Page 172 of Waiting Game

My mouth gapes. “That’s harsh, man.”

“Fuck you, Greco,” Davies barks.

“I can’t trust you for shit when I’m not on the ice.” Greco scowls at the dude whoshouldbe his backup goalie but isn’t. “You let that puck in tonight when a kid in bantams could have stopped it. You’re too busy thinking about who you’re banging and that hair of yours to worry about your job.”

“Who the fuck do you think you are?”

“You do worry about your hair a lot,” McIsaac mumbles.

“I have sponsorship deals!”

“Don’t we all, but we don’t let them get in the way of our real job,” Greco counters.

“You let pucks in too, Greco,” Davies accuses.

“Not as many as you. We need someone who recognizes that his job is to keep the puck out of the net, not in it.”

“You’re an asshole.”

“The truth hurts and the truth is you don’t even belong in the ECHL. You’re either sucking Bradley’s dickorblackmailing him?—”

Liam cracks his knuckles. “This conversation is devolving.”

I get it—it’s been a long fucking day.

“I can’t believe this,” Davies sputters, glancing around the room and finding that no one is on his side. “This is so out of order, it’s unreal.”

He has a point but…

“We’ve got one of the best teams on the ice and we’re barely scraping through our wins.

“We need to up our shit because otherwise, we’ll end up losing like last year. I didn’t move across the goddamn country to lose,” Greco continues, utterly remorseless as he lays into Davies.

His declaration, however, has most of the guys fidgeting like kids after one of the team dosed our gear with itching powder.

None of us want to lose. None of us came here to lose. And there’s no denying—we tend to lose when Davies is in goal.

“You’re going to let him talk to me like this, Donnghal?” Davies jerks to his feet in outrage.

Liam hitches a shoulder. “The stats don’t lie, man.”

“Some fucking captain you are.”

“Maybe it’s time you learned a few things in the minors,” I insert. “No shame in needing some extra training where the pressure isn’t as intense.”

“I helped win the gold medal for Canada,” Davies roars. “And you want me to play in the minors?” Looking around the team and yet again finding no allies, he shoots a glower at Liam, then, like an idiot, throws a punch.

Before he can reach Liam, I field his flying fist and drag his arm behind his back. “You wanna rethink that?” I snap. “Cool your jets, dude!”

“This is bullshit. You’re trying to clear house so you can get the whole Bukowski ‘team’ together. You think I haven’t seen the papers? They’re all begging for that to happen since the GM got appointed?—”

“I’m not an ex-Bukowski billet kid,” Greco denies. “Grow a pair and accept that you suck.”

“Fuck you.”

“Play better and I wouldn’t want to get rid of you?—”

Before he can finish the sentence, Davies storms out of the room, hurling his beer bottle at the wall.

---