Page 16

FIFTEEN

JACK

NOVEMBER

“We should probably let you get to it,” Mara said, shifting nervously, then smirking. “Thanks for the tour, Jackie baby.”

Mikey snickered in the background and I shot a glare over my shoulder at him. I fished in my locker for my suit pants and dug out my credit card. “Here. Get the kids whatever snacks will make them happy. Whatever anybody wants.”

“Hell yes,” Gabi said, “I’m totally getting day drunk.”

Mara just laughed, but I was not quite as amused. “Relax, she doesn’t drink.”

“California sober, bay-bee,” Gabi said, firing finger guns. Our other goalie, Nikita Koretsov stood by his locker watching us with a big smile. That explained all the giggleboxing and tittering Gabi and Mara’d been doing.

Mara bent to collect Hazel from where she was headbutting Romelski’s thigh. “‘Kay. We’ll go get some energy out before the game starts.”

“Alright.” I leaned toward her, instinctively thinking I was going to touch her somehow, but not having a sensical action plan once I initiated the movement. When had I ever been this awkward around women? I settled for some weird side hug thing, which Mara turned into a warm squeeze.

“We’ll just come back down here after the game?” Mara peered up at me, her ice-blue eyes framed by the prettiest curled lashes.

“Um, yeah. There’s a whole room for wives—and friends and stuff. Just tell the security guy on the way out and they’ll tell you where to go.”

“Okay. See ya, Jackie baby,” she said with a wide grin.

Silence followed her exit minus a few quiet conversations. I busied myself at my locker. Once the outer door clicked, the interrogation began.

“I see someone brought a date today!” Romelski sing-songed.

Dick.

“She’s just Harper’s friend’s mom,” I said.

“Is that all she is?” Mikey chimed in, prancing on his tiptoes with his hands tucked next to his face.

I threw a wad of used tape at him and ground my teeth. “Yes.”

“Well, I really like her. And Jeannie said she was really nice at Harper’s party,” Sorrento added. “Not like you to pick someone whose personality isn’t being a viper.”

“Damn, even Sorrento coming in with an opinion,” Romelski laughed.

“Mara is pretty and nice, but I didn’t ‘pick’ her,” I clarified. “Harper just seems happier when she’s hanging out with Aspen. It’s good for her.”

“And is somebody else happier when they hang out with Aspen’s mom?” Obi asked in a tiny voice. “I think I saw Jackie baby’s teeth and he wasn’t growling.”

I laced up my sneakers and headed for the bikes. “Fuck. Off.”

I finally caved to checking my phone during the second intermission, convinced my kids were being hellions for Gabi and Mara. There was always the possibility that Harper had mentioned Mara being around more to Sydney, and knowing Syd, she’d likely have something rude to say about it. What if Harper was spilling stuff like that?

And anyway, how much of this was ill-advised? Not to be elitist, but I was somewhat famous, and Mara was a normie. She could easily be just like Sydney, waiting to take advantage of me. Of my kids.

But her kids were there, almost as collateral. My gut told me Mara was just a mom in the same way I was just a dad.

Everything ok?

MARA O’CONNELL

(pic of the whole crew, all of them with some kind of frozen drink and purple tongues)

Big Princes fans up here. You’re mean down there

Won’t lie, Hazel’s a little fussy

Shit

Sorry

She’s ok for now but we’ll see how this last inning goes

Period

Fine

She’s ok for now but we’ll see how this last inning goes.

I added the period :)

You’re a menace

And yet, I couldn’t stop grinning.

We were up four to three with just three minutes left in the third. I’d already banked an assist, and I tried not to think too hard about who was watching and whether my kids were behaving.

Ohio’s goalie had left the net. I got the puck and probably could have lobbed it from our end and gotten the empty net goal. But I had a little case of the zoomies and felt extra dickish. I took off up the ice toward Ohio’s zone, their defenseman Jones hot on my tail.

“Fuck off,” I called back to him as I picked up speed.

“Don’t think about it, Leroy,” he warned, swatting at my stick.

But he was too late, and I couldn’t help myself. Just a few feet out from the goal, I clapped it on the empty net, not only scoring the goal, but scoring it in the most asshole way possible. An “ooh” issued from the crowd and I threw off my gloves, predicting the drama to come as I turned back to face my opponent. His gloves were already long gone and his first punch caught me off guard.

“The fuck you thinking, huh?” He grabbed my jersey to pummel me. The power of Nickelback surged through my veins. I was so ready.

Romelski and Mikey arrived at my side as the rest of Ohio’s guys showed up and it became a full-on pile in seconds. Jones slipped away from me, but plenty of his comrades took his place.

The crowd got louder as the fight escalated. I looked to center ice where Obi was even taking their goalie, and goalie fights are a rare and beautiful thing. Somebody’s fist came out of nowhere, and my lip split. It had been a good long time since I got into a brawl of this scale, and the refs were doing their best to break it up. I kept reaching for whoever’s jersey I could get. My knuckles were split, my helmet was gone, and my lip dripped down the front of my jersey.

Stelle and Mikey stood off to the side with their arms around Jones’s shoulders, their faces in various states of beaten disarray as they watched Obi struggle to wrestle Ohio’s goalie to the ground. Both goalies were laughing, Obi with a cut on the side of his face that left blood running dramatically down his face.

They split up and the crowd got even louder as the ref skated to center ice.

“Los Angeles number twenty-nine and Ohio number eight, five for fighting!”

Well, there went my game.

I waved as I headed for the tunnel, garnering applause from the crowd. I’d gotten what they call a Gordie Howe hat trick: a goal, an assist, and a fight in one game.

God, I love hockey.

MARA O’CONNELL

Hey I think we’re going to have to leave right after the game. Hazel is melting down

Good lord what are you doing? It’s like you’re fishing for a fight

That’s exactly what I was doing :)

Just come down and get the keys. I have to warm down and do another workout before I can go home

Mara’s face peeked around the corner. “Everybody decent?” she called, then winced noting the TV crews interviewing me and a few of the other players. I smiled around my swollen lip seeing her like that.

Why did she look fucking cute and innocent being all polite? She’d apparently bought an oversized Princes sweatshirt and her hair was up in some scrunchie thing.

She grimaced and tiptoed away, zipping across her lips.

“Sorry, what was that?” I asked the interviewer.

“Your third career Gordie Howe hat trick, Jack. How does that feel?”

I smirked, looking over at a smiling Mara. “Hurts so good, just like every time.”

That got laughs from the media. The reporter thanked me and turned away. I beckoned Mara into the locker room, and ducking around a few cameras, she made her way in.

“You proud of yourself?” Mara asked, patting my cheek and touching her finger below my busted lip. She sniffed. “Oof. You stink.”

“Very proud, and that’s the smell of hard work and sacrifice,” I said, smiling and accidentally splitting my lip back open again. She laughed, holding her fingers up to keep the blood from streaming. A trainer swooped in with a piece of gauze, and Mara stepped back, extending her blood-covered hand. “Oh, uh, can you get her something for that?”

I took over holding the gauze, and the trainer went to grab Mara a wipe. “You’re very brave,” he said to her.

She laughed and agreed. “Just another day of being a mom.”

“Ouch, Jack, she’s your mom,” Romelski laughed.

I got my keys out of my locker, making a face at him. “You good to drive?”

She took the keys from me. “Yeah, I got real lit on those grape freezies.” She stuck her tongue out in a way that bordered on obscene and I had to fight a blush at the thought of her doing that in a very different context.

Stop making this weird, Jack.

“I have to take Gabi home. It’s kinda out of the way, but she’s got a date tonight,” Mara said, making Nikita’s head snap up, “and I guess I’ll drive back to my house? Yours?”

“I can give Gabriela a ride,” Nikita volunteered, his accent dancing over her full name.

Mara and I exchanged an amused look and she agreed. “Yeah. She’d appreciate that.”

“Go to my house,” I said, going back to the prior point. “I’ll have a dinner order sent to the house. Then I can give you guys a ride home.”

“Great. Good game, Jackie baby,” she said, and with a wink over her shoulder, she was gone.

And I was left standing there with a ridiculous, dumbfounded grin on my face.