what it felt like to reach the ultimate pinnacle in our sport, which gave them the drive and urgency to get there again.

  The Blackhawks might have struggled more during the regular season, but that was only because they were part of the Central Division, which, to oversimplify matters, was the toughest division in the NHL right now. In that way, the Blackhawks might prove to be a more difficult adversary for us. They also played a more similar style to ours, as a team built around speed and skill more so than size and brute force.

  The Kings were more of a hybrid. They could play our way, but they could also push us into playing a more physical game, which would surely give them an advantage. And, as the top seed in our division, they would have home-ice advantage over us, whereas we would have that benefit in a se
ries against the Blackhawks.

  But on a personal level, I would much prefer for the Kings to win Game Seven. I wasn’t keen on dealing with the inevitable return of the attention if we had to go back to the same city where the banana peel incident had taken place…where Marcus Jameson was killed by a cop…where protests and demonstrations were heating up. The drama around me had finally started to die down, and the press was beginning to focus on the fact that we’d come together as a team and beaten the Sharks, and the press in Chicago was focusing more on the bigger picture of the racial tensions in the city and the nation.

  I’d prefer to keep things moving in the current direction.

  Maybe it was a ridiculous reason for me to hope for one opponent over another, but there was never much logic to be found in emotional responses—and if anyone deserved to react emotionally, it was me right now.

  When we got home so late from San Jose, Bergy had announced he was giving us the full day off on Easter Sunday. We had at least a few days before the first game of the next series, and he said he wanted us all to get some rest. No practice. No film sessions. The guys who wanted to go in for treatment for their various ailments were welcome to do so, but otherwise we were free to spend the day with our friends and family. He wasn’t requiring anyone to show up at the practice facility for any reason.

  Briefly, I’d thought about hitting the gym, if nothing else, but then I thought better of it. My knee was killing me, so the more rest I could get, the better. But that meant I had no plans for how to spend my day.

  RJ’s brother had come into town, and so RJ and Amanda invited me to spend the day with the three of them. I wasn’t keen on the idea of being slobbered on by Max and Lola all day, so I passed.

  Koz was getting a few of the younger, single guys together at his place, too, but I wasn’t in the mood to play designated driver or be the guy who made sure Koz didn’t get arrested for groping a stripper. I turned down that invitation, too.

  To be honest, I wanted to spend the day with Anne, but I hadn’t thought to ask her before we’d said good-bye after getting back to PDX. And besides, she had family in the area. She’d probably want to spend the day with her father.

  If she even celebrated the holiday. I didn’t have any idea if she was Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, atheist…or just one of those people who celebrated holidays regardless of the religious meaning behind them. Any of the above was possible.

  There was also a good chance she might spend the whole day working. The more time I’d spent around her lately, the more I realized she was a true workaholic, not to mention a perfectionist. As an NHL player, I devoted a lot of time and effort to the team and to bettering myself as a player, but she put me to shame in that regard. I’d never seen someone who was so devoted to her career.

  For a couple of hours, I lounged around the house and debated whether I should call her up anyway to see if she wanted to get together. I should spend the day studying for finals, not that I wanted to. But before I could make up my mind to do either of those things, my phone buzzed with a text message from Harry.

  Bored as hell. Hanging out with Hammer and Thor. Hammer’s kids are with his ex this weekend, and Thor’s are doing a girls’ day with their mother. Colesy’s on the way. You coming too?

  Colesy was what we called another of our teammates, Cole Paxton. After a momentary private chuckle over the juxtaposition of Thor and Hammer, which I doubted Harry had noticed when he’d plugged it into his phone, I tapped out a response.

  Me: Sounds like the over-the-hill, overpaid defensemen’s guild meeting. Why would I want to be part of that?

  Harry: If you come, we can be the overhyped, underperforming, short-as-fuck jackwads league. You coming or not?

  Me: Your place?

  Harry: Yes. Bring beer. We’ve got food.

  I grabbed a couple of six-packs and headed out the door with my phone pinging at me again. Assuming it was Harry with another request for booze or something, I swiped my thumb over the slider and stumbled into a message from Anne.

  Actually, it was just a picture—of the two of us, her head resting on my shoulder while we both dozed on the flight home last night.

  Fuck.

  I tossed the beers on the passenger seat, climbed in, started the engine, then sent her a response.

  Me: Do I want to know how you got that?

  Anne: My dad let me know it’s on Twitter. Apparently, Riley Jezek posted it. Called you “lover boy.” Now Dad wants to meet you.

  Yeah, fuck didn’t even begin to cover it.

  Me: Do you want me to meet him?

  Anne: I don’t know. Are we at the meet-the-parents stage? We’ve barely been on a date, and we haven’t even kissed yet.

  Good question. And one I didn’t have a ready answer for. I wouldn’t deny that the idea of moving things into that territory sounded great, even if I didn’t know the first thing about her father or how he would react to me, but I doubted he’d be as bad as Webs had been when Babs started dating Katie.

  If Anne wanted me to meet her father, maybe that meant we could move things along more quickly than we had been.

  Me: So if I kiss you next time I see you, will you be ready for me to meet your father? Because I’m game if you are.

  It seemed like an eternity passed before she responded. I almost gave up and started driving over to Harry’s place, assuming I’d pushed too hard, too soon. But finally, my phone buzzed again, with a single-word response: Yes.

  SPENDING EASTER WITH the guys turned out to be more fun than I’d anticipated. There was something about getting together with some of the older guys on the team, with no wives, girlfriends, fiancées, or kids around, and just shooting the breeze. I didn’t do that often enough. Most of the time, I either hung out with RJ and Amanda or I stuck to myself and hit the books. When I did get together with a big group, it was usually with the younger, single guys—Koz’s crowd, even though they all complained about him nonstop—but those guys wanted to party and goof off, which wasn’t very appealing to me anymore. Maybe I was becoming an old fuddy-duddy.

  I’d sure as hell been called worse things before. Everyone knew that after what had happened in Chicago a couple of weeks ago.

  Anyway, we spent the day lounging around Harry’s pool. It was the warmest it’d been so far this spring. He started up the grill. We ate, drank, and spent hours poking at each other like guys tend to do when there aren’t any women around.

  Harry’s skin was turning pink and the sun was starting to set. About an hour ago, he’d put up an umbrella to block the sun’s rays and put on more clothes and sunscreen to protect himself, but by that point it was too late to do any good. He was well on his way to lobster-ville when his phone buzzed for what had to be the tenth time since he’d made the changes. He glanced down at the screen briefly, but then he tugged his ball cap down over his face and ignored whoever it was trying to get in touch with him yet again.

  “You ever going to answer that?” I asked.

  “It’s a text message, not a call.”

  “And? You could respond.”

  “Not if I want to still be alive after next time I see Webs, I can’t.”

  Colesy and Hammer both busted up laughing.

  “What?” I said. “What am I missing?”

  Harry poked his head out again to stare at me. “Last time Dani Weber was home from school, she cornered me in the wives’ room after a game and kissed me.”

  “And she’s home again for the holiday weekend, I suppose.”

  “He’s leaving out the best part,” Hammer said, reaching into the cooler for another beer. He leaned across the table and grinned at me. “Webs saw the whole thing go down. And it was right after the big hushed-up arrest incident, so you can imagine Webs wasn’t a happy father.”

  “Oh, shit,” I said, trying not to burst out laughing. A few months back, instead of coming along with most of us to help Koz celebrate his birthday, Harry had gone off on his own. He still hadn’t fille
d any of us in on exactly what he’d been doing that night, but he’d been arrested…and we’d all been too drunk to go bail him out. He’d ended up getting Webs involved, and the team’s legal department had made sure nothing serious ever came of it, but there’d been more than just a hint of mystery surrounding Harry ever since that night. Not only that, but he seemed to have found a permanent spot on Webs’s shit list. Surely seeing his youngest daughter kissing the guy hadn’t sat well at all. Webs had taken a long time to give in on Katie, his older daughter, hooking up with Babs—and there weren’t many who came more clean-cut than Babs. Harry couldn’t even hope to come close.

  “She kissed me, not the other way around,” Harry argued. “Which is exactly what I fucking told Webs. I didn’t encourage her in any way.”

  Colesy seemed ready to be done with the direction of our current conversation. He turned and asked me, “Did you see what RJ put on Twitter yet? Doesn’t seem like him. I don’t know why he would have done that.”

  “Ghost doesn’t do Twitter,” Harry said.

  Hammer set his beer down on the table between us and raised a brow. “You don’t do Twitter? How the hell, in this day and age, do you not do Twitter?”

  “Hammer’s got a point,” Harry said, peeking at us from under his hat again. “He’s a fucking dinosaur, and he’s on it. Why aren’t you?”

  “Watch it,” Hammer said. “I might have T-Rex arms, but if I catch you…”

  “You won’t have any problem catching him,” Colesy said. “He’ll be burned to a crisp.”

  “Hammer’s only on Twitter to watch videos about how to braid his daughters’ hair,” I shot back. “Why would I need to see those? I don’t want to see all the other shit that gets posted about me.”