In the Zone (Portland Storm 5) (36 page)

“I’ll think about it,” I finally hedged, not willing to give him a definitive answer one way or the other. The fact was, I was leaning toward doing exactly that for him. I couldn’t explain it, but the more willing I was to step outside of my comfort zone in terms of my body image issues, at least when Keith was involved, the less they seemed to plague me. I still wasn’t sure I was ready to wear that skimpy outfit that the seamstress had made for my performance with Devin, but I was at least a lot closer to ready than I had been a few weeks ago. The way he looked at me, no matter what I was wearing, gave me a confidence that had been sorely lacking for a very long time.

“I guess I’ll have to accept a maybe, then, and hope for the best.”

He pulled back a bit, far enough that he could tip my head up toward him, and he kissed me very soundly. I pushed up on my tiptoes to meet him, deepening the kiss. We were both out of breath, our pulses frantic, by the time we had to separate.

“You really have to go?” I asked, even though I knew the answer.

“I do. Four days, Brie. That’s all. I’ll be back on the thirtieth. Well, late that night, but still.”

“I know.”

He cupped my face with both hands, planting kisses over every spare inch of skin he could find, it seemed. That was more than enough to steal what little breath I had left. No one had ever kissed me like that before, as though every piece of me was precious. When he released me and stepped toward the door, I had to put a hand on the bar between my kitchen and living room to steady myself.

“I love you, Brie,” he said.

Then he walked through the doorway and was gone.

I
SPENT A
lot of time with Colesy on the road that trip. He admitted that he didn’t know exactly what he had going with Shane, but that it was nice to know he could potentially be in a relationship and have someone know about it and be okay with it. I tried not to pry, but I inadvertently did when I asked him why no one from his family came to visit for the holidays.

“Dad is about as homophobic as they come,” he told me over coffee. “Once I came out to my parents, Dad pretty much wrote me off. He won’t let Mom have anything to do with me. She secretly sends me letters and stuff. I wish she’d stop, though, because if he finds out…”

The way he left it hanging made me wonder if his father was a violent man. I got the distinct sense that I wasn’t too far off the mark.

“Well, you don’t have to worry about anything where I’m concerned,” I assured him. “I’m pretty sure you could come out to the rest of the team if you wanted and everything would be fine. But only if that’s something you want to do.”

He changed the subject pretty quickly, so I knew my suspicions were right and he wasn’t ready for that kind of step. But he did have me, at least. I was glad I could be the one person he felt comfortable enough to be real with. I only wished there were more.

That could come in time.

Even though we were only gone for four days on this trip, we had three games. We beat San Jose five to four in a wild one on Saturday afternoon, then flew down to LA. Sunday night, we lost to the Kings when we left Bobby out to dry. The second game of a back-to-back was always iffy, and as Hunter’s backup, Bobby had drawn the short end of that stick. None of us had any legs after the track meet of a game we’d had the day before against the Sharks. We finally had a day off again on Monday, complete with no travel, before we were set to face Anaheim.

I talked to Brie as often as I could while we were gone, but between my schedule and hers, it wasn’t easy to find moments that worked for both of us. Whether she would have been willing to give me a show on FaceTime or not, there hadn’t been a good time for us to work that out, either.

She hadn’t told me that she loved me, too. And maybe she didn’t. Maybe not yet. I’d jumped headfirst into love with her a lot faster than I’d ever imagined, so it was only natural to think that it might take her a little longer to get there. How long did it take most people to fall in love? I’d never bothered to ask anyone. It had never seemed to matter until now.

As long as she knew that I loved her, though, and she wasn’t trying to pull away from me again, I was all right with waiting for her to get there. I told her again every time we talked, sometimes more than once. She would usually get a little quiet when I told her, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad sign. It could just mean that she was trying to let it sink in. I’d noticed that she did the same thing every time I told her how beautiful she was, too.

Regardless of all that, something between us was awkward when we talked Monday night. We’d been on the phone for at least twenty minutes, all of them slightly uncomfortable, before I finally figured out what wasn’t quite right.

She’d been telling me about her latest rehearsal with Devin, how they’d finally finished all the choreography and there would be no more changes to the piece for the New Year’s Day show. Tomorrow was the dress rehearsal.

“I can’t wait to see you dancing that number in front of a real audience,” I said. “The way you come alive even in practice? I bet it’s magnified a hundredfold when you’re on a stage with all the lights.”

“I’m nervous,” she admitted quietly.

“This is what you do, though. There’s no reason to be nervous.” I always had a slight case of nerves before going out for a game, but once my skates hit the ice, all my nerves melted away. Then it was only adrenaline and the repetition of practice that got me through.

“It’s not about dancing. That’s about the only part of my life where I feel truly confident.”

“Then what?”

Brie hemmed and hawed, putting off giving me a real answer. But then she finally came out with it. “The seamstress came back with my outfit today, all complete with sequins and beads and whatnot. It fits a little too well.”

There was no such thing as something fitting Brie too well, at least not in my mind, but I had a feeling that telling her that would have the opposite effect of what I was going for. I bit my tongue, giving a thoughtful, “Hmm…” and then waiting for her to finish.

“The way it’s cut, and the way it hugs my body… I’m just worried that I’ll be so focused on the fact that people other than you are seeing me dressed that way that I won’t focus on the dancing.”

“The way you move, they aren’t going to be able to focus on the dress, Brie.”

“You’re only saying that to make me feel better.”

“No, I’m not. I doubt that even
I
will be able to focus on how you look in that dress, and I can promise you that I
want
to focus on that, at least a little.” I waited until she chuckled. “Have Devin and Tanya seen you in it?”

“Yeah. And Shane, too. He came by today to take me to dinner and got there just in time for me and Devin to do a rehearsal in it.”

I was a little jealous that my brother had seen her in it before I did. Not to mention the fact that he’d gotten to go to dinner with her tonight. Okay, maybe I was a lot jealous. “What did they have to say?”

“They said no one will be looking at the dress.” Her voice held a definite pout.

“Well, then, I guess I was right.”

“Maybe.”

“Mmm-hmm. You keep thinking that. When I get back to Portland, you can dance in it for me and then we’ll really see.”

“Or I could dance for you in something else…”

My mind raced through all the different pieces of lingerie she hadn’t worn for me yet, and I imagined watching her doing a strip-tease. A reminder alarm on my phone beeped in my ear, though, telling me I had to get off the phone and call it a night. I had to be up early for a leadership meeting before morning skate, and Bergy would murder me if I wasn’t well rested.

“Time’s up,” I said halfheartedly. The last thing I wanted to do right now was hang up the phone and try to sleep. There would be very little chance of me actually sleeping if all my thoughts were on Brie and her sexy body doing a dance just for me. “Gotta hit the hay.”

“Mmm…me too,” she murmured. “With all these practices, I’m worn out. Thank goodness I haven’t had any classes to teach the last couple of weeks. I don’t know how I’ll get through the work on the music video once classes resume.”

“You’ll figure it out.” I had no doubt that Brie could do anything she set her mind to. “I love you, Brie.”

She fell silent for a few moments, quiet enough for so long that I thought I might be able to hear her heartbeat through the phone. That might only be one of her cats purring, though. It was really hard to tell.

Then, “Good night, Keith.”

“Good night.”

We hung up, and I was still waiting to hear those three little words from her mouth.

B
ERGY PULLED ME
, Colesy, and the rest of the Storm’s defensemen aside after morning skate on Tuesday before our game against the Ducks. “Nicky’s back in tonight,” he said, his arms crossed over his chest. “The doctors have cleared him, and he’s been looking really good in practices, so he’s getting the start. We’re going to send Bobby back to Seattle, which I’m sure they’ll be glad about.”

The Seattle Storm was our AHL affiliate team. Without Bobby, they’d really been struggling in goal. That was one area that the Storm organization apparently didn’t have enough depth. I knew Jim Sutter, our general manager, had been trying to work out some sort of trade for another goaltender of decent skill to plug in over there, but as of yet nothing had panned out.

Bergy looked each of us in the eye, glaring through us with the same kind of intensity he used to bring to the game in his playing days. “It’s been a while since he’s seen any game action, though. He’s going to be rusty as a fucking nail, and that means he’s going to be relying on the six of you more than ever. So everything we’ve been working on, all the communication that I’ve been preaching, that all comes into play tonight more than ever before. You’d fucking better be talking to each other out there, and talking to Nicky. And if you don’t, you’re going to find your asses glued to the bench. Am I clear?”

A chorus of “Yeah,” and “Got it,” met his pronouncement.

Apparently we’d been doing what he wanted lately because Bergy hadn’t changed up the defensive pairings in weeks—not since he’d put me and Colesy together. Each of the partnerships had definitely had some struggles at first, but things were really starting to click. Well, as long as you ignored that last game against the Kings. I was pretty sure we would all like to put that one as far in the past as possible and forget that it had ever happened.

“Burnzie, you and Colesy are going to be stuck like glue to the Getzlaf line all night. Every time they go out, you go out, too. Pay particular attention to Perry. That guy has Nicky’s number and always has. I don’t want him getting in Nicky’s head tonight, so I want you to deal with him.”

I couldn’t stop the grin from stealing over me. There was nothing I liked better than playing against a guy like Corey Perry. He talked trash all night long, but he could back it up, and he always played right on the edge of what was legal. Sometimes he crossed over that line, but he was always right there, pushing until you broke.

There wasn’t a chance in hell I was going to break.

“I can handle that,” I said, nodding at Colesy. Perry was definitely my responsibility for the night. Dealing with that guy would require no small amount of the snarl I could bring to the table. It was just the thing I needed since I couldn’t get Brie off my mind.

“Glad you’re looking forward to it,” Colesy said when we were heading back to the locker room to clean up. “That guy drives me insane.”

“Me too. Good thing for us that makes me a better player when someone’s driving me insane.”

Sure enough, Perry seemed to have an extra-pesky streak to his game tonight, always trying to get in tight on Nicky. He kept me on my toes, but no matter how hard he tried, he never quite got clear of me.

Not until midway through the third period of a scoreless game, at least.

Up until that point, the
D
had done a great job of keeping all of the Ducks forwards out of the middle. We let them have room from the outside, trusting that Nicky could see those shots and stop them. And he’d done a great job of it so far all night.