Page 9 of Pucking Billionaire

“All right,” I say. “This was… interesting. I’d better get going.”

Apparently, I have a new house to check out and turtles to befriend.

“Wait,” Mason says as I turn away. “I want you to consider my deal.”

“Sure,” I say. “I’ll consider it.”

With that, I leave without a backward glance.

Just to make sure I’m not a liar, for a millisecond, I consider the idea of selling the team—and decide that my answer is still “hell, no.” Even if Mason Tugev weren’t such a jerk, I need to wrap my head around my newfound wealth before I make any deals. Also, if I have as much money as Mr. Cohen said, I don’t need any more, so I might as well stay diversified by owning a hockey team.

Speaking of diversification and not squandering my inheritance, I need to speak to someone majoring in finance. Which, luckily for me, is my best friend and roommate, Abigail.

Jumping into a cab, I tell the driver to take me home.

Chapter 6

Mason

As soon as Ladybug is gone, I realize I don’t have a way to contact her, even if by some miracle she does decide to make a deal.

“You could’ve handled that better,” Cohen says carefully.

In reply, I punch the fucking wall, leaving a big hole in it.

“I’ll bill you for that,” Cohen says, surprisingly calm. “Oh, and before you ask, I won’t be discussing Miss Papachristodoulopoulou with you.”

“Papa-what?” I rub my bleeding knuckles.

“Papa-christo-doulo-poulou. It’s a common Greek last name.”

Sure it is. “Thanks for the culture lesson.”

He smirks. “When I invoice you for the wall, I’ll also include one billable hour.”

“Because that’s how long it takes to say that name?”

He shrugs, smirking harder, and I resist the urge to punch the wall again, deciding to save my emotions for practice.

Usually, I feel at peace after practice, especially when sharing a meal with the team like I am now, but not today.

“So, how did it go?” Jason asks through a mouthful of gyro.

Everyone goes quiet, even the restaurant staff.

My lentil hummus suddenly tastes like packing peanuts. “She didn’t sell… yet.”

“That fucking sucks,” Jason says, and the rest of them echo the sentiment, cursing on my behalf in English, Finnish, Russian, and Canadian French.

“I guessed as much by how vicious you were during the drills,” Jason says. “Looks like you’ll have to keep eating your cow food for a while longer.”

By cow food, he means my extremely nutritious but mostly plant-based diet. “I was going to do that anyway,” I mutter. “I eat right to live longer, not just so I can keep playing hockey.”

All of my teammates look at me skeptically. The idea of something not being about hockey is as foreign to them as eating a Boston cream doughnut is to me.

Jason wrinkles his nose at my hummus. “If I ate like you, I’d wither away and die.”

“I agree with Friday here,” Parker butts in. “Except the order of events would be: fart up a storm and then wither away and die.”

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