Page 9 of What If I Hate You (Anaheim Stars Hockey #6)

CHAPTER SIX

BLAKELY

I never ask easy questions first. That’s how you get men like Barrett Cunningham to talk.

You catch them with their helmets off, their guard still leaking adrenaline and sweat.

You start with a jab, not a massage. So, when he tries to ignore me and keeps walking, I sidle up to him in the corridor, and don’t even bother with pleasantries.

“Did you expect to shut them out tonight, or are you just as surprised your legs held up for three periods straight?”

He halts so suddenly that the camera guy almost collides into him, lens first. There's an untamed, electric energy radiating from him, cheeks flushed crimson, hair sticking to his forehead in damp strands.

His dark chocolate eyes lock onto mine, intense and probing, as though he's trying to decide whether I'm here to unravel his secrets or savor his story.

“Hi to you too, Rivers,” he grunts. He’s so close I can count every blood vessel in his eyes, and maybe he knows it, because he lifts his chin the way feral dogs do before a fight. I smile back, trying to kill him with kindness.

Or at least a cheap smile.

Ignoring the press of bodies behind us, I lift my mic. “That was a solid game tonight. A few days ago, you were barely holding it together, I see you finally took my advice.”

He blinks once, slow, the way a man does when he’s deciding whether to eat glass or say something he’ll regret later. “Advice?” His voice, if possible, is more gravel than usual. “Pretty sure all you’ve given me is one reminder after another that my five-hole’s wider than the 405.”

A couple of other cameras go up. Someone’s recording on their phone, probably hoping I’ll go viral by publicly neutering a man twice my size. This is dangerous territory, and I love it.

“I’m just saying, sometimes a little constructive criticism goes a long way. Or did you suddenly get shy about feedback?” I keep the smile, but I don’t blink.

That’s the trick: never blink first.

He stares at me for three full seconds, jaw muscles rolling under the helmet of sweat. I see the calculation, the urge to mock or detonate or, maybe, just walk away. Then he does something I’ve never seen him do.

He laughs.

It’s not loud. Not even the camera mics will catch it. But it’s real enough that, for exactly one second, I glimpse the person inside the bear suit. The one who isn’t just a headline or an angry press subject.

“You know, Rivers, I never figured you for the gentle encouragement type.”

I lean in, just enough to kick the tension up a notch. “You’re right. I’m not. But I do believe in calling out bullshit when I see it, and tonight,” I shrug, “well, I guess you didn’t stink up the joint.”

For a second, he takes the compliment at face value. Then he cocks his head and gives me a look so shrewd it makes my scalp tingle. “That supposed to be a compliment, Rivers? Or are you trying to get ahead of the next time I screw up?”

“Both,” I answer deadpan, refusing to give him the satisfaction of my kindness.

He closes the gap between us, reducing the six inches to a mere three, and suddenly, I'm acutely aware of the magnetic pull Barrett Cunningham exerts.

It's as if he can envelop an entire room or stretch a fleeting moment with just his presence, a lingering shadow and the seductive lilt of his voice.

He glances down at my mouth. Not long, but enough to log it.

“If you want to be the one to personally discipline me after every bad game, Rivers, you’ll need to clear your schedule,” he says, and it takes me a half-beat to realize he’s not making a joke for the camera. He’s making it just for me.

I’m about to volley back because, come on, that’s my whole reason for living, when he leans in, lowering his voice so only I can hear it. “Or are you just dying to check my five-hole for yourself?”

It’s not lewd, not exactly, but somehow it’s a thousand percent more obscene than if he’d said it straight. My throat goes dry for a moment, and I force myself not to look away. Not to let him see that when he wants to, he can knock me completely off axis.

I’m not about to give him the pleasure.

I set my jaw and raise my face to his. “That depends, Barrett. You think you could handle the scrutiny?”

He holds my gaze, dead-on, no blinking. For a second, the mask drops.

There’s hunger there, and a dare, but also a sliver of what looks almost like relief.

Maybe he’s just glad I didn’t fold. Maybe this is what we do, trade barbs instead of numbers, slaps instead of touches, these fleeting collisions where the only thing getting scored between us is pride.

“I think you’d be surprised what I can handle,” he says quietly, and for a second there’s no one else.

Not the news crew, not the security guard pretending not to eavesdrop, not even the half-drunk fans hollering down the hall.

I feel the weight of his full attention like a fist against my chest. It would be easy to take a step back, reset the balance, but I don’t. I hold.

“I can’t wait to find out,” I say. And this time I can’t help my smile. A real honest to goodness smile, the one that pries through power suits and broadcast makeup and says you can’t break me.

Not now.

Not ever.

It knocks him off center for just a moment. And then the helmet comes back on, the professional mask, and he steps back, leaving behind a void that smells faintly of sweat and ozone and perhaps a little of victory.

I know a win when I score one.

For a full three seconds after Barrett walks away, the hallway is quiet. I’m left standing here, teeth sunk into my lower lip, pulse throbbing in places I don’t want to admit.

Even Robert, my camera operator, mouths “holy shit” before offering me a quick thumbs-up like I just won the Nobel Prize for Verbal Warfare.

A few straggler reporters in the vicinity huddle together, eyes darting between me and the closed door Barrett just disappeared behind.

I hear Troy’s voice somewhere in the distance saying, “You see that? She’s got him on a leash. ”

The camera crew dissolves around me and even the post-game chaos thins out, but my head’s still spinning from every calculated syllable the man just delivered.

I should feel smug. And I do. I got Barrett Cunningham to blink first. But something about the way he looked at me, like I was the only thing worth focusing on in the whole damn arena, sets off a chain reaction inside me that’s part pride, part panic, and wholly something else.

I practically float back to the media room, and it’s only when I see my reflection in the glass door that I realize I’m grinning.

Like an idiot. Like a girl with a crush, which is neither on brand for me nor allowed, though rules about workplace relationships don’t seem to be enforced around here given the rest of the team and their chosen partners.

Marlee Remington, my best friend, heads the Events and Operations department and she and Ledger Dayne have three kids together.

August Blackstone is married to Ella and she’s the team’s mascot.

Layken heads up the charity office for the Stars and she’s married to Griffin Ollenberg and hell, Bodhi Roche is with Corrigan Hicks, the coach’s daughter.

I suppose the guys like to keep their women close around here.

And although I don’t want to admit it, there’s a part of me, a teeny tiny part, way, way, way, deep down that wouldn’t mind getting a little closer to Barrett Cunningham.

I clamp down on the very thought and try to push it out of my mind, but the sting of his last words lingers, hot and electric, as I flop down at my desk to start dashing off bullet points for my next segment on Sports Wrap.

“I think you’d be surprised what I can handle.”

I wonder if he’d handle me the way he handled that puck in the third period; with a possessiveness that left no doubt, not even a sliver, about who controlled the space.

I wonder if his hands, wide and veined, would close around my wrists, pinning me to a mattress or to a wall.

The press of his body a warning shot and a promise all at once.

Obviously this is a sign that I need to either A, drink water, or B, break something heavy and ceramic so I can clean up the mess and feel like a productive member of society.

There’s just something about Barrett that feels so deliberate, so braced and locked, that I find myself wanting to see what would happen if I saw another side to him, if he in fact has a softer side, or better yet if he really saw me.

Blakely Rivers.

The single independent female who has a passion for sports reporting and all that entails, but who also wouldn’t mind having someone to come home to who would wrap his arms around her, make her feel desired, loved, and respected and if she’s lucky, fuck her till the sun comes up.

That doesn’t happen though with the line of work I’m in.

I mean sure, they’d probably all fuck me till the sun came up if I asked them to.

Also, ew.

But I’ll never have their respect.

I get it.

The men around here might understand that I know hockey because I’ve played hockey, but to them women’s hockey is nothing like men’s hockey.

Not in the slightest. So, no matter how hard I push, no matter how relentless I am to prove myself in this career, I’ll never have the one thing all the rest of my colleagues and players have.

A penis.

To them I’m nothing but the pretty girl who obviously slept with someone or provided some quality, intimate favors to get this gig. Because evidently my tits carry voodoo magic.

Who knew?

Honestly, I just find Barrett Cunningham intriguing.

He’s not the flashy professional athlete that some of the other guys are.

He’s not into high fashion. That I could tell by the suit he had on earlier.

He doesn’t drive an overly expensive car.

He’s broody all the time, even in the few instances where I’ve seen him off the ice.

After our first encounter in the press room something about him latched onto me and now I find myself wishing I could peel back his armor and see what might be left underneath.

I want to know if Barrett is just a myth of his own making, or if there’s actually a pulse under all the muscle and mood.

I’m barely at my desk at Sports News Network a week later when I hear the the familiar quick tap of dress loafers down the hall signaling either an HR intervention or my boss.

Braced for a scolding about my on-air decorum, I turn to the doorway just as Simon barrels toward me, his expression pinched and frantic as if he’s been mainlining straight espresso since five this morning.

“Blakely! Good, you’re here.” He clutches a folder like it’s a life raft. “Walk with me.” He doesn’t wait for my answer, just pivots and expects me to fall in step, which I do, if only because I’m curious whether I’m about to get fired or promoted.

Please don’t fire me.

Cunningham will have a field day.

He slaps the folder against his palm. “I need a favor. Actually, more than a favor. An assignment. You’re traveling with the team for the away games this week.

In fact—” he stops so abruptly I nearly run into him.

“The plane leaves at seven sharp tomorrow morning. You’re on it.

Full access. Locker room, press room, breakfast buffet at whatever godforsaken hotel can accommodate thirty men who all eat their body weight in waffles.

” He looks at me like he expects protest, but honestly, it’s the best news I’ve had in weeks.

“The network wants more behind-the-scenes content and you’re the only one the guys haven’t gotten banned from the locker room yet. Consider it a compliment, Rivers.” He shrugs with a slight cringe. “Or a sentence, I guess.”

I manage to keep a straight face, careful not to let on that I’m already mapping road trip outfit strategy and wondering if there’s a Starbucks on the way to the airport.

“Roger that, boss. Are there parameters, or do you just want me to record every instance of them dropping their towels in the locker room until the FCC fines us for indecency?”

The very idea of being inside the locker room has me both extremely excited and tremendously nervous.

Simon shifts from foot to foot. “You’re the first woman ever embedded for an entire Stars away series, Rivers. There will be… scrutiny. The network is expecting you to do what you do best. Just, uh…” He grimaces, as if preparing for a dental extraction.

“Look, just don’t get in another war with Cunningham on camera, okay? The producers love your banter but the sponsors aren’t huge on viral clips about goalie five-holes. I don’t need more calls from Legal.”

Oh shit.

My stomach drops out, then returns, clawing its way up with feral delight. “Copy that.” The minute I’m back at my desk I send a quick text to my best friend.

Me

OMG SSN is sending me with the team to the next couple away games! Complete and open access to the team!

Marlee

I know! I saw your name on the roster when I got in this morning! EEK! Ledger’s parents are taking the babies for a few days so I’ll be there too! YAY!

Me

Thank God because I need someone to keep me sane. I have a feeling Cunningham isn’t going to be too happy to have me around.

Marlee

You might be surprised.

Me

What’s that supposed to mean?

Marlee

Oh nothing. Ella will be with us too!

Me

Sweet! Can’t wait! I’ve got to get home and pack!

Marlee

See you in the morning!