“Ouch.”
Savannah fell silent He was being ridiculous. But how could he not play hockey? It was all he knew.
Rhian’s arrival spared Garrick attempting to explain any of that. Rhian looked back and forth between them in the growing silence until Savannah jumped in to ask him some questions. Rhian gave her all favorable reviews, even claiming had never felt better.
Of course. To be young and at the top of his game again. Garrick remembered how easy it had been.
A few nights later, Savannah buttoned her coat and tried to ignore the itch between her shoulder blades as the players walked past her door on their way out of the arena. When she was suitably bundled up to face the New Brunswick winter night, she turned to find Bobby standing in the hallway, talking to a friend, his eyes fastened on her.
Shit.
Even as her heart sped up, she held firm to her resolve not to be intimidated. Bobby was a serious problem that could not be ignored, but that didn’t mean he was allowed to run her life. She was determined to be cautious. Not cowed.
Steeling herself, she stepped into the hall and closed her door, keeping her movements slow and precise to not betray her nerves. As the deadbolt locked into place, she promised herself she’d find Mark tomorrow and tell him about the stares, the hovering. She hadn’t yet because she didn’t want to sound like a baby, and it was hardly against the rules to stare at someone. But Mark had seen Bobby’s childish stunt a few nights ago—she had a nice bruise on her shoulder blade because of it, too—and Bobby wasn’t letting up. Not being a baby was one thing. Being stupid was another.
Bobby’s friend said goodnight and moved away. The next sound was a footstep drawing closer to her.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
“Savannah!”
Garrick’s voice made her jump. She spun toward it, not bothering to hide her relief.
Bobby stopped just a few feet away. He glared at Garrick then moved quickly in the opposite direction. The smile Garrick sent in his wake was more a baring of teeth.
Garrick stopped at her side. “Are you okay?”
She shrugged. “Yeah, sure.”
“Okay, good,” Garrick said quickly, not making her explain. She was grateful. Again.
She sighed as they walked toward the doors to the arena parking lot. “I’m going to talk to Mark tomorrow.”
“Good idea. If there’s anything I can do to help…”
She smiled ruefully. “You’ve already done more than I can possibly thank you for.” He didn’t look at her, his eyes constantly scanning the passageway, then the parking lot.
He’d been hanging around her office and had walked her to her car a couple nights before, after the incident with Bobby. And, mysteriously, Rhian had shown up and walked out with her last night while Garrick had done photos with the scout troop who had won tickets to last night’s game.
She wanted to be irritated. Wanted to be tough. Independent. Unafraid. Unfortunately, her previously stated policy against being stupid prevented her from objecting to Garrick’s rather unsubtle orchestration of her nightly escorts.
“So—” She broke the silence. “Do you think there will be a buyer for the Cats quickly?”
Garrick glanced down at her before returning to his diligent surveillance of their surroundings. They left the bright halo around the arena and moved into the darker rows of cars. “I hope, but I’m doubtful. They’d be buying a bit of a mess.”
“They would?”
They stopped in the orange glow of the parking lot vapor lamp nearest her car. The night was cold, but not unbearable—the wind that had been whipping in off the Atlantic for the past few days had died down at last.
“Lamont has been mostly ignoring the team and this arena for years,” Garrick explained. “I think before the economic downturn, it was easy enough to make his profit and he didn’t care about the margin or the size of the return until they went into the red.”
She nodded. “Ticket sales are down, but you all still pull in a good crowd.”
“We do, fortunately, but we could sell more. And even with sales down, Lamont’s missed a lot of opportunity. To start with, the arena should be retro-fitted to allow parquet to go down quickly, leaving the ice below. Good management could arrange the basketball team’s game around ours and move the poor basketball team out of the convention center. It would also facilitate more concerts. More events. The University could use it too, I’m sure. And then there are the concessions.” Garrick’s waving hands jerked with frustration. “He’s had the same fried dough, cheap pizza, and watery beer stands going for decades. Microbrews like Picaroons and even bigger local companies like Moosehead would easily outsell at least half the Bud and Molson taps. And don’t get me started on the lack of corporate sponsors and season ticket holders. I could—” He stopped abruptly, shaking his head. “Listen to me ramble on about shit I know nothing about.”
“I am listening. It’s interesting.”
“I’m easy-chair quarterbacking. I don’t know what I’m talking about.” He stared down at his boots, his hands stuffed in his coat pockets.
“It sounds like you know what you’re talking about.”
He shrugged. “Not really. I just have lots of ideas.”
“Have you told Lamont your ideas?”
He looked at her. “Lamont?”
“Yeah, you know, the guy who could actually make money by listening to you?”
Garrick’s eyes widened. “I couldn’t. I mean, I’m just a hockey player. I don’t know anything about running a team or an arena.”
Garrick had struck her as a lot of things, but never insecure. His lack of confidence surprised her.
“Seems to me you know plenty. Everything you just said makes sense and jives with what I’ve seen other arenas do. And don’t give me the just a hockey player crap. The smartest men I know are hockey players, so that doesn’t mean shit to me.”
She couldn’t be sure in the strange light, but it was possible Garrick LeBlanc was blushing.
“Yeah, well anyway, to answer your actual question,” he said, obviously avoiding a response to her outburst, “I think the Cats and the arena need to find a buyer with good ideas and a willingness to invest. And given the current state of the economy, no, I don’t think that’s going to happen quickly.”
She nodded. He was right. He was also a hell of a lot smarter than she’d given him credit for.
She stood, head tilted to the side, and stared up at this new Garrick, aware of the bemused smile on her face. He blinked, slowly, and his eyes darkened, going black in the dim light.
She licked her suddenly dry lips. His gaze darted down. Otherwise, he didn’t move. Not a muscle.
I could kiss him.
The thought—which she never should have had to begin with—held way more appeal than it ought to. Not because she felt sorry for him, or because she was grateful for his help these past weeks. But because he was gorgeous and kind and smart and funny and holy crap. When had she stopped pretending he wasn’t smoking hot?
Of course, none of that mattered. He was a player on the Ice Cats.
“Goodnight,” she said abruptly.
“Goodnight.” His deep voice drifted over her skin and made the little hairs on the back of her neck stand up beneath her scarf.
She yanked her keys from her pocket, unlocked the car, and practically dove into the driver’s seat. Screw waiting for the engine or the frigid air around her to warm up. She slammed the car into gear and hightailed it out of there.
She looked back in the mirror, once, just before she turned out onto the highway. Garrick stood exactly where she’d left him, watching her drive away.
Chapter Five
Savannah was all business the next morning when she saw Garrick, which, for some reason, he seemed to find amusing. She doggedly ignored his failed attempts to hide his smile while she resolutely spoke of training, conditioning, his hip, and his groin pull.
That she wanted to smile back w
as another issue, one she refused to acknowledge. She hadn’t meant to befriend one of the players, but she had, and it didn’t mean she’d lost her ever-loving mind and would do something colossally stupid.
Once she’d sent Garrick and the rest of the players off to run through their training programs, she stopped by the gym to check in on everyone. Then she went to see Mark.
It sucked to bring him more shit to deal with the day before they left on a road trip to Nova Scotia, but she’d promised herself, and more or less promised Garrick, that she would address it.
Standing outside Mark’s door, she watched how his hands tugged at his hair while he reviewed whatever numbers were on the spreadsheet before him. She considered leaving it until the bus ride tomorrow.
Tempting, but she’d need that time to get organized for the days and games to come. Now was her best chance.
She left Mark’s office a half hour later, sealing off his stream of muttered curses as she closed the door behind her. Mark was a nice man, but his hands were tied. Bobby hadn’t laid a finger on her since that day in her office, and the “accidental” body slam the other night, about which he had professed absolute innocence.
She sighed as she made her way back to her office. It was going to be a long season if she couldn’t figure out a way to get Bobby off her ass. She didn’t know where to begin and had no one she could ask. If she called her parents for advice, they’d have a seizure. And any one of her six brothers could be counted on to drive to Moncton and attempt to remove Bobby’s black heart. Through his nostrils.
Settling in at her desk, she took a chance her best friend, Grace, would answer her phone in the middle of the day. She hung up a while later feeling immeasurably better. Grace didn’t have any answers either, but it had been good to tell someone what was going on. She’d even managed to deftly deflect all suggestions and innuendos regarding Garrick.
Now, sitting alone in her office, a few of those suggestions wandered through her mind. She cursed Grace for giving her imagination so much fodder. She hadn’t slept well last night as it was, and now her tired body felt twitchy and hot.
She just about jumped out of her skin when Garrick said “hello” from no more than two feet behind her.
“Hi!” Leaping from her chair, she yanked her fleece down over her butt and thighs.
He lifted one brow. “You doing okay?”
“Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?”
His warm brown eyes met hers and she struggled not to do something ridiculous like squirm or try to push her fleece down to her knees. Her face was warm, no doubt flushed, and the rest of her body felt sensitive. Swollen.
“No reason,” he said, watching her closely. “I just came in to see if I was allowed to have two more ibuprofen now that I’ve been a good doobie and done all my work.”
She laughed as she moved to the cabinet, grateful for the distraction. “You make me sound like a grade school teacher.”
Garrick cleared his throat. “You definitely don’t remind me of any grade school teacher I ever had.”
She was about to ask what he meant by that but bit off the question when Bobby stepped through her door. She shot Garrick a look to warn him.
“What do you want, Bobby?” Garrick’s cold stare and arctic tone couldn’t possibly have been less welcoming. Savannah smiled into her medicine chest.
“My elbow hurts, and she said I should have it wrapped before practice.”
Savannah turned, speaking before Garrick could. “Yes, of course, Bobby. Please have a seat.”
Bobby eyed Garrick, who stared back. Tension hovered in the air around them, climbing until she worried they would come to blows. She couldn’t relax, even when Bobby relented and flopped into the chair he hadn’t deigned to sit in for months.
She went to Garrick and dropped the two pills in his palm. “Here you go.” She smiled up at him, her back to Bobby, and mouthed thank you. “Let me know how you’re feeling later and we can talk about what’s next.”
He dutifully moved toward the door. In truth, she wanted to beg him to stay, but she couldn’t hand that kind of power over to Bobby. Confirming she was afraid of him would only make him worse. Hell, just the hint that she and Garrick were friends gave Bobby too much.
Garrick shot Bobby another hard stare on his way out.
She gave him a little push. “Come use the tub whenever you’re ready.”
His eyebrow went up, silently giving her one last chance to change her mind. When she said nothing, he left her office and disappeared around the corner.
Savannah stared at the empty door longer than necessary, but by the time she turned to gather what she needed to wrap Bobby’s elbow, she was composed.
She moved quickly, keeping as much distance as possible without being obvious. She didn’t ask him any questions, which was unlike her, but she didn’t want any more contact than was absolutely required.
Bobby was uncharacteristically cooperative, holding his arm as she needed and keeping his hands to himself. Too bad he spent the entire session staring into her face from mere inches away. His breath brushed her cheek when she bent to cut away a loose string and she forced herself not to jerk back. She did, though, hold her breath.
Garlic for breakfast?
By the time Bobby stood to leave, a continuous trickle of cold sweat slid down her back. She left her supplies where they were, not cleaning up as she would usually, choosing instead to stand back and let him go. He smiled at her from the door and her fingers tightened around the scissors still clutched in her hand.
His laughter echoed in the hallway as she slumped into her desk chair, tossed her scissors onto the pile of paperwork, and wiped her clammy hands on her pants.
Holy shit. How the hell was she going to fix this?
Garrick bolted out of the coach’s office, barely calling a goodnight to Rick and the rest of the forward lines with whom he’d been forced to sit and review strategy for the upcoming away games.
As he jogged around the arena toward Savannah’s office, his hip protested the unforgiving concrete beneath his feet. It hurt like hell.
There won’t be many more than twelve years of hockey for me.
It was scary shit to think about. Almost as scary as coming around the bend to find Savannah’s door closed and locked, her lights off. She’d already left.
Hoping he might still catch her, he took off at a run, ignoring the increasingly sharp pains from his hip. Bobby had left the locker room right after practice, and from there, Garrick had no idea where he’d gone. Maybe out with the sycophants he called friends. Or home with an unfortunate puck bunny who didn’t know which players should be avoided.
Or maybe he was waiting in the parking lot, knowing Garrick was tied up in a meeting. Knowing Savannah would be alone.
Shit. He ran faster.
He should have asked Rhian to walk her to her car, but he hadn’t thought his meeting would take long. Christ, Rick would have dissected the best shot strategy for another hour if they’d let him.
Running on concrete sucked for his hip, but when he pivoted to go down the hall to the doors, his groin pull protested too, a line of fire dropping into his nuts. He frowned and moved through the pain. He wasn’t an idiot. It was time to move on from hockey. The question was, to what?
To whatever you were going to do when you went off to McGill and got that shiny degree in finance and economics.
Trying out for the McGill team, joining up and playing all four years had all been a lark. Something to keep him busy between classes and studying and partying. A way to keep fit. When the Eastern Hockey League scout had first approached him, he’d been astounded. And, of course, flattered. But some sane part of him had been tempted to send him packing.
Hindsight was a bitch.
Not that he’d do it any differently if he could go back. He was glad for the opportunity to play for his home team. He just couldn’t figure out how he’d launched a career that could only last a dozen years and not given
any thought to what would be next. Now next was bearing down on him like a freight train.
He swung around the last corner and stumbled to a halt. Savannah stood a few feet away in the little lobby, bundled up against the weather, her phone in her hand. The squeak of his sneakers on the smooth floor brought her head up.
She’s waiting for me.
His heart beat harder and it wasn’t from the run. “Hi,” he said, trying not to grin.
“Hi.” She smiled almost shyly.
He resisted the urge to clutch at his chest. Christ, she was adorable when she was prickly. But a shy smile? If she flirted with him, he just might collapse on the spot.
“I hope it’s okay.” She gestured to the door.
“Of course.” He shook himself out of his momentary stupor, opened the door and walked through first. She’d broken him of the habit of trying to hold the door for her, but it still felt wrong.
She moved to his side in the glare of the fluorescent lights ringing the arena. They didn’t say anything as they made their way toward her car in the far corner of the nearly deserted parking lot. Garrick burrowed his face under the collar of his parka, feeling like a love-struck fourteen-year-old when their arms brushed and he got a little zing. She didn’t normally walk this close to him, did she?
They were passing under the last row of lights, almost to her car, when a pickup truck roared to life at the end of the aisle. Wheels squealing, the huge truck peeled out of its parking space and gunned toward them. Garrick leaped forward and yanked Savannah between two cars. The truck accelerated past them, gravel spitting from beneath its tires, before careening through the main exit and disappearing around the corner.
Savannah stood frozen, her mouth hanging open. “Holy shit. Please tell me that wasn’t Bobby’s truck.”
Garrick tried to bring his blood pressure back down from the stratosphere. He’d been so preoccupied with Savannah’s arm brushing his, he hadn’t seen a fucking thing until the truck had practically been on top of them.
Fair Play (Hat Trick, Book 1) Page 4
