They did manage to squeak one into the net past Ziggy, but Davis answered with a second goal less than a minute later. Now he was on hatty watch, and at the end of the second, we had a 3-1 lead. Everyone knew that was the most dangerous lead, though; at 3-1, the winning team often let their foot off the gas at the same time the losing team got desperate. It wasn’t unusual at all for a team to be winning 3-1 only to ultimately lose 3-4.
Not happening tonight. No fucking way.
During a commercial break in the third period, the announcer said, “The Pittsburgh Whiskey Rebels would like to extend our congratulations to Rachel Erlandsson, widow of our beloved captain, Leif Erlandsson. Their son Adrian arrived tonight at 7:19 pm. Mom and baby are both doing fine.”
As the crowd went wild, an image appeared on the screen of Rachel holding the swaddled newborn with her older kids on either side of her.
The announcer’s voice barely carried over the cheers: “Welcome to Pittsburgh, Adrian Avery Erlandsson.”
Wow. They’d given the kid Avery’s name as a middle name? Though… I wasn’t surprised now that I thought about it. It was a sweet gesture, and Leif probably would’ve loved it. Hell, maybe it had been his idea.
What I did know was that the announcement gave the crowd a surge of energy, and that in turn gave us a surge.
I smacked Davis’s shoulder. “Think you’ve got a hat trick in you tonight?”
He scoffed and smacked me right back. “Fuck yeah, I do. Let’s go!”
I turned to Eminem, who was my right winger while Avery was out. “Let’s get Davis a hatty, yeah?”
He flashed me a big grin and bumped my fist. “The fans will bring down the house if we do!”
“Perfect! Let’s do it!”
A minute later, the third line was peeling away for a line change, and Coach sent us out. Jersey still had their fourth line on the ice, and they were both gassedandhemmed into their own end.
Eminem was first over the boards as our tired forwards came back. My skates had barely touched the ice before he was slamming a winger into the glass and relieving him of the puck. He came around the back of the goal, scanning the players. I slapped my blade on the ice and he passed without hesitating.
A defenseman tried to intercept it, but I bodied him out of the way. Two others were barreling down on me, but I spun away from one and took the other’s hip check without flinching… or losing the puck.
A stick smacked on the ice, and I turned to see Eminem wide open. I sent the puck to him. It had barely hit his tape before he shot it toward the goal.
And there was Davis, waiting at the edge of the crease.
He tapped it in under the goalie’s pads, and he was right—the fans brought down the house.
We all piled on Davis, hugging him and smacking him as hats fell all around us. When we skated to the bench for fist bumps, all the guys were roaring and effusive. The energy in this arena had already been off the charts, and now it was in the stratosphere.
In the end, the score was 6-1.
“Hey. Check it out.” Davis gestured at the scoreboard, and he sounded a little choked up. “It’s Early’s number.”
I looked at the score, then at the jersey hanging in the rafters.
Sixty-one.
Absolutely perfect.
Avery looked like death warmed over when I went to pick him up for our informal practice the next day.
“Come on in.” He stood aside. “I still need to finish my coffee and hunt down some sneakers.”
“No rush.” I stepped into the house, and as he shut the door behind me, I added, “If we beat the guys there, they can wait.”
He offered a tired laugh as he wrapped his arms around me. “Damn right they can.” We shared a long, lazy kiss that almost made me reconsider going to practice at all. I’d already skated with the team this morning. Couldn’t we just spend the afternoon doing… other cardio?
I wanted to help him be as close to game condition as possible when he came back, though; his conditioning loan to the minors was coming up fast, and the more he did now, the less ground he’d need to make up.
When Avery broke the kiss and gazed at me with heavy-lidded eyes, my resolve wavered again. Just a quickie before we left? That wouldn’t hurt anything, would it?
