“Hey.”
“Hi.”
He’s barely making eye contact, and that’s fair. It’s been like that since that dinner at his place. I clear my throat and look down the aisle. No one is coming this way, but before I can apologize, Abbott grabs a Gatorade and heads down the aisle to his seat next to Conner Garrison.
When we finally land and hop on the bus to the hotel in Las Vegas, I feel a weird sense of melancholy. I love the West Coast. I miss it. Angela and I used to go to Vegas a lot for vacation. Everything is familiar, but I feel like a stranger.
At the hotel, it’s the same drill it always is with the Riptide. A whole team of hotel employees is at the ready with keys in front of them. I give them my name, grab my key, and tell Grady I’ll meet him in the lobby for dinner. We’ve been invited to Nash Westwood’s for dinner tonight.
I manage to slip into the elevator that Abbott gets in, and I get off on his floor, even though my room key says I’m two floors lower than him. “Hey. Abbott!”
He turns. I try to smile, but it feels weird. “I was wondering if I could talk to you for a second?”
“Yeah. Sure.” He sounds like I just asked if I could scratch his back with a cheese grater.
He dislikes me, and he has every right to. We stand awkwardly in the hall, both holding our small wheelie travel bags, until I finally say, “In private? Like a second in your hotel room?”
He looks like he’s actually considering saying no. He probably wants to, but he’s the captain, and he kind of has to deal with my stupid ass. So he nods curtly and we walk the few feet to his room, where he swipes the key card and turns the handle. He walks in before me and doesn’t really hold the door, so I have to catch it with my foot.
He walks past the bathroom and into the main part of the room, tossing the key card on the small desk by the floor-to-ceiling windows. He lets go of the handle on his bag and turns to face me. I’m stuck in the small hallway by the door that just closed, not wanting to invade his space more than I have to. “I know about you and Grady.”
His face remains stoic. “Know? Know what?”
I shove my hands in the front pockets of my dress pants, my shoulders turning in, and fight to keep eye contact. “After dinner that night, he told me you knew he was gay, and I figured out why he would tell you when he doesn’t tell anyone else. And well, it made me into a bit of a jealous bitch, which is why I’ve been… a little cold to you.”
“Grady… you think Grady is gay?” Abbott leans against the side of the small desk, all casual and calm, like this isn’t the most awkward conversation ever. Forget the Stanley Cup, give the man an Oscar.
“I sure hope he is,” I quip. “Because giving life-altering blow jobs seems like a weird hobby for a straight guy.”
He scratches the back of his neck by his hairline, where his wavy blond hair curls the most. He’s fighting a smile, I can tell, and he finally decides to be honest with me. “So that’s why you were pissy at warm-up the other night? Hitting Grady with the puck, on purpose, and giving me stares so cold I think I got frostbite? Because we hooked up once, with no strings attached, a lifetime ago?”
“Yeah. I’ve got feelings for Grady.”
Abbott stops leaning on the desk and pulls himself to his full height. “Wow. I did not see that coming.”
“You and me both,” I admit as I wipe my sweating palms on my pants.
“Grady knows how you feel?”
“I mean… he’s aware there’s a sexual attraction. It seems to be mutual.”
Abbott lifts both eyebrows momentarily, but he also smiles. “Grady is a great guy, but as long as I’ve known him, he’s not a… relationship guy.”
“I don’t know that I am either, at the moment.”
He nods. “Well, lucky for you, there’s no fraternization clause in our contracts when it comes to other players, because in spite of my existence, they still don’t consider gay relationships as a possibility.”
I hadn’t even stopped to consider a code of conduct breach or a violation of our contracts when Grady and I started messing around. But fuck, Abbott is right. They don’t have a single rule about sexual relationships between teammates because they treat it like an impossibility, which seems homophobic in its own way.
“But I think it can make things messy. Just like if you were dating a trainer or whatever.”
“I don’t think we’re dating,” I say and try not to sound disappointed. “Anyway, just really wanted to clear the air because I’m having enough trouble finding my place on this team. I didn’t want to have a captain who doesn’t like me on top of it.”
Abbott smiles and walks closer to me. “I like you, but more importantly, now I understand you.”
My phone starts ringing. I grab my bag and slip out of the room with a wave to Abbott before I pull it out of my pocket. The number on the screen is Coach LaRue. “Hi, Coach.”
“Casco, can you come down to the lobby? We’ve got a situation.”
