Page 2 of Press Your Luck

No one, except for my boss, the team's owner, gave me the respect I should have as a coach. And I even questioned how much he really did respect me and how much his hiring of me was just because of the publicity the team was receiving.

Not only was I young to be coaching a minor-league team at only twenty-three, but I was a woman.

Both made my job difficult, but the breasts made it even more so since many people didn't feel I was up to the task, including many on the team. It was only through control that I had gotten us this far, to the All-Star game in Toronto.

Every moment was an exercise in control. Controlling my anger so I didn’t yell and give anyone the excuse to call me a bitch or get arrested for beating a player with a hockey stick.

Controlling the frustration and hurt at the team’s and media’s discounting me, even though few people, men included, had as many successes and accolades as I did in hockey.

Controlling the urges to quit knowing that my boss was using me because I was a woman, not because I had the skill. So much control was required to do my job. I needed to be on my game at every moment.

Pierce had a strange way of knocking me off my game, and usually, I found it annoying. But right here, right now, with Pierce sliding inside me, making me quiver and gasp, I wanted to relinquish control. I wanted to let somebody else be in charge. I wanted to feel nothing but good.

Who cared if the man who was making me his erotic prisoner was my rival?

Who cared that he was practically old enough to be my father, had my father been nearly twenty when I was born?

I pushed all the cares and obstacles away. Tonight, for the first time that I could remember, I would surrender to temptation. I would let Pierce take me to the heights of pleasure, and I would do it without any regrets.

“That’s right, baby... let me make you feel so fucking good.”

1

Pierce

Iscowled as I surveyed my players stumbling across the ice at today’s practice. They were slow and lazy, and I was getting frustrated. I shouted at them, "Get your asses in gear.” Jesus, why I’d let my best buddy and ex-hockey teammate, Reed Hampton, talk me into partnering with him to buy a minor-league hockey team, I’d never know.

“They need to dig deeper,” I grumbled mostly to myself.

Reed nodded beside me. "I've seen better, too.”

“We need to step it up," Bo, the newest member of the coaching staff, chimed in. As one of the greatest to play the game, I thought his presence would motivate the young men on the team. They were in awe of him, but it didn’t seem to improve their skills on the ice.

“We can’t afford any weak links.” I thought of the Silver Nuggets, our rivals down in Henderson, and how much more cohesive they were. Except for Big Ed, who clearly balked at having a woman as a coach. Inwardly, I kicked myself for thinking of Naomi Withers. Every time she entered my mind, I had dirty thoughts. This time, it was imagining her on the ice in nothing but skimpy lingerie. Fuck.

“I’d like to sell out the season. We need to prove that Las Vegas is a hub for sports and strong enough to support two minor-league hockey teams.”

I nodded in agreement. When Reed and I bought the Buckaroos, they’d been in a steady decline, and there were questions about moving the team or simply disbanding it. But for the last few years, using Reed’s fortune from his online betting empire along with my coaching skills from the NHL, we’d been doing our damnedest to turn this team around. So far, we looked like idiots for buying the team, and me for leaving an NHL team the year before it won the Stanley Cup.

Naomi’s team, the Silver Nuggets, weren’t faring much better. Business wonder-man Todd Marshall had bought the team recently. The man was often called the Midas of Business because everything he touched turned to gold. Everyone thought he was nuts to hire Naomi to coach his ragtag team, including me. But I didn’t think it was a crazy move because she was a woman. Naomi knew her shit when it came to hockey. If hockey had prodigies or savants, she’d be one. But as far as society had come in treating women equally, it hadn’t arrived in professional men's sports, and when it did, hockey would be the last to accept it.

Bo and I had snuck into a Silver Nuggets practice not long ago, and while some of her team was on board with her coaching, many, including Big Ed, their star player, weren’t. Between Ed and angry fans who didn’t think she could pull it off, Naomi had a lot working against her. Why would Marshall set himself up like that?

Then again, maybe it would give us an advantage, which we’d need if my players kept skating like they had their heads up their asses. I watched them skate, running a 3-1-3, with a mixture of frustration and determination. I knew they had what it took to be a winning team, but they needed to work harder and get their shit together as a team.

With my eyes fixed on the ice, I shouted at the players again, "Let's go, boys. Do you want to win the season or what?"

“I don’t think any are even close to moving up,” Bo said.

Teams like ours were feeders for the NHL. It was how Reed and Bo and I all moved up in our careers. I suppose it was vanity that I felt coming from coaching an NHL team, but I should have been able to whip these players in shape and get them promoted. But Bo was right. At the moment, none seemed to have what it took. Oh, sure, many had the potential, but so far, they were falling short.

As I continued to watch the players skate, Analyn, Reed’s wife, appeared with their son on her hip.

Reed grinned like a loon at the sight of her. It was amazing to me how a woman could turn a man into sap. Okay, so maybe I was being hard on him. It was probably jealousy because the guy was happier than I’d ever seen him, and that includes the times he was on ice during his prime hockey playing days.

He leaned over and kissed her, then took the boy. “You’re a sight for sore eyes.”

“How’s it going?” she asked.

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