Page 13 of Face Off
I scowl. “A peewee drill? You can’t be serious.”
“Come on, Red.” Maverick gives me a wicked grin that warms my skin. For half a second, I can see why women fawn over him. He moves across the ice like it was made for him, heading for the goal. “You don’t think I’m going to waste my time until I know you can actually play, do you?”
“This could’ve been avoided if you had just watched my tapes.” I sigh. “But okay. I’ll bite.”
Maverick tracks my position as I move toward him. He watches me line up at center ice. He follows my hands when I adjust my grip on my stick, and for one fleeting second, I think I see admiration in his eyes before he blinks it away.
“I don’t have all day, Hartwell,” he says with a lazy drawl. “Unless you want to talk more about biting. Then you have my attention.”
“Any last words, Miller?” I drop the puck and tap it with my blade. “There’s still time to walk away, sweetheart.”
He laughs.
It’s manly and low, filled with gravel. If he wasn’t so obnoxious and full of himself, I might find it sexy.
He leans forward, and his grin stretches wider. “Good luck, Hartwell. You’re going to need it.”
Maverick doesn’t play goalie, but from what I’ve seen in videos of scrimmages and dick-measuring shootouts with teammates, he favors protecting the left side of the net over the right.
He doesn’t know I know that, though, and I use it to my advantage.
I move from side to side, taunting him. He watches me, a predator tracking its prey.
When I shift back to the left, he reaches to the top corner of the goal, falling for my fake out. I take advantage of his misread, winding up and hitting the puck as hard as I can to the right, a slapshot that sails straight into the net.
“What was that?” I ask. “Did you say something about luck?”
“What the fuck?” Maverick looks at the puck then at me. “Again.”
“If you say so.”
His stance widens and his broad body takes up every inch of space to play defense. I set up like I’m going to do another slapshot, but I change my grip at the last second.
The blade cuts around the puck. I shift my weight from my back foot to my front foot as I move with the motion.
My hands follow through, an upward trajectory resulting in a wrist shot I used to spend hours perfecting with my dad on the lake behind our house.
Maverick stares at me. I think he might be seconds away from kicking me out of the rink, and I brace myself for whatever wrath he’s about to unleash.
“Do it again,” he barks out, passing the puck my way.
So I do.
He blocks my third attempt, a sloppy backhand I fumble from a stationary position. I score on the fourth and fifth tries, two more slapshots I net despite Maverick’s best efforts to stop them.
Again and again we go. Ten minutes stretches to twenty, then thirty. Neither of us say anything, but every now and then, he lets out a grunt that’s just as deep and low as his laugh.
My arms ache. Sweat rolls down my cheek, and my sports bra is soaked. My breathing turns labored, and even Maverick seems winded when he lifts his chin and looks at me.
“Stop,” he says. He pushes his fingers into his side and leans on the goal post. “We’re taking five.”
“Can’t keep up, Miller?” I ask, skating toward him warily. My heart thumps in my chest, and his eyes drop to the pulse point on my throat before he drags his gaze back up to my face. “I thought you’d be quicker on your feet.”
“Given I play forward and not goalie, I’m not sure how much quicker you want me to be. My save percentage is forty.”
“Means I scored on you sixty percent of the time.”
I haven’t gone head-to-head with anyone in ages, and it’s invigorating to push myself. To feel that slow rise of exhaustion hug my bones and tire me out.
