Page 119 of Game Misconduct

“Maybe about what’s making you not okay?”

Leif fell back again, sighing. “The locker room has been … weird lately.”

He could talk about that, even if he couldn’t say what was really bothering him.

“Yeah? Because Nicky came back and you’re worried about your spot?”

“Honestly? No,” Leif admitted. “That isn’t it.”

“So what is?”

“I’ve mentioned it’s not a very … welcoming locker room, right?”

“Yep.”

“Well, after—after that night we had in Boston,” Leif said, “one of the guys noticed the hickey you left. He made a crack about it.”

“Fuck!” Tanner said. “I am so sorry. I wasn’t even paying attention and I didn’t?—”

“I know.” Leif cut his ramble off. “I know you didn’t do it on purpose.”

“So what did he say?”

Leif repeated it and Tanner made a low noise in the back of his throat. “Duuude, fuck that guy. I am so going to fuck him up the next time we play.”

“I don’t need you to beat up my teammates for me,” Leif said. Not to mention the fact that by pro hockey standards, Tanner was not exactly a tough guy. He was a scrappy puppy, nipping at someone’s ankle.

“You can’t stop me,” Tanner said darkly.

Despite himself, Leif chuckled. “Itwouldbe a nice change to have you annoy someone else on the ice.”

“You know you love it, Princess.”

I love you, Leif thought and for one horrifying second, he was sure he’d said that aloud.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Tanner was psyched for the team’s west coast trip.

Crawford had been out for a couple of games with a minor injury, so Tanner had been playing with one of the call-ups. It was fine but also annoying because he and Crawford had kind of an unspoken connection.

Playing with someone new always felt like trying to pat his head and rub his stomach at the same time. And, of course, by the time he was really settling into a groove with the new kid, Crawford was back and they were headed out to Vegas.

In Vegas, the team—minus Crawford who was visiting his family—checked out a show and had dinner. They played the next day, absolutely destroying Vegas before they headed to San Jose, where they won again.

After that, they headed to Los Angeles.

Tanner was always psyched to hang out with the boys, but L.A. wasespeciallyfun.

They had some free time after practice and Jesse planned a trip to the La Brea Tar Pits. They were super fucking weird. Big-ass holes in the ground with sticky black goo bubbling up out of the earth, right in the middle of the city.

There were fences around the pits of course, to keep idiots from falling in or, like … trying to ride one of the realistic-looking mammoth sculptures.

Tanner squinted at them. Okay, riding one did look kinda fun …

He got a few photos through the fence, then stopped on the walkway bridge thingy over the Lake Pit where the fence was only about waist height. He had a good view of the family of them. Two of them—one ababy—stood safely along the edge of the pit. Tanner frowned at the adult in the middle of the pool, clearly stuck and struggling and looking like it was about to drown.

Tanner knew it wasn’t arealmammoth or anything, but it made him think of the real ones they’d found bones of in the pits and it made him kinda sad, imagining how scared it would have been. His eyes watered and he blinked a little.