Page 21 of Never Dance with the Devils (Never Say Never #6)
“Yes, the lone remaining loyalists. At least according to my dad,” she says wistfully, her hand to her chest. But, very intentionally changing the subject from her father, she points from me to Maddox.
“Enough about me. Tell me more about you two, like how this happened? And I don’t want the internet version. ”
“You looked us up?” Maddox asks, flashing a pride-filled grin. “Did you see my stats last season? Best ever… to date.”
I shouldn’t be surprised. Hell, with the type of family she has, I wouldn’t be surprised if a full, FBI-level background check from her apparently wound-up, control-freak brother was standard MO before any dates.
But I don’t think that’s what happened. I get the feeling she was the one typing our names in and reading all about us, and that feels important.
Like we passed a test, and I’d be willing to bet big that Kayla’s tests are tough. As they should be.
“Maybe,” she drawls out. “But tell me everything.” She puts her elbow on the table, rests her chin in her hand, and looks ready for a detailed storytime.
This is Maddox’s arena, not mine, so I let him take the lead.
“Riggs and I drafted onto the Devils,” he starts, leaning her way.
“At the time, we were young and stupid, and all our hockey dreams were coming true. We were two peas in a pod back then.” He grins at me, both of us remembering that time.
“We lived, slept, and breathed hockey, every minute of every day, and because we were both rookies, we became friends, on and off the ice.”
“Wait, two peas in a pod?” Kayla repeats, doubt written in the cute crinkle of her brows. “You two?”
No one would describe us that way these days, but it was true back then. Now, we’re more the Yin and Yang of polar opposites—Mr. Congeniality and Mr. Asshole, with him obviously being everyone’s favorite charmer and me being the second one in the buy one, get one free equation of us.
He gives me an encouraging look because this is my story to share…
or more often, to not share, especially with strangers.
I’m not sure about this, and I think it has the potential to run Kayla off again, but Maddox says there’s no way around it, only through it, so I lean back in my chair and clear my throat.
“I was married then, to my high school sweetheart. Things were good, which meant I was good, until they weren’t, so I wasn’t.
When we got divorced, she did a number on me, saying all kinds of shit about me and to me, and took damn near every penny I’d earned on the ice to that point.
It left me in a deep, dark place,” I admit solemnly.
“That’s when Maddox saved me from myself.
This” —I hold my arms out wide, pointing back at myself— “is what’s left of that dumbass kid.
A little wiser, a lot less trusting, and pretty banged up inside.
” I don’t tap my heart, but rather, my head, because that’s what Eliza really messed with—the way I think, especially about myself.
Eliza fooled everyone. Or maybe she changed as the money came in?
She’d certainly seemed like the same home-town girl I’d always known when I brought her to team get-togethers in the early days.
But she became a cruel, money-hungry bitch by the time we signed the divorce papers.
I’m not sure what exactly happened. In hindsight, I think it was a slow morph into someone who only saw me as the person bankrolling her lifestyle, not as the man she was supposed to love the way I loved her, but she left a trail of gossip about me through the wives and girlfriends, and therefore, the team.
I almost hadn’t recovered and had even contemplated giving up on hockey altogether until Maddox knocked some sense into me about that, literally with a few love-taps to my solar plexus that hit like a slap-shot.
Kayla’s gone quiet, her eyes searching my face as she processes the trauma dump I just laid at her feet, and in full support of me, Maddox holds a fist out. “I’ll take this you over that one any day, man.”
One side of my mouth quirks up the tiniest bit, not in a smile but in something closer to acknowledgement that I am different now.
“Thanks, man,” I say. Touching my fist to his and then letting out a deep exhale, I conclude, “So yeah, that’s me in a nutshell.
Drama, trauma, and scars, oh my.” The rewrite of the ‘lions, tigers, and bears’ phrasing makes Maddox chuckle because it’s something he’s said to me before when I needed a kick in the ass.
It’s like our own private joke because sometimes, dark humor is all you have to get through the rough patches.
“Angeline told me what a big deal those jerseys are, that you don’t sign merch anymore because someone was falsifying signatures,” Kayla says quietly. “I appreciate your doing that for the foundation. Thank you.”
It’s not a question and she’s not expecting an explanation, but I want to give her one anyway.
I let out a heavy exhale as I dip my chin in a faint nod.
“Yeah, we were already having issues, but when I started pushing back on what Eliza was spending—nothing major, just asking if she really needed more shoes when she had a closetful she’d never worn—she found another way to monetize me.
But the truth is, that wasn’t the worst of it. I would’ve given her all the money?—”
“You basically did,” Maddox hisses.
I chuff out a bitter laugh, admitting, “He’s not wrong.
By the end, I just wanted to be done with her, and I would’ve written that check for my entire bank balance if it would’ve made her go away.
Because it was the more insidious stuff she did that hurt more, like making me doubt my game, question my teammates, and not trust myself.
I’m good on the ice, but off? She played me…
no, she outplayed me, and I never saw it coming until it was too late. ”
I stare at the flowers Maddox placed in the center of the table for our dinner date, letting my vision go hazy, and he takes over the rest of the story for me.
“She told the WAGs—the wives and girlfriends of the guys on the team—that Riggs was controlling, like he wouldn’t let her go places with them and he didn’t allow her to buy things, and that his on-ice roughness was nothing compared to how he was at home.
” Knowing this is the part I hate the most, he slowly adds, “And how he was in the bedroom. ”
Kayla gasps, her hands covering her mouth. “She did not.”
I nod solemnly. I’m not one of those guys who bases his whole personality on sexual prowess.
Hell, up until my divorce, Eliza was the only woman I’d ever been with and I never breathed a word about our private lives to anyone.
Considering we learned how to be lovers together, I didn’t figure it was anyone else’s business but ours.
It wasn’t until later, when a teammate told me that his wife was asking him uncomfortable questions, that I found out Eliza had been telling people a whole bunch of stuff, most of it outright lies.
But there was just enough truth to it—like that my dick is big, and I’m quiet by nature—to make people believe that I was an uncaring, aggressive partner who got off on hurting her.
“It was ugly, real fucking ugly,” I say in what’s probably the understatement of the century.
“Thanks to my lawyer and Coach, most of it stayed out of the press, and eventually, her lies caught up to her and people figured out that she was full of shit. Still, it changed how they looked at me for a long time. Some of them still look at me differently.” That’s what I hate the most—the questions in their eyes when teammates or their wives look at me.
I can see the doubt there—was she telling the truth, is he telling the truth, or are they both liars?
“This guy doesn’t exactly help that,” I say, tossing a wave toward Maddox and trying to lighten the heavy pall I’ve thrown on our date.
“People joke that he’s my handler, keeping me from ruining some poor, unsuspecting woman’s vagina with my dick, and he goes all Chuckles McFuckstick over here, laughing and saying it’s like trying to tame an out-of-control firehose and takes all hands on deck. ”
I glare at him for that one, remembering the overly animated demonstration he gave of “me” holding my dick while it danced around wildly like one of those car-wash inflatable things, complete with machine-gun sound effects that I think were supposed to be me blasting cum everywhere.
Yeah, not his best response to a locker room tease, though nobody has said that particular taunt ever since, so maybe it did work a little.
Maddox grins, holding his hands out like ‘what?’ as if he’s the picture of innocence. “Hey, if they want to believe anything they hear, that’s on them. What’s important is that we know the truth.” He winks, trying to irritate me.
Kayla has gone silent, her face blank despite Maddox’s playfulness, and I can’t help but think that, even from back home where she lives again, Eliza is still ruining things for me.
She’d be thrilled about that, and while it should make me angry, I’m just sad about it.
I dealt with my anger a long time ago and, for the most part, don’t give my ex-wife a second thought anymore.
Except when I have to explain how I came to be the man I am today, because good and bad, she had a big part in that.
“I’m sorry she fucked you over,” Kayla finally says, her voice quiet but strong as she reaches out and lays her hand over mine on the table. “I had someone do that to me too, and it hurt.” She lets out a bitter laugh. “It still hurts sometimes.”
“What happened?” I flip my hand over to take hers into mine and press kisses to her knuckles, one by one.