Free Agent

by Catherine Gayle

  “So it is your healthy, poisonous shit.”

  “Fine, give it back to me,” I said, holding out a hand. I crossed one ankle over my other, making myself comfortable next to her in her bed, where she was propped upright with countless pillows supporting her from every angle. “I’ll eat it and you can go without.”

  She tugged the bowl away from me and tucked it by her side. “Not a chance, chica. Hands off my ice cream.”

  “I’m just trying to be sure you and the baby stay healthy.”

  “I’d rather you try to be sure I stay sane.”

  “Might as well be the same thing,” I said, winking.

  “You’re not as funny as you think you are.”

  “And you’re not as scary as you think you are.”

  “Hmph,” she muttered, but she started shoving the ice cream into her face, nonetheless. “Oh, God, this is so good,” she said around a mouthful.

  “Told you.” I laughed and filled my own spoon with a bite from her bowl.

  She tugged the bowl away. “Hands off. Get your own.”

  “Good grief. You know I’m only going to eat two or three bites and then I’ll stop. And I brought you four different flavors, too, so you’re stocked up for a while.”

  “I don’t care. I don’t wanna share. I’m already sharing everything with this little leech,” she said, fondly rubbing a hand over her ever-increasing belly.

  All I could do in response was laugh.

  Dani shoved another spoonful in her mouth. “You need to tell Cody exactly where to find this so he can buy me more. What store, which aisle, where on the shelves… I need at least three pints a day from now until this baby is out of me.”

  “Um, you do realize you need to eat real food, too, right?”

  “You do realize you’re supposed to be my best friend, and I’ve already got more than enough people nagging me, between Cody and Mom and my army of doctors. I need you to be on my side.”

  “I am on your side—which means I want you and your baby to be healthy. Which means I’m going to do everything in my power to be sure you follow doctor’s orders.”

  Instead of responding, she glared and shoved her spoon back into the bowl for another bite, challenging me to take it away with a defiantly raised brow.

  “Guess my nasty, healthy, poisonous stuff is okay then,” I muttered, holding back more laughter.

  “If I can’t get my hands on the real deal, this’ll do in a pinch. But don’t tell Cody how much I like it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because then he might not be willing to bring me either this or the real stuff when I have a craving at two in the morning.”

  “You’re incorrigible.”

  “And you love me for it.” Dani smirked.

  She was right about that part, at least.

  “So,” she said, licking the spoon so as not to miss a single smidgeon of her ice cream, “what’s the latest on the Koz situation?”

  “Situation?” I had to stifle a snort.

  “Have we moved on from it being a situation, then? What is it now?”

  “I don’t know,” I hedged. “It’s just…a thing.”

  “A thing?”

  “Yeah.”

  “An obnoxious thing? A we-want-to-stab-his-eyes-out-with-a-rusty-spork thing? An it’s-not-ideal-but-we’re-finding-a-way-to-deal-with-it thing?”

  “Just a thing,” I said.

  Dani’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head, and her jaw dropped. “You like him,” she said, sounding shocked and confused, and maybe a little bit peeved.

  “I don’t know if I’d say I like him.”

  “You do,” she insisted. “I thought you did before, but then he did a typical Koz thing and we hated him, but now you’re back to liking him again.” She shoved another bite of ice cream into her mouth. “Damn it. I wanted to keep hating him. I like hating Koz. I don’t want to like him.”

  “You don’t have to like him. And you don’t have to hate him, either. You don’t have to feel anything about him one way or another. This doesn’t have anything to do with you, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “Whatever. If you like him, I have to like him. If you hate him, I get to hate him like I want to. That’s how this shit works.”

  I snort-laughed. “What shit?”

  “This hos-over-bros shit.”

  “Did you just call me a ho?”

  Dani shrugged, shoving another bite into her mouth and practically moaning in pleasure. “Called myself one, too.”

  “Is that supposed to make it better?”

  “Fine, you’re not a ho. Actually, if ever I met someone who was the opposite of a ho, it’d be you.”

  “Exactly.”

  “We need to change that, and stat, if you’re thinking that you might like Koz. You need to go have a wild one-night stand with a rock star or something. I bet we can have Katie help you out there. She’s got connections in the business. She knows people.”

  Dani’s sister, Katie Babcock, had worked with some big names in the music industry for years. These days, she was spending most of her time writing songs for some of the hottest acts in the business instead of pursuing her own singing career.

  “I don’t want a one-night stand with anyone,” I argued, struggling to keep my tone serious so Dani would listen to me.

  “Oh, please let me set you up with someone. I need to live vicariously through you since I’m stuck in bed.”

  “You might recall that the last time you tried to set me up with someone was when this whole thing with Blake got started.”

  Dani groaned. “Don’t remind me. But one failure doesn’t mean I’m doomed to fail again.”

  “You’re doomed to fail again because I’m not going along with any of your plans.”

  She pouted and stuffed another large bite of her ice cream into her mouth. “Well,” she said, speaking around her dessert, “if you’re going to go out with anyone, you’d better dress like a hottie. Even if it’s Koz.”

  “I don’t think you need to worry about that,” I said.

  “Meaning you’re going to wear something I made you? Or meaning you’re not going out with him?”

  Meaning it didn’t matter one way or the other. I didn’t think he’d be interested in me in that way, so the point was moot.

  I shoved my spoon into her ice cream container and stole a bite while she was distracted.

  “You’re avoiding answering me,” she said, pouting.

  “Maybe I am.”

  “Chicken.”

  “Bock bock bock!” I flapped my arms, making the droopy skin of my biceps and triceps jiggle around. Then I tried to scoop out another bite of Dani’s ice cream, but she tugged the bowl away from me so fast she nearly threw herself off the bed. I shot out an arm to stop her progress, barely preventing a fall.

  We both laughed like loons, effectively forgetting all about the conversation.

  A beep sounded on Dani’s phone. She reached for it and swiped the screen. “Game time,” she said. “Hand me the remote. You staying or going?”

  I needed to work on lesson plans, and I had a stack of papers about half a mile high waiting to be graded. But the temptation to stay was strong.

  I shifted a couple of pillows around to prop myself up next to her, settling in for the next little while. “Need to leave by first intermission,” I said.

  “Mm hmm. Whatever. Next time, you just need to bring your work with you so you can do it while we watch.”

  “But it’d just sit there, because I’d be watching.”

  “True, but at least you could pretend to be working. Much like I pretend I’m going to be good about what I eat.” Dani reached into her nightstand and pulled out a couple of pieces of individually wrapped dark chocolate, tossing one my way.

  I glared at her, but she grinned and winked as she opened the wrapper and put her piece into her mouth.

  “Now that I know where your stash is, I’m going to get rid of it,” I said.r />
  “I’ll just get someone else to hook me up.”

  “You’re a mess, Dani.”

  “And you still love me for it.”

  Yeah, she was right. I did.

  I settled back against the pillows, unwrapping my chocolate and focusing in on the television—because they were doing a pregame segment all about Blake, so his cocky, sexy grin was right in front of me in high definition.

  I didn’t want to like him, but Dani was right; I did. I wasn’t sure it would ever be more than that…but there was something blooming inside me, and I felt powerless to stop it.

  Blake Kozlow had worked his way under my skin. Damn it.

  THE PUCK WAS on my stick, which was exactly where I liked it, but two Sabres defenders were closing in on me fast.

  It was a scoreless game at home even though we were more than halfway through the third period. Something needed to change that. Or someone—and I was more than okay with that someone being me. It’d go a long way toward helping me redeem myself in the team’s eyes if I could make myself invaluable on the ice.

  Whether I was the one to break the ice with a goal or it was another of my teammates, we needed to get on the scoreboard.

  I scanned the ice, looking for my options.

  One of my linemates, Preston Hutchinson, was all tied up with his defender along the boards and couldn’t get free. My other winger, Aaron Ludwiczak, had tried to skirt around his defender, but the guy had tripped him up and none of the refs had called it.

  The officials seemed to be trying to stay out of the way, allowing us to settle the game on the scoreboard and not through penalties.

  Cole Paxton and Chris Hammond, the two Storm defensemen out on the ice with us, were both relatively free—but they were also my worst-case-scenario options. Those two were a hell of a lot better at playing defense than they were at anything remotely resembling offense.

  But now the guy chasing me was zeroing in on me, and he kept getting his stick in my way. Continuing to hold on to the puck wasn’t going to help anyone. I needed to find an outlet, someone I could pass it to until I could lose my man.

  Another quick glance behind me revealed that Colesy had skated away from the Sabres forward who’d been hounding him, and now he had a clear lane to the net. Apparently that was as good as I was going to get. I took a chance, caught his eye, and passed the puck his way.

  One of the guys who’d been tailing me took off to cover Colesy, which was exactly what I needed.

  Then I made a beeline straight for the goal, myself, with only one defender chasing me.

  Colesy didn’t hang on to the puck for long, passing it back to me like it was a hot potato, but my brief time without it was all I required to get a couple of strides away from the Sabres defenseman.

  The rubber hit my tape just as Luddy and Hutch both converged on the goal along with me, all of us arriving at virtually the same time.

  With a quick wrist shot, I flicked the puck into the mass of humanity in front of the goal. It didn’t go in—the Sabres netminder had a clear line of sight on my initial shot—but I hoped the ensuing melee would be enough for us to sneak it past him.

  It was a madhouse of flailing skates and sticks, with curses flying in a combination of English, Swedish, Russian, and Czech. I dove into the pile of bodies, too, trying to get my stick on that little rubber fucker.

  I’d always had a love-hate relationship with the puck. I loved it when it went off my stick and into the net; I hated it the rest of the time. The hate made it easy for me to hit the shit out of it on a regular basis, which led to the love more often than not.

  And then it happened—the puck squirted across the goal line—only no one saw it but me and the Sabres goaltender, who quickly covered it with his glove and inched it back to the other side of the goal line.

  “It went in!” I shouted, trying to extricate myself from the sweat-covered pile of smelly hockey equipment and oversized bodies. “It’s a fucking goal.”

  Finally seeing that the Sabres goalie had the puck, the refs blew their whistles and attempted to break up the pile so they could sort through what had happened.

  But there was no goal light. No signal from the officials that we’d scored.

  I didn’t know who they’d credit with scoring it, and for that matter, I didn’t care—just so long as they gave us the goal.

  The linesmen were still hauling guys apart, but the two refs had skated away toward center ice and were discussing the play with one another. I started to follow them, determined to be sure they saw things my way, but then I thought better of it. I was supposed to be keeping my head down, doing my job but otherwise keeping my nose clean and doing my best to stay out of trouble.

  Opening my mouth in front of the officials was probably a bad idea. I was bound to say something I’d regret—and this time, it would hurt my team, not just me. Couldn’t allow that to happen, especially since I was still trying to climb my way out of the doghouse I’d created for myself on Twitter.

  Instead, I caught Hammer’s eye and nudged my head toward the officials, indicating that he should go over and see what they were saying. Then I skated over to the bench, and all of our coaches converged around me.

  Bergy bent over the backs of my teammates on the bench so he could hear me. “It went in?” he asked. “It crossed the line?”

  “Absolutely. I watched him cover it with his glove and then inch it back out so they wouldn’t see it.”

  “You’ve gotta challenge if they don’t call it our way,” Webs said to Bergy.

  “We can’t afford to lose a challenge at this point,” Bergy said. “We might need our time out later.”

  That was one of the league’s rules these days—a team could challenge a call on the ice, but if they lost the challenge, they would also lose the ability to call for a time out. It was a risky call to make in an otherwise scoreless game.

  “You won’t lose it,” I insisted. “The replays will have to show the truth. It was in.” At least I hoped the replays would reveal the truth. Sometimes, there just wasn’t the right camera angle to prove a goal had happened.

  “Whose goal is it?” our head coach asked, raising a brow. “You looking for the credit?”

  I glanced back toward center ice and saw that Hammer had insinuated himself into the conversation along with one of the Sabres players.

  “Hell, I don’t know who touched it last. I don’t care.” It wasn’t like I was trying to win a league scoring title or anything, and it was still early in the season, anyway, so what did it matter? I glanced up at the jumbotron overhead, watching the replay that the AV team was showing to the whole crowd. “It’s in,” I insisted, despite the camera angle not revealing anything. “It’s a fucking goal.”

  Hammer skated toward us, looking grim.

  The refs finished their huddle, and one of them turned on his mic. “The play is under review,” he announced to the arena, and then he skated over to the scorekeeper’s bench to put on a headset.

  “They’re saying no goal,” Hammer said when he reached us.

  Fuck. That meant the video evidence would have to be definitive in order to overturn the call they’d made on the ice. If they couldn’t prove it via some replay or another, then the refs’ decision would stand, and we’d still be locked in this scoreless tie.

  Around that time, the jumbotron started showing better replays—angles that took us closer to seeing the truth. The crowd went silent while everyone looked overhead to see the truth of what had taken place on the ice.

  The first angle was inconclusive. The crossbar was in the way of the puck, and you couldn’t tell that the fucker had definitively crossed the goal line.

  The next view made it look like the rubber had gone in, but the angle was bad—it could be a camera trick making us think it was in when it wasn’t.

  What we needed was the view I’d had—almost directly overhead but without the stupid crossbar muddying the waters. There’d been a tiny sliver of whit
e ice between the red goal line and the black rubber of the puck. It had not been a figment of my imagination or wishful thinking.

  Too bad we couldn’t wear helmet cams. A camera on the goaltender’s glove would be handy right about now. One of these days, once I was retired and bored with life, I’d try to come up with a way to do it. I could make a fortune on something like that.

  Granted, I didn’t know the first thing about designing cameras or protective gear for use in sports, but that was beside the point. If I put my mind to something, I could make it happen. Grandma had drilled that into my head, and it was one of the few things that had stuck with me.

  I kept watching the video, trying to see evidence of what I knew had happened…but it just wasn’t there. Bad angles all around. Nothing conclusive. We could only hope that the war room in Toronto had a better angle than the arena’s entertainment crew had been able to provide.

  Finally, the refs skated back to center ice and conferred with one another before one of them flipped on his microphone. “After video review, the call on the ice stands. No goal.”

  Our home crowd flipped out, cursing the refs the same way I wanted to. But I couldn’t lose my cool, so I bit down on the urge to skate over and tell them exactly what I thought of their garbage refereeing abilities.

  “Koz,” Bergy said in a tone that allowed me to feel his glare through the back of my skull.

  I turned around to face him.

  “Sit.” He pointed at the bench.

  Sitting was the last thing I needed to do. I needed to move. I needed to burn off the energy that had built up during the time we’d had to wait for the officials to foul up the call. I needed to get back out there and try again to score.

  But that wouldn’t help me with the coaches, so I sat.

  My feet bounced in my skates with the adrenaline that had built up within me. My eyes were jumping around, scanning the ice. I gripped my stick with the need to use it for something more than simply banging it against the boards.

  A few of the other guys headed out onto the ice, and Babs shifted down the bench until he was seated next to me.