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“There’s a no fraternization policy.” Tristan wets her lips with her tongue, and I shouldn’t be following the movement, but I can’t stop myself. “Mr. Seever was all too willing to remind me you’re irreplaceable, but I’m not.”
Fuck Bob Seever.
“I don’t want to be a social media coordinator my whole life. I thought this project would be my chance to show the organization that I can take on a bigger marketing role, but that can’t happen if I lose my job because they think we’re fraternizing.”
“They can’t punish you for me,” I say, but even as the words leave my mouth, I know I’m wrong. Just because it isn’t right doesn’t mean it won’t happen. I have a multi-million-dollar, multi-year contract. Tristan would be significantly easier to replace in terms of cost. Job proficiency wouldn’t even come into play. I’m good at my job too.
“They have before,” she says, the words so quiet I almost think I imagine them.
“I’ll fix it,” I tell her and it’s a promise—an oath—because I created this mess and I will be the one who puts it right. I will not be another burden to this woman. To anyone. “Let me fix it. I promise I will.”
She pushes up onto her toes, her hand pressing against the thud of my heart, and then her lips feather across my cheek. I cup her elbows on instinct and almost turn my head, wanting to draw her mouth to mine, but I can’t. Not after everything she just told me. The door is firmly shut now, locked and dead-bolted, and I have instructions to stay away. There might as well be laser security crisscrossing the threshold, just in case. Her thumb wipes the spot she just kissed, but it’s too late. I think I’ll feel that one platonic press forever. I hope I do.
“Thank you, Vic.”
I don’t notice her leaving. I don’t hear the snick of the lock catching on my heavy front door. I don’t move a muscle until my mom pokes her head back into the foyer and asks what I’m doing. Then my whole body jolts like I’ve stuck my finger in a light socket and, for a moment, I want to tuck my head into my mother’s shoulder and cry like a kid. Robbie was wrong. I don’t just want Tristan Grant. I think I might have actual feelings for her. And there’s nothing I can ever do about that.
We stop short of drafting an actual statement. Despite my telling him it wasn’t necessary, Vic paid a visit to Bob Seever and said something to assure him we were on the up-and-up. I have no idea what he said—Vic would not to tell me on his own, and I refuse to show how much it bothers me he didn’t by asking outright—but he’s assured me that everything is fine.
I also don’t know what he said to his teammates, but in the last week we’ve had some additional players tag along to our filming. If their smiles are a little extra wide, if they spend a little extra time glancing from me to Vic… well, boys are dumb. What did I expect?
The comments haven’t stopped, but Vic responds to as many as he can instead of liking their posts. Is he flat out denying there’s anything between us? Not really, but he draws the focus time and time again back to the video itself. He talks about the community programs, tells fans he hopes to catch them at the next home game, makes comments about how if hewerein a relationship, he’d want it kept private. Either way, I’m not concerned about being ousted from my job.
To be fair, I wasn’t all that worried by the time I left Varg’s house. My elevated heart rate? In his fancy-as-fuck foyer? That was because of rage. Not the way his biceps popped as he crossed his arms, or the way the strong cords in his neck moved as he swallowed. And okay, fine, the heat in his hazel eyes.
We film some partner drills with Robbie Oakes. He glowers more than he speaks, but the appeal is there and the videos double most of our other engagements, not including the puppy video. The guys are competitive, something I knew from spending even a little time with the team, but Oakes and Varg take it to another level. When Vic tells the camera they started working on one-timers—taking shots right off the pass—as kids, I know we have winning footage.
They start simple, tight to the net and emphasizing the sweeping motion of their sticks. They offer pointers for the shooter—hands out and away from the body for leverage, proper alignment with knees over toes, a snap of the hips for power as they send the puck into the back of the net. Then they back up, covering more and more distance with each slapshot. The filming devolves when the guys take turns rushing each other after each pass. I know there’s contact in hockey, but they devolve into wrestling moves Iknoware not league-sanctioned.
“It makes us move faster. Both to pass and shoot,” Vic tells the camera. “Not a lot of time to think on the ice. It needs to be instinct, muscle memory.”
“The not thinking is why you’re leading in goals. Not sure it’s a fair competition when your brain doesn’t work right to begin with,” Robbie quips and then their gloves are on the ground as they grapple, but both are smiling.
Ólaffson films with us twice, something I wasn’t expecting from the shy Icelander. He takes us through some goalie drills with Vic explaining each move for him, and then he walks us through his goalie gear. He’s quiet enough that I have to get in close as he talks about his pads and blocker and glove. It’s not his accent, hitting every letter of each word before rolling hard into the R sounds, it’s the pauses he takes as he tries to work with his stutter that are so endearing. Our female followers think so too, and for one blissful week the focus is on the sweet, shy, hulk of a man who stands alone between the pipes on game day.
I feel a burst of pride as he talks about the artwork on his helmet. It’s painted to look like a gyrfalcon, the national bird of his home and a fierce predator from the high arctic. There’s pink on his cheeks as he explains that his little sister designed it for him, and I know the poor man will have to beat prospective dates off with his hockey stick for the foreseeable future.
Chris didn’t want me to work with Ragnar for this series. He didn’t think the guy could carry content. I had my doubts, too. I was wrong. Goes to show they shouldn’t underestimate either of us.
I also can’t help the warmth that spreads through my body when I remember it was Vic who advocated for the goalie’s chance to film. It was Vic who put in extra time helping Rags practice what he wanted to say and to find alternatives for the words that tripped him up, and it was Vic who stood right next to me with a smile to rival my own as we pointed the camera toward the Nordic mountain.
Spaeglin takes us to a local bowling alley, one owned by the same family for almost fifty years. It’s candlepin bowling, played with a small ball and ten skinny pins that look like candlesticks. Each player gets three turns instead of two, and I lose track of the rules myself, but Spaeglin and Varg play frame after frame before taking on the ancient bubble hockey machine. The two argue about who gets to be team USA until Vic pulls rank and whoops the rookie into submission with his plastic team.
Spaeglin is the only one who sidles up to me and asks if I’m dating the captain, although he doesn’t use the word dating. An icy stare—combined with a thump to the back of the head from Varg—is enough to have him offering me a sheepish grin and a shrug of his over-wide shoulders.
I’m not concerned. Especially not after Chris calls me into his office and tells me I’m heading on the road with the team. Management wants to show that the men can still be good, wholesome, upstanding citizens, even when in Las Vegas. I never travel with the team, and I’m not sure I want to this time, but I do feel confident that they’d never send me if they thought I was fucking their star player.
Unless it’s a long con to give me the boot… but they wouldn’t have to go through the motions of getting me a hotel room and a seat on the chartered plane. Bob would have just sent me packing that day in his office.
At least that’s what I tell my siblings when I break the news to them. I’ll be gone for just about 48 hours.
Palmer, Mads, and Hayley are incensed that I’m leaving them with less than a day’s notice. They want my phone GPS on to track my whereabouts, texts when I board and land, and get to the game, and the hotel and dear god don’t get kidnapped and trafficked like some dateline special. When I point out that I’ll be surrounded by twenty-some professional athletes, not including coaching staff, and it’s doubtful anyone will get anywhere near me even in Sin City, Joey tells me that if I come home married, she’ll disown me. I try not to laugh so hard that I fall off my couch.
If I’m not supposed tofraternizewith a player, I definitely can’t marry one.
Not that I’m going to.
“I’m going to do my job, get some footage, eat the food the team provides, and go to bed. I won’t be socializing, let alone wedding anyone,” I tell my siblings as they perch on any surface they can find in my apartment.
