by Ruby Lang
Sarah leapt up. “We scored!” she yelled at Helen.
Helen rose and looked at the big screen. The camera focused on the center, who had a grim smile on his face. His teammates were patting him on the back. But Helen’s eyes went back to the ice where Adam skated in short angry sweeps, seemingly not caring. He really was furious at something.
Why is he angry?
He’d been tired over the last week on the phone, his voice gravelly with fatigue. But there hadn’t been any urgency—well, not the livid kind. And Adam right now looked really, really tense.
His cheekbone ticked, and she could imagine a drop of perspiration sliding down its sculpted surface.
Again—WHUMP!—this time from behind. The big guy from the other team smashed right into Adam. His helmet bounced right against the boards. She could feel it almost rattling her own teeth even though the crowd was screaming. She tensed her jaw until there was probably a tic there, as pronounced as his.
But instead of fighting, he left the ice. He was wiping his face, and she saw a little blood on the ice before his teammates skated over it and made it a faint pink smear.
“Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth,” Sarah said, her voice authoritative and cool.
Helen felt Sarah’s hand at her back.
“I’m not having a panic attack.”
“You’re not, but maybe we shouldn’t watch the rest of this.”
“You’re enjoying yourself.”
“I’m not going to enjoy myself if I have to scrape you off the icky floor. Ugh. Maybe we should get a new arena. This one will never be clean.”
Helen felt herself laugh.
“That’s better,” Sarah said. “Look, your boy is fine. He’s back on the ice. He’ll probably get a bonus or a fatter contract out of his performance.”
“He will?”
“Yeah. Not that I follow hockey, but people are talking about him. Talking enough that even I’ve heard something.”
He was swooping back around the ice, smooth and graceful despite being slammed and hit. She let out a cold, long breath, and she felt it for the first time. Pride. Mixed in with all the fear was a hard, resilient knot of pride that pushed so hard against her chest that it almost made her want to burst into laughter or tears. She was proud of him, of his strength and his power, which she could finally see unleashed. And her pride worried her, because that meant that she was changing, that she could see why he brought on the violence, the blood, the mayhem that he could cause.
The acknowledgment was seeping through her system, anesthetizing her fingers and slowing her heart; she could see him, for the first time. He wasn’t just the man who shared her bed or her opponent or a subject of study. He was an athlete, someone great, something magnificent and wonderful. Not that she hadn’t thought he was great and wonderful and magnificent before, but she had never thought about it when it came to Adam and hockey. She hadn’t thought of him as an athlete, maybe because he had always been self-effacing. He didn’t know his worth. All along, he had been incredible in ways she could barely wrap her mind around, and he didn’t know it.
But all of that just made it harder to think about the ways she could lose—had maybe already lost—him if he kept doing this. Watching him be great was making her hurt.
He had an assist shortly before the end of the period. She was glaring at him so hard that she wasn’t watching the puck. All she saw was the sharp snap of his stick back and that split second pause as he followed its path. She saw the swirl he made when it went in the goal and the stream of teammates thumping him on the back.
But someone on the other team must have said something, because Adam was turning and yelling something at the biggest guy on the team. In another minute, they were circling each other ,and before Helen had time to close her eyes and shield her open, aching heart, the fists were flying.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
At least he didn’t end up in the hospital. He wouldn’t have known what to say to Helen if he showed up there looking like he did now.
It had been the most brutal fight he’d had in years. At the beginning of the period, the Calgary center had bumped his shoulder. Adam had elbowed him, as a matter of course. Then later, the center, who had already pushed Adam before, said something like, Asshole. Maybe Asshat, possibly Asswipe, and then the gloves were off, and both teams were a bloody pile mash in the middle of the ice.
So now he sported a cut on his lip, a rapidly swelling eye, and a bruise on his cheekbone. His face and shoulder felt raw. His ribs hurt; his knee hurt like hell. When he’d staggered off the ice, he’d been tempted to hurl his gloves into the stands and give them all the finger. He’d thought it, but he didn’t have the energy to do that.
Now he was out for the next few games. He’d gotten off easy.
In retrospect, he had been keyed up enough to really whale on someone and the other team had known it. After that Hummer talk with Yevgeny, he’d still had all that excess anger and holding it in hadn’t helped him.
He’d been mobbed by reporters afterward, too. “What triggered the incident?” “What’s the extent of your injuries?” “Are you going to protest the suspension?” “Do you feel like you’ve come back?” “Do you think you’ll be suspended?” they yelled.
Janel was somewhere at the back, probably tweeting his responses or just making crap up.
Someone thrust a microphone in his face. It’s possible that he might have snarled. He didn’t remember what he said. He was exhausted, and he bundled himself into a car and plodded home as soon as possible. He was supposed to see Helen, but he felt uneasy. His whole aching, sore, tender body throbbed for her. But although his wounds were mostly superficial, he knew he looked terrible. Worse, he’d let himself get too angry. His rage had been a red line of focus that kept him hard and furious until at last he’d snapped. He’d probably looked good on the ice, but it didn’t make him feel good.
She was a doctor; she was used to growly patients with wounds. Right?
At least he was home, he thought, finally stretching out on his bed with gel packs dotting his body—correction: stretched out on his side of the bed. Helen wasn’t there yet.
He checked his phone and, of course, found a picture of himself, battered, bloody, and ugly, on the front page of the ESPN website. “Howling Mad,” the headline read. He continued to scan the article dispassionately. They had ended up winning. The comments were bloodthirsty. Some people wanted to stop his violence with violence. Some people thought he hadn’t hit hard enough. The Wolves were finally showing their mettle after some growing pains, the story read.
He was described in Rinky Business as the de facto team leader, an eloquent goon. They also unearthed an old publicity photo of him shirtless from his rookie year. Was he supposed to be flattered?
He was happy they’d won, of course, but he hoped Helen hadn’t watched this particular game.
His phone rang. Helen. He sucked in a breath.
“I’m downstairs. Let me up,” she said, without preamble.
“Are you sure? I’m tired. I can’t be your stud boy tonight.”
She snorted. “Tough luck. You haven’t given it to me in a week or more.”
Jesus. He’d been joking—but it appeared there was an interested party in his pants. Her voice and her rough words were enough. His head fell back against the bed with a thunk. He rose and went to push the release to let her upstairs. Then he braced himself for his happiness and her unhappiness.
• • •
Just how hurt is he?
Helen willed her tension down as she rode the elevator to his apartment. After all, Adam hadn’t been admitted to hospital. She’d checked. He’d sounded fine on the phone—a little nasal, a little tired. But he had his wits.
The elevator doors slid open, and she looked down to notice that her fingers had gripped the handrail so hard that red lines crossed her skin.
The door was cracked open for her, and she stretched a smile across her
face in preparation for him. And there he was—standing, at least, leaning in the door frame, shirtless and bruised, his eye swollen shut. And he was trying to smile at her with cracked lips.
He was fine. Everything would heal. It looked ugly, but the wounds were superficial. She should have been ecstatic, but a sob threatened to escape her throat. She wanted to grab him and absorb all of his wounds into her body, to make him whole. But of course, she swallowed her warring impulses down and tried to look at him with the detachment of a physician.
But she wasn’t his doctor.
He moved toward her and hesitantly put his arms around her. He was a little damp, but he felt warm and wonderful. He’s hurt, she reminded herself. Don’t sink into him. She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek—the uninjured one—and slipped away from him to close the door. She knew that he could feel her distance.
“You should be in bed,” she said after a moment.
Adam leaned into her again, as if asking her to take his weight, then pulled her in and kissed her. Hard. She couldn’t help herself. She opened her mouth and moved closer and grasped him, her fingers moving greedily over the warm muscles of his back.
And then she tasted the blood of his split lip in her mouth, and she remembered.
She pulled back almost in a panic. “You need to get back to bed, now,” she said.
He blotted his mouth with a tissue. “Like I said, I can’t be your stud boy tonight.”
“Drop it,” she said, grimly steering him toward his bedroom.
She took off her jacket, draped it on a chair, and motioned him to the bed.
The room was dim and smelled faintly of Icy Hot. But aside from the mussed bed, everything was neat.
“You don’t need to use your doctor voice on me,” Adam said.
His spoke slowly and his voice seemed mild, but she could still feel the sting in the words. “You don’t seem very surprised to see me like this,” he added as he lowered himself gingerly onto the mattress and unbuckled a knee brace. “I guess you watched the game.”
She hesitated, not sure how much to tell him. She leaned over and started arranging his system of ice packs. “I saw it. I was in the arena.”
A pause. He turned his face away from her a little. “Guess you got your money’s worth then.”
She tightened her fists. “Do you have any pain medicine?”
“Stop doctoring me,” he snapped. Then softer, “I’d like a moment with my girlfriend, not with a medical professional.”
She couldn’t help herself, she wanted to say. At least she understood pain medications. Yes, the wounds were superficial. Yes, he was probably fine, although peevish. She sat down next to him, and his arm came up to caress her butt and waist. His touch slid up her arms, to her hands, and he loosened her fingers from their tight hold one by one. He’s right. Relax, she told herself. You’ve waited for this all week.
She toed off her shoes and eased herself down so that her head rested on his arm. His sheets were wet and cold from the condensation of the cool packs. The rest of her was not really touching him, but at least she was near him. It had been so long. She closed her eyes and breathed him in.
“Come closer,” he said. “I’m not going to break.”
He pulled her in. “Be careful,” she said.
“Damn it, Helen. I’ve missed you and need you to touch me, and I don’t want you to be scared.”
“I’m not.”
“I know it looked bad on the ice. I was aggressive tonight—I had a stupid argument with Molotov—and the other team responded. Damn it, I was planning on having you come to a game after the vote on the arena. I was hoping to clear things away tonight and finally have good news for you. But I look like a mess.”
She prodded him gently. “What good news?”
She saw the gleam of his smile in the dim light, and she felt a twang of something that was almost like relief. He could smile. That was enough to make her happy, and she tipped her head up and beamed right back up at him. “I found acceptances from grad schools waiting for me tonight,” he said.
“That’s great!”
“Plus, I’ve already been learning the ropes with Molotov’s West Coast operations. And the way things are going, I might be able to play for another year or two with the Wolves.”
Helen stiffened but Adam continued. “Now that my family’s farm is on more stable ground, it would give me the opportunity to save up a little. Plus, I’ve already checked and I can defer enrollment in the programs I applied to—it’ll give me time to make up some of the credits they want me to have.” His arm tightened around her. “This is mostly good news. Finally, I have opportunities. I have choices.”
Helen took one breath. Then another. “You’re going to play for another year or two.”
“It’s early to say, but ... I didn’t think I’d get to this point. I didn’t think I’d survive. It’s not always going to be like tonight, Helen. They actually want me to play. They want me to do something that I know how to do. I’ll get paid.”
Although she knew it was technically impossible, she could actually feel her heart tearing away from the spot in her chest and dropping down to her stomach as he confirmed it. Her mind flashed to the sight of him earlier this evening, his face contorted and bleeding. He’d raised his head, almost seeming to look toward her, almost as if he’d exit the fray and come to her, and at that moment, she’d felt a wild, desperate hope. And then he’d turned, and his fist had come up and he was in the fight again.
“Tonight was rough,” he was saying, stroking her hair as if she were the one who was injured, as if she needed soothing. “But come on, it wasn’t that bad. I know it’s a lot to process, Helen. But can’t you see how relieved I am? It’s good news for me.”
“You sound happy,” Helen said, low.
“Well, I guess it’s hard for me to get my mind around it, too. But overall, it’s a good thing, right?” He sighed. “We should sleep on it.”
He lipped her neck and shoulder and started to unbutton her sweater. And she wanted him to do it. She wanted to do it again—to fall into him and just let him take over. She wanted to depend on him, but she just couldn’t. He was injured, and she couldn’t—shouldn’t—lean on him.
“Adam,” she said, “what if I don’t want you to play another year?”
“It’s not that bad,” he said.
“It isn’t nothing,” she said, her voice breaking a little.
“Are we at that point, where you can ask me to alter my plans? We’ve never even gone out on a date in public.”
“Yes and no. Maybe. Of course I think of a future with you. I wish it were now.”
“But why isn’t it, Helen? The arena vote is going to be here soon, and after that ... why aren’t we planning beyond a few days together at a time?
“You’re right, we should sleep. You’re hurt.”
“I’m not that hurt, Helen. You’re a physician. You know these are things I’ll heal from. The thing you’re really afraid of is that one day, I’ll end up like your father and that you’ll have to take care of me.”
“I love you, Adam. I love you this way—well, less banged up. Whole.”
She couldn’t help the gulping sob that came out of her throat this time.
“We don’t know what will happen, Helen. Things could change. We could find treatments. But I saw how you looked at me when you came in tonight. You just ... you shut down everything, as if you couldn’t deal with me. The only way you could get yourself to touch me was like a doctor. But Helen, if you treat me like this now—if you treat me like a patient, like a case study, like a problem, through most of the relationship—well, what’s the point? I love you, Helen. I love you whole. I love the fact that you were an amazing young teenager and that you’re gorgeous and amazing now. I love the fact you’ll change, and I want to get to see it. But I’m starting to think that that’s not going to happen. With us. Because I change all the time, too. I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve had t
o deal with my failure—my fear—and I am moving on. There’s hope for me, Helen. I have these opportunities in front of me, and sure, they scare me. But I recognize them for what they are, and they give me strength that’s been really hard won. And now all it takes is that look on your face to blow a huge hole in it.
“I need more from you, Helen. I need some kind of commitment—not that you’ll endorse the arena, not that you’ll be photographed coming out of a club kissing me. Just ... I want to call you my girlfriend, to go out to a movie like a normal couple, to just hold your hand and meet your friends and have you meet mine. I need you to say that you’ll be there for me. That I can come home to you. That you can come home to me and not be afraid that one day I’ll lose my memory, that I’ll die slowly.”
She found it hard to breathe, as if every part of her was shutting down, as if her throat and stomach were swamped by the helpless anger that had been sitting inside her since her father’s diagnosis. “Do you know what it’s like for me, Adam? To see you get hit? Do you know what it’s like for me, knowing what I know?”
“When it comes down to it, how much more do you know than anyone else? That it can happen? I know it, too. That it will? You have no idea and neither do I. The difference is that you’ve told yourself that you need to do something about it—find a cure, prevent everyone from ever getting hit, stop all the hurt. But Helen, for right now, you can’t stop anything.”
“I can’t accept that.”
She flinched from the deceptive solidity of his arm, of his chest. She sat up. Everything about her felt shaky. Her hands were probably trembling. She rubbed her arms.
“You’re leaving,” he said. “Again.”
His face was in shadow.
“Yeah, I am.”
She didn’t move. Maybe he would change his mind.
But he turned his face away.
“Fine, Helen. Go. But don’t ask me to give up a chance at a future when you can’t even stand to be in the same room with me for this night.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
This time, Helen really couldn’t find her car.