Page 5 of Temptation On Ice

“Hey, not all of us are multi-lingual, you dick. I can’t pick up on your Frenchie bullshit, but I know you insulted me. I’m still your captain, Dumont,” I call as he trudges to his stall, grin now replaced by a pout. Sensitive bastard.

“Westy hurting your feelings?” Rook Stephens asks as he enters with Nico Torres, who always has a killer tan with his South Florida upbringing and Puerto Rican heritage.

“No one’s hurting any feelings. We’re just catching up after the break,” I assure him, rolling my eyes.

“I’ll hurt some feelings. Rook, you’re still just as ugly as you were last season, you Dollar Store Channing Tatum-looking motherfucker,” Campbell LeRoux says in his standard snarly growl as soon as he enters the dressing room.

I turn and catch Campbell giving two middle fingers to Rook, who throws his rolled-up socks at Campbell in retaliation. These two. Looks like a successful season on the same defense line didn’t magically make them like each other any better. I sigh. Something has to break through their animosity at some point. At least they work well on the ice now, even if they stay bitter enemies off it.

“Enough of the bickering, boys. It’s time to act like a team again. Or if you want to keep at it, I’ll do to you what my agent did to Knox and me and make you live together for the season. You’ll either figure out how to get along, kill each other, or fall in love, like we did,” Ryder Kingston, our goalie, grumbles as he strides in. He’s a grumpy wall of muscle, and apparently, full of fresh ideas for the D-line to get over themselves.

“Fuck off, Kingsy. Not everyone wants to fuck their roommate like you do,” Campbell gripes as he throws his bag into his stall and begins pulling his gear off the shelf.

“Get your shit out of my space,” Rook snaps, tossing an elbow pad that tumbled over some arbitrary line into his stall back at Campbell.

Okay, these two are extra cranky, and we’re right back at the starting line, like last season.

Kingsy walks up to them while they’re snipping at each other, grabs their heads, and forces them together before they can stop him. “Now kiss and make up,” he says. Their mouths smash together as they sputter and flail before jumping to their feet and springing apart, eyes wide and cheeks red as they look at each other and then turn on Kingsy.

“You bastard!” Rook shouts, spitting on the floor and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Motherfucker, I will end you,” Campbell growls, his fists clenched and shaking, on the very real verge of violence. As our enforcer, Campbell isn’t known for keeping his temper in check all that often, and Ryder is just as likely to get the mean end of it now for what he just did.

“Enough, all of you,” I shout over the noise. Goddamn, these guys are children. “Kingsy, leave the boys alone. Being bi doesn’t give you a free pass to do…whatever that was.” I turn to the enraged D-men. “Rook, Campbell, stop fighting with each other, or I’ll have Coach bench you.” I look around at the rest of the team that has filed in and taken their spots with varying degrees of interest in what’s going on. “We have rookies joining us today, boys. We'd better look like a team they want to play for. No fighting in front of them. Get moving, and I’ll see you on the ice in ten.”

I put my gloves on, grab my stick and helmet, and leave the dressing room as murmurs of assent, “damn, he’s intense,” and “hard ass on the first day,” can be heard.

When practice finishes hours later, they’re cursing Coach Kennedy instead of me, and focused on hazing the new rookies—Johannes Virtanen, a Finnish forward we pulled from a European league, Cody Bischoff a center fresh out of college, and Kole Barrett, a young bruiser of a defenseman from Chicago who was traded for one of our players who didn’t get a lot of ice time last year. They did well during practice, keeping their cool despite some guys giving them good-natured shit and playing pranks. I think they’re going to be good additions.

“Hey, boys, nice practice and welcome back. I hope you enjoyed your summer break and you’re ready to spend another eight months on the ice,” Coach Kennedy says as we’re circled up around him in the practice arena. “We did well last season. No one expected us to make it as far as we did. Hell of a first season as a team. I’m damn proud of all of you, like I said after our season ended, but that just means we have to work even harder this year to prove it wasn’t dumb luck. I know you can play hard and have what it takes, so you’ll prove it at every practice and game. No excuses. McKenna has something she wants to talk to you about, so give her your attention when you get to the gym for dry land training with Scotty.”

With that, he waves us off the ice as we groan. Scotty means torture, and we’ve already been bag skating and performing drills until ready to puke. He meant it when he said we’re going to prove ourselves.

When we’ve changed into dry workout gear and make it to the gym, McKenna Kresley, the Hydras’ head of PR, is looking chipper while chatting with a serious-looking Scotty, which doesn’t tell me much about the workout Scotty has planned. Scotty has one mood—focused.

“Hey, guys! Welcome back,” McKenna calls. “I won’t take up too much of your training time. I know you want to get to it.”

“Please, take all the time you want,” Westy says, throwing his hands out in supplication, getting a laugh from the rest of us who know what we’re in for.

“Seriously, stay all day, Scotty won’t mind,” Nico adds, draping an arm over the shoulders of the petite brunette trainer who is currently standing with military efficiency. Her heavily muscled arms are crossed over her chest, feet hip distance apart as her bulging quads test the stretch of her loose joggers.

Scotty’s maybe five-five, a buck-thirty-five, but she could outperform all of us in a Ninja Warrior competition, kills us in muscle-ups, probably benches more than I do, and gives us a run for our money in leg presses. The woman does not mess around. Nico must have forgotten the fact that Scotty is also a mixed martial arts superstar. She has black belts in several martial arts and even fought competitively for a while.

Scotty grips Nico’s wrist where it rests on her shoulder, lifts it over her head, and twists it around his back in a smooth movement that instantly has him screeching and falling to his knees.

“Ay ay ay, okay, mami. Please, that hurts! Fuck. Scotty, let go!”

“Keep your hands to yourself, Torres,” Scotty says without inflection, like she didn’t just bring a six-foot-three, two-hundred-plus man to his knees with a twist of her wrist. She releases Nico’s bent fingers and takes a casual step away as the group snickers.

“Damn, girl, be careful. I’m gonna fall in love with you if you keep being mean to me like that,” Nico says with a nervous laugh as he rubs his wrist and rises off the ground. “You saw that, right, boys? My future wife just had me on my knees for her like it was nothing,” he says, looking around. “I’m good for it, Scotty, I can be on my knees for you whenever you want me to.”

“Go dunk your head in the cold plunge,” Scotty says mildly, but the slight pink tinge to her cheeks hints that Nico may have ruffled her a little with his comments.

I’d step in and tell him to leave her alone, but she’s clearly more than capable of handling her shit. I’ll let her set her boundaries and enforce them later should there be a need.

“Gentlemen, may I have your attention again, please?” McKenna calls, reminding us that she’s even there. When we’ve refocused, McKenna beams. “Thank y’all so much! I have something exciting to tell you. We had such a great response to our Pride night and partnership with Outlanta last year that we’ve decided to partner with another charity this season. Isn’t that great?”

She gets a less-than-enthusiastic response from the team, and I roll my eyes. At them, not at her. I liked the campaign we did with Outlanta. It was cool to support an organization that helps LGBTQ+ youth, and our partnership brought a ton of visibility their way. It also allowed the team to open up a bit.