Page 4 of Sticking Out

“Yeah.”

I glance at her hands as she links them, squeezing tight. Fuck. I drive to the downtown core, hurrying to reach the hospital, and squeeze my vehicle between two big trucks. I steal a glance at Dani, who is trying to appear calm, but her nervous energy is palpable.

I kill the ignition and reach for the door handle. Her hand lands on mine. “You don’t have to come in. You can go grab a coffee or something.” She glances around. “There’s plenty of coffee shops around here.”

The worry in her eyes speaks volumes. “Didn’t you know?” I nod toward the hospital. “The coffee machines in these places have the best brew in the world.”

She grins and nudges me. “Always motivated by the finer things in life, Conner.”

As I take in her grin, I can’t help but think she’s one of the finer things in life. I’ve always known it. I thought my brother did too.

Her eyes narrow. “Are you okay?”

I put on a fast smile. “Yup, let’s go.” I hop from the car and when she closes her door, I hit the fob to lock it. I walk over to her and casually throw my arm over her shoulder. She weaves her fingers through mine, and we head inside the hospital. She registers and we take the elevator up to the fifth floor. She takes a seat and points to a spot down the hall. “Machine is down there.”

I’m a bit reluctant to leave her, and I’m not exactly sure what my role is here. “You…uh…want me to come in with you?”

“No, that’s okay.”

I nod and saunter down the hall just as her name is called. I glance back over my shoulder to watch her walk away with a nurse. I grab a crappy coffee and take a seat in the waiting room, tugging my hat low, because one, I look and feel like shit, and two, I don’t want anyone to recognize me. I normally love the fans. Right now, however, I’m too wound up to carry on any kind of conversation.

I finish my coffee, and toss it into a nearby trash can when the same nurse who’d taken Dani to her room appears, the lines on her forehead deep as she seeks me out.

“You’re Conner?” she asks.

The coffee turns in my stomach. “Is Dani okay?”

“She wants to see you.” Before I can even ask what’s going on, the nurse is on the move and I hurry my steps to keep pace. I struggle to keep the panic down, because my gut is telling me something very bad is happening.

As my blood drains to my feet, I force my heavy legs to work quickly, and the second I enter the room, and see Dani on the bed, her face as white as the sheet she’s laying on, a tortured sound crawls out of my throat. She reaches for me, and I hurry to her, taking her cold hand in mine. Tears fall down her cheeks.

“Alec…can you call him?” she manages to get out between sobs. “I need him.”

I nod, and stumble into the hallway, pulling my phone from my pocket. Through blurry eyes, I punch in his number, and when he answers, sounding happy, relaxed…sated…rage grips my throat and pushes cruel words from my lungs. “You get your fucking ass home right now, or you’re dead to me.”

Little did I know that those words, spoken in the heat of the moment, were going to come true. If I had known, I never would have spoken them.

2

Dani

Present Day:

* * *

Here we are in game seven, three wins for the Bucks, three wins for the Panthers. But we’re on home ice and the guys are feeding off the crowd tonight. The current score is two to one for the Bucks and the Panthers are on a power play with ten seconds left. I grab Brighton’s hand as the Panthers pull their goalie, their center skating down the ice, ready to score on Brady. Conner, along with a couple other Bucks, are tight on his heels, but the guy they are chasing—Lazar—is fast and widening the lead.

“Ohmigod,” Brighton cries out, as we hold our breath. Melanie might not be here tonight as that guy challenges her husband, Brady, but I know she’s watching this all play out on TV and I’m sure she’s on the edge of her seat, much like we are, even if she’s home with their son Kayce.

“I can’t look.” I put one hand over my face, but peek through my fingers as Lazar takes the shot, only for Brady to stop it seconds before the buzzer goes off.

The packed arena goes wild, everyone jumping to their feet and screaming. The guys on the ice all start hugging each other, and I don’t miss the way Conner glances up at me. Nervousness invades my stomach as our eyes meet. Tonight…well, tonight I am going to ask him for a favor. A big one. I’ve been building up to this for months and I told myself that if they won the cup tonight, they’d all be in a good mood, and it would be the perfect time to ask.

All the WAGs hug. Not that I’m a wife or girlfriend of any player, but I am best friends with Conner. We’ve been best friends since I moved into his neighborhood my freshman year. I almost blew that once in high school, though. I had a wicked crush on him and found the nerve to put it in writing—on a pretty sheet of pink paper. I left the letter on his bed one day. I waited for days for him to say something to me. God, those days were excruciating. When he never brought it up, I figured he wanted to stay in the friend zone, so that’s where we stayed.

Thank God, it didn’t ruin our friendship and while it would have been nice to have a conversation, that could have made things awkward. I guess in the end, he handled it correctly and it was shortly after that when his brother, the hottest senior in high school, started paying attention to me. Me—Miss Nobody. A girl who only sticks out in this crowd of women because I’m not hot like they are. Nope, I’m just plain Jane—a little too curvy—Danielle Birch. I never did go back to my maiden name after we lost Alec in that terrible car accident, the same day I lost my unborn baby.

But I can’t think about that right now. After counselling, I’ve forced myself to move on, and moving on is exactly what I’m doing, and hopefully, my best friend Conner is going to help me with that.

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