Power Play (10 page)

“Yo, dickhead.”

Eric turned to find his brother standing behind him. “Yes, shit for brains?”

“I cannot believe Monica Geary has fallen so hard for you. The way she was looking at you . . .” Jason frowned. “I don't know if I can watch
W and F
anymore. Seriously.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because all I'll be able to think is, ‘That poor, deluded woman has totally fallen for Eric's line of bull.' ”

“No line of bull, my man. The sparks are there. You saw it yourself.”

“Yeah, well, let's just see how long it takes them to fizzle out. With your track record—”

“This is different,” Eric snapped. Jesus, Jason was a pain in the ass. Jealous, no doubt, now that he'd settled down to a life of Delilah, dogs, and the in-laws from hell.

“We'll see,” said Jason. He and Eric picked up their gym bags, and they began walking out of the locker room together. “Nervous about tomorrow night?”

“Not at all.”

Tomorrow was the season opener on home ice, Eric's first as a Blade. He'd been going above and beyond in practice, winning the occasional curt nod of approval from Ty Gallagher, which was about as much validation as he could expect at this point. But tomorrow night would be different. Tomorrow night they'd all see he wasn't just a hero off the ice but on it as well.

SEVEN

Blow.
Suck. Disappointment. Unfocused.
Those were just a few of the words Eric was able to come up with to describe his virgin performance as a New York Blade. He wished he could put it down to bad luck, but the bottom line was his reaction time had been poor, his concentration worse. He'd choked when he should have been blowing everyone away.

Maybe it was the booing when he first stepped out onto the ice. He knew Guy Le Temp's skates were big ones to fill, and that he'd played for a hated rival, but Jesus Christ, it wasn't like he was some newbie fresh up from the minors. Too bad he played like one. By the time the game was over and the Blades had lost to Tampa Bay 4-1, he was surprised his teammates weren't booing him, too.

“Mitchell.”

The stern timbre of Ty Gallagher's voice boomed through the depressed haze in the locker room, rendering it silent. Gallagher had already done a postmortem with the team right after the game, and hadn't, much to Eric's relief, singled him out. So much for that.

Eric stopped toweling his hair. “Coach?”

“My office in five.”

“Gotcha.”

He turned back to his locker, looking at the small gold cross hanging there that he wore during games for luck, just like his brother did. Maybe he should start wearing it all the time—not that it had done him any good on the ice.

He could feel some of his teammates' eyes on his back, could imagine their thoughts:
Can't believe we got rid of Guy for you. Not a good start, bucko.

David Hewson walked up to him, and Eric tensed. “So you sucked,” Hewsie said. “It's just the first game, and you were nervous. You'll get your legs.”

“He fuckin' better,” Ulf growled. “Maybe you should concentrate less on banging Monica, Mitcho, and more on your new
job
.”

“Stop calling me Mitcho, okay?” Eric snapped. “I fucking hate it.”

Ulf sniggered. “Hear that, boys? Mitcho hates being called Mitcho.”

“Why do you hate it, Mitcho?” Thad Meyers asked.

“Yeah, Mitcho?” Barry Fontaine chimed in. “What's wrong with Mitcho?”

Eric rolled his eyes. Assholes. He should have kept his mouth shut. For the rest of his time on the Blades, he'd have to endure being called Mitcho every three seconds.

He dressed, trying to concentrate on getting his head on straight before going to see Ty. He felt the same way he did when he was a kid being sent to the principal's office, a weird combo of vulnerability and defensiveness. Ignoring the jeers of “Good luck, Mitcho,” he squared his shoulders and prepared to meet the one-man firing squad.

 

“What the fuck just happened out there?”

Eric blinked, blindsided by Ty's hitting him between the eyes before he'd even had a chance to close the door behind him. He wished there was a hint of concern in Ty's voice, but there wasn't. It was pure incredulity laced with anger.

Eric turned his palms up apologetically. “I don't know.”

“You were tentative with the puck. You didn't even try to skate into the zone. We traded Guy for you because we needed an
offensive
defenseman. That's what I need from you. That's what I've been telling you I need you to be at practice. That's what I've seen you
do
at practice. If all I wanted was somebody to dump it into the corners, I would have stuck with Guy.” He shook his head. “You know the papers are going to tear you a new asshole tomorrow, right?”

Eric rubbed his forehead. “Yeah, I know.” Truthfully, he hadn't even thought about that yet. His mind was still back at picturing himself on the ice, sucking.

Ty leaned against the front of his desk, eyes narrowed, arms folded across his chest. “I hear you're dating some actress?”

“Yeah.”

Here it comes, thought Eric. The “live, eat, and breathe hockey” speech everyone in the league knew about. The “relationships come second” talk. Judging from what his brother had told him, he was surprised it had taken Ty this long.

“Anyone I know?”

“Monica Geary from
The Wild and the Free
.”

“Really.”
Ty looked impressed. “Haven't watched that show in ages. I think the last time I tuned in, Grayson Lamont's face had been burned off in a warehouse fire.”

Eric brought him up-to-date. “Grayson's face was perfectly reconstructed by the top plastic surgeon in Garrett City, Dr. Jessica Schmidt, and he married her, but it didn't last.”

“Huh,” Ty grunted before his trademark glare returned. “Actresses are high maintenance, correct? Lots of parties. Public appearances.”

“I guess,” Eric mumbled. “We haven't been going out for that long.”

“Keep a lid on the social side of things,” Ty warned.

“I will.”

“I mean it.”

Ty pushed off his desk, walking toward Eric. “You need to live hockey. You have to eat it and breathe it. It has to be the only thing you think about. The only thing you
dream
about.”

“I will, Coach,” Eric promised.

The speech. Finally. In a weird way, it made Eric feel like he was really part of the team. Now he just needed to prove it—not only to everyone else, but to himself as well.

 

“You're late.”

Monica practically pounced on Eric as he walked through the door of her dressing room, his name written neatly on the name tag the security guard had given him declaring him a “Guest.” For the past fifteen minutes, she'd been stalked by Carolyn Shields, the
Soap World
writer whom Monica despised. Carolyn, on the set for the day to write what seemed to Monica to be her fiftieth “A Day in the Life of
W and F
” article, had oh so coyly been asking about Eric. Monica had oh so coyly responded that Eric was in fact going to be visiting her on the set today, and if Carolyn wanted, she could talk to them together and get a
Soap World
exclusive. All they were waiting for was Eric's arrival.

Eric smiled at her as she tugged him inside by the arm and closed the door. “Am I imagining things, or are you actually glad to see me?”

“Damn right I'm glad. That journalist I told you about is prowling around the set, just dying to talk to us. Let's go get it over with.”

“Right.” Eric looked amused. “Give me a moment to put on my adoring face.” He turned away from her, putting his hands over his face and mumbling some kind of incantation. Then he whipped back to her, his “I worship you” expression firmly in place.

“Very funny,” said Monica, though she was amused. “What's next? Changing into your Superman tights in a phone booth?”

“Do they still have phone booths in New York?”

“Good question. Now put your arm around my waist.”

“Your wish is my command.”

Eric put his arm around her waist, and Monica put her arm around his. She could feel the hardness of his flesh through the lightweight material of his tennis shirt and resisted the urge to run her hand up and down his side. “Let me do the talking,” she said. “I've dealt with this woman before.”

“Jesus, you're bossy.” He paused. “Your waist is so tiny,” he marveled.

“I don't eat,” Monica confessed.

He seemed for the first time to notice that she was in a white lab coat. “What's up with the coat?”

Monica sighed. “Roxie is posing as a doctor. She's going to slip into the hospital and try to kill Grayson's father.”

“Excellent! He deserves it, the lying bastard. The way he's had no sympathy since Grayson was paralyzed—”

“Eric.” Monica felt a wave of pressure threatening to push her eyes from their sockets. “It's time to put Fan Boy away, okay? I need you to be Boyfriend Man.”

“No prob.” He opened Monica's dressing room door. “Shall we?”

 

“Eric Mitchell.
Enchante
.”

Eric reached out to shake Carolyn Shields's plump hand, keeping his other hand firmly around Monica's tiny waist. He wasn't sure what he expected the journalist to look like, but this wasn't it: the woman's thinning hair was dyed raven black, her eyebrows painted on to look like teacup handles. She looked kinda, well, insane.

Monica was smiling at the woman as if they were old friends, though Eric was astute enough to pick up the subtle tension between them. The woman must have dissed Monica in print. The thought ticked him off.

“So here we are,” Monica said gaily to Carolyn. “What would you like to know?”

“Well, obviously, everyone knows you two met when Eric here was doing his cameo—which by the way, was fantastic.”

“Yeah? You think so?” The compliment pleased Eric, especially since his teammates had laughed so hard watching him he thought half of them might wet themselves. He'd gotten all the ribbing he'd expected from them and more. But it was worth it; the envy had outweighed the derision.

“Oh yes, you were wonderful,” Carolyn was gushing, but she wasn't even looking at him as she spoke; instead, she was staring hard at Monica. “You're quite a
good actor
.”

Eric felt Monica's arm tighten around his waist. For a moment, he feared Monica might dig her nails into
him
, since she couldn't rake them across the writer's puffy cheeks, even though she deserved it.

“Isn't he?” Monica agreed. “We were all pretty amazed.”

“So,
lovebirds
, who approached whom first?”

“I approached her,” Eric said, even though Monica had opened her mouth to speak. He wasn't a complete dolt; he could handle questions like these. “I've been a fan for a long time. I had to tell her.”

“It was very sweet,” Monica continued, glancing up at him with a happy smile. How did she get her eyes to dance that way? Eric wondered. It was starting to unnerve him a bit, how real this thing could appear sometimes.

“He was very shy at first, which was surprising, given his rep.”

“Yes, the consummate ladies' man, I hear,” said Carolyn, licking her lips hungrily as she looked him over before scribbling on her reporter's notepad. Eric felt a shudder pass through him. He didn't mind when hot babes dug him. But when forty-something women with crayola eyebrows gave him the once-over, it weirded him out.

Carolyn glanced back up at him. “Obviously, Monica is gorgeous. But what, beyond her physical attributes, attracted you to her?”

“She's smart and funny,” said Eric, pausing to tenderly kiss Monica's cheek. “And she's very cultured. She's teaching me a lot.”

Eric felt a nail dig into his side. Time to shut up.

“What about?” Carolyn purred.

“Theater,” Monica interjected. “Art. Though mainly we just enjoy each other's company, you know? Talking. Laughing. We're still in the getting-to-know-each-other phase.”

“Mmm.” Scribble, scribble. Carolyn cocked a fake eyebrow. “Is Monica the woman who might tame you, Eric?”

“Could be,” said Eric with a wink. Tame him? What did she think he was? A circus lion?

“Do you need any more?” Monica asked Carolyn sweetly. “I have to be on the set soon.”

“One more,” Carolyn said tartly. She turned to Eric. “You said you're a longtime fan of the show?”

“Yup.”

“What do you think of the new character, Paige?”

“I think she can't act her way out of a paper bag,” Eric said without hesitation. He glanced at Monica; she looked uncomfortable. “Everyone on the Blades agrees,” he added, hoping it would back up his observation. “We all watch the show.”

“Interesting.” Carolyn looked at Monica. “That should do it—for now. Will you be available if I need to ask any further questions?”

“Of course,” Monica said graciously. “Just call my personal publicist, Theresa Dante. I prefer working through her than the publicist for the show.”

Carolyn nodded. “Would you two mind posing for a picture?”

“Our pleasure,” said Monica.

“Roddy! Over here!” Carolyn boomed.

A nervous, clean-cut-looking young guy hustled to Carolyn's side. Monica obviously knew him; her face lit up when she saw him.