Page 37 of Crossing Lines

“Okay.” He stood and pulled his sweatshirt over his joggers. “I have to do the same.” Walking toward my door, he said, “Let me know if you need anything from me.” His breath hitched and he turned to face me, his hand on my doorknob. “Don’t do something stupid and get caught. Okay?”

“Yeah.” I combed my fingers through my hair. “Thanks, Archer.” Having him on my side was going to make it a whole lot easier.

“Yep.” He left my room.

I should call Ryan and let him know how things went. We’d exchanged numbers after breakfast this morning. Just to be safe,I’d entered his name into my phone as Rhonda. No one would think much of it if they saw him calling me.

I fished my phone out of my pocket and dialed.

It rang once and picked up. “Jonah? How’d things go?” He panted.

“Good.” I leaned over and propped an elbow on my thigh. “What are you doing?”

“I’m at the gym getting a workout in. I thought it would be a good idea to do some of my PT for my knee.” Clanking filtered through the phone.

Someone must be lifting weights around him. “Yeah, okay.” I thought back to the conversations with the guys. “So, I told the guys about Owen and that you twisted your knee. That was my excuse for going home with you. Then I told them I was too drunk to go home, so I slept on your couch.” I smirked, my heart warming as I remembered our breakfast. “And I told them you were nice enough to make me breakfast.”

“Yeah? Okay.” He sniggered. “I’m not really happy about the Owen thing, but I suppose it was a necessary part of the story.”

“It was. All the guys got worked up about it and wanted to teach him a lesson. In fact, Tyler thinks he might have him in one of his classes.” I tapped my fingers on my knee. If only Ryan knew the loyalty he had behind him. “I’m sure they’ll all be asking about your knee on Monday, so be ready for it.”

“Oh yeah?” A smile carried through his voice. “Okay, well, how about Archer?”

“Archer knows.” I rubbed my index finger up and down my thigh. “There was no getting around it.” I sucked in a breath. “He’s cool with it and has my back. So don’t worry about him.”

“Okay,” he said. “I, uh, need to get going. I’ll see you at practice tomorrow, eh?”

“Yeah, see you at practice.” And hopefully more after. “Have a good workout. Bye.”

“Bye.” The call ended.

I peered at my phone. How the hellwasthis going to work? Could we even date, or would it always be just hooking up at his place? I threw myself back on my bed and gazed up at my ceiling. Whatever. I didn’t care. I had him now, and I’d take him any way I could get him.

CHAPTER TEN

RYAN

Monday morning came around, and I was sitting at a long table in a conference room with all the coaches. We’d gone over game footage and strategized what drills we were going to work on this week in preparation for our away games at Robert Morris in Pittsburgh. They had a strong offensive game, so we’d focused on my D-men. I’d decided to keep playing Carlson with Hodge. They were gelling nicely as a team. I had no idea why Hammett hadn’t put them together before.

Patterson, sitting at the head of the table, straightened his shoulders. “Okay, now we need to talk NHL scouting. I’ve been approached by several teams, one being the Maple Leafs.” His gaze cut to mine.

My pulse quickened, and I held my spine straight. “Yeah? Who?” Hockey was a small family, and being a juniors coach up there meant I knew a lot of these guys.

“Frank Shannon. He’s looking at our forwards. I referred him to Boehm and Nowak.” He tapped on his laptop. “Boehm’s got some good stats this year. His goals per game are better than average.”

I swallowed hard. How ironic if Jonah ended up in my hometown of Toronto while I stayed here. I brushed my finger up theside of my open laptop. I needed to stay out of this unless asked for an opinion. But Frank was an acquaintance. “Yeah, Frank’s tough to impress. Is he coming to a game?”

“He’ll be at the games this weekend in PA.” Patterson focused on Finley. “You got time to pull together data for him if he needs it?”

“I do.” Finley glanced at me. “Maybe since you know him, Gibson, we can have a little chat about it.”

“Yeah, sure.” I nodded and breathed in deeply. Okay, now I was involved in Jonah’s possible future in the NHL. I didn’t like it, but what choice did I have?

Later that day,I skated onto the ice toward my defensive line, waiting for my instruction. The ibuprofen I’d taken earlier was doing its job, and I was almost pain-free. Everyone should already be warmed up, so I’d just get to it.

Carlson skated toward me, holding his stick in both hands. “Hey, how’s the knee, Coach?”

“Fine.” Shit, hopefully, word hadn’t spread too far among my players about the incident with Owen on Saturday night. I glanced at the rest of them, all lined up on the blue line.

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