Page 32 of The Power Play

Chandler’s face twists in disgust, “Fuck that. We are going and we are going to make sure she stays away.”

“Oh, I have a plan for that. I told Charlie I wanted to know the full story of what happened, and I’ll make her go away.”

“I like the sound of that, I’m in.”

“I knew you would be.”

Another round of mimosas are delivered and we talk about the different approaches for dealing with Charlie’s ex. Some are petty, okay a lot of them are, but if he wants her out of his life for good then leave it up to us to get it done.

Chandlerand I arrive at the arena early to get drinks before going to the glass for warmups. She will never pass up the opportunity to watch her boyfriends stretching on the ice. And I might be looking forward to seeing Charlie out there. We haven’t seen each other today, but he knows I’m going to be here.

We are in the WAGs suite for the game, which is open to friends and family. But Chandler and I will head up there after we watch the best part of the game down here.

The players skate out onto the ice, knocking down a stack of pucks to shoot with during their warmups. My eyes bounce around the rink to the players skating around catching on the familiar numbers of Chandler’s boyfriends and then on thirty-six, Mann. My focus is solely on him as I watch the way he moves and how focused he is.

Charlie weaves around his teammates on the ice stretching, taking a puck with him and then shooting it directly into the goal. He repeats this multiple times, and my eyes never leave him. It’s so amazing how easy he makes skating look because I know if I attempted it, I would fall right on my ass.

Chandler is drawing the attention of her men; Brent sending a subtle wink her way, Vince being a bit more obvious with blowing a kiss in her direction and mouthingI love youmultiple times as he skates by. Matt, the showboat he is, lingers in frontof her and makes a lewd gesture that has him being yelled at by someone.

“Charlie!” I hear a woman yell, and while I’m sure this happens a lot to them, for some reason I seek out the source of this particular voice.

It’s a woman around my age, and she’s really pretty. Her blonde hair looks natural and falls in waves around her shoulder. She’s model thin and wearing super tight jeans along with a jersey with his name and number on it.

I glance out on the ice and see the moment Charlie sees her; his relaxed face turns anything but. She’s waving at him and he’s scowling at her while frozen until someone bumps into him and he starts moving again, slapping a puck much harder than before. I glance back at the woman; she’s staring intently and looks…hopeful? I’m not sure what part of his reaction would make her feel like that, though. For some reason watching her look at him gives me a misplaced feeling of jealousy. I try to shake it off, but it’s lingering in the pit of my stomach.

I nudge Chandler, “I think that’s the ex.”

“Where?” she practically yells with venom in her voice.

I nod in the woman’s direction right as Matt skates back up to the boards. “Get Charlie to come here for a second,” Chandler tells him through the glass. I wasn’t sure it was possible for them to hear us through it, but apparently, they can.

“Why?” Matt asks.

Chandler rolls her eyes, “Just do it.”

They don’t have much more time out here and I want to know for sure before doing something stupid.

Matt skates over to Charlie and points him in our direction. The scowl he’s sporting seems to soften slightly when his eyes lock on mine, but I refuse to acknowledge that. Charlie comes over to us and I refuse to look at the woman to see if she’s watching, though I’m sure she is.

“Is that her?” I ask him, knowing he knows who I’m talking about.

His lips pinch together tightly before he nods.

“You’ll owe me,” I tell him with a wink.

The look he gives me is unsure, but he just nods again before going out and finishing warmups and going back into the locker room before the game starts.

I look over at who I know now is Tabitha, she watches until Charlie is off the ice then turns and looks over at me. Her eyes narrow before they look me up and down, clearly wondering who I am. I wait to see if she will say anything to me, but she doesn’t. Instead, she flips her hair over her shoulder and walks away.

“I’m confused,” Chandler says. “I thought we were going to make her go away.”

“We are, I want her to say something to me first. For now, I want her to drive herself a little crazy wondering who I am.”

“I’m glad we are friends because I don’t think I would ever want to cross you.” We link our arms together as we head to the suite bar.

Once we have our hard seltzers in hand we go to the friends and family suite. We are greeted by Vince’s sister, Em, and her two daughters who immediately run to Chandler for hugs.

“Audrey! I’m so glad you made it,” Martha wraps me up in a tight hug. She does seem really nice. A little oblivious, but nice.

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