Page 96 of Puck Happens

I narrowed my eyes, wondering what his angle was. Could it be he had no angle? He was just a clueless, incredibly gifted, supremely self-absorbed athlete? “I’m fine,” I said.

“You could have called me,” he said, skating backwards.

“I’m not showing up to work in your car, Novek.”

“You could have called Cap.”

My eyebrows lifted. Was he fishing for drama? If so, he wasn’t getting it from me. “I can get myself to work.”

“I’m just saying, Cap is one of those white knight guys, you know? Howdy ma’am and all that.”

“Is that why you give him so much trouble?” I asked him. Novek skated around me and slid to a stop. “You think he’s too nice?”

“Where I’m from,” he said, his face soft without his sneer. God, he was young and extremely handsome. “You eat or get eaten. Teams only wanted one thing from me, score goals. Fill seats. I don’t understand all the things the captain wants from me.”

“Well, if you want to be on the team, you have to try.”

He held out his arms, his white teeth blinding. “How does that woman singer say? This is me trying.”

My jaw dropped open. “Are you quoting Taylor Swift to me, Novek? Did that just happen?”

“She has the voice of an angel and the legs of a super model. Undeniable.”

Fucking right undeniable. I didn’t see this coming, but I found myself rooting for Novek.

“Let’s go, buddy. Center ice. We’re fixing that momentum problem in your c-cut.”

* * *

Dillon

Dillon: LIV, WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?

Liv: Calm down. I’m at the practice facility. I told you I needed to be here early.

Dillon: Why is your car still in the parking lot?

Liv: The battery died. I had to take an Uber.

Dillon: Why didn’t you just wake my ass up so I could drive you?

Liv: GIF: DUCK SNORING.

I chuckledas I looked down at the image of the duck blowing through his beak like he was about to blow the roof off the house.

Liv: Also, I’m not showing up at work in your car. Exactly what we’re trying to avoid.

I stood outside my building, my near freakout when I saw her car in the parking lot without a trace of her around, slowly subsiding.

She was fine. She took an Uber instead of waking me up.

This was going to work in my favor, because she was going to need a ride home tonight. I would be there like a knight in shining armor with some takeout and a dirty mind. In the meantime, we needed to get her car to a garage and have them do a diagnostic on everything.

Tonya needed a new battery. An oil change. A tune up definitely.

Especially if she was considering driving that old thing to Montreal.

No disrespect, Tonya.

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