Page 3 of Shootout
I grimaced. I didn’t have a stick, either, a fact that wasn’t lost on him. What had I been thinking, challenging an NHL player to a shootout while wearing figure skates and without my own stick?
He chuckled, threw some pucks onto the ice, and handed me a stick. It was too long for my height, but I’d make do.
I hefted it in my hands and clumsily dribbled a puck toward the net, losing track of it multiple times, letting my opponent believe I didn’t know how to play. He watched for a moment and smirked before turning to the other net and ignoring me.
For the next few minutes, I kept my back to that infuriating man and did my worst shooting and moving the puck. The few times I glanced his way, I caught him watching me with a satisfied grin on his dangerously handsome face.
Eventually Geneva showed up. She stood at the boards, glancing from one to the other of us with a question in her eyes. “I’m here. Make it quick—I have work to do.”
“This figure skater here invited me to a shootout. Ten shots in ten seconds.” Banks’s voice dripped with disdain.
Geneva turned her attention to me and did a double take. A slow, sly smile crossed her face, and she winked at me. She knew who I was. The arrogant bastard might not recognize me, but his equipment manager did.
“Jessie, you want to go first?” She called me by my first name, but Slater didn’t catch on.
“No, I like the pressure of knowing what I’m competing against.” I leaned on my stick and smirked at Slater. He glowered at me and squared his shoulders. Looking from me to Geneva and back with suspicion. He knew something was up. Geneva stepped onto the ice and placed ten pucks several feet apart on the blue line.
She turned to Slater. “Okay, Slate, stand over there. Don’t start until I say so.”
“Prepare to be impressed.” He flashed me a cocky grin, and I answered with my own version.
Unfortunately, I was impressed. He skated at the speed of light, slapping each puck in rhythm to his stride. In nine-point-one seconds, he’d put eight out of ten pucks in the net. He blew on his knuckles, swiped them across his chest, and turned toward an invisible audience. He bent low, taking a bow, not once, but multiple times in different directions as if he’d been playing to a sold-out crowd of tens of thousands. He was too much.
“Oh my god,” Geneva whispered loud enough for me to hear. I suppressed a giggle. She stared down at my skates. “I’d find you some hockey skates, but you have pretty small feet. How about a better stick?”
Gratefully, I told her what stick I usually used, and she returned with a passable substitute.
“Thank you,” I said gratefully.
“Go get ’em, sister.”
“What the fuck?” Slater grumbled. “You’re supposed to be neutral.”
I cast a brilliant smile in his direction, feeling a bit cocky myself.
“I would be if the playing field were even. She’s under a handicap with those skates and a strange stick,” Geneva said with a degree of smugness.
“Her handicap goes way beyond skates and a stick.” He chortled with laughter and both of us glared at him. He had the decency to sober quickly.
Geneva placed the pucks on the blue line and backed away. “Ready?”
I eyed the pucks, formulating a plan, even though instinct and training would take over with my first stride. Digging in, I burst forward. Those stupid figure skates weren’t as fast as my hockey skates, but I made the best of them. I missed my first shot and closed my ears to Slater’s hoots of laughter. I nailed the next seven, which shut him up. One more, and we’d be tied in the number of shots in the net. I was pretty sure I was a fraction of a second faster. Feeling cocky and confident, I swung my stick in my hardest slap shot yet, surprised I hadn’t broken it. The puck streaked toward the net and hit the crossbar with a resounding ping before glancing off.
Geneva smiled apologetically at me. “Seven shots in nine seconds. You win, Slate.”
For a split second, Slater gaped at me. He knew we’d pulled a fast one on him. Then he shook his head and powered forward, came down on one knee, stick raised in the air, in his usual celly. Bursting to his feet, he skated circles around us with his hands fisted over his head.
“Conceited prick,” I mumbled, drawing a snicker from Geneva.
He skated to us, stopping at the last minute and spraying ice all over our legs. Grinning like the poor winner he was, he tapped his lips. “How about a kiss to congratulate the winner?”
I debated smacking him across that smug face of his but resisted.
“How about a fat lip?” Furious, I stomped off the ice, no easy feat in skates, not caring I was a sore loser. His laughter followed me. I pushed open the guest locker room and slammed it for effect. That asshole. What an arrogant, obnoxious asshole. Just the type I despised who thought he was the best thing to happen to hockey since the Zamboni.
I stripped out of my sweaty clothes and pulled a fluffy white towel from the rack near the showers. I was exhausted, but anger still vibrated through me. The nerve of that insufferable dickhead.
Still muttering expletives to describe Slater, I walked across the immaculate expanse of tile flooring, hung the towel, and cranked on the water. As soon as steam filled the room, I stepped under the hot spray and let the water wash over my body. Closing my eyes, I cleared my head and reined in my temper. The last thing I needed was to let a guy like that get under my skin. I knew better, and I was more disappointed in myself than in him. He behaved as expected. I, on the other hand, had let frustration and anger get the best of me.
