Defender (Seattle Sharks 9)

“Come on, let’s get you over to the qEEG,” Harper said and led me from the room.

“So now that I think about it, how the hell are you twenty-one and graduating with your second doctorate?” I asked, holding the door for her.

“I’m surprised you remembered that,” she answered.

“I spent weeks with you, Harper. I remember what little you told me.”

She glanced up at me before walking across the hall. “I’m kind of a genius.” She shrugged and opened the door.

“You’re what?” I asked, certain she was joking. I shut the door behind us and she walked me to a chair flanked by a computer and a swim-cap-looking sensor-array.

“Sit there,” she ordered.

“Tell me more about the genius thing,” I challenged.

She sighed. “Fine. I graduated high school at fourteen and started at U-Dub that fall. I’m freakishly smart. This doctorate is in organic chemistry and I already have one in physics. Now, will you please sit down?”

I did. “So why U-Dub? Why not Harvard or Yale?”

“Because I’m from Seattle,” she said while she placed the sensors on my head. “My parents knew I was smart but decided I was too immature to go that far from home. In their defense, they were right. And besides, I can’t think of anywhere else I would have felt as comfortable.”

Okay, now I was intrigued.

“So if your doctorate is in organic chemistry, then what exactly are you doing interning with Seattle Brain Health?”

She paused for the shortest of seconds before finishing with the sensors. “I’m conducting a study in hopes of developing a new helmet. Well, new inserts, really.”

Something about her tone told me she wasn’t done, so I waited for her to continue.

“I was actually hoping to talk to you, alone.”

Bingo. “Harper, we’ve been talking alone for ten minutes.”

“Right. I’ve been working up the courage.”

“No time like the present. I’m literally your captive.” I pointed to the wires that connected my head to the computer.

“I want to know if you would sign a waiver allowing me to use your test scores in my study,” she blurted.

“What?” I asked, blinking. “Why would you—”

“Because if I could get your baseline now, and then take another at the end of the season, or even a little more frequently, I could amass data—”

“That could seriously kill my negotiating power when my contract is up for re-negotiation,” I interrupted. “You start tracking brain injuries that closely, and the team will know what impact every little bump on the ice has.”

“Well, that’s the whole point,” she said quietly.

“And when it shows damage at the end of the season? What does that mean for retention? The reason we baseline at the beginning of the season is that we have five to six months off to heal up. You take that time away, and there’s no telling what you’ll find.” Fuck, that much information was powerful to the team owners.

She started typing on the keyboard and shook her head, knocking free a couple tendrils of dark brown hair from the knot on her head. “I just thought that you of all people would understand how important this kind of research is.”

“And why is that? Because I’m a stupid hockey player who bangs his head a lot?”

She adjusted a few of the sensors. “No, because of your family history—”

My fingers wrapped lightly around her wrist, stilling her movements. “How the hell do you know about my family history?”

“I googled you, naturally.”

My eyes flew wide. “You what?”

“I. Googled. You,” she said, looking me in the eye. “Come on. It’s a completely rational action when you’re traveling with a stranger to a foreign country.”

“I didn’t google you.”

She blinked, tilting her head to the side. “Well, then I guess you’re not particularly rational.”

Holy shit, the logic on this woman was something else.

“Anyway, while I was researching traumatic brain injuries in division one schools...well, your last name is pretty memorable. I dug a little deeper and put it together.”

“Look, it’s not like I’m embarrassed or even try to keep my family history a secret—that’s pretty impossible in the NHL—I’m just not used to people connecting the dots on their own.”

“I’m sorry. I know it was prying. I just…” She sighed. “I want to prevent what happened to your family from happening to anyone else. I get that publishing results from any end-of-season testing could harm your career. Even though I think you should get that test done for your own peace of mind, I respect the fact that you’re a professional athlete. I wouldn’t want to do anything that jeopardizes your career.”

I let go of her wrist, and she continued adjusting the sensors.

What she was asking me to do was dangerous to my career. But if she was working on something that could have helped Nick… My throat clogged at the memory of my mother’s screams, and the silence that followed in the months after. If it had been preventable…