Page 9 of Penalty Box
There was no telling him that, though.
We tossed our empty bottles and kept walking. Voices drifted from the tunnel, sharp and laughing. I heard a slap of a stick on a locker door, and then a voice joking about something that I couldn’t make out. What I made out loud and clear in the mix of it, was Mason’s name.
My pulse tripped over itself.
Dad didn’t seem to notice. “So did you ever win the fight against that damn bracket?”
“Bracket?” I blinked a few times fast, afraid I’d be caught out. “Oh, the Zamboni. Yeah. For now.”
He eyed me curiously, and the nervous laugh I followed it up with didn’t help.
“You know me,” I said, trying to rein it in. “If it’s broke, I’ll fix it.”
“That’s my girl,” he said proudly, patting my shoulder. It was a rare show of affection here at the arena, and I accepted it wholeheartedly.
His phone rang as we started down the tunnel.
“Vultures are circling again,” he sighed, then swiped to answer, his game voice poised and ready. It was always weird seeing him like this—in Head Coach mode. “Where did you say you were calling from?”
He looked at me and mouthed ‘Hot Seat’. I suddenly understood the rough edge in his tone as he fielded questions from the reporter. That particular publication was one of the more frustrating gossip rags in town.
“Off the record, huh?” He twirled a finger at his temple to show me just what he thought of that suggestion. “Well, off the record, I still have no comment about Grayson Steele’s love life. I’m his coach, not his agony aunt.”
Even though the call had nothing to do with me, my stomach tightened.
Fluorescent lights buzzed above us, the chill of the rink seeping up through the soles of my boots.
He pocketed his phone and muttered, “All they care about is who’s holding hands and making heart eyes.”
“I know, right. So stupid.” I wished I could be invisible, and escape the conversation altogether. Or that I finally discovered my ability to teleport.
“Grayson and Josie, Grayson and Josie,” he whined. We were at the locker room now, but he made no move to go in. “Meanwhile, nobody’s noticing his game. Or the fact that wemade it to the second round of the playoffs last season. No, let’s talk about them being spotted in Aspen last month wearing matching flannel.”
I snorted, instantly recalling that post that went mildly viral. “It was adorable, you can’t argue that.”
His glare had a little more dad in it than coach. “Mark my words, Cass. Romance is a death blow, especially in this game andespeciallywhen you’re as young as he is. Doesn’t matter how talented… A guy gets tangled up emotionally, the next thing you know, his head’s out of the game. On the ice, that’s how careers die.”
“Bit dramatic, don’t you think?” I didn’t know why guilt churned in my gut. I had nothing to feel guilty about.
“I’ve seen it,” he said with a flat tone. “They think they can balance it all, but most of the time? They can’t.”
I looked away, pretending to study a scuffed patch of tile near the locker room door. Mason’s face floated to the front of my mind, totally uninvited. His stupid soft eyes. That ridiculous smile when the engine turned over. The way he looked at me like—
I cleared my throat. “I’m not the one scoring goals and getting gossip column features. So you still love me, right?”
“Dinner on Sunday,” he said, his gaze unwavering. “I’ll answer you after that.”
If we were anywhere else, there would’ve been a cursory kiss to my forehead even at my ripe age of twenty-one. At Frost Bank, though, I got the nod he gave everyone else as he pushed into the locker room.
I stood there a second longer, listening to the rush of chatter filtering through the gap while the door swung closed behind him. Wondering what it meant that I knew the exact laugh I waslistening out for. Wondering why some guy with a beat-up Neon had crawled under my skin like a bad tattoo.
I was playing with fire, but not the good kind.
The sun had dipped low enough to bleed orange across the stadium roof when I made it out to the lot. The wind had teeth, nipping at the back of my neck as I zipped my hoodie up all the way. Texas wasn’t supposed to be this damncold,but a low pressure system had blown in and made me pull out my hoodies and Under Armor early this year.
I didn’t usually come out this way, but I was on a mission. The brown paper bag crinkled under my arm, weighing barely anything but the implications… They could’ve flattened a monster truck.
“Rookie!” I was pleased to see my timing had been spot-on.
