Breakaway (2 page)

—and then he was upended as Shore, out of the box, ran right into him and knocked him off the puck. Furious, Lane picked himself up off the ice and watched in dismay as one of the Renegades went flying down the ice with the puck on his stick.

Goddammit.
Goddammit
.

“Where the hell were you?” Lane demanded, glaring hotly at Shane McBride, the defenseman who should have kept Shore far away from Lane. “It’s not like you didn’t know he was gunning for me.”

“Right, Mr. Superstar,” Bridey snapped, and there was something hot and angry beneath the usual flush of exertion on his face. He’d messed up and he knew it, and he was silently daring Lane to make anything out of it. “Maybe you should keep your head up.”

“I was shooting the
puck
—”

“Settle down, Jesus fucking Christ,” Coach Spencer snapped, eyes narrowed. “McBride, you blow coverage like that on purpose and you’ll be sent down so far, you’ll have to find a goddamn ice rink in Hell. I don’t care how much you dislike Courtnall, you fucked up a goddamn golden scoring chance.”

Bridey mumbled something, nodded, slid down on the bench, and busied himself with his water bottle. Lane looked up at Coach Spencer, warmed by the “golden scoring chance” comment, even though it wasn’t really praise directly given. That didn’t last, though, as Coach Spencer just said, “Bury that next time, Courtnall, if you have to shoot from your goddamn knees like Alex Fucking Ovechkin.”

Lane nodded, all restlessness and disappointment. He watched as Sparks skated by Shore without so much as a bump to the shoulders.
Oh, screw this
.

That’s when Lane knew what he had to do. He jumped over the boards for his next shift, took the face-off, and then skated right over to Shore. With nine minutes left in a relatively unremarkable rivalry game, Lane Courtnall did something on the ice he’d never done before.

He threw his gloves off.

Shore stared at him and then started laughing. “You’re fucking kidding me.”

“You ran me over,” Lane snapped, angry and wishing they could just fight and get it over with. It was stupid. He already knew that. Did it hurt to get punched? Probably.

“Yeah, ’cause your dickwad teammate there blew his coverage. This is hockey, pipsqueak.” Shore took off one of his gloves. “You sure about this?” he asked, pulling at the other one. “I don’t think you’ve taken a punch in your whole life, pretty boy.”

Lane threw a right hook, and it landed right on Shore’s jaw. “First time for everything.”

Shore’s grin was quick and angry, but it did weird things to Lane’s insides. “You’re an idiot,” he said, and then he punched back.

Lane, who was actually taller than Shore by two or three inches, didn’t remember much of the fight afterward. He could hear the crowd cheering, sort of, but mostly he heard the ringing in his ears when Shore cracked him across the face and landed a fist in Lane’s stomach.

Holy
shit
. That
hurt
.

Lane’s first punch might have been the only one that made any sort of contact, but he didn’t give up. Shore was trying to pull his jersey over his head and push him down on the ice, but Lane was suddenly finding a nice outlet for all the anger and disappointment of his pro career thus far, and even if he wasn’t doing any damage, he still kept swinging.

The linesmen finally pulled them apart. Lane didn’t know his lip was bleeding until he wiped at his mouth with the back of his hand, pulled it away, and blinked in confusion at the smear of red on his hand. He was being taken to the penalty box, or so he thought—until he realized the linesmen were taking him to the tunnel that led back to the locker rooms.

He was being given a game misconduct penalty, which was longer than the time that remained in the game. That meant he’d be watching the rest of the game in the locker room. Which might have been disappointing—but when he skated by his teammates, they were all pounding their sticks on the ice.

“You’re fucking crazy, Courts,” Reeder called out. Sparky gave him a thumbs-up. Lane grinned at them, feeling euphoric. It could possibly be from blood loss, but who cared?

A few fans high-fived him as he went down the tunnel. It was the most disgraceful game he’d ever played since he first strapped on a pair of hockey skates—a blown goal and a game misconduct, on top of an instigator penalty for the fight with Shore. But it was also his favorite.

IT WAS
not, however, his coach’s favorite.

Spencer yelled at Lane for a good ten minutes, telling him that “burying a shot does not mean get buried by Jared Shore” and reminding him that his team had to kill the penalty for a fight he didn’t—and couldn’t—win.

Lane nodded, made the appropriate responses, and waited for the coach to cool off. Finally he sighed, shoved his hands in his suit pockets, and stared up at the ceiling. “I know what you were trying to do, Courtnall. I hope it worked. I know you can play better than you’ve been playing. I’m glad you’re trying to do something about it, but try not to end up on the injured reserve list, all right?”

“Yes, coach.”

“Score some goals, Courtnall. We’ve got guys who can fight.”

They did have those guys, but Lane didn’t point out that they weren’t exactly rushing to his defense. It didn’t escape him that the coach knew he was having problems getting along with his teammates, and if Coach Spencer hadn’t done anything about it by then, he wasn’t going to. He clearly wanted Lane to deal with the situation himself.

And without bleeding.

When Lane went into the locker room, he wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but it wasn’t to be ignored like every other time he came into a locker room after a game. Except he was, and something inside of him quietly snapped. He stood right where he was, holding his stick like it was a life preserver, and he started…
talking
. Loudly, but not shouting. He was still Canadian.

“You know, I’m sorry I said that stuff. Okay? I’m an idiot. No, really. I know that, but you know what?” The room fell silent as the guys elbowed each other and nodded toward Lane. “You can get over it. If you’re that offended that you can’t pass me the puck or, I don’t know,
be a defenseman
,”—he glared at Bridey—“then that’s your problem, not mine. I’m not apologizing for saying all the wrong things again. I’m not. So get over it already.” Lane crossed his arms and glared. “Also, I want to go to dinner, and I’m really tired of the Econo Lodge, so does anyone need a roommate?”

There were a few moments of silence, and Lane thought he’d actually made things worse—which didn’t seem possible, but maybe it was. Then Reeder and Sparky started clapping, and the rest of the team followed suit. Lane flushed hot at their applause and the “It’s about time” and “We almost gave up on you, Courts” that were thrown his way.

Finally.

LANE WENT
with his teammates to Cruisers after the game and had two cheeseburgers and fries with cheese on them, and basked in the warm glow of having a team that didn’t hate him.

Ryan Sloan, a third-line winger, sat by Lane at the table. He was a nice guy, chatty. Before they’d finished eating, Lane knew everything about him. He was from Toronto, a Leafs fan like Lane, and came to Florida because he knew he’d never get drafted, but he loved playing, he really did.

“It’s fun. Hockey is supposed to be fun, you know? I mean, sure, we don’t get a lot of money and fame or anything, but we get to play.”

“Well, I haven’t been having very much fun, but I’ll take your word for it,” Lane said dryly.

“Hey. Well, my first team? I asked if there was an age restriction because the guys all looked old enough to coach.” Ryan winced. “It wasn’t as bad as the stuff you said, but it still sucked. Sorry, dude. Want to be roommates?”

And just like that, Lane had an out of the Econo Lodge, a dinner invitation… and a hockey team. He also had a buzz, because they kept buying him beer he wasn’t old enough to drink. But Lane didn’t think you turned down team bonding, no matter what form it took. Or
foam
it took, which was a thought that Lane kept giggling about even if he couldn’t explain it to anyone.

Someone took him home to the Econo Lodge so he could sleep it off. He had two more nights there, and then he could move into the apartment with Sloan. Lane got a package of donuts from the vending machine, ate two, threw up everything in his stomach, and fell asleep on the bathroom floor.

That was a lot more like what he expected playing professional hockey would be like.

What he did not expect was waking up at eleven thirty at night, dry-mouthed, starving, and vaguely sickened by the thought of packaged donuts. He took a shower and brushed his teeth, which took a long time because he was dizzy. Drinking was dumb when you played a contact sport for a living.

Lane eventually hauled his sorry ass down to the front desk, where he asked if there was a restaurant anywhere within walking distance. The man at the desk sucked his teeth for a few seconds—which Lane was starting to think might be secret code or some kind of weird Florida dialect—and then he shrugged.

“Not really. Can go over to Bomber’s, though. It’s a bar, but sometimes they got pizza.” He pointed vaguely toward the front door. “S’across the street.”

“Thanks,” Lane said, smiling weakly. He crossed “the street”—which was
the interstate
—and went into a dive bar with a plane painted on the side of it and a blinking red Budweiser sign in the window. He realized at the last second that he wasn’t old enough to be drinking in a bar, and he didn’t have his entire team there to vouch for him.

It didn’t seem like anyone cared, though. No one said a word to him as he walked in and stupidly sat at a table for ten minutes before getting up and going to the bar. The bartender was a guy about his dad’s age, with white hair tied in a ponytail and a beard that made him look like a pirate.

“Get you somethin’?” he asked, cleaning a glass.

“Pizza?” Lane asked, hopefully. Damn. He was starving.

“Nah. Oven’s broke. Got some peanuts. Oh, and a fry daddy. We still got some chicken things in the freezer, if you want those.”

“That sounds great, thanks,” Lane said, his stomach growling.

“You want something to drink with that?”

“Sure… do you have Dr Pepper?”

The bartender stared at him for a good two minutes, silently drying the glass until it was squeaking. Then he reached into a cooler, pulled out a bottle of Bud Light, popped the cap off, and placed it in front of Lane.

“Thanks.” The last thing Lane wanted was beer, but he also didn’t want to get kicked out before his dinner of “chicken things from the fry daddy” showed up. Or maybe he did. Florida was so weird.

He was messing with the coaster when he caught the guy a few seats down looking at him. Lane’s stomach did a little flop when he met a pair of familiar, pale-blue eyes. Jared Shore, of all people, was in that stupid bar and giving him an unfriendly look. “You even old enough to be in here?”

“I’m
starving
,” Lane told him, as if that were any kind of answer. “I just wanted some pizza or something.”

“They have delivery, you know, here in America.” Jared was also drinking a beer, out of a bottle, and the sight of his mouth on it was distracting. “Rest of your team around?”

“No.” Lane’s stomach rolled unpleasantly when he took a sip of his own beer. He didn’t think he looked as cool as Shore. “Is yours?”

“Nah. They’re all out at nicer places,” Shore said, still watching him. “Your lip hurt?” The way he asked was direct. His intense eyes focused on Lane, and oh, that made Lane dizzy, made his stomach curl with heat.

Oh, he should get out of there. Fast. “Umm. Kinda. Yeah.”

“Good.” Jared finished his beer and placed it on the bartop. For all his reputation might suggest, he was a quiet man who moved with more grace than aggression. And he had nice hands. Lane wondered why it was so warm in the bar. “I hope it was worth it.”

“Huh?” Lane could tell the guy was pissed at him, but he didn’t know why. Shore was the kind of guy who got in fights all the time, wasn’t he?

Shore laughed, and it wasn’t a very nice sound at all. “You think you’re the first pretty boy who’s tried to make his teammates like him by throwing down with me? You’re not.”

“Really?” Lane expelled a breath. “That’s good to know. Thanks.” The bartender dropped a plastic basket in front of him. It smelled like food and fried things, so Lane ate one and nearly burned the roof of his mouth to cinders. When he was over the embarrassment of that, he looked back up to find Jared had moved next to him. That wasn’t helping his equilibrium, but it did distract from the screaming pain in his mouth.

That was the second time in one day that Jared Shore had made Lane’s mouth ache. Technically other things were aching, but they were in the category of Things Lane Courtnall Didn’t Think About.

“Did you really mean that? I’d say you were being a smart ass, but you don’t really strike me as the type.”

Lane swallowed his small piece of burning processed meat, shrugged, and took a long drink of the cold beer. “I’m Canadian. We’re subtle. It’s easy to miss sometimes.” He went back to the chicken things, broke one in half, and wisely let the steam rise out of it for a few seconds before eating it. “I mean, it was a dumb thing to do, but it worked. So yeah, it was worth it.”

If Lane hadn’t been hungover, tired, hungry, and distracted by the continual searing pain in his mouth, he probably wouldn’t have said that.

“Guess I see why your teammates didn’t like you,” Shore snapped, standing up abruptly.

“Wait,” Lane said, confused, holding half a steaming chicken thing in one hand. “Why are you mad? That’s your thing, isn’t it? Getting in fights?”

“Yeah, pretty boy. That’s my
thing
.”

“So you shouldn’t be mad, but you are. I can tell. I know mad. Believe me.” Lane put the other bit of chicken into his mouth, swallowed hastily, and washed it down with the aid of the Bud Light. It was the worst meal he’d ever eaten by far. Good thing he could barely taste it.