Page 9 of Offside

He nodded.

"Lift it." Declan's hand remained close without touching me.

I raised the arm through the range he'd cleared that morning. He watched the shoulder blade and the joint, then my face. He didn't put his hands on me until the arm was down. Two fingers at the front of the shoulder. A light check under the joint. Nothing that hadn't happened dozens of times.

My skin knew exactly where he was.

"The adaptation held," he said. "That doesn't mean the shoulder is better."

"I know," I said. "I let a puck go at the blue line in front of eighteen thousand witnesses."

His mouth moved at the corner. "I saw."

He was looking at my face again. There was no clinical reason for it. He'd already seen what he needed in the movement. I wasn't answering a question.

I held his gaze.

The room moved around us. Tape tore. A shower started. Hayes argued with Volkov. Declan's fingers remained at my shoulder for one beat longer, then dropped.

"Ice tonight," he said. "Mobility before bed. We'll progress the strength work if the joint settles by morning. Sunday?" His hand stayed on the tablet.

"I'll be here."

He collected the tablet and went to Garrett.

I showered, dressed, and waited for the room to thin. By the time I left, most of the players' lot was empty.

The corridor split beyond equipment storage. One direction led to the exit. The other led past the training room. Light showed beneath Declan's door.

I stood at the turn with my bag over my left shoulder, then headed for the players' exit.

4

Declan

By nine-ten, the only roll of rigid tape left beside the sink had three useful turns on it. I held it up to the light as if that might produce more tape.

It didn't.

The morning’s supply order was waiting in equipment storage. I'd postponed collecting it twice—once for charting and once because Zoe needed a second set of hands with a rookie's ankle. If I left the roll where it was, six a.m. would arrive before the supplies did. I took the cardboard core with me out of habit.

The facility this late was different. The cafeteria chairs stood upside down on the tables. The video room was dark. Somewhere beyond the concrete wall, the ice compressors ran with the mechanical hum that never stopped during season.

The corridor between the training room and equipment storage was narrow enough that two equipment carts couldn't pass. One strip light in the ceiling flickered at the far end. I'd submitted a request to replace it in August.

I came through the training room door at the same time Bishop entered from the other end. He carried a stick under his left arm. His hair was damp at the temples, and the smell of cold air came off his practice gear.

"Pryce."

"Bishop." Neither of us moved.

There was an open doorway behind me. I could have stepped into it and given him the corridor.

"Extra ice?" I asked, looking at the stick in his hand.

"Garrett wanted extra reps."

"So you gave him the time." I turned the cardboard core in my hand.