Page 34 of Interference

“Great.” He nodded. “I’ll let Vanessa know. Thanks, guys!”

We were halfway through practice, taking a break between drills, when it dawned on me that while Simon and I had a place to go for Thanksgiving, there was someone in our house right now who didn’t. If I was doing the math right (and that wasn’t always a guarantee), Lily would still be finishing up her meds. I couldn’t just ditch her and Wyatt for the holiday, could I? That would be a dick move.

So, I pulled Russell aside and quietly said, “Hey, I’ve—Simon and I have someone staying with us. A friend from out of town. He’ll probably still be here next week—is it okay for us to bring him dinner?”

“Yeah, sure.” Russell shrugged and squirted some water into his mouth. “The more the merrier.”

“Okay. Okay, cool. He’s got a service dog. Will that be an issue?”

Russell arched an eyebrow. “Like a service dog? Or a ‘service’ dog?” I understood his skepticism—the wife of a former teammate had designated her dog as an emotional support animal so she could take him everywhere. That would’ve been fine with everyone, except the dog had turned out to be aggressive, loud, barely housebroken, and completely undisciplined.

“This one is a legit service dog,” I said. “And I can vouch for her—she’s probably the best trained dog I’ve ever seen.”

“Oh, no problem, then. Just let me know if he needs anything for her. A water dish or whatever.”

“I will. Thanks, man.” I clapped his shoulder with my glove and nodded toward the drill that was just finishing. “Looks like you’re up.”

Simon came out of the drill, breathing hard and sweating. There’d been a time when seeing him like that made my spine tingle, and it wouldn’t be long before we were exchanging suggestive looks and flirty comments. As soon as we got home, we’d be engaging in what he liked to call “post-practice cardio.”

My heart sank. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d done that. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d had sex at all. Worse, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d wanted to.

What happened to us? And how do we unfuck this mess we’re in?

He glanced my way, flashed a smile that I was pretty sure was solely for the benefit of any cameras that might’ve been watching us, and then focused on watching our teammates again.

I turned my gaze away, too, and I was grateful no one could’ve known about the lump in my throat.

Do you even want to fix this, Simon?

Chapter 10

Wyatt

Anthony looked miserable when he walked into the house.

Not like someone who’d just done a major workout and was sore from head to toe. He didn’t seem sore or anything. No, it was the downcast eyes. The expression on his face that said he was a hundred percent done with everyone and everything. The way his shoulders seemed to hunch beneath the weight of his thin hoodie.

It reminded me of the way his whole demeanor had changed both times Simon had shown up since I’d been here. Where all he had to do was hear the garage door opener, and the dark clouds would start circling. The way he was shuffling through the motions of getting a glass of water, it was like the last few hours had utterly sucked the life out of him.

I shut off the TV and got up. With Lily trailing after me, I joined Anthony in the kitchen. “Hey. How was practice?”

“Not bad,” he said quietly as he pulled a glass down from the cupboard. “It’s always a little rough the morning after a loss.” He sighed. “Especially a loss like that one.”

“I didn’t think last night was that bad.” I rested my hip against one of the kitchen islands. “You guys only lost by two. That’s—okay, I don’t know much about hockey, but that didn’t seem really bad?”

“Nah, it wasn’t. We held our own, at least on the scoreboard.” Anthony pushed his glass under the fridge’s water dispenser. “Our goalie saved our asses, though, because the rest of us weren’t playing very well.” Shifting his gaze to his filling water glass, he added a quiet, “Especially me.”

That tracked, I supposed. The commentators had mentioned more than once that it was a genuine miracle Seattle hadn’t been scored on more than they had.

“Every man on this team had better be buying Beaus dinner,” one had mused after the goalie had damn near dislocated something making a save. “Calgary would be up by five or six by now if not for him.”

“You’re not wrong,” the other had replied. “Where is Seattle’s defense? Their blue line is sound asleep tonight.”

I’d managed to parse that the “blue line” referred to their defense. God, this was a complicated sport. And how many times had they mentioned that Anthony was having a rough night? That he’d been having a hard season, and last night was even worse? His coaches and teammates probably hadn’t been happy about that, so, yeah, I didn’t imagine practice had been fun for him this morning.

Anthony sipped his water and gestured toward the living room. We moved from the kitchen to the couch, and Anthony took one end while I took the other. Lily rested her head on my thigh. I left the prosthetic on; I usually did anyway, but there was also the part where even after four years, I still felt weird taking it off in front of new people. I’d been around a few too many in the early days who were silently but obviously creeped out by the sight of my leg ending abruptly a few inches below my knee, and those looks made my skin crawl. So even if I had been in the habit of taking it off when I sat down—some amputees did, some didn’t—I would definitely leave it on now.

I was about to ask Anthony when his next game was just to get the conversation rolling, but Bear picked that moment to hop down from the cat tree and flop onto Anthony’s lap.

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