Page 53 of The Nanny Goal

I grin. “What are you fucking waiting for, solnishko?”

She drills a slapshot right to the centre of my chest.

I’m laughing as she circles around to pick up another puck, but the laughter dies as she shoots low, forcing me to butterfly.

There’s a thread of respect in how she works me over, sticking to the low shots for a bit as my legs get warm. But there’s a competitive edge, too, and I’m not surprised when she’s decided I’ve had enough kindness and starts disrupting the pattern. Really making me work for the saves.

And then, just as one of our trainers steps onto the ice, she shifts her speed to another gear—and now she’s flying.

This isn’t anything like watching her brothers barrel down the ice towards me.

This is something different.

Her edge work is incredible. She shifts directions like a video game player, as if gravity means nothing when stacked against her determination to evade invisible defenders, to get to the net and beat me at my own game.

This is my house.

My barn.

And she’s owning it as she becomes a blur, her shoulder dropping, her knee bending, taking a shot I can barely track—exceptno, she didn’t shoot, because she’s paused and flipped the puck to the back of her stick.

Time stops as I realize what she’s doing.

I feel every one of my two-hundred-and-ten pounds as I try to fight the momentum in my body and reverse direction to protect my blocker side.

She stares me down, then flicks the puck just below my glove anyway. The original target, after all.

Fuck me.

Our trainer is clapping as she skates over and introduces herself. “Nice shot.”

“Thanks.” Emery shrugs. “I’m just his babysitter.”

I swear in Russian.

She winks at me. “I’m going to go find Inessa now. Can I keep the skates?”

“We’re not done here,” I growl.

“But I’m done,” she says sweetly. “Come find us when you finish.”

Fuck me.

Fuck fuck fuck me.

I need more time with her. I knew she was a good athlete—she’s been on the national team since she was seventeen, I think, and has been to the Olympics twice—but I’ve never seen her skate.

Why is she not playing professional hockey right now?

Why, instead of doing that against the best women goalies in the world, is she my emergency back up babysitter?

There’s something there that doesn’t line up.

I watch her skate off the ice, then reluctantly give my trainer my full attention, because that’s my job and I’m a professional.

Also, I truly do appreciate the Hamilton program.

After coming up slowly through the Calgary system as a prospect who didn’t get a ton of NHL ice time, and more often than not sat on the bench as a backup goalie when I did get rostered, this season in Hamilton has been a revelation—in so many ways.

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