Page 22 of Player Misconduct
“Didn’t say it was.” His voice drops, serious now. “But I’m not letting you spend the night thinking about everything that could go wrong. If something happens, you won’t face it alone.”
My throat goes tight again for a completely different reason.
The line moves forward. We’re handed a room key packet by another suited agent, the laminate fogging with disinfectant.ROOM 214scrawled across the front in Sharpie.
“Next,” someone calls behind us.
Aleksi squeezes my elbow lightly, steering me toward the waiting shuttle. “See? Married couples board together,” he says. It’s sarcastic but also has a tinge of enjoyment in it.
I huff out a breath that might almost be a laugh if it didn’t sound so tired.
I should be furious. I should be mortified. But under all of that, buried deep where even I don’t want to look, is relief.
Because he’s right—I don’t want to be alone.
And even if the world outside is unraveling, for the next few hours, I won’t have to be.
“If we’re married,” I mutter, lifting my bare hand and wiggling my ring finger, “where’s my ring?”
I’m standing behind the next person, Aleksi, at my back as we shuffle toward the shuttle steps.
“You want a ring? No problem.”
I glance over my shoulder, not realizing he’s taking that as a challenge, until I see him elbow-deep in his duffel bag.
“I was kidding,” I say, just as the shuttle driver—also suited head to toe in a hazmat suit—barks at me to move it along. Apparently I’m holding up the line. “Sorry,” I mutter sheepishly.
If he only knew that the hockey player behind me is currently making a fake wedding ring in the middle of a CDC quarantine line, just to sell a ridiculous lie he told for me so that I wouldn’t be alone tonight, maybe he’d understand why I look like a deer in headlights.
I climb the three narrow steps into the shuttle, still reeling. Aleksi follows right behind, still busy crafting whatever makeshift ring he’s conjuring from the depths of his hockey duffel. Like this is summer camp and he’s making me a friendship bracelet, instead of a CDC quarantine nightmare, like we’re not possibly infected, and he’s about to fix it all with a strip of athletic tape around my ring finger.
And God help me, a tiny, unwanted part of me is glad he’s coming with me.
The shuttle pulls off the main highway somewhere between the middle of nowhere and should’ve stayed in Denver. The desert stretches out in every direction, endless shrubs and red dust that glows under the floodlights. The motel squats at the edge of the lot—two stories, painted the color of tired toast, and an empty swimming pool surrounded by a crooked “TEMPORARILY CLOSED” sign.
When we unload, the air is dry enough to scrape my throat. People fan out toward the lobby, CDC agents shepherding groups with the precision of a fire drill. My mind is running through every protocol I can remember from medical crisis training. None of it helps.
Aleksi’s duffel hits the asphalt beside me with a heavy thud. “Five-star accommodations,” he mutters.
I shoot him a look that’s half exhaustion, half disbelief. “You lied to the government for this.”
“Technically,” he says, adjusting his mask with a crooked smile, “I lied for you.”
Inside, the lobby smells like lemon cleaner and despair. The linoleum curls at the corners. A tired clerk in a matching hazmat suit checks IDs while a CDC agent oversees the process. Aleksi hands over our room key packet like he’s proud of it.
“You sure this is a good idea?” I whisper.
“Best bad idea I’ve had all week,” he says.
The clerk hands us two paper bags labeled DINNER – DO NOT REHEAT and a pair of single-use thermometers. Then we’re directed down a hallway lined with faded carpet and flickering lights, like a set from a low-budget apocalypse movie.
Our room smells faintly of an air-conditioner that’s been running too long and stale cigarette smoke that’s older than I am, masked by the smell of bleach. Two queen beds, one flickering lamp, a TV bolted to the wall. There’s a packet of disinfectant wipes on the dresser and a sealed bag of disposable toothbrushes.
“This is cozy,” I say dryly.
Aleksi grins behind his mask. “I’ve stayed in worse road hotels when I played overseas.”
“Not during a potential viral outbreak.”
