The line goes dead.
Naomi lowers her phone, grinning to herself. Her heart is still thudding a little too hard. Her face feels warm, and her entire body is buzzing with glee from getting under that massive man’s skin.
CHAPTER 9
NAOMI
As she speed-walks down King Street West, Naomi narrowly avoids a rogue taxi splash and a slushy crater disguised as a puddle. The downtown sidewalks are a minefield of snowmelt and suited office workers on their lunch breaks. She tucks her chin into her scarf and pushes forward, boots clicking, eyes scanning for a clear path and a miracle.
Her heeled ankle boots are already damp, and she regrets wearing the nice ones.
She has approximately one hour to find Garrett Tall somewhere inside the labyrinth that is the Marlies’ arena, touch his stick, and make it back to the office in time to pretend she didn’t almost get frostbite doing a favor for a superstitious goalie.
This morning had been a full-blown gong show. She’d already lived through back-to-back client calls and a caffeine shortage of biblical proportions. Then Richard had summoned her to his corner office to redline her email sequences for the mattress client. Again.
“‘Sink into Stillness’ sounds like a slogan for a drowning,” he’d said, smirking. “Maybe let’s not suggest our mattress is a gateway to the afterlife?”
Okay. Fair. But also? Shut up, Richard.
She speeds up, tugging her wool coat tighter around her as flurries drift down from the relentlessly gray sky, sticking to her hair and lashes. The wind claws at her face, icy and rude.
By the time she reaches the arena’s threshold, her toes are fully numb, her carefully faked loose curls are crisping into tiny icicles, and her patience—already hanging by a thread—is officially gone.
She’s been here before for concerts, mostly. Student discount nosebleeds in university, a few post-grad girls’ nights with overpriced drinks and ears ringing for days after. It’s not as big or flashy as where the Leafs play, but it still seats thousands.
Now, it’s eerily quiet. No crowds, no beer lines, no bass thumping through the walls. Just the low hum of refrigeration systems and the occasional flicker of ancient fluorescent lights overhead. The whole place feels like it’s holding its breath.
She stops in the concourse, fingers stiff as she digs through her purse for her phone and jabs out a text to him.
Here.
Come find me down below.
She rolls her eyes so hard it’s a miracle she doesn’t detach a retina.
“Cool,” she mutters. “Love a scavenger hunt.”
She heads down the corridor, the soles of her boots echoing on polished concrete. Somewhere behind the cinderblock walls, she hears the low clatter of pucks and the rhythmic scrape of blades.
She types again, fingers starting to tingle and burn from the change in temperature.
Hotter/colder clues or nah?
No response.
She glares at her phone.
God, he’s annoying.
A burst of laughter echoes down a side hallway, and she pivots toward the sound, hurrying around the corner. A cluster of Whalers players in warmup gear have taken over a stretch of the corridor, clearly unsorry about it. They’re playing keepy-uppy with a soccer ball.
She exhales in relief and beelines toward the only guy whose name she remembers with full certainty.
“Hey, Carter,” she calls. “Have you seen Tall?”
Carter juggles the ball off his knee, flicks it toward another player, then turns and gives her a full-wattage grin.
“Hey, Red,” he says. “You come to watch us cook tonight? We’re on a heater.”
