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“You want to go out?”
“No.”
He shoved my shoulder. “Come on, man. Let’s blow off some steam.”
“I just want to go home.”
The airplane food had been cold and shitty. I was planning to pick up some steamed chicken, rice, and veggies from a Chinese place nearby and do nothing for the rest of the night.
“We could play Call of Duty,” he suggested.
“Fuck off,” I said shortly. “I’m sick of everyone right now.”
“You don’t need to be a dick.”
I scowled at him. “The fact that you don’t seem to care that we’re 0–3 is a little concerning.”
He shrugged. “I’ve learned to let it go. Don’t obsess about it, man. It’ll eat you up inside.”
I wanted to lunge at him. No opponent ever pissed me off as much as an ambivalent teammate.
“Are you fucking serious?” I demanded. “We don’t get paid millions of dollars to let it go; we get paid to win. To not look like a bunch of fucking amateurs thinking about video games instead of our piss poor performance.”
“Jesus, dude, someone needs to slip some Midol in your coffee tomorrow.” He flipped me off and walked away.
I shook my head and continued toward my Range Rover. As soon as I was in my driver’s seat, I placed an order for food and started the drive toward the restaurant.
Being captain of this team was shaking my confidence. In Minnesota, I was known as a tough but fair captain. I never asked anything of my teammates that I didn’t also expect of myself. But I hadn’t been in the arena the day of the explosion. I didn’t have to live with the aftermath of what happened to the Coyotes every day. What business did I have telling the guys who had survived what I expected of them?
Hell, just getting back on the ice after something like that was a major accomplishment, winning and losing aside.
I tipped the kid at the Chinese place extra to make up for my shitty attitude, relieved when I pulled into the parking place under my apartment and got on the elevator. I didn’t usually drink much, but tonight was definitely a good night for a glass of bourbon after dinner.
After finishing every bite of the food, I changed into shorts and a T-shirt, poured a drink, and went out the French doors that opened onto my stone patio. I had an outdoor couch, a table, and two chairs out here, but I only used the couch. I sat down and put my drink on the end table next to the couch, breathing in the mountain air I’d missed while on the road.
A sniffling sound and movement made me turn to the patio next to mine, where Elle was trying to flee inside her apartment. Apparently I’d ruined her solitude.
Even in my horrible mood, I couldn’t let a crying woman slip away without saying something to her.
“Hey,” I said, standing up. “You okay?”
“No.” She choked out the word. “I’m awful, which probably makes your night. Break out the confetti.”
Her jab landed, making me feel like an asshole for giving her such a hard time.
“You want a free shot?” I asked gently. “Lob one at me and I won’t say anything back.”
“No,” she said, her voice nasally and exhausted. “I can’t focus my energy on how horrible you are right now.”
A spark of her fire was still there, even though she was upset, and damn if I didn’t like that about her.
“I could send you a picture of my playoff beard from a few years ago,” I offered. “It looked like…well, my teammates called me Crotch Face.”
In the glow of the strands of lights hanging over her patio, I saw her smile slightly. “I can see that. You are rather vaginal.”
I laughed harder than I had in a while. Vaginal. That was a new one.
I disliked her, but she looked so vulnerable and beautiful that something else flared in my chest, wanting her to stay.
