Page 63 of Dirty Pucking Player

The warning is growled low, so no one else could possibly hear it, but with enough force that it makes me recoil from him. For the first time since he joined my team, I can see that danger he usually only presents on the ice directed at me.

Anger and confusion mix into a volatile concoction in my blood.

“Fuck you, Bash.” I shake my head and check for young ears that might be listening. “You can drag me to a strip club and then do unspeakably nasty things to me, but I can’t ask you a personal question?”

He shoves his hands through his hair and stares at the ceiling for a minute. “You can ask, but it doesn’t mean I’m going to answer.” His normally warm bourbon eyes meet mine, now iced over with a don’t fucking push me warning. “Some things are better left in the past, Greer, and my relationship with my father is one of those things.”

The true anguish in his reply slams into me, rocking me back slightly. This isn’t about him being angry at me; whatever this is goes a lot deeper and stems from something traumatic that happened a long time ago. Something with his father.

“Was it really that bad?”

His eyes answer my question even though he doesn’t offer a verbal response.

Yes.

Jesus. What could his father have possibly done that was so awful?

“Please, Greer, just leave it alone. You don’t want to know the truth. No one wants to hear what growing up with Mike Fury was really like.”

I shift closer to him, probably closer than we should be to continue to maintain the illusion that we’re nothing more than player and coach. “I do, Bash. I do want to know. Because it means something to you. Because your relationship with your father shaped who you are today, on and off the ice. I can see how upset you are, and I want to understand.”

He closes his eyes and inhales a deep breath. When he opens them again, determination lies in their depths. “I can’t, Greer. I’m sorry.”

Bash pushes off the boards.

“I am, too.”

But he doesn’t hear it.

He skates away from me without a look back, beelines for the gate in the boards, and stalks off the ice, leaving me with two questions.

What the hell just happened?

And how the fuck am I supposed to get home?

The little boy Bash was just working with skates over to me and tugs on my arm. “Where did Mr. Fury go?”

I force a smile and fight the tears pooling in my eyes. “He had to go prepare for our game.”

A grin spreads across his face, his blue eyes lighting up. “That’s so cool. I can’t wait to watch.”

Normally, I would agree with him.

Watching Bash play since he returned from his suspension has been truly awe-inspiring. He’s playing differently. With a renewed vigor and purpose. And without spending half the damn game in the penalty box.

Something changed, and part of me thought that something might have been me. But he just proved how fucking wrong I am about that.

17

GREER

Excited chatter and the clinking of glasses and bottles surround me. The din might as well not even exist, though. Everyone moves around me like I’m in a dream, a light ethereal fog surrounding everything.

Somebody pinch me.

Is this for real?

It still hasn’t sunk in…

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