Bury the Hatchet (27 page)

ELIAS VIRTANEN, THE
guy who would most likely be my backup this season, had played the first half of the game against the Stars. With the massive breakdowns going on in front of Eli, it was a small miracle that he’d come off the ice at the halfway point of the game having only allowed six goals. In all fairness, he’d made some spectacular stops and probably should have given up a few more goals in that stint.

Now he was guzzling Gatorade on the bench, sweating like he’d just run a marathon in Tulsa’s summer heat, and I was the one facing the fire.

That honestly wasn’t much of an exaggeration, either. In my half of the second period alone, Dallas had peppered me with more than fifteen shots, and our
D
had done little more than look over their shoulders at me and slink away each time the red light flashed.

I couldn’t blame it all on them, either. My head wasn’t in the game. Not at all. I kept thinking about Tallie and Lance, wondering how he’d gotten his hands on her again and why she wouldn’t just tell me about it. What was so bad she needed to think about it first? Why didn’t she trust me enough to tell me about whatever the hell it was?

Now that only five minutes remained in the game, and I’d let in four more goals to go along with the six that had gotten past Eli, there wasn’t any chance the Thunderbirds would come back to win this one. The guys had yet to score a goal, so I wasn’t going to hold my breath. That said, I knew I needed to get my shit together. One glance over at the bench to see the scowl on Spurs’s face as he glared at me was enough to know he expected more of me. I expected more of myself, but tonight just wasn’t my night on multiple levels.

After a stoppage in play, Spurs sent out some fresh players—an odd mix of two young
D
who had a snowball’s chance in hell of making an NHL team anytime in the next decade and whose names I couldn’t bother to remember, alongside Zee, Dima, and Seth McCormick, a journeyman winger—to take the next face-off.

They were down in the Stars’ zone, for once, and somehow Zee ripped the puck away from Stars’ captain, Jamie Benn. One of the Stars’
D
lost an edge and went down, which left Dima free to break for the net. Zee passed the puck to Mac, who somehow got a seeing-eye pass through to Dima. All Dima had to do was tap it in, since the Stars’ goalie had pulled himself fully out of position.

The light flashed, but instead of the expected goal horn, some fucking war drums started pounding, scaring the ever-loving shit out of me. For that matter, nearly everyone in the jam-packed arena jumped out of their skins at the sound.

I scanned the crowd, trying to find the sons of bitches responsible, because those damned drums wouldn’t stop. Finally found them right behind me. It took a supreme effort to refrain from giving them the finger, but no doubt I’d have to put a few thousand dollars in the swear jar over a move like that, not to mention, the league might decide to fine me, too. Better to bite my tongue and try to ignore it.

Although I made a mental note to be sure I
wasn’t
biting my tongue anytime there was a possibility the T-Birds could score when we were at home, at least as long as they insisted on those damn drums. I’d probably end up biting my tongue clear off if they started up when I wasn’t prepared. I had every intention of talking to anyone and everyone I could about getting rid of the drums, though. The thought of having to hear them every time someone scored at home was enough to give me the shakes.

The players on the ice changed after the goal, and a new line came out to take the face-off at center ice. This time, Razor was one of our
D
. He looked back at me and shouted something, but there wasn’t a chance in hell I could hear him over the drumming. I just nodded, letting him know I was ready, regardless of whatever he’d said.

After the puck dropped, the drums finally stopped. I shook my head, trying to clear the reverberating sound from between my ears.

Shouldn’t have done that.

Benn and his linemate, Tyler Seguin, were bearing down on me. Those two might very well have been the most lethal twosome in the whole fucking league at the moment, and only Razor was anywhere close to catching them. Razor took a diving pass at knocking the puck free from Benn’s stick. He missed. I had to decide which of those two was the bigger threat. I skated out from my crease, cutting down Benn’s angle and trying to poke-check the puck away from him. I missed. He passed it to Seguin. I flailed, trying to contort my body back into position. Too late. Seguin snapped off a wrister, and the puck just grazed my glove hand before flying beneath the crossbar and in.

Razor skated up to me, tapping his stick on my pads. “Sorry, bro.”

“How about you try to fucking do your job instead of being sorry next time?”

“How about you try to fucking take a pregame nap instead of boning your wifey before the next game?” he shot back before skating back to the bench.

If only that was what had me off my game.

DANA’S LITTLE BOY
,
Ryan, was squirming around in my arms. He kept trying to contort his body so he could put a Thunderbirds sticker on my cheek—never mind the fact that he’d already put six others on me in various places by then—when Hunter came up to the wives’ room to collect me after the game.

Dana was a tall, athletic blonde, a little bit on the tomboy side of things, but absolutely gorgeous and as sweet as could be, if slightly shy. She was also the mother of two toddlers, who kept her on her toes. Ryan, in particular, being all of fifteen months old, had a rambunctious streak a mile wide, not to mention some seriously sticky fingers. I wasn’t sure what he’d been into, but it was now all over me, too.

When Hunter looked down at me, he seemed as dour as I’d ever seen him. That was probably to be expected after the team had been thoroughly trounced, twelve to one, in the game. Dana had reassured me when we returned to the wives’ room to wait for our husbands that tonight’s game wouldn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, but I doubted Hunter’s ego would agree with that assessment.

Dana glanced at Hunter when he reached us, stretching out her arms for the squirming toddler. “Come on, buddy. Back to Mommy. Looks like Hunter and Tallie are ready to go.”

Ryan apparently didn’t want to give up yet. He grabbed on to my upper arm, digging in his fingers over my fresh bruises.

I bit down on my tongue to keep from crying out in pain. Dana’s eyes shot up to mine, worried. Apparently, I didn’t do such a good job of keeping my face a mask. She tugged him over to her lap.

“Sorry,” she said, glancing between me and Hunter and back. “He’s got quite a grip. Taking after his daddy.”

“It’s all right, really. He’s just a little boy.” And Ryan hadn’t been trying to hurt me. Not like Lance.

“You ready?” Hunter asked me. He held out a hand. I took it and got to my feet, fighting back a grimace at the pain in my upper arms. He didn’t say anything, and his face betrayed nothing, but his barely contained anger was seething just beneath the surface, crackling between us where we touched.

I nodded, gathering up my purse and phone, but Dana practically leapt to her feet before we could go.

“I forgot. There’s one more thing I need to talk to you about before you go.” She gave Hunter an apologetic look. “Do you mind?” Without waiting for him to respond, she plopped Ryan over into Hunter’s arms and guided me away with a gentle but insistent hand on my elbow. She didn’t stop until we were together in a quiet corner of the room. Her legs were long, and I had worn heels—a habit that was hard to break, particularly since there might be an opportunity for Hunter and I to perform for the cameras while we were out—so I’d had to hurry to keep up with her.

“What’s up?” I asked, trying to come off nonchalant even though I was almost positive I’d interpreted her behavior correctly. She thought Hunter was hurting me. There wasn’t a better explanation for her reaction.

She and I had already made plans, along with a few of the other Thunderbirds’ wives and girlfriends, to get together later in the week for lunch and an afternoon of girl time and charity event planning. Dana had spearheaded it all, but I’d agreed to be her backup in everything since I’d been involved in so many other charitable endeavors through the pageants I’d been part of over the years. It looked like she was going to need my assistance to get all of these women on the same page, too. I’d rarely seen such a catty group, and that was saying something considering I’d spent all of my twenty-one years as part of the pageant world.

Regardless of all that, I’d already given Dana my phone number, and we were planning to see each other again in a few days. I didn’t understand what the problem was or why she couldn’t talk about it in front of Hunter unless she believed
he
was the one behind the pain in my biceps.

She eyed me up and down, as if she was assessing every inch of me. In an overly subconscious move, I crossed my arms. Not that it would do any good. My face always gave everything away. Couldn’t hide a darned thing unless it was airbrushed, but even then, they could only conceal so much. Photographers always told me it was because I had such expressive eyes, which I found to be both a blessing and a curse. Plus, crossing my arms like that only reminded her of my injured hand by bringing that bandage back to the forefront for a moment.

Finally, Dana frowned, her brows coming together over her nose, but she blurted it out. “Look, I know you don’t really know me yet, so you don’t have any good reason to tell me this, and I honestly don’t want to think anything bad of Hunter because Eric and I have known him for several years now, and I would never have believed it of him based on that, but is he hurting you? Because if he is, you’re not leaving here with him. I won’t let you. You’re coming home with us and—”

“He’s not hurting me,” I cut in. I took her hand and squeezed, trying to reassure her.

She narrowed her eyes at me, scowling. “You may not have bruises I can see, but I saw how you reacted when Ryan dug in. Don’t get me wrong. I know those little fingers can pack a punch, but your response wasn’t normal unless you’re hiding something. You can’t ask me to pretend I didn’t see it.”

“I’m not,” I said. “I wouldn’t ask you to do that. And I’m not denying that I’m hurt, either. But it wasn’t Hunter. He would never do anything like that.”

“Then who?” Dana clearly had no intention of letting the subject drop. “Does Hunter know? Of course he knows. You’re married. There’s no way he hasn’t seen whatever you’ve got going on. What’s he doing about it?” She kept scanning me, as if she could see through my clothes to everything hidden underneath.

“We’re going to talk about it when we get home,” I replied.

“Why haven’t you told him yet?” she asked, suspicion creeping back into her tone.

“Because it happened right before we had to leave to come here. I didn’t want him to be late for the game, and I needed time to process it.” Not to mention, I needed time to figure out how to tell Hunter what had happened without him killing my former pageant guru, but Dana didn’t need to know that part. The less anyone else knew, the better. “I promise, that’s the first thing we’re going to do when we get home.”

“You won’t tell me who did it, though? You won’t let me help? Because I’m ready to take you home with me and Eric right now, especially if you’re trying to cover it up and it really is Hunter. We can wait until Eric and a few of the other guys get up here. We can get security involved. We can get you out of here safely.” Her eyes flickered over to the security guard standing at the door.

“It wasn’t Hunter, but I think he deserves to hear the story first.” Once I’d finished figuring out how much to tell him. Then I could keep all the details the same whenever I told anyone else, if it came to that. I supposed I would have to tell Dana now, since she’d already learned this much, but I’d rather keep it from anyone else if at all possible.

She chewed on her lower lip. “You swear it wasn’t him?”

I nodded.