Page 24 of How to Puck Your Boss (L.A. Hawks Hockey #3)

Chapter Fourteen

J ack hadn’t recognized him.

He had seen his father only a few weeks ago in New York, but his face had become even gaunter, his skin flabbier, and his mind seemed more confused.

As the chlorine burned Jack’s eyes, as his muscles fought the resistance of the water, he wondered if he should have found him sooner.

He could have overcome his fear and sought him out years ago, when he was still healthy, before it was too late to talk.

He had missed the moment. He’d never thought this was something that would bother him.

He’d never thought a day would come in his life when he wished he had talked to his father sooner.

Jack dove under the water and resurfaced. Under. Up. One, two, three, breathe. One, two, three, breathe.

He didn’t have many memories of his father.

His mother had retrieved him one night when he was six years old.

Child welfare had picked him up after midnight in his neighborhood for the second time in a row.

His father had been too drunk or tired to open the door for him earlier, and whatever had happened before was either so terrible or sad that he had simply repressed it.

But, one thing had been burned into his mind forever: Bill West’s angry face, red cheeks swollen from alcohol and nicotine, and veins that bulged on his forehead whenever Jack hadn’t tiptoed around his hangover.

West Senior’s pupils were always a little too big, and they could darken from one blow to the next.

Today, however, his father’s face was no longer compatible with what Jack had hated for so long.

He increased his pace, penetrating the surface of the water again and again, battering his muscles until his whole body burned.

West Senior was no longer the man he had been before; dozens of doctors and nurses had explained that to him.

Half his memory had been eroded by alcohol and the other by dementia.

His few moments were still blurry. He had not recognized Jack during any of his three visits in the past year.

It might have been because Jack was no longer a child.

Or maybe it was because memories of him had been so unimportant to his father that the illness had simply erased them first. Jack knew that he could not hate this shadow of a man who had once been his father.

Furthermore, how could he hate a helpless man who couldn’t even recall mistreating him?

But it was killing him that he no longer had the right to his emotions, never having let them out in the first place.

He no longer had an outlet. When his father had been healthy, he had been able to hate him from afar, but now?

Now West Senior was in Los Angeles because he had no friends or relatives left to care for him and his previous home had encouraged Jack to move him closer.

After all, he was the one with power of attorney over his father’s living will.

So, what was he supposed to do? Tell the home staff that he didn’t care much about the man and that, for all he cared, any person off the street could make decisions about his welfare?

It probably wouldn’t have been the truth, anyway; he was not actually indifferent.

He still felt emotion, after all these years.

What a hypocrite he was. He had preached to Dax that he should let go of his anger and just ignore his father.

That indifference could have been his best guide.

Yet he had failed to follow his own advice – for twenty-five years now.

His legs began to tremble as he picked up the pace once again. His arms parted the water like the thought of his father parted his mind.

His dad must have been a different person, right? Otherwise, his mother wouldn’t have given Jack away back then. Or would she?

How had she lost the custody battle? Had she been too tired to fight? She’d already had a new family…and thought it would be easier that way?

He didn’t know; he had never asked her. And now she was dead, and his father didn’t remember anything, so he would never find out.

He turned his head to the right again, took a breath…

and saw movement. Confused, he paused, surfaced, and brushed the wet strands from his eyes.

He was no longer alone. Penny was standing at the edge of the pool, her arms akimbo and her lips pressed together.

She looked like a Greek goddess of war preparing for battle.

Who the hell had been stupid enough to mess with her?

“Did you know that men suck?” she shouted. Her voice echoed off the high ceiling and tile floor. Jack bobbed in the middle of the pool.

Jack blinked and raised his eyebrows in irritation. “What?”

“Men. Suck,” she summed up. “Especially the rich and privileged who think they’re smart and all-knowing.”

Okay. Jack felt like a little context would help. “Your war isn’t with me, master!” he replied dryly.

“Right now, it’s with all men who patronize women.”

He sighed heavily. “Penny, I don’t feel like arguing right now,” he said honestly and swam toward the edge of the pool.

“That’s too bad, because I’m furious right now and I need an outlet before I lose it! I mean what’s wrong with you men? Why do you feel like you can label everything that comes out of a woman’s mouth as silly? When it’s about sports, when it’s about business, or when it’s about anything important!”

Jack understood the need to vent. He needed to, too. But, just then, he wasn’t the right candidate for the job. “Penny, please,” he murmured with a sigh and grabbed the edge of the pool. “Find someone else to share your bad mood.”

“But I don’t have anyone else, Jack!” Her voice trembled.

With anger, with desperation – he didn’t know.

“All my friends are in New York or Argentina and my brother is my enemy right now. My parents are just waiting for me to give up. I don’t have anyone who treats me like a human being.

No one who treats me with respect. Nobody but you! ”

He narrowed his eyes and ran his hand through his hair. It wasn’t fair of her. She was trying to use him now, all of a sudden, when she’d been keeping him at arm’s length for weeks.

“That’s not true, Penny,” he said tensely. “Not all men are like you described. Not all…”

“Most are, Jack,” she interrupted angrily. “Most of you! If my brother had told them to look at the statistics, they would have looked at the damn statistics!”

“I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. And to be honest, I’d rather be left alone right now, so…could you just leave? Please?”

The next moment, he submerged again and swam another lap.

He should have known that Penny wasn’t going to give up easily. When he reached the other side, he felt a gentle touch on his bare shoulder, compelling him to look up again.

Penny was crouching at the edge of the pool, looking down at him. “What’s wrong?” she asked, her eyes concerned. “Is that your way of being angry? You don’t punch something, you just…becoming really serious?”

Irritated, he frowned. Did he? He didn’t know for sure. But he did know one thing, “I don’t want to talk about it, Penny, okay?”

“Oh.” She nodded slowly, her eyes fixed on his face. “But you could,” she said finally, hesitantly. “If you had to. There’s something on your mind. I can set aside my anger. It’s silly – you had nothing to do with it anyway. So, if you wanted to confide in me what’s going on…that would be okay.”

Jack suppressed a groan. There they were again – the contradictions.

The fascinating mix of so many opposites that he couldn’t even count them in his head.

How could she be as hard as granite one moment and soft as a feather bed the next?

How could she simply morph her anger into compassion?

How could she scream one minute and then throttle back to a whisper so soft, he could barely hear her?

She obviously had problems of her own, but from one second to the next, she seemed to have forgotten them. She’d done it for him.

“Why do you even want to know, Penny?” he asked impatiently.

“Yeah. I like you,” she said, surprised – as if he should know that already.

His heart suddenly clenched. Shit.

Jack narrowed his eyes. Why did she always have to be so shamelessly honest? At some point, it would kill her. Or him.

“Just because we’re not going to sleep together again doesn’t mean we can’t be friends,” Penny continued, her voice as gentle as the rippling water.

But she was wrong. Jack was certain they couldn’t be friends. Friends didn’t look at the top button of their blouses, hoping it would open on its own. Friends didn’t want to do all the dirty things that Jack did with Penny every night in his dreams.

“I’m sticking with ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’” he replied calmly.

She nodded. “Okay. May I talk then?”

He sighed. “Fine. But if you want to argue or get upset, at least help me up out of the water so I’m not at your mercy.”

She rolled her eyes but was suppressing a smile. “As if you’ve ever been at someone’s mercy at any moment in your life.” She held out her hand.

He took it in his, ran his rough fingertips over her soft skin…and knew that there was no way she would be able to lift him out of the water. He was two-hundred pounds of muscle, and her biceps were no bigger than a tangerine that had missed its growth spurt.

No. If they were going to be literally eye to eye for the conversation Penny was so desperate to have, they had to find another solution. And Jack already had a good idea.

Penny pulled on his hand — and he pulled back.

With a squeak, she stumbled forward before falling headfirst into the pool.

Water splashed and she caught his stomach with an elbow as she kicked back up to the surface, gasping for air. Her hair stuck to her face and neck and her breathing was hectic.

“You did not just do that!” she gasped in disbelief, raising her chin to keep her nose above water.

He grinned. Being wet suited her. “You looked like you could use a cool down.”