Wildcat

by Rebecca Jenshak

  “Okay. Ready.” I look at Leo and find his gaze on my chest.

  “That’s what you’re wearing? You look… naked.” His voice is low and thick. He reaches over and tries to pull up the tank, but the power of cleavage and a great pushup bra is no match for the cotton material.

  “I’m selling flavored vodka at a paintball bar. Looking like this is the whole point.”

  I pour him a small shot and offer it to him. He sniffs, makes a face, but then drinks it. “Not awesome.”

  “You have the day off?” I ask. Dad wasn’t home when I left, so I assume there’s something happening at the arena today, even though he told me not to worry about coming in.

  The team has their first home game tomorrow. Mom calls the week of camp, and those next few weeks after it, blackout month because that’s how little we see my father at home. Even when practices are over, and the team is in town, he spends long days and late nights at the office.

  “Sort of.” He checks the time on his watch. “I have until six, and then I need to get back to the arena for a meeting with Coach—”

  “My dad?”

  He smiles. “Yeah.”

  It’s early still, that awkward time after lunch and before happy hour. Leo hangs by my side and even helps me hand out the free merchandise. He pulls the hat down low over his eyes like he wore it the other night.

  We wander around passing out free shots, but that doesn’t take very long since the bar is so empty, and I find myself outside alone with Leo Lohan.

  “Not a bad gig.”

  “I’m just filling in. The girl who usually does it had something come up and needed a few hours of coverage. I still need to find something with more hours.”

  “What about your photography? Any jobs there?”

  “I’m not ready for that. I still have so much to learn. I signed up for a free online class, and I’m practicing when I can. Last weekend I went to Owlsen Park and shot photos of a dog birthday party.” I don’t know why I’m telling him all of this, but being with him like this—just the two of us—makes me nervous and babble, apparently.

  He nods, crosses one leg over the other, and leans against the building. “I went to a wedding there last summer.”

  “It’s beautiful, and there’s always something going on there. Birthday parties, weddings, families hanging out. It’s great for working with different lightings and elements.”

  “Sounds nice.”

  “How do you spend Saturdays?”

  “Playing hockey, getting ready to play hockey, or on the road somewhere to play hockey.”

  I roll my eyes and sample the caramel apple vodka. Interesting, but not as bad as I expected. “What about in the off-season?”

  He’s struggling to come up with an answer, twisting his face up and bouncing his head side to side.

  “This is truly pathetic. Do you like to do anything that doesn’t revolve around hockey?”

  His heated gaze falls over my cleavage and down past my skimpy shorts. I would love to pretend I’m unaffected by it, by him, but I’m not. He places a hand at my hip. His fingers brush underneath the tank onto my stomach.

  “You should get out more, broaden your horizons.” I pull away from Leo’s grasp. “Funny thing happened this morning.”

  He slides his hands in his pockets. “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, I went to pay for my car, and someone had already taken care of it.”

  His lips twitch with a smile he doesn’t let free.

  “You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

  “Nah. Frankie loves working on Hondas, though.”

  I roll my eyes. “Thank you. It wasn’t necessary, but thank you.”

  He dips his head. “Welcome.”

  A group of guys wander outside. Fresh from paintball, some of them are still covered in it.

  “Free shots?” I ask, holding up the bottle.

  They crowd around, and I pour sample sizes into the small, plastic shot cups. They’re good sports, trying it even though they all agree it sounds awful.

  “It’s like Halloween in my mouth,” one of them says and goes for a second.

  “Is that a good thing?” I ask and look to Leo. He’s inched back, and I realize too late why he’s suddenly gone shy.

  The closest guy is staring straight at him with wide eyes. “No way. Leo Lohan. What are you doing here? Are you endorsing the booze?”

  “Uhh.” He looks to me for help.

  “No,” I say, quickly, “I saw him and begged him for an autograph. Does anyone have a marker?”

  “I bet someone at the bar does,” one of the guys says as he walks backward. “I’ll go check. I want one too.”

  In seconds, someone has a Sharpie, and they gather around Leo to get him to sign autographs. It would do me well to remember this is who he is—not my hot Leo that I met at a bar, but Leo Lohan, star hockey player.

  The bar starts to pick up, and I hand out more samples while the crowd around Leo refuses to let him go. When Lanie, the girl I’m covering for, shows up, I’m ready to leave, but Leo’s still stuck in the same group of guys, except more have joined. I slide between them and wrap my hand around his arm.

  “Sorry, guys. I need to get my autograph before I leave.” I pull him without waiting for a response.

  Inside, I finally stop and check him over. My dad will be pissed at me if I get one of his players hurt right before the season. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” He laughs it off.

  “That happens a lot?”

  “Often enough.”

  “I wasn’t thinking. Sorry.”

  “I’m a big boy. I can handle myself.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  He narrows his gaze. “What are you up to, Scarlett Miller?”

  I tug him backward toward the paintball room. “Broadening your horizons.”

  18

  BODY ODOR AND PAINT THINNER

  LEO

  A bigger group lets us join in on their paintball game.

  We’re divided into teams of five. Scarlett and I get on the same one, and we move with the rest of our teammates to one side of the large room, as the other team heads to the other side. Tires and other structures divide us and offer hiding spots. When the game starts, our three teammates take off hustling to find the enemy. Scarlett and I hang back.

  “This sounded like a better idea from afar. Is it too late to be a spectator?”

  “Afraid so.” I smile at her nervousness. “Probably got a couple of minutes before they find us. What shall we do with the time?”

  I let my gaze flick over her body and then back up to those plump lips I can’t stop thinking about.

  “How can you possibly be checking me out in this hideous outfit?” She stares down at her clothing. “It smells like body odor and paint thinner.”

  She’s right about that. These clothes could use a spin in the washing machine. Even so, she’s sexy as hell in her camouflage overalls and face mask.

  “You forget, I know what’s underneath.”

  She looks away and adjusts the goggles on her face. “Is that never speaking of it again?”

  “Which time are we never speaking of again?” I ask, and she raises her brows with a playful smirk on her lips I want to kiss off.

  The sounds of battle in front of us indicate some of the players have found one another.

  “Come over after.”

  “What?” She laughs lightly. “You have a meeting.”

  “I know, but I want to spend more time with you. You can clean up at my place, and then hang out if you want while I go to my meeting. Shouldn’t take long and we can do something later. Watch a movie or…” I trail off because all the other ideas jumping to mind are dirty.

  “Clean up? I don’t have a drop of paint on me. I don’t know about you, but I plan to leave this game without being splattered in paint. We’ll just hide out here and—”

  I fire the gun at my shoe and then wipe my
hand on the yellow paint.

  “Oh no,” she says as I reach toward her.

  I stalk forward, watching her beautiful eyes widen.

  “Leo,” she warns and backs away from me. She’s so worried about me that she doesn’t notice that we’re out in the open. Neither do I until a barrage of pink, blue, and green paint pelts us. A blue blob hits the side of her glasses and streaks down her hair, but her smile doesn’t falter. And neither does mine.

  After a brutal loss, we shuck the overalls, and I walk Scarlett out to her car. “I don’t know how to tell you this,” I say as I lean into her, brushing a hand along the curve of her neck. “But you stink.”

  She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear as laughter spills from her lips. “Yeah, well, you don’t smell so great either.”

  I drop my mouth until it’s an inch from hers. Just a hint of caramel apple vodka lingers on her breath. I gotta say, I prefer it a lot more this way.

  “Come back to my place,” I ask again.

  “I can’t.”

  “Can’t or don’t want to?”

  She doesn’t answer. Instead, she opens her car door. “Thanks for the game, Leo Lohan.”

  “Just out of curiosity, what’s with calling me by my full name?” I ask as I watch her slide behind the wheel.

  “Do you have a problem with that, Leo Lohan?”

  “Sure don’t, Scarlett Miller. Just wondering why?”

  “It reminds me who you are.”

  The way she says it like this is a terrible idea, doesn’t phase me. I’m in too deep.

  I hold her stare. “I’m just me. Awesome paintball player, exceptional date, and vodka tasting assistant.”

  “You’re a professional athlete and you play for my dad,” she fires back. “Bye, Leo Lohan.”

  I go to the arena for my meeting with coach.

  “Come in. Come in,” he calls from behind his desk with a scowl. “Have a seat.”

  That glower deepens when I fall into the chair. He rummages through a few papers on the top and then opens and closes every drawer.

  “Everything okay?”

  “I can’t find my phone. I know I left it in here.” The stack of papers falls to the ground as he continues moving things around.

  “I got it,” I offer and squat down to pick up the papers. I stand and set them on a corner of his desk. Finally, he lifts his laptop bag, and the phone appears.

  We take our seats again.

  “I was supposed to make reservations for tonight and it slipped my mind,” he says as he taps out something on the phone. “Just one second. I need to send an SOS text to my wife and see if she can bail me out. After almost thirty years, I think she’s probably expecting it at this point.”

  “No problem.” I pick up a framed photo on his desk. It’s a black and white of him smiling from the bench. He’s younger here, taken some time before he came to The Wildcats, but I recognize the smile. It’s a victory smile—one I hope we get to see frequently this year.

  “My daughter took that years ago after the junior’s team I was coaching won the division title,” he says when he notices me looking at the picture.

  His daughter. Scarlett.

  “It’s a great photo.” I set it back on the desk.

  “She’s talented,” he says, staring at it like he’s seeing it again for the first time. “One year for her birthday, she must’ve only been five or six, she asked for a camera. We got her the cheapest digital camera we could find, fully expecting that she’d lose it or break it in the first week.” He shakes his head lost in the memory. “She had it for years. Brought it with her everywhere. I think most of our family photos over the years were taken on that thing. Lasted well into her teen years before it broke. By that time, I would have gladly bought her a nicer, newer one, but she only wanted to use that old cheap one, so then we had to find someone to fix it.”

  “Does she still have it?” I’m smiling at the glimpse into a young Scarlett and her stubbornness, not thinking about how asking private details might seem odd.

  “Nah. She has this big, fancy thing now with lots of buttons and detachable lenses.” He waves a hand dismissively. I know that camera, but I like the image of her with an old cheap one because it’s another piece to the puzzle that is Scarlett. I’m eager for any details he might toss out, but he changes the subject.

  “Any grumbling in the locker room about the line switches for tomorrow night?”

  “No, sir. We’re ready.” The first regular season game is tomorrow, and the only chatter is how much we want to win. There are a lot of people who have already discounted us because we’re young and we want to prove them wrong.

  “Good. I saw some nice things on the road. Let’s use these next few games to let everyone feel out where they’re comfortable and where they fit best. You’ve been a consistently strong player for us, Leo. I’ve switched your line maybe more than anyone else. It isn’t because I’m trying to figure out where to put you. It’s because you make each group better.”

  It hadn’t occurred to me that when he was asking about the guys grumbling, he really wanted to know if I was silently fuming about the lineup for tomorrow. Would I love to be on the first line with Jack and Ash? Hell yes. That’s where I was last season and we read each other so well it was almost easy. But Coach’s been trying me at center with Tyler and Maverick. We’re not quite at that same comfort level as I was with Jack and Ash, but they’re great players, and I have no doubt we’ll work well together.

  “All that’s important is we win.”

  “That’s what I needed to hear.” He smiles and stands. “Thanks for swinging by. I won’t keep you. I’m sure you have plans of your own tonight. Girlfriend?” He squints like he’s trying to think if he’s ever seen me with a woman.

  “Not currently,” I say around a lump in my throat. My palms sweat as I slowly back out of the room. The only woman I’m interested in might earn me a permanent spot on the bench. Or worse.

  19

  HOLY PUCKING SHIT

  SCARLETT

  I’m sitting in the dark of the kitchen eating a bowl of cereal when Dad comes in. He flips on the light before he sees me.

  A tired smile pulls at the corners of his mouth. “You couldn’t sleep either, huh?”

  I shake my head. Meeting up in the middle of the night for a snack used to be our thing, and I’m happy that after being gone for two years, we still have something that’s just ours.

  He grabs a bowl and sits in the chair next to me.

  “The Raisin Bran is in the pantry,” I say as he dumps my Fruity Pebbles in his bowl.

  “I missed these. Your mom never bought them when you were gone.” He settles in beside me and spoons a heap of the colorful candy cereal into his mouth.

  “Are you nervous about the game tomorrow?”

  “Always,” he says. “They’re a talented group. Maybe the most talented I’ve ever coached.”

  “Shouldn’t that make you less nervous than normal?” He never sleeps the night before the first home game. As far back as I can remember.

  He laughs softly. “Probably.”

  “I get it. It’s like when I’m taking pictures of something really beautiful or special and the light is perfect, I expect the quality of my photography skills to be better, too.”

  “Taken anything recently I can see?”

  “You mean like when I forced you to look at an hour worth of my study abroad pictures and you fell asleep?” I sent pictures while I was gone, of course, but I held back all my favorites to see their reactions in person. Dad was out after ten minutes. To be fair, there were a lot and most of them were buildings and churches. The other half had Rhyse in them.

  “I’m mostly doing favors for friends and trying to come up with a portfolio before I apply for photographer positions.”

  He nods his approval. “I know why I’m up burning the midnight oil, but why are you?”

  “I told Mom that I dropped my classes.” She was giving
me the third-degree on missing classes to travel with the team and I couldn’t take it anymore.

  “Ah.” His eyes briefly widen. “That explains why she’s up there with her sleep machine on listening to the soothing sounds of the ocean.”

  I’d bet a month’s salary she also has on her gel sleep mask, slipped into silk pajamas, painted her nails, and journaled before bed. My mother drowns herself in self-care when she gets stressed. I’m not hating on her methods, but they’re a sure warning sign for the rest of us to give her space to decompress when she’s going through her ritual. It makes being the one to cause it that much more miserable to see her in that state.

  “She’ll come around. We both want to see you happy.”

  “I am,” I say. Or I’m getting there, anyway.

  The next night I ride to the first home game with Mom. Her nail game is on point and her face has the dewy glow of a day at the spa. She hasn’t mentioned school or photography, but I noticed she restocked the Fruity Pebbles.

  At the arena, we get drinks and popcorn and find our seats. We’re so close to the ice, I could toss popcorn over the plexi glass onto the Wildcats bench.

  Dad, as if he has some sort of sixth sense alerting him to our arrival, turns as we’re sitting down and waves. He looks handsome in a navy suit with a striped navy, white, and green tie.

  “Did you pick out that suit and tie combo?” I ask as I wave back to Dad. He flashes his same old dad smile and then turns back and slips right back into Coach Miller mode.

  “I told you, last year he was voted the worst dressed coach in the league. I took the necessary precautions to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”

  “How did you get rid of all of the baggy polyester blends he’s been trying to bring back since he wore them in the nineties?”

  She grins. The proud grin of a woman who has outsmarted her man. “I refused to take them to the dry cleaner.”

  Why does it not surprise me that my dad would rather buy new suits and ensure that my mom continues to run his errands than make weekly trips to the dry cleaner himself? He’s all about efficiency.