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“Any other questions?” Seraphina asked, her eyes skimming across her audience, patiently waiting for someone to speak up.  When she concluded that no, there were no more questions, her eyes narrowed directly at a player Madison couldn’t quite make out from her current position.  “Brandon Thorpe, I’d like to speak to you in my gr – my office please.  Right now.”

Players around Brandon nudged him and laughed.  Some even “oooohed’ like they were back in elementary school.  All Madison could focus on was the tremor in Seraphina’s voice when she stumbled, once again, over the appropriate word.  It wasn’t her grandfather’s office anymore.  It was hers.  And though her voice remained firm throughout the rest of the request, Madison could easily read the sadness that started to crawl back into her eyes.

She couldn’t even imagine what Seraphina was going through.  Her grandfather died just last week – probably murdered, or that was what Amanda claimed she heard – and she inherited the team – a team she knew absolutely nothing about – where no doubt she’d get shit from opposing teams and owners as well as her own players and staff.  She set herself up for criticisms, constructive or not, from everybody simply to continue on her grandfather’s loyalty.  And on top of that, she had to deal with her grandfather’s death.  It sounded like they had been close too.

Madison was just a girl from a small town.  No one in her family had died; she even had both sets of grandparents still alive and kicking.  It was such a strange concept to her, but seeing a victim a loss just reinforced the concept of mortality and reminded her that she was lucky. 

“I think I like her,” Amanda said.

Madison was thankful for the interruption.  Death wasn’t a subject she liked to dwell on too much.  “Me too,” she agreed.

“I wonder what she has to talk to Thorpe about,” Amanda said, directing her brown eyes at the two as they headed up the stairs by themselves.

“Well, you said he was the one who was holding out for more money, right?” Madison asked.  “She probably wants some final decision made, especially if preseason starts soon.”

Amanda’s face suddenly paled.  “You don’t think that Thorpe, I mean with talks about money and everything, you don’t think he could” –  She stopped herself, noticing someone behind Madison, and forced a smile.  “Alec, good to see you.”  She looked over at Madison, and her brown eyes calmed down a bit from the worry they had just held.  “I’ll see you later, Mad.  Take care.”  And just like that, Amanda disappeared up the stairs.

Madison frowned as she turned to face Alec, her mind wracking with all the possibilities that Amanda might have said had it not been for the man standing in front of her, staring at her without any shame.  Did Amanda think that Thorpe could actually kill Ken over money?  But certainly Thorpe would rather see himself traded than resort to something as awful and as life-changing as murder.  Although, residing in Newport Beach, living in a huge mansion minutes – if that – from the beach, with beautiful weather and women, a laidback environment, dedicated fans, could potentially be a motive, couldn’t it?  Why would Thorpe want to be traded when he could live here and make more money?

But Thorpe had to know that if he even did commit the murder, it didn’t guarantee him his demands, especially not with a new owner who knew absolutely nothing about hockey.

“Hey.”  The voice was low and confident, but surprisingly enough, there was an element of sweetness in it, and as Madison focused her eyes at Alec, tried to decipher whether it was genuine or added in order only add to his endearment.

“Hi,” she said, her tone flat.

“I’m Alec Schumacher,” he said.

“Yeah, I know.”  He seemed to like this response, but before the entire smile eclipsed his face, Madison continued, “I heard you get lectured by the new owner.”

“Oh.”  His smile fell, but she had to hand it to him, he didn’t retreat to the safety of his friends with his tail between his legs.  “Yeah, well it was a dumb question, I guess.” 

This surprised her even more than his tenacity, to actually admit that
he
was the one who said something rather stupid instead of blowing off Seraphina’s answer as a part of her just being a bitch.  Dare she think it was refreshing?

“Anyways,” he continued, clapping his hands together and locking eyes with Madison once again.  “You’re the only Gulls Girl I haven’t introduced myself to.  I know most of them from last season.  Like I said, I’m Alec.”  He extended his hand, and before Madison thought better of it, she reciprocated the gesture.  “You must be new because I definitely would have remembered you.”

She snorted.

And she didn’t even try to stop herself.

She laughed at him.

“Seriously?” she asked, giving him a pointed stare.

“Seriously what?” he asked, and though he didn’t sound particularly angry at such a blunt refusal, he did sound somewhat annoyed.  He crossed his arms over his chest and raised a brow, waiting for her response.

The more she stared at him, the more Madison realized that
yes, she was definitely attracted to him.  Now that she saw him up close, he was about half a head taller than she was, and his body was toned with muscles.  Even now, crossing his arms over his chest caused his biceps to strangle the thing material of his t-shirt, and his eyes had a kindness about them that other so-called players couldn’t claim.  But even so, she didn’t want to put her heart through the ringer; it had had enough pain in its twenty-two years of life and wasn’t quite ready to jump back in the ring just yet.

“That’s the best you could come up with?” she asked.  She sighed, her shoulders sagging forward. 
“How… disappointing.”

“Excuse me?”  He still didn’t understand, but he did appear to somewhat surprised that his usual flattery wasn’t working on her.  It would take more than one superficial pickup line and good looks to wrap Madison Montgomery around his finger.

“Well, ever since I joined the team, everyone warned me about what a ladies’ man you are, how charming you are,” she explained.  Then she shrugged her shoulders, making sure to keep eye contact with him.  Which was rather easy to do because she really did have a weakness for blue eyes.  “I guess they’ve all been exaggerating your prowess though because that line you just used is lackluster and unoriginal.”  She reached up and squeezed his shoulder which felt just as broad as it looked.  Before she could think too much on it, though, she released him, her arm dropping back to her side.  Offering him a sympathetic smile, she added, “Better luck next time though.”

With that, she spun around on the heel of her converse and followed the trickling hockey players up the stairs to the main center of the rink.  Yes, she was certainly attracted to him, but the usual rush of adrenaline, the over-thinking and insecure thoughts didn’t plague her thoughts.  She could do this.  He wasn’t her type anyways, though it was hard to forget that when he was in street clothes.  And if he wore glasses, she just might be doomed.  But for now, she could do this.  She had to.

Now that the initial meeting was over with, Madison would probably free from Alec Schumacher’s so-called wooing capabilities.  He would probably find some poor girl who was completely infatuated with him and what he represented.  It most certainly would not be her.

7
.
 
As superficial as it sounded, and as much as she hated to admit it, from the moment Seraphina laid eyes on Brandon Thorpe, she found herself to be wholly and completely attracted to him.  In fact, as she looked at him standing to the side of the collective group of Gulls players, she could literally feel her pupils dilate.  Then her conscious mind reminded her why she needed to talk to him, and as she requested he come up to what once had been her grandfather’s office, pushed her attraction to him in the back of her mind.  It was surprisingly easy to do only because her body responded to something purely physical he seemed to emit.

It wasn’t as easy to do when she was confronted with the direct sight of him sitting across from her once they entered the office.  It was hard for Seraphina to claim it was hers just yet, hard for her to take a seat that had once belonged to her grandfather when she would normally take the seat Brandon Thorpe sat in.  She had gotten to the office early, intent on cleaning it and ridding it of unnecessary items such as that newspaper, but the police took the majority of things so all Seraphina could do was sit down a kill time.  She hadn’t planned on getting lost in the many memories that accompanied the office, and before she knew it, Seraphina was crying.  Which was why she was late to the informal meeting and she thanked her lucky stars she had opted not to wear makeup.

Seraphina realized that as she stood in front of the players, the Girls, and everyone else who had some stake in the team, that nobody took her seriously while she spoke.  Nobody believed she would be successful as owner-manager of a hockey team.  And it was hard not to believe them.  But as she continued to speak, she began to believe what she was saying so that by the end of her little soliloquy, it didn’t matter what they believed because she did.  She believed that she could do it.  No, it definitely wasn’t going to be easy, and yes, she expected to take on more than enough adversity, but she could do it.  She sort of had to, didn’t she?  There was no way she would sell the team, no way she’d give Alan the satisfaction.

One of the first things she needed to do was resolve whatever conflict her grandfather had with Thorpe, because the clock was ticking and she needed to know if she was going to have to tell Henry to start practicing – oh, what was his name? 
Sam something? – whomever the second string goaltender was.

Sitting in front of her, Brandon Thorpe didn’t look too intimidating.  He was tall, but not excessively so; maybe six foot, six foot one.  He had short brown hair and an oval shaped face, with matching whiskers covering the lower half of his face.  He had grey-green eyes that seemed closed-off to his surroundings, but not because he was daydreaming or staring into space.  They almost seemed guarded, protecting some secret nobody else knew but him.  His nose pointed out rather than curved down, and his cheekbones were high and sharp.  His ears stuck out and maybe were too big and his chin was blunt rather than angled.  His shoulders were broad, hidden behind a long-sleeved off-white shirt, but he was lean, toned, but
lean, although it filled his frame quite nicely.  He wore dark blue jeans that wasn’t too tight or too loose, something Seraphina admired in men her age given the trends that were popular right now.  His feet were clad in tennis shoes, and Seraphina wasn’t sure if he planned to go to the gym after the meeting or if it was just his style.  Though Brandon Thorpe had a handful of noticeable flaws, there was something about him, something that caused this sudden urge in Seraphina to –

She didn’t know what.

And more importantly, she had to focus on the task in front of her.

There was nothing in the rulebook that said she couldn’t be attracted to her player unless it affected her decision-making process.  And due to the jumbled thought processes going through her mind right this second, it would seem that perhaps she would have to dedicate a good deal of mental control.  But she needed something to distance herself from him, something that might not cause her attraction to disappear but possibly hinder it so it was more manageable.   

He could be a suspect.

The thought was like being completely naked and thrown into an ice cold bath tub.  It caused her to straighten up and steel herself off from him.  No matter how magnetic his pull was on her, if she kept reminding herself that he was a suspect, she wouldn’t get swept away.  Plus, she had a crush on Christopher Williams.  There was too much she had to do to be attracted to more than one person, and it would be crossing the line especially since Thorpe was both a player and a suspect.

He
was
a suspect.

There was a reason Christopher Williams asked about him.

And, Seraphina realized, he was kind of a douche.  He held out at the last second in order to acquire more money even though the Gulls had yet to ever make playoffs.  Certainly he was a good goaltender, but not good enough to make playoffs.  What about the loyalty Papa had instilled in his players?  What about family?  Didn’t this guy care that he could be risking playing with people he’d been playing with for…

How long
had
he been playing for the Gulls anyways?

Oh boy, she would definitely have to read up on not only Brandon Thorpe but everyone else too.  And here she thought she’d be free of homework now that she had graduated college.

Where was his sense of honor?  Wasn’t there some kind of hockey team code that the team came first?  Seraphina wasn’t lying when she told Alec Schumacher that she expected him to adhere to the team mentality rather than an individual mindset.  That was Papa’s motto – team before self.  So why was this guy so adamant about getting more money?  Didn’t he care about his team?

Not only that, but he could have killed Papa. 
For money.  Because he wasn’t going to get his way.

Or was he?

Seraphina did suggest Brandon get a second chance.

             
Okay, thinking about things in a rational manner had calmed down her insides.  She could look at the man sitting in front of her without her mind throwing out suggestive comments and catcalls.