Page 98 of Body Check

“Fuck.”

Throwing the door open, I shoot out from the car and head for the entrance. My strides are quick, clipped, as I angle past doctors in white coats and patients as they’re shuffled from one room to another. Some of them look sick: jaundiced skin, thin bodies.

Some, like myself, show no outward signs of having anything wrong.

The Badass of Hockey isn’t feeling so badass today,I think, as I palm open a swinging door and wait for the elevator that’ll bring me to Dr. Mebowitz’s office. When itpings!I step inside, head down. Pull out my phone and check the time once more.

11:33.

I’m late. Well, at least I’m not a year late like the first time I showed up here.

The elevator doors swing open and I step out, feeling like I might vomit. My stomach twists unpleasantly—to say nothing of the pounding coming to life in my head. And then I finally admit to myself what I haven’t wanted to for so long: I’m terrified. I’ve always been a man who takes what life throws at him with a grain of salt. I rule with confidence, strength, and control. But with this . . . with this, I’m scared fucking shitless.

I don’t want to do this alone.

My heart thuds erratically in my chest as I fumble for my phone.

“Ah! You’re here, Mr. Carter. I was beginning to think that you were going to stand me up for yet another year.”

I thumb through my contacts, praying to the cell-phone-service gods, until I come across her name. Stepping back, I mutter something unintelligible to the doctorbefore I give him my back and eye my phone’s screen for the little bars to shoot to full service.

“C’mon,” I grind out, “c’mon, c’mon, you motherfucker—”

There! Right there.

I lock my feet in place, tap on Holly’s name, and wait.

And wait.

And fucking wait some more until—

“Hello?” comes her sweet voice over the line, and my knees nearly collapse with relief. “Jackson?”

My voice emerges as a rasp, “I need you.” I slam my lids shut and tilt my face up like I’m going to wish on a fake shooting star in the middle of a damn hospital. “I’m at Mass General. Dr. Mebowitz—he’s in neuropathology.”

Her panicked gasp echoes in my ears, and I rush to add, “I’m okay. I mean, I’mnot. But it’s not . . . it’s not an accident.” I swallow thickly, the emotions tangling in my throat as the anxiety latches onto my lungs. “I need you here with me, Holls. Fuck, I—I need you.”

“I’m coming. Whatever it is, I’m there, okay?” There’s the sound of a door slamming shut and jangling keys. “I’ll be there in fifteen—in the car now. I love you, Jackson. I love you so damn much.”

There’s theclickof the line going dead.

And then I turn around and walk into Dr. Mebowitz’s office, feeling like I’m walking into my execution.

I love you, Jackson.

My ass collides with the same chair I took last time, and I wait.

For whatever news Dr. Mebowitz is about to hand over.

For the woman I love more than life itself to get here and take my hand.

For my life as a hockey player—as captain of the Blades—to come crashing to an end.

34

Holly

Idon’t remember the drive from my office to Mass General.

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