Seduced by the Game (30 page)

They didn’t waste any time
retrieving the puck again and driving into our zone. As soon as they got set
up, their goaltender headed for the bench so they could bring on an extra
attacker. The way Colorado cycled the puck, it was like they were putting on a
passing clinic. We couldn’t quite catch up to them. Every time we’d prevent a
pass one direction, they’d find a seam going the other way.

A hard pass to the point.
I dropped to block the shot, and it hit off my shin and bounced right back to
their
D
. The point-man sent it to the half-wall, then to the other
defenseman streaking in for a back door opportunity. Nicky made the stop, but
he couldn’t control the rebound. Colorado retrieved it again and kept the
pressure on.

We needed a whistle.
Colorado kept cycling the puck, kept us chasing them for so long we were just
trying to suck in air and not blow the game.

They sent the puck back to
the other point. He passed it straight to the guy I was covering, who had his
stick cocked for a one-timer. I squared up to block it, and this time it hit my
skate. The puck sailed between both defenders and out of the zone.

They spun around to chase
it, but I somehow found another gear despite my exhaustion. I beat them to it
at center ice.

I took a swing.

The puck went in the net.

The Moda Center went
berserk.

After that, with a
three-goal lead, it was pretty much just a matter of running down the clock
without giving them anything. My line headed back to the bench, and Hammer gave
me a solid whack on the back of my helmet. “Nice work, Babs,” he said. “Fucking
right.”

I was watching the action
on the ice when Soupy elbowed me and pointed to a group of girls in the front
row behind the penalty boxes. They were all wearing skimpy tops and looked so
young I wondered why they didn’t have dads like Webs running guys off. Each of
them held a sign up to the glass.

Be my prom date, Jamie
.

Tiegan + Jamie = 4Eva
.

My Goal: Make a Storm with
Jamie Babcock
.

There were probably half a
dozen more than that, too. I’d started ignoring the signs about a week into my
rookie season; they were only a distraction. The boys never let me off the hook
about it, though. Soupy and Zee kept trying to get me to auction myself off as
a prom date for charity or some shit like that.

“Fuck off,” I said to
Soupy.

He laughed. “You could
have your pick of them. I’m sure they’d all be thrilled to go to prom with you
if you’d rather take one of them than Katie.”

There wasn’t a girl in the
world I’d rather do anything with than Katie Weber, and he fucking knew it.
Hell, apparently everyone knew it, judging by my earlier conversation with
Kally. If they hadn’t known it before this morning when she’d had her dad shave
her hair off and I could barely hold it together, they all knew it now. I hadn’t
been able to look away, hadn’t been able to hide anything I’d felt while
watching it.

No poker face.

The horn sounded, marking
the end of the game.

I couldn’t get down the
tunnel fast enough.

Maddie Shaw had latched on
to me a few months ago when we first found out I was sick, and it didn’t look
like that was going to change now, even though I looked like an alien. Granted,
she had always been a little different than most other little girls, or most
people I knew, for that matter, so I didn’t ever count on her reaction being
what I should expect.

Maddie was Rachel Shaw’s
eight-year-old daughter. Rachel and Soupy were engaged and living together
these days, plus Rachel worked for the Storm’s GM, so I saw Maddie and her
brother Tuck all the time—even more than usual now that I wasn’t in school.
They both had this bright red hair and a lot of freckles just like their mom,
but that was where the similarities between the two kids ended.

Tuck was a few years
younger than his sister, but he reminded me a lot more of myself, at least when
I wasn’t sick—full of energy, completely outgoing, and into everything and then
some. As far as I could tell, the kid had never met a stranger, and he had a
unique knack for getting everyone to like him.

Maddie was shy and quiet,
though. She liked to stick to herself and read a book more than anything, or
maybe talk with one or two people—but almost never kids her age. It was a lot
more common for me to find her having a deep conversation with an adult than
playing with another kid.

Maybe that was why she
liked me—because even though I was technically still one of the kids in the
Storm family, I was also one of the adults.

The last few weeks, I was
gladder than ever that Maddie liked to hang out in a quiet corner. Chemo drained
me, completely zapping all the life out of me. I didn’t always have the energy
to even talk much, especially late in the day when most of the Storm’s games
took place. By then, I was often talked out, and I could count on her to be off
in a corner with a book and to welcome me in. But she always let be if I needed
to just sit quietly.

That was what had happened
tonight. When Mom and I had gotten up to the owner’s box for the game, Maddie
had been in her usual spot—in the opposite corner from all the other kids and
their noise—with her nose buried in a book. She’d smiled when I sat down next
to her, seemingly oblivious to the fact that all my hair was gone and I had a
stupid scarf covering my head to help keep it warm. “Want to share my blanket?”
she’d asked.

I’d taken her up on the
blanket. I was always cold these days, whether it was actually cold wherever I
was or not.

That was exactly how we
remained after the game, both of us cozy beneath the blanket, when I heard
Jamie’s voice behind me. I’d been expecting Dad and the other guys who had
families watching the game up here to arrive sometime soon, but I hadn’t been
expecting Jamie. These days, he usually just headed straight for wherever the
team was going for dinner along with the other single guys.

I couldn’t stop myself. I
whipped my head around to stare at him. He’d paused to talk to the kids near
the entrance, especially Tuck, who thought Jamie was the best thing since Candy
Crush. He had on a suit with a skinny tie like the Swedish players all preferred.
Liam Kallen’s fashion sense must be rubbing off on him now that they were
living together. All the guys wore suits to and from their games—league dress
code—but tonight Jamie hadn’t taken the time to dry or style his hair like he
usually did before leaving. It was wet and slicked back, which somehow only
made him more perfect in my eyes. Thank God he hadn’t shaved his hair off. I
wouldn’t have been able to see him like this if he had, and that would have
been a travesty.

I had to get myself
together.

Maddie put down her book
and spun her head in the same direction. “Mr. Jamie had a good game tonight.”

“Yeah, he did.” I forced
myself to turn around in my seat and look at Maddie instead of gawking at Jamie
like a stupid teenager. He had more than enough teenaged girls staring at him
all the time. He didn’t need me to do it, too.

She was still looking over
her shoulder at him, though. After a minute, she looked at me and grinned.
“He’s coming to talk to you. I have to go tell Mommy something.” That was all
the warning Maddie gave me. She got up from her seat, took her book, left me
the blanket, and pranced away.

“Hi, Maddie. Bye, Maddie,”
Jamie said behind me.

My heartbeat stuttered.

What was he doing? After
what had happened in the locker room this morning, he must have lost his mind
to even think about coming near me. Dad was already emotional, and these days
he was on high alert with everything concerning me. It wasn’t like Jamie
Babcock wanted anything more than just friendship, though—not that Dad would
care about that. Still, it would be a lot better for Jamie to just stay away
from me right now.

But he didn’t.

Jamie moved between me and
the chair in front of me, smiling in that way that brought out his dimples and
made me tingle everywhere. “Hi, Katie. Mind if I sit with you for a minute?”

I checked over my
shoulder. A few more of the guys had made it upstairs now, but Dad still wasn’t
among them. “I don’t know if that’s smart,” I said. “My dad—”

“He won’t be happy,” Jamie
interrupted. “I know. I’d still like to talk to you.”

“Okay,” I agreed, mainly
because I couldn’t tell him no. I wanted him to be next to me. I wanted to talk
to him. I wanted to let myself imagine he could feel for me even half of what I
felt for him. I wanted so many things that would lead to Dad killing him. Maybe
it was selfish of me to give in so easily, but I didn’t have it in me to stop
myself right now. Who knew cancer made you selfish?

He sat down in the seat
Maddie had just vacated. His arm brushed against mine, and I shivered.

“Are you cold?” He
adjusted my blanket before I could answer, drawing it up close to my shoulders.
His knuckles brushed against my chin, and he snapped his hand away like I’d
scalded him. “Sorry,” he mumbled.

I hated that he felt like
he had to apologize for touching me, especially since he was just doing
something nice. “It’s all right,” I said, unable to stop my smile. I was pretty
sure I was blushing, too, and for a moment I wondered if my scalp would be all
red like my cheeks when I blushed. “Dad didn’t see.”

“Yeah. Right.” Jamie
chuckled. He leaned over in his seat, resting his forearms on his thighs with
his hands together. Then he sat up suddenly. “Listen, I’ve been thinking about
what Kally said at lunch. About how you should go to your prom. He’s right.”

I shook my head, trying to
keep my hot tears at bay. Enough with the stupid crying, already! I couldn’t go
to prom. Not with my bald, alien head—whether I wore a scarf to cover it or
not. The kids at school weren’t like Dad’s teammates, and they weren’t like
Maddie Shaw. Teenagers could be unbelievably cruel. The second I walked in
looking like this, I’d be mocked right back out the door, and I’d never live it
down. I just wanted to hide away from them until I finished chemo and my hair
grew back and I could pretend none of it had ever happened, and maybe even
longer than that since they’d all forgotten I existed.

“Don’t say no. Think about
it.”

“I am thinking about it.
I’m thinking about how they’ll all laugh. How they’ll make fun of me because of
my bald head. I’m thinking about how no one would want to go with me.” As soon
as they’d heard the word
cancer
, all my supposed friends had turned all
weird. They’d dropped me like it was contagious or something, like they could
catch leukemia from spending time with me. Mom kept saying that it was just
that they didn’t know how to be around me anymore, that they were scared and
that teenagers just weren’t equipped to handle some things that life throws at
you. I didn’t buy it. “I’m not going,” I said emphatically.

“I wouldn’t say
no one
would want to go with you.”

The look Jamie was giving
me stole my breath and made my stomach flutter, but not like it always seemed
to do lately when I was going to be sick. This was night and day from that—all
crazy electricity and jangling nerves, kind of exciting instead of gross and
sick feeling.