“You’re gonna make me say it?” He exhales the long-suffering sigh of a man carrying a great burden. “Fine. Your knee?—”
“My knee is fine.”
“You’re full of shit.”
“It’s fine.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“So the wincing every time you stand, the limp that’s getting worse—you’re doing that for fun?”
I clamp my jaw shut. Noah has known me longer than most, and better than almost anyone. He knew me before the injury. Before the surgery. He knows when I’m lying.
He shifts forward again, elbows to knees. “Just because me and your physio girl are the only ones who’ll say it to your face doesn’t mean we’re the only ones who notice.”
My eyes widen at the implication that Elliot is mine in any way. “I don’t care who notices. People can think whatever the hell they want about me. My only focus is getting the team?—”
“To the Cup,” he finishes for me. “Yeah, we all know your endgame, Ace. And let’s say we do it. Let’s say we win the playoffs and the Cup is ours. At the rate you’re going, you won’t be able to walk onto the ice to hoist it over your head.”
He’s right. As much as I hate it, he’s right.
“What am I supposed to do?” I mutter. “I’ve seen the doctors. I’ve tried the exercises. And there isn’t a physiotherapist out there who can put up with me.”
His grin makes a slow return. “You sure? Because I can think of one.”
I scoff. Just because Elliot has managed to survive our encounters with her head held high doesn’t mean she could handle me as a patient. I’d break her like all the rest.
“I’m just saying,” he adds, smug now. “I think you two could help one another.”
I watch him stand, unfolding his long limbs with infuriating ease. No stiffness. No hesitation. No pain. I should hate him for that alone.
“I’ve got to get tomyphysio session.” He lifts an eyebrow at me as he heads for the door. “Sure you don’t want to come? All the cool kids are doing it.”
I give a single shake of my head. “Pass.”
“Suit yourself.” He checks his phone before he leaves, hisexpression changing from confused, to surprised to giddy in about ten seconds flat.
“What’s so funny?” I ask because I can’t help it.
“It seems your girl brought in cookies for the guys.”
“Stop calling her my girl.” The very idea that someone like Elliot, someone so good and full of optimism, could ever be with someone like me is laughable. In a cruel joke kind of way. “Why is that funny?”
He steps forward and holds out his phone to me, shoulders shaking. There’s a picture open on the screen. It takes me a moment to understand exactly what I’m looking at.
What the fuck?
CHAPTER SEVEN
ELLIOT
I feellike I’ve been summoned to the principal’s office for the first time in my life—except I’m thirty-two, not twelve, and the stakes are much higher than detention.
My steps are slow, like I’m trying to buy myself time or run out the clock. I run through possible openings like a comedian trying for the perfect punchline.Obviously,I have to apologize for the way I spoke to him yesterday. That’s the smart, survival-move thing to do.
But he should apologize too for the crap he said to me. I’m not naive enough to think that’s going to happen. I’m the one on a probationary period. He’s the one with all the power. All it would take is one curt phone call from him and I’d be gone.
