Page 77 of It's Mother-Pucking Christmas!

“Bitch!” the first player wailed, blood spurting out of his nose. His fist collided with my face.

I didn’t even feel it. I just brought the Stanley cup down on his collarbone with a sickening crack. One of the purple-shirted players grabbed my arm, twisting it and taking me to the ice, knees on my chest.

“You motherfucker!” I screamed. My fingers were trapped in the handle of the cup, twisting.

The player flew back as Ryder slammed his hockey stick into him, sending him flying. My female family members, who had swarmed the ice at this point, jumped him, causing more players to abandon the game and throw down their gloves and sticks.

“Dakota?” Ryder’s anxious face appeared in my vision. “Why are you on the ice?”

“They were going to hurt you,” I croaked. “I can’t watch you get hurt.”

Seeing motion, I grabbed the front of his jersey and hauled him to my right, just in time to catch a hockey stick to the teeth as more purple-shirted players jumped us.

It was an out-and-out brawl. Players and the rest of my family were swarming the ice.

I scooped up my Stanley cup and swung it in front of Ryder while he begged me to please stop and tried to defend me with his hockey stick.

One Arctic Avengers player tried to headbutt me and probably would have knocked me out if Ryder hadn’t bodychecked him hard.

“Don’t hit my daughter. Were you raised in a barn?” My mom was there swinging her purse, which I knew held a thousand pounds of sodas, snacks, and alcohol she’d snuck into the stadium.

It connected with the player. He went down on the ice hard.

Another Arctic Avengers player knocked into me, and I slipped on the ice and fell in a heap. A round, confused pug slid past me as I was trying to scrabble up.

Beer and blood was all over the ice. Half the stadium was screaming and throwing things, fighting with security in the stands. People were yelling for the police. Someone threw a chair.

My aunt in the announcer’s booth was yelling at her brothers to “Fucking fight! I know I taught you better than that! My twelve-year-old daughter fights better than you assholes!”

“Dakota!” Granny Murray hollered. “Down!” She pulled out the biggest can of pepper spray I’d ever seen and pulled the trigger. It took a second to register. There was a hissing noise, then a fine red mist descended over the ice.

I took a breath then doubled over, wheezing as the red fog expanded.

“How?” Gracie coughed next to me as the chemical warfare was unleashed in the stadium. “How did she get a mortar round of Mace up her vagina?”

“Because I have birthed eight children!” Granny Murray hollered as both teams, the refs, the coaches, and the fans unfortunate enough to have rink-side seats all doubled over coughing and wheezing. With tears running down my cheeks, I crawled, choking on my own snot, to Ryder. His eyes were red and watering.

“Are you okay?” I wheezed.

“No.” He wiped at my face with his gloves. “Are you?”

“I’m dying.”

“Same.”

I curled up in the fetal position next to him. “I’m glad I’m dying next to you though.” I coughed at him, trying to crawl inside his jersey.

He choked out a laugh.

“Get off him!” muffled voices yelled as gas-masked police officers slipped and slid on the ice, pulling me and my family members off the hockey players.

Handcuffs were snapped on my wrists.

“Wait.” Ryder grabbed at me.

Paramedics also wearing masks pulled him back.

“Dakota, I—” He doubled over coughing, and the EMT sprayed something in his face.

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