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Knox flies backward, but doesn’t fall. Instead, he digs into the ice and skates toward me with fury in his eyes. The moment I have waited for has finally arrived. I am going to kick his ass, and then we are winning this fucking game.
Our gloves fly to the ice, and the linesmen kick them out of the way so we don’t trip over them as we fight.
“I hope you can hit better than you shoot,” I say to him when he’s a few feet away.
He doesn’t say anything back, and as he pulls his arm back to swing, I beat him to the punch, literally. I block his hit with my arm and slam my fist into his face. Immediately, I deliver a second one before he has a chance to recover.
He grabs my collar, and I grab his. We are locked together, and our fists are flying. He lands a good one to my jaw and then my nose. For a split second, I consider the chance that Knox might actually win.
But there is no way that is happening. I drop his collar and slam my left fist into his jaw, followed by my right hook.
He falls to the ground, and I drop to the ice next to him and laugh.
“That’s the best you’ve got, Knox? I’ve got another one in me if you want to go again.”
The ref pulls me off of him, and the crowd goes wild. The sticks smack against our bench as our team cheers on my victory.
“Woo!” I scream into the abyss of sound echoing in the rink.
We’re both escorted over to the penalty box to sit for two minutes for roughing.
As I’m sitting in the box, counting down the seconds until I can leave, I can’t help but think of Nikki.
I scan the crowd even though I know she’s not in it. We’ve texted off and on the last week since our FaceTime. Each day, I find out new things, little and big.
She loves chocolate and hates kiwi. She hasn’t been able to visit her parents in a few years and misses them dearly. She has nightmares, like me. She has gone to the library daily since our call, and I would love to know what she’s reading. Is it nonfiction, like Hockey for Dummies? Or is it straight porn on pages? I want to know what she reads to escape, and I intend on finding out soon.
I wish she were here, cheering us on. She should be in the bleachers, wearing my jersey and screaming my name.
The thought of her stays in the deep recesses of my mind during the remainder of the game. When the final buzzer sounds, we take the win, four to one.
When we get to the locker room, Kos slaps my back. “What the hell got into you? You were on fire the last part of the third. That fucking shot you had was fucking filthy. The goddamn tendy didn’t know what to do!”
I laugh, replaying the final breakaway I had tonight. “Fucking right.”
“Well, whatever flipped that switch in you needs to keep flipping it. We’re taking the Cup this year, boys!” he cheers and screams, and we all follow suit.
After a couple of drinks at End Zone, Brett and I Uber home. He decided to bring some chick home with him, who practically already has her hand down his pants in the car.
“Can you fucking wait until we get to our place?” I scoff.
Brett just laughs. “Fuck off, Costy.”
Thankfully, we quickly arrive at our condo.
I tip our driver and jump out of the car. “Don’t rush up.”
The girl is more sober than Brett, who is already swaying side to side as they walk behind me to the door.
She probably thinks she’s going to get a night of great sex. But Brett is already fucking sloshed and will probably pass out in the next thirty minutes.
When I finally shut the door of my bedroom, I grab my phone and fall onto my back on the bed.
I somehow find myself in the Photos app, staring at the screenshot I took of my Little Dove earlier. She is breathtaking in every way.
Biting my lip, I set the photo as my new home screen. I definitely can’t change my lock screen, or I’ll get shit from the guys, which won’t ever end.
I want to call her and ask her about her day. But I don’t know if she’s up right now or if she would even pick up. I sent her a text after the game, saying we won and that I wished she had been there. I sent a kissing face emoji, and I’m now wondering if it was too much. Leave it to Little Dove to have me overthinking an emoji.
