Page 7 of Home Ice Advantage

And here Sullivan was, handed the job like he’d been handed every other good thing in his life, while Eric was still asked about the times he’d lost his temper and done something really stupid on the ice. His mother would have said that whining didn’t solve anything, but he wasn’t whining, he was justpissed off.

Hey,Sullivan texted him and Petey,can we set up a time to speak before I have to do press conferences?

Petey wrote back immediately,sure thing, boss, because that’s the kind of guy he was.

Eric didn’t answer, because that’s the kind of guyhewas.

Eric thought about letting his mother know what had happened. That he’d worked his ass off to develop good relationships with his players, that he’d bitten his tongue during three years of Leclerc, that he’d done the best he could and that it hadn’t mattered. That, once again, his temper and the fact that he hadn’t won shit overshadowed his more recent accomplishments. That it had all come back to bite him in the ass. She would’ve said something sympathetic, but she wouldn’t have understood the deep-seated rage. Maman just wasn’t like that.

He couldn’t avoid Sullivan, either. Sullivan was coming in to take over the next day of training camp, and when Eric hadn’t answered by the close of business that night, he had taken matters into his own hands.I’ll see both of you in the coach’s office before training camp. Be there by 6:30.

“Be there by six thirty,” Eric said mockingly to his empty apartment. No one answered him back.

As much as he wanted to show up late just to piss Sullivan off, Eric was also aware that even if he was currently keeping his job, that wasn’t a given. He was in the last year of his contract, so it wouldn’t even be that much dead money for Chernoff to keep paying through the end of the season if Sullivan decided to bring his own man in.

So even though he felt like punching something about it, Eric showed up at the practice facility bright and early, although he didn’t bother putting in the effort of actually forcing a smile onto his face. It probably would’ve looked more like baring his teeth, anyway.

Sullivan was already in the office, it seemed, judging from the light sneaking out under the door. Petey waited outside, slouched against a wall with his eyes closed. Didn’t matter if they were at home or on the road—Petey wasn’t a morning person, and no amount of coffee could shift the martyred look or sleepy eyes off of his face.

“Bon matin, Roney,” Petey said.

“Maudit matin,” Eric muttered back, ignoring Petey’s laugh.

“Ready to meet the new boss?”

“Fuck off.”

Petey opened the door first, and Eric followed him in. He hadn’t been sure what to expect, but it didn’t look at first like Sullivan had changed much since Leclerc had vacated it. The whiteboards hung in the same spot; the same desk sat in the same place. Of course, he’d just been hired; there probably wasn’ttimeto change anything. Sullivan sat behind the desk, looking down at an iPad and a shitload of papers spread all over the leather blotter that Leclerc apparently hadn’t bothered to take with him.

When he heard them come in, Sullivan stood, and Eric got his first close-up look at the guy in over five years and his first close-up look at him out of hockey equipment in even longer.

The first thing you noticed was that he was short as fuck. The kind of guy who was officially listed at five-eight but was probably closer to five-six. The second thing you noticed was that despite the fact that he was short, he was anything but small. Built like a bulldog, with a barrel chest and broad shoulders and ridiculously huge legs. His thighs were so distracting Eric had to force himself to look up. He had come dressed for practice in a hoodie and sweatpants in Beacons black and gold, not quite sized right for the proportions of his body.

The third thing that Eric noticed, anyway, was that despite the fact that there was nothing about his face that was classically good-looking or anything, Sullivan was...shit. There was only one way to describe it, and that was: Sullivan was hot. Silver fox, broken nose, light brown eyes, smiling mouth and stubborn chin hot. Something about the way he held himself, like he had too much energy to be contained in that small of a space. Some answering thing in Eric thrilled to the surface, itched to contain him.

Not that it mattered if Sullivan was hot. It didn’t matter what he looked like, because Eric fuckinghatedhim.

There was a second where they just stared at each other, wordless. And then Sullivan opened his mouth and Eric hated him even more. Hated him and his stupid fucking Boston accent.

“It’s good to meet you both,” Sullivan was saying, and Eric fought the urge to shake his head like a dog escaping from a bath and trying desperately to clear the water from its eyes. “I know things are probably going to be a little awkward given the way we started off, but I want you both to know that I’d like this to be a collaborative environment.”

Eric’s face made expressions he couldn’t entirely control, no matter how he desperately tried to rein them in.A collaborative environment.Fucking hell.

To make matters worse, Petey was nodding along with this little speech like it was exactly what he’d wanted to hear. Petey’s playing career had ended after one too many concussions, and Eric had worked with him long enough to know that he still suffered from some of the effects of post-concussion syndrome.

He’d tried a variety of therapies and eventually found that microdosing psychedelics worked better than any traditional treatment. Whether it was his natural personality, the psilocybin, or a choice he’d made, Petey was probably the most aggressively chill person Eric had ever met. While it normally meant that they got along well, right now, it made Eric want to shake him and yell,now is not the time to be agreeable, you stupid fuck.

“Is everything clear?” Sullivan asked, and Eric realized, belatedly, that they’d been staring at each other again and that his face was probably doing the thing where his eyebrows drew in above his glasses and people assumed that he was angry with them.

In this case, at least, the assumption was correct.

“Crystal,” Eric said, drawing out the word as sarcastically as possible.

Sullivan gave him an odd, quizzical look, and then smiled at the two of them. “I’m going to go down to the locker room to talk to the boys before we start camp for the day. I’d like you to be there with me.”

“Makes sense,” Petey agreed, and Eric wanted to draw his finger sharply across his throat in the international sign for shut the fuckup.

Instead, he said, “Lead the way.”

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