I didn’t move until I was sure there was nobody else in here with me. Voices faded in the hallway, then the quiet settled in pockets. I waited.
The second I could no longer hear anyone, I let the ache roll in. Not a slow creep. More like the joint had been waiting for its chance. The weight of everything hit the back of my neck at once, then started working through my gear.
Elbow pads first. Then chest protector. My right arm wouldn’t lift cleanly, so I angled my body and eased the fabric over my head in little increments. Sweat hadn’t made any of it easier. The tape had baked itself into my skin. My jersey felt glued on, and when I worked it free, my shoulder twitched in warning. The pull settled behind the bone, muttering to me about consequences.
I told myself I’d been smart out there. Stayed within my lane. No reckless hits. No desperate reaches. But then the reel in my head replayed a few moments I could have dialed back. A lunge on a broken play. A stretch along the blue line I didn’t need. Not reckless, but unnecessary. I’d taken the gift the Coyotes gave us and used it like I was invincible.
“You really are an idiot,” I mumbled under my breath.
I picked at the tape, but it fought back with teeth. My fingers slipped twice. Sweat made the edge stubborn, and every tug set something deep in the joint quivering. I gripped the strip between my thumb and forefinger, tried again. My hand shook. Jaw locked. I took a breath, then pressed my elbow to my thigh to steady it, but the angle pulled too much at the wrong place. My shoulder bit at me, and I swallowed down the grunt that almost punched free.
One more try. I dug at the corner of the tape, pried it up by millimeters. The adhesive clung. A pulse of pain climbed toward my collarbone, not a sting but a dense swell that made the room tilt its weight to one side.
Then a hand closed over mine.
My lungs went tight. Instinct kicked in, the kind that told me to jerk away, square up, guard the shoulder like it mattered more than breathing. I didn’t twist, not with the joint already on its last nerve, but every muscle braced.
“It’s okay. Let me.”
Reese. Her voice settled exactly where my panic had been climbing.
She eased my hand aside and pinched the edge I’d been mangling. No commentary. No pity. She peeled it back with clean control, the tape lifting under her thumb as if it hadn’t been welded to me for hours. Each release tugged along raw skin, and the joint reacted with a deep pulse that radiated outward like a bruise waking up.
“Have I ever told you that you have the best timing?”
“Hold still.”
She moved to the next strip. That one had worked itself into the line of my deltoid, and when she loosened the corner, something inside my shoulder gave a hard throb that made my whole arm feel like it couldn’t be trusted.
I clenched the edge of the bench to hold steady. If she noticed, she didn’t say it. In fact, she was strangely quiet while she worked.
“I lied before.” Her fingers stalled, and that’s how I knew she was listening. “In the med bay…” I drew it out, savoring her rapt attention, knowing she hated having to give it to me butcouldn’t help herself. “You don’t have any chin whiskers. I was just messing with y— Ow!”
She’d slapped the side of my head, which helped to shut me up, but it also made my neck jerk in a weird angle that my shoulder definitely didn’t like. More to the point, she didn’t care. Her hands moved faster now, peeling back the last two strips with even less sympathy than when she’d started. And she’d started with none.
“I felt good out there tonight.” It was time to get to work appeasing. “I really think it’s working.”
“We haven’t started anything yet.” She pulled another section off. “What you felt was tape, gel, painkillers, and adrenaline. They don’t fix anything.”
It sucked to hear it, but at least she was talking.
“I’ll be happy to take that awesome foursome to the bank, and finish the season on a high,” I said, and sighed as she removed the last strip. It felt like my whole body was sighing with me.
But Reese didn’t buy my bravado. “You’re going to need two arms if you want to lift that Cup.”
The joint pulsed again, deeper this time. A reminder that she was right. A reminder that I didn’t want her to be.
“Then you better keep me in one piece,” I said, turning my head enough so I could flash her one of my winning smiles.
She didn’t return it, but the look on her face told me she was still in this. Still willing to help me keep my secret, as long as I kept hers.
8
Reese
“Salt Lake winds do nothing for my hair,” Josie muttered as we stepped out of the elevator. She tried patting down a flyaway, gave up, and let Cass tug her toward the dining room. The rest of the team filtered ahead in loose groups, half-awake but mostly ready for the early fixture.
The general mood was subdued. After their two home wins against Utah HC, everyone expected more of the same. A Round 1 white wash.
