“Your grandmother does cocaine, so that’s not surprising. Stuff me full of amphetamines, and I’ll be all over this ice.” I spit blood.
“Second, you ignored all of my plays.”
“I’m not making the butterfly play,” I say stubbornly as her lip curls.
“The Direwolves overly rely on that diamond formation. You need to push through then back pass to Ziggy, Jovi, or literally any of the other people I put on your right wing and cut away. You could have scored. You had several chances that if you had just listened to me—”
“I’m not listening to a crazy person.”
“Third,” Ellie screeches over me, “you disobeyed a direct command. I ordered you to get off the ice. Even if you hadn’t started that fight, you were too spent to perform an effective play anyway and would have cost us another goal.”
I don’t even tell her that the fight was an accident. “I’m not your dog on a leash.”
“No shit. You can’t even come when you’re told. Now go to the locker room.”
“Uh-oh, sounds like a lovers’ spat,” some doughy hockey commentator who barely bag skated when he was in rec league chortles. And now he’s making me feel like I have to defend her.
Fuck it. I’m itching for a fight.
“The fuck did you say?” I turn on the man.
He doesn’t have the God-given sense to shut up. Chucklehead says, “There are rumors that she’s sleeping with players.” He yelps when I buck at him.
“Sleeping with players.” My fists clench in my heavy gloves.
I look down at Ellie. Her face is pinched.
“Funny. I didn’t get my dick sucked today.”
“Yeah, because you lost the game,” she snaps.
“So if I win?” I let the words hang there.
“Well, that honor should go to the captain, and I don’t know if you’re captain material.” She looks me up and down, chin set stubbornly.
I’m going to punch someone. Probably one of the media idiots with their cameras in my face.
“No way would anyone want to be with her,” I tell them. “She’s argumentative. Stubborn.”
“I’m stubborn? Mr. Can’t Follow Simple Directions.”
“You have your whole fucking family working here, princess.”
“You liked my mom’s cake. You had two pieces. Yes, I saw that.”
“You feed your players cake?” one of the reporters asks.
“Why, you want some, fucking bag of milk?” I grab the reporter’s shirt collar, lift him up in the air.
“Sullivan, now that you’ve suffered one of the worst losses in the history of the NHL,” a reporter asks as the crowd around us, “do you think hiring a female NHL coach was a terrible idea?”
“Leading question much?” I spit. I toss the other reporter away.
“I think you’re putting words in his mouth.” Suddenly, Ryder O’Connell’s there like a poster boy for the NHL.
No helmet hair. The golden boy is perfect.
While my face looks like I lost a fight with a garbage truck, Ryder only has a bloody scrape under one eye, looking like he’s out of Central Casting for a movie or something.
