Page 9

nine

RHETT

My skates slow as I near the tunnel, the buzzer still ringing in my ears. Everything’s a blur—what just happened on the ice, the three goals against us, my screw-ups. It’s like I’m walking underwater, too slow to catch up with the reality pressing in around me.

Then a hand grabs my arm.

“Can I borrow you for a minute, please?”

My head snaps up.

Caroline?

I blink, certain I’m hallucinating.

Before I can ask anything, Bear steps up behind me.

“Caroline, are you interviewing him?” he asks.

“Yes, Coach,” she answers, all professionalism. “Just for a minute.”

He nods. “Keep it brief. We need him in the locker room.”

“Of course.”

He looks between us, then exhales like this entire situation personally wounds him. “Good luck,” he mutters to her, smacking a hand against my shoulder. I barely feel it.

My eyes don’t leave her. Not even when she turns slightly and mutters something I barely register: “I have him.”

“Cub?” I say her name like a question, because… what the hell is going on?

She doesn’t answer. Just keeps listening to whoever’s talking in her ear. I try again.

“Cub?”

Nothing. She lifts a hand to her earpiece like I’m background noise.

And then—Caroline turns, all charm and poise. A cameraman—one I’m only just registering—stands in front of us, raising his hand and counting down from five.

And I finally realize what’s happening.

I’m being interviewed. On live TV. By her.

I jerk my focus back to her, fully alert now, adrenaline spiking for a whole new reason. “Cub, what are you?—?”

“Yes, thank you, Mick,” she cuts me off, effortlessly smooth. “I’m here with Rhett Sutton—a man certainly used to having eyes on him. But I think it’s safe to say there are more eyes this evening than even you are used to handling.”

She holds the mic toward me. I should answer. I know I should. But I can’t stop looking at her. My feet shift, instinct pulling me closer.

“Define handling?” I say.

She laughs, and I swear it echoes somewhere in my ribs.

But then she’s serious again. “There’s certainly a lot of pressure on you tonight with this being your first game as the Storm’s new captain.

Do you think the nerves that come with that may have contributed to some of what wasn’t an ideal first period? ”

I shake my head. “I don’t really get nervous.”

She blinks, caught off guard. “Oh. What would you call it then?”

I pause, gloved hand lifting to my helmet, trying to pull something coherent from the mess in my head. “Sort of… fevered, I guess.”

“Fevered?” she echoes. “As in… excited?”

“Yeah.” I step closer again. “There’s a lot of that going on in my brain.”

She glances at the camera, like she’s searching for an exit. “Hopefully we can get some of that out of your head and onto the ice this next period. What do you think?”

“That’d be great if it was possible,” I say, voice rough. Too honest.

“What are you going to tell your team in the locker room to make it possible?” she asks, quick and polished.

I can’t help the soft laugh that slips out. My gloves are too hot, so I tug one off, running my bare hand along my jaw. “You got any suggestions?”

Her eyebrows rise. She hesitates, like she’s waiting for me to get serious. I don’t. I just look at her.

“I mean… really?” she asks, disbelieving.

“Yeah,” I say. And this time I’m dead serious.

She glances at the camera again, then pivots fast—voice sharp, words precise.

“Well, Ottawa was the second-worst team on the penalty kill last season while you all were second-best on the power play. So if it were me, I’d tell the guys to play aggressively.

Push toward the net, force penalties, make them make the mistakes, and then capitalize on the power play.

A couple of those, and you’re bound to score.

I think you just need one to get the momentum going. Then just play the game you all know.”

My throat goes dry. I don’t know what impresses me more—how fast she snaps into that analysis or the fact that she’s dead-on.

“Wow,” I mutter, grinning before I even mean to. I shift closer again, drawn to her like gravity.

“Whoa, Captain.” She throws out a hand, stopping me with her palm right over the ‘C’ on my chest. “Watch the skates. You were about to owe me a new pair of heels.”

Her cheeks flush, and she tries to laugh it off.

And because I’m an idiot, I make it worse. So much worse.

“You know I’d buy you a whole shoe store if you asked, Care Bear.”

She freezes—mic clenched in her hand like she might launch it at my head.

Then she glares at me. Not annoyed. Not surprised.

Livid.

“Oh, I—Cu—Caroline, I mean—” I stammer, panic spiking as my brain short-circuits.

“Thanks so much for your time, Rhett,” she says to the camera, her smile looking carved from stone. “We’ll let you get to the locker room now. Back to you, guys.”

The air between us turns razor sharp. I can just barely make out the crackle of her earpiece.

“Thanks so much… Care Bear…”

The second the camera cuts, she exhales sharply—every ounce of tension snapping out of her body only to flood straight into mine.

Did I just call her Care Bear on live TV?

And did someone on the broadcast just repeat it?

Caroline slowly lowers her mic.

“Cub,” I murmur, “I didn’t mean?—”

“No.” She jabs a finger at me like a weapon. “No, you have no idea what you just did.”

I shake my head, scrambling. “I didn’t even—what are you doing down here? I thought you were working the TV analyst gig?—”

“Well, don’t worry about it,” she snaps. “Because by morning, I’ll probably be working no gig. Thanks so much, Rhett. ”

She brushes past me like I’m nothing, fury radiating off her in waves. I open my mouth to call after her, but before I can, Coach is already shouting my name down the tunnel.

I turn, dazed, helpless, throat burning.

What the hell just happened?