Page 27 of Wrong Score

"Where did the skates come from?" I ask, though I’m sure I know the answer.

I’d like to know who to personally thank for this intrusion.

Rowan glances down at the skates I'm referring to as she glides slowly next to me.

"Penelope had an old pair, and we wear the same size. Lucky don’t you think?"

"Lucky… right," I say, knowing that there’s no “luck” involved when Penelope decided to stick her nose in it. What is she up to?

She clears her throat as we stop. I let go of her hand once I'm sure she's stable on her own. “I wanted to talk to you about this job. About why this is so important to me.”

I stay silent, pulling another puck from the tipped-over bucket with the end of my hockey stick, and then wind up and hit it. The puck makes a loud thud noise as before, the sound ricocheting off the walls of the rink. In the corner of my eye, Rowan jumps at the loud crack. It's a lot louder out here than it is behind the plexiglass.

I slide another puck into position and wait for her to continue.

“I know we’re never going to be friends, and that’s fine. I don’t expect us to get along, but this job means everything to me. It’s my career, my way of proving myself and it's the only thing I have for myself."

The only thing she has for herself?

I want to ask her exactly what that means, but she continues, and the less I know about Rowan, the better.

"And after the Hawkeyes win the Stanley Cup. You’ll see much less of me. But until then, I don’t want to be enemies anymore.”

I let her words sink in, the honesty in them disarming me. For the first time, I see the one attribute that Rowan and I both share. We're both dedicated to our careers. I'm just still not sure what lengths she'll go to keep hers.

"You're asking for a truce?"

I stare down at her, the ice reflecting off her big blue eyes, causing them to shimmer.

There’s something disarming about her, something that makes it hard to keep my walls up... but I can’t let myself fall for her, not when my team is on the line.

"Yes, a truce. For the sake of the team and the championship, so that both of us can do our jobs."

I think for a second. I don't know if she's trying to pull one over my head, so she'll have to earn a truce.

I hand her my hockey stick. “If you can sink this puck into that net, you’ve got yourself a truce.”

I skate around to her back to help guide her into position.

"Sink the puck?" Rowan looks over her shoulder at me, eyebrows raised in disbelief. “And if I miss?”

“If you miss, no truce,” I say, reaching around from behind her to adjust her grip on the stick. Her scent lingers in the air between us, subtle but distracting, and the way her body fits between my arms feels dangerously natural.

“But like I told you before,” I murmur, my voice low. “We’re not enemies. I just don’t trust you. Not yet.”

Her eyes meet mine, something unreadable in them, but I force myself to look away, focusing on the puck. She draws a deep breath and lines up the shot, clearly out of her comfort zone. My hands grip her hips, positioning her body into place, feeling her heat through the thin material of her dress.

For a split second, I almost want her to make the shot–to force us to play nice–to address what is or isn’t happening. But then I know better. It’s a bad idea that will likely end badly.

Rowan winds back and hits the puck. The puck flies off to the right, missing the goal by a long shot.

Her shoulders slump, disappointment etched on her face, the brightness in her big blue eyes dimming just slightly. I should feel satisfied that the bet worked out in my favor, but there's a part of me that wonders what would happen if we agreed to a truce.

"Well, I guess that settles it," she mutters, handing the stick back to me. “No truce.”

I grip the stick but don’t pull away. Her effort was decent, and for someone who’s clearly out of her element, she tried, I'll give her that. “You gave it a fair shot,” I say, my voice softer than I intended.

Rowan shrugs. “Guess I’ll just have to work on my slap shot. Maybe I’ll beat you next time.”

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