Page 82 of Dirty Pucker

My mind goes to the day we met, how she refused to believe I was an asshole. How she, unlike so everyone else, saw the softness in me. How she befriended me and helped me build up my social media accounts. How she used the Bashers’ TikTok to show fans that I was more than the hockey player everyone loved to hate. How she helpedmesee that I was so much more than that.

I think about how sweet and funny and bubbly she is. How much I like the sound of her voice. How I can’t stop staring at her every time I see her, she’s that beautiful.

A giddy feeling swoops through me. When was the last time just thinking about someone got me this excited?

I shrug at Blomdahl. “I love a tough practice.”

He scoffs. “Yeah, right. You sure you’re not smiling because of a certain blonde social media expert?”

I roll my eyes, but I’m still smiling.

“Alright, gentlemen,” Coach Porter says. We stop talking and immediately focus on him. “I know that practice was rough, but it had to be done,” Coach says. “You put in the work today, and I liked what I saw out there. Fantastic effort and drive. High energy. Tenacity. That’s exactly what we need going into playoffs.”

Despite our loss to Las Vegas, we have a strong enough record that we made it through to the first round of playoffs. We’re taking on the Los Angeles Devils.

Coach Porter pauses as he looks at all of us. “The Devils are a tough team. They won the Cup a few years ago.” He frowns. “But I’ve won two. We can beat them, I know we can.”

We all holler, pumped to take them on. He dismisses us and we head toward the locker room.

“Richards, hang back for a sec.”

I stay on the ice while the rest of the guys walk off. Coach makes his way toward me.

“I heard back from the department of player safety.” He frowns at me.

I tense up. Coach Porter is almost always frowning, so I can’t even tell if this is good news or bad news.

“You’ve been suspended for one game.”

I let out a breath and nod. “Okay.”

“I know that missing even one game is upsetting, but they were adamant about it.”

“It’s okay, I understand.”

“I told them why you did it. That Crowley made a sexual threat against a member of our organization and you were reacting to that.”

“You did?”

He nods. “They admitted that Crowley crossed a line, but they said that it didn’t excuse your physical retaliation. I toldthem that was utter crap and that if Crowley or anyone else speaks like that around one of my players again, I’m going to tell my team to retaliate just like you did.”

I stare at him, shocked to hear Porter defend what I did. “You said that?”

He’s quiet for a second as he looks at me. “You did the right thing, Richards. I don’t care what the department of player safety thinks. If I were still young enough to play and a guy said something like that around me, I’d have kicked the crap out of him too. I’m proud of what you did.”

He pats my shoulder and the tension riddling me instantly fades. It feels good to know that Coach Porter supports me on this.

But “support” doesn’t even feel like the right word. It feels more like he’s defending me and putting himself on the line for me too.

And then, for some strange reason, I think about my dad. I think about how he never once told me he was proud of me. I think about how I can count on one hand the number of times he made it to my hockey games as a kid. Other parents never missed a game. And the ones that did had good reasons to, like they were working to support their families, which is of course understandable.

But my dad never had that excuse. He just didn’t care enough. He didn’t care enough about me to be proud of me. But Coach does.

Emotion flashes through me.

“Thanks for having my back, Coach,” I finally say.

Porter nods. “Of course.”

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