Ryker (Cold Fury Hockey 4)

It takes me only one long-legged step until I'm on him. He sees me...eyes confused for a moment and then round with fear as I lower my shoulder and plow into him.

Then everything speeds up.

I drive into him with every bit of my Brick Wall reputation, right over the top of the bar stools that are behind him and down onto the hardwood floor. One of the stools topples over and hits me in the temple. I feel a warm trickle of blood that slides down and along my jaw and that actually titillates me. It induces blood lust.

Claude lets out a grunt of pain as his lungs deflate from the force of the tackle and my weight coming down on top of him. But it's not enough pain.

I get in one, two, three quick punches--right hand to left cheekbone--and I actually laugh with evil malice when his skin splits open on the third strike. I raise my fist for another, wanting to see blood splatter, but then I'm being pulled backward with a solid arm locked around my throat.

Suddenly I hear the noise all around me again, mostly Alex growling in my ear, "You need to calm the fuck down."

Mikkel helps Claude from the floor while Sam grabs a rag from the bartender and presses it to the cut on his face. Claude glares at me. "What the fuck, Evans?"

I raise a hand and point a shaky finger at him. It's shaky because I'm still consumed by rage and it hasn't been properly expelled, and the only thing holding me back is the throat-lock Alex has on me.

"You do not talk about her that way," I say in a guttural voice. My words come out measured...laced with the promise of retaliation. I don't need to say her name. We all know who's the subject of the conversation.

"What's it to you?" he sneers, leaning forward, but I know he feels brave because Alex is holding me back.

"She's our boss, you asshole. She signs your paychecks. Do you think that's acceptable what you just said?"

"I'm just having some fun," he mutters like a petulant child. "Christ...don't get so bent out of shape."

And that right there sets me off again. I pull away from Alex's grasp so quickly he can't react. I break his grip and lunge at Claude, grabbing him by the throat. He gives a terrified squeak as I pull him toward me.

When we're almost nose to nose, I do nothing more than murmur these words to him: "You talk like that about her again, you better hope there's an ambulance nearby, because you will need it."

He just glares at me, trying to show me he's not intimidated. But I can feel the nervous swallow he's pushing down his throat underneath my palm. I don't wait for an answer that he understands me. I don't force him to give it, because I know he won't. He may have just had his ass handed to him, but it doesn't mean that he's cowed in any way. I know young fucks like him and they think they know everything. You add on fame and fortune because he's a professional hockey player, that makes him feel invincible. I can see it in his eyes...even at this moment. He thinks he's better than Gray. He thinks he's so valuable to this team that she'll bend to him and not the other way around.

I can see in his eyes that he is going to be trouble down the road.

A hand touches my shoulder. "Let's go," Alex says calmly.

I release Claude and turn away from him. I give him my back and almost hope he leaps at my blind side. I've still got a lot of ass whooping left inside of me, but he does nothing.

Silently, Alex and I head through the lobby and into the elevators. He follows me to my room and walks right in behind me.

"You need to have that cut sealed," he says as I throw the room key down on the bedside table.

I reach my hand up and it comes away wet with blood. I don't respond to Alex but walk into the bathroom and grab a hand towel, pressing it to my temple. I don't even bother to look at it in the mirror.

When I walk out, I find Alex sitting on my bed with a grave look on his face. I find that in the few moments that it's taken to leave the bar downstairs and get up to my room, I've calmed considerably. I also know I overreacted and probably wouldn't have done so had I not been inebriated.

"Thanks for pulling me off him," I mutter as I walk over to the honor bar. I reach in and grab a Perrier, taking a moment to drop the towel onto my shoulder while I crack it open.

Alex's eyes slide to the cut on my face. "It's bleeding again. You probably need some butterflies on it."

I shrug and press the towel back on the cut. "If it doesn't stop in a bit I'll call Terry."

Our head trainer. He'll be able to patch it up in no time and he won't ask questions.

"Want to tell me what that was down there?" Alex asks quietly.

While I'm not as close to him as I am to Zack, he and Garrett have become good friends over the months. Alex is also our team's captain, so I know this is of concern to him. This is his first year with the "C" on his uniform, but he earned it and was the logical vote by the team once Luca Bressard, our former captain, retired.

"Lost my temper. Let that little fucker get the better of me," I reply guardedly as I lumber over and sink down into an armchair that sits in the corner.

"You overreacted," Alex observes. "Players talk shit about GMs and coaches all the time."

I suck in a deep breath through my nose, let it slide out slowly through my lips. I pull the towel away, gingerly touching the wound. Just a tiny bit of blood comes away, so I press it back on. "I agree we express our frustrations about management, but Christ, Alex...you heard him. He was talking about rape."

"He never said those words," Alex says with a hard edge to his voice.

"That's what he meant," I grumble.

"You don't know that. What he said was crude and way out of line, but he was drunk. You should have let me as the captain handle it or gone to Coach Pretore."

"Fine, whatever," I growl. I know he's right, but damn it all to hell...I feel fucking fantastic for clocking the shit out of him.

"If Claude reports this, you could be in trouble. Technically, he could bring criminal charges against you."

"Yeah...don't really care, Alex," I say as I push up from my chair. "Thanks for your concern, but I think it's time for you to go."

I walk over to the door and pull it open. Alex stares at me a moment, and with a sigh stands from his perch on the mattress. He scrubs one hand through his hair and scratches at the back of his head as he walks toward me. Just before he steps past me into the hallway, he turns and says, "Listen...sorry I came down hard on you. I just don't want to see you get off track. You're killing it in the net and this team needs you to stay focused."

"I get it," I say tersely.

"Do you?" he asks seriously. "Because I get what you were doing. You're defending a new set of principles that management has put into play, and those principles are not popular with the team as a whole. You're going to alienate yourself from everyone."

"Are you telling me you're aligned with Claude's way of thinking?" I ask with narrowed eyes. Because if that's the case, I've just lost every bit of respect for him as a captain.

"Of course not, you douche," Alex snarls at me. "Claude can't see past the fact that Gray is a woman. That's his only problem with her, and it's not a problem that I have at all. She's got the qualifications. I am not, however, convinced about her making contract-signing decisions based on some mathematical formulas. You have to look at more than that."

"It's more than just a mathematical formula," I defend.

"We'll see," Alex says quietly. "But I am willing to give her a fair shot to prove this works."

I nod at Alex in understanding and I really can't hold fault with his thinking. That's fair and I get his point about Claude. That guy is a sexist, chauvinistic asshole who isn't smart enough to comprehend what Gray is trying to accomplish.

Still, I know I'll have to keep my eye on him. Alex is right. He was drunk and spouting off.

But I also know that the things that Claude said about Gray came from a very dark place inside of him, and there was a layer of truth and deep-seated belief. I don't trust that son of a bitch and I would not put it past him to do so

mething crazy.

Chapter 8

Gray

I don't wait for Ryker outside of the studio this time because I don't want to appear anxious. In fact, I'm not anxious. I've spent the last day and a half telling myself over and over again that this is just a general manager having coffee with her starting goalie. We can talk about hockey and I even brought a little folder that has some charts I printed out that shows a progression of his save percentages by month and how they compare to the other goalies in the league. While I can't figure out why, for some reason his save percentage always peaks in March of every year. Fascinating--probably irrelevant--but at least it gives us something to talk about.

When Ryker walks into the studio, the first thing I notice is that he's without a gym bag this time. He's wearing a pair of black track pants with a silver stripe down each powerful leg and a black nylon pullover with the Cold Fury logo. As my eyes travel upward, I can't help the tiny little gasp that comes out of my mouth when I look at his face.

He has two butterfly bandages over his right temple and a massive bruise surrounding it. The bruise then travels downward and curls around his cheekbone to come to rest halfway underneath his right eye. I take an involuntary step toward him, but he gives me a tiny shake of his head.

Message received. It's not the time to talk about it.

So I call the class to order and I take them through the workout. Melissa isn't here today, so I don't have to waste any potential brain cells worrying over Ryker being interested in her. Not that that matters to me, because it doesn't. It's just...I don't want him to be distracted while he's working out.

Yeah...I want him to be focused, because this will help his skills and flexibility, and I'm trying to build a championship team. That's all there is to it.