Nothing but Trouble (Chinooks #5) (13 page)

“That’s pretty good.”

Derek smiled as the late afternoon sun caught fire in his hair and bounced off his white forehead.

“Watch this.” He bent his knees, hunched over, and put pressure on the insides of the skates. He rolled back a couple of inches and beamed like he’d just scored a hat trick. What Derek lacked in skill, he made up for in heart. Heart was the one indefinable element that made a good player into a great player. No amount of drills could teach heart.

“You’re getting there.” Too bad heart wasn’t enough. “But you’re bent over looking at your feet. What’s the number one rule in hockey?”

“No whining.”

“Number two.”

“Keep your head up.”

“That’s right.” He pointed his cane at the boy. “Have you been practicing your step-overs and jumps?”

Derek sighed. “No.”

He lowered his cane and looked at his watch. “Keep your head up and get going to the end of the driveway and back.”

Chelsea pushed back the heavy drapes and watched Derek lift one knee and then the other. He marched toward the end of the driveway, his arms out from his shoulders. As he attempted to turn around, he fell on his skinny behind.

“Keep your head up,” Mark yelled.

Derek dusted himself off and marched all the way back. He reminded Chelsea of Rupert Grint in the first Harry Potter movie. Only geekier.

Mark met him in the center of the drive and handed him a half-full bottle of Gatorade. Chelsea couldn’t hear what Mark said to the boy, just the deep timbre of his voice. Derek nodded and drank.

Mark took the bottle and returned it to the shade of the porch. “Two small. One big,” he called out to the kid, and Derek began jumping in place. He immediately fell.

Chelsea let go of the curtain and moved from the office. She walked outside and stood next to Mark. “I thought he was going to show you a few stops and go home. Why are you making him march and jump up and down?”

“The kid needs to learn balance.” He pointed his cane at the boy and hollered, “Now change it up. Small jump. Big jump. Small jump. Big jump. Bend your knees, Derek.”

“Who are you? Mr. Miyagi?” She held her hands up in front of her, palms out. “Wax on. Wax off. Bend your knees, Derekson.”

He chuckled. “Something like that.” He walked to the center of the driveway, a slight hitch in his otherwise fluid steps and his cane a smooth extension of his arm. Chelsea folded her arms beneath her breasts and sat on the porch. Mark pointed down the driveway, said something about pushing and gliding. Falling down and getting back up again.

“Use your hips. Head up,” Mark called after him. After about fifteen minutes of pushing and gliding, the kid was clearly winded. His cheek had turned a bright red, one of his knees was skinned, and Chelsea almost felt sorry for him. Almost, but the little liar had made her look bad.

He collapsed on the porch next to Chelsea and reached for his Gatorade. “I’m getting good,” he said before he upended the bottle and drained it. Chelsea was no expert, but even she could see the kid had a long way to go before he approached “getting good.”

The boy looked up at Mark, his eyes filled with exhaustion and hero worship. “Maybe I could come back and practice some more.”

Right, like Mark would want the kid hanging around. He didn’t like anyone hanging around.

A frown line creased Mark’s brow as if he had a sudden headache. “Check with Chelsea to see which days I’m free next week.”

Chelsea was shocked. “You’re free Wednesday and Friday.”

Derek set down the bottle and unbuckled his skates. “I have summer band practice on Wednesday.”

Of course he did. He probably played the tuba. Most of the skinny band-os she’d ever known had played the tuba. Kind of like most of the short guys she’d ever known had driven trucks.

“How about Tuesday and Thursday?” Mark countered.

“You’re house hunting those two mornings.”

“I can come in the afternoon,” Derek said as he tied his shoes. He stood and shoved his skates into a backpack he’d hidden next to the porch. He zipped the backpack closed and threaded his stick arms through the straps.

“Have your mom call me.” Mark placed his right hand on the kid’s sweaty head. “When you get home, drink lots of water and get lots of rest.”

“Okay, Coach.”

Chelsea bit the side of her lip. Inside his crusty, cantankerous, jerk-wad, wrapped-up-in-rhino-skin exterior, he was a softie.

She stood as Derek moved to the front of the garage where he’d left his bike. “Shouldn’t we give him a ride?”

“Hell no.” Mark scoffed. “He needs to build up the strength in his legs. He’s as weak as a girl. Riding a bike will be good for him.” He turned to look at Chelsea, at her two-tone hair and wild dress. He had an assistant who was more trouble than she was worth, and now a skinny, star-struck, wimpy kid stopping by twice a week. How in the hell had that happened? “It’s getting close to five.”

“I was just about to leave. Need anything before I go?”

There she went again. Asking him what he needed. “Not a thing.” He moved back out into the driveway as Derek rode away.

“See you Monday, then,” Chelsea called after him.

He raised a hand and moved to the garage door. He punched the code into the key pad, and the door slowly rose. If he was going to help the kid out, he needed his coach’s whistle. He ducked beneath the door and moved past his Mercedes. This week he hadn’t taken as much medication. His grasp was coming back in his right hand, and he was sure he could drive again soon. He flipped on a light and continued toward the shelves in the back.

The last time he’d seen his whistle and stopwatch, he’d shoved them in a gym bag. He leaned his cane against the wall and looked up at the floor-to-ceiling shelves. His gaze leveled on a blue equipment bag, and the air left his lungs as if he’d been punched in the chest. The bag was old and worn and had logged thousands of air miles. He didn’t need to look inside to know that it held his skates and pads. His helmet and jersey. His hockey shorts and socks were in there. Probably his protective cup too.

When management had come to him in the hospital to tell him the guys wanted to keep his stuff in his locker, he’d told them to pack it up and take it to his house. The guys had had enough to think about besides him. They hadn’t needed the daily reminder, and he hadn’t wanted to someday walk into the locker room and pack it all up.

Next to the equipment bag lay his long stick bag. And he didn’t need to see the Sher-Wood sticks inside to know that each blade had been manufactured especially for him, with a half-inch curve depth and a 6.0 lie. White grip tape wrapped around the handles, candy-caned down the black shafts, and wrapped heel to toe. His old life was in those two bags. Everything that he was and ever wanted to be. All that was left after nineteen years in the NHL was in those bags. That and the hero worship of one eight-year-old boy with skinny legs and weak ankles.

He’d told the boy he’d coach him twice a week, and he wasn’t quite sure how that had happened. One second he’d been thinking about getting inside out of the heat, and in the next he’d told the kid to check with Chelsea to see which days worked out best. He hadn’t even been thinking about coaching Derek, but the kid had looked up at him like Mark had once looked at guys like Phil Esposito and Bobby Hull. That look had dropped him quicker than a cheap shot to the cup.

He was a sucker. That explained it.

Of course, another explanation was that he didn’t have a lot going on in his life. He reached up and grabbed a smaller gym bag from one of the upper shelves. He had no job and no family. He was thirty-eight, divorced, and had no kids. His grandmother and father lived several states away. They had their own lives, and he saw them only about once a year.

What he did have was a house that was too big, a Mercedes he couldn’t yet drive, and an assistant who was driving him insane. The crazy part was that he was beginning to like Chelsea for no explainable reason. She had a smart mouth, and physically she wasn’t his type of woman. He was at least a foot taller than she and had to outweigh her by a hundred pounds. And as a general rule, he was attracted to women who liked him, not who looked at him as if he was a dickhead. Although he supposed he couldn’t blame her for that. He
was
a dickhead, which, surprisingly bothered him more than it used to.

He unzipped the bag, and inside was a whistle, a stopwatch, and a ball cap the kids from last year’s hockey camp had given him, with “#1 Coach” embroidered across it.

He took a few youth-sized sticks and orange cones off the shelf. Derek White didn’t have the innate skill to ever play professional hockey. He just wasn’t an athlete, but there were a lot of guys who loved the game and played in the beer leagues. Guys who were passionate and still had a lot of fun. Mark couldn’t remember the last time he’d laced up his skates with the sole purpose of having a good time.

He put the hat on his head and adjusted it a few times until he found the perfect spot. It felt good. Right. Like nothing had felt in a real long time. He’d loved hockey. Loved everything about it, but somewhere along the line, it had stopped being fun. Playing had been about winning. Every game. Every time.

From outside, he heard Chelsea’s car pull out of the driveway, and he moved toward the back door. He’d known his assistant for less than two weeks. Twelve days. It felt longer. She took charge of his days and invaded his sleep.

The other day she’d told him that he looked in control of his life. Hardly. Before the accident, he’d been in control on and off the ice. He’d controlled his personal life as well as his chaotic career. He’d controlled the sometimes out-of-control antics of his fellow teammates, and he’d controlled who walked into his home.

A nagging ache settled in his hip and thigh as he moved through the door and into the kitchen. He reached inside a drawer and pulled out a bottle of Vicodin. Now he controlled neither. He opened the bottle and looked down at the white pills spilling into his palm. It would be so easy. So easy to take a handful. To pop them into his mouth like PEZ and forget all his problems. To let the strong opiate do more than take away his pain. To let it numb his brain and pull him into a nice, cozy place where nothing mattered.

He thought of Chelsea and their conversation about control. He dumped all the pills back in the bottle. He still needed them for pain, but a lot of the time, he hadn’t been taking them for the pain in his body. If he wasn’t very careful, he’d end up liking them too much.

He thought of Chelsea playing hockey in her little skirt. If he wasn’t very,
very
careful, he might end up liking her too much too.

Friday night when Bo got home from work, she handed Chelsea a business card. On the front was the name and information of a media company that the Chinook organization used to produce all their commercials. Handwritten on the back was the name and number of the talent agency they used.

“I thought you might be interested,” Bo said. “Most of the time we use the players in our advertising, but sometimes we use local actors.”

She looked the card over and checked out the agency on the Internet. She’d be in Seattle for several more months. Depending on where she decided to have her breast surgery, maybe longer. She had to figure out something to do with her time, other than watch TV, go to nightclubs, answer Mark Bressler’s fan e-mail, and set up appointments with real estate agents. So why not? If she didn’t like the talent agency, she’d know within moments of walking in the doors. No harm, no foul. She’d take her résumé and leave.

On her way to work Monday, she called the agency and set up a meeting for Tuesday when Mark would be coaching Derek. An hour later, she switched cars and drove Mark to see the house in Bellevue. The seven-thousand-square-foot mansion on the waterfront in Newport Shores was filled with hand-crafted parquet flooring and massive oak timbers. The huge windows at the rear of the house looked out over a large backyard with a cabana and spa next to the swimming pool. It had a bar and a temperature-controlled wine room. As for opulence, it was on par with the house he currently lived in and had the added bonus of being priced a million dollars less.

Mark stood in the pantry about the size of Bo’s entire apartment and said, “I don’t need a house this big.”

Chelsea was pretty sure she’d told him the total square footage before they left his house.

“And I don’t want to live behind gates,” he added.

He’d never mentioned his aversion to gates, but if he’d looked at the information about the house that she’d printed out for him, he would have known. After they left the estate, she looked at him across the Mercedes and asked, “Do you sit around and think up ways to be difficult or is it a natural reflex? Like breathing.”

He put his mirrored glasses on the bridge of his nose. “I thought I was being nice today.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah.” He shrugged.

She shook her head. “I didn’t notice.” She paid more attention as she drove him to the dentist. And she supposed if sitting in uncomfortable silence equaled being nice for him, then yeah, he was nice. But an hour later on the way home from the dentist, he totally blew it with his horrid backseat driving again. Oddly enough, she found it more relaxing than his efforts to be nice.

“The light’s about to turn red.”

“It’s still yellow,” she pointed out as she sped through the intersection. “I thought you were going to be nice.”

“I can’t when I’m worried about getting killed. Are you sure you have a valid driver’s license?”

“Yes. Issued by the state of California.”

“Well, that explains it.”

Behind her sunglasses she rolled her eyes and changed the conversation. “Did you have cavities?”

“It wasn’t that kind of appointment. He just wanted to check my implants to make sure they are still okay.”

Chelsea knew about dental implants. She had a friend who’d knocked out her front teeth in a surfing accident. The dentist had drilled screws into her upper jaw, then stuck porcelain crowns on the spikes. If a person hadn’t known she’d had her teeth knocked out, you wouldn’t be able to tell. “How many do you have?”

“Three implants and four crowns.” He pointed to the top left side of his mouth. “I’m lucky.”

She wondered what he considered
un
lucky.

Tuesday afternoon she took her portfolio to the talent agency in downtown Seattle. She met with the owner, Alanna Bell, who reminded Chelsea a little of Janeane Garafalo. But the Janeane of ten years ago, before the actress had turned all bitter about life.

“What’s your real hair color?” Alanna asked as she riffled through a file folder.

“The last I checked, it was brown.”

“I could find more work for you if your hair isn’t two colors. Would you be willing to dye it if I asked you?”

She looked at all the posters and signed photographs on the wall of Alanna’s office. The vibe in the agency felt good. Right, and she should know. She’d met her fair share of sleazy agents. “I’d consider it, yes.”

“I see you’ve studied at the Theater of Arts.”

“Yes. As well as a few years at UCLA.”

Alanna handed her a monolog from
White Oleander
. Chelsea wasn’t a huge fan of cold readings, but it was part of the business. She took a deep breath, cleared her head of everything but the words in front of her, and read: “The Santa Anas blew in hot…” When she was through, she set the paper on the desk and waited as she had countless times before. But this time there was something different. Strangely enough, sitting in the agent’s office a thousand miles from Hollywood, cold reading, she felt the teasing nibble of the acting bug. Only it was calmer than it had been in years. She didn’t have to prove anything to anyone here in Seattle. Least of all herself. There was no pressure to meet the right people or compete for the right part that would launch her career. Here she could just act. She could relax and have fun with it. Something she hadn’t done in a while.

“I might have some background work for you this weekend.” She glanced down at Chelsea’s résumé. “HBO is sending up a crew to shoot around the Seattle Music Experience.”

Chelsea groaned inside. She wasn’t a fan of standing around in the background for hours, but it was a start and wouldn’t interfere with her real job. “Sounds great.”

“I assume you have a union card?”

Chelsea dug it out of her wallet and slid it across the desk. After several more moments, she shook Alanna’s hand and drove to Medina. Keeping her head in acting and exercising her craft before she returned to L.A. was a good idea. She’d heard of well-known actors and actresses who, after a few big movies, had left the spotlight to act in off-Broadway shows, only to return rejuvenated and with a clearer head. She’d never understood it before, but now she did. Her own head felt clearer. Chasing the dream for ten years had robbed her of the joy of acting. The fun of getting to play someone else for a while.

She drove down Mark’s street and pulled up next to the curb. It was a little after two, and Mark stood in the middle of his long driveway, one hand on his cane, the other on his hip. Instead of his regular uniform of white T-shirt and jogging pants, he wore a dark green polo and jeans. A beige ball cap shaded his eyes and cast a shadow across the lower half of his face. Derek stood several feet away, hockey stick in his hands, pushing a puck from side to side. Chelsea parked on the street to give them plenty of room. A slight breeze ruffled her hair and the bottom of her Burberry kilt skirt as she walked toward him. A pair of dark glasses shaded her eyes from the sun.

“How long do I have to do this?” the boy asked.

“Until you can do it and keep your head up,” Mark answered, looking so big and imposing next to such a skinny kid.

Chelsea stopped in front of him and pushed her sunglasses to the top of her head. “Do you guys need anything?”

He looked at her, and the shadow from his hat slid down his nose to the bow of his top lip. “Like what?”

“Water? Gatorade?”

Slowly, one corner of his mouth lifted. “No. That isn’t what I need.”

“Then what do you need?”

From within the shadow of his brim, his gaze lowered from her eyes to her mouth, down her chin and throat to the front of her white blouse. His attention felt almost like a physical caress. Her stomach got all light and her breath got stuck in her lungs as his gaze paused mid-chest before sliding to her skirt and bare thighs. Within the shadow of his hat she felt the heat of his brown eyes, and she half expected him to say that what he needed was her.

“How was your meeting?” he asked.

“What meeting?”

“With the talent agent.” He turned to watch Derek and she could breathe again. “Isn’t that where you went?”

Oh,
that
meeting. “It was good. She wants me to do background work at that Seattle Music Experience by the Space Needle.”

“What’s background work?” he asked without taking his attention from Derek.

“It’s just like it sounds. It means I stand in the background looking like I’m doing something important.” She pushed her hair from her face. “She asked me to dye my hair one color.”

“Head up and roll your wrists,” he called out to Derek. “Did you tell her no?”

She glanced up at him and her mouth parted in surprise. “You hate my hair.”

“I don’t hate it.”

“You said I looked like a Russian just off the boat.”

“I was talking more about your clothes.” He looked down at her, and once again the shadow of his hat slid to the bow of his top lip. “Your hair’s not so bad. I’ve gotten used to it.”

“Is this you trying to be nice again?”

“No. If I was trying to be nice, I’d tell you that you look good.”

Chelsea glanced down at her white blouse and Burberry kilt. “Because it’s more conservative than what I usually wear?”

He chuckled. “Because your skirt’s short.” He pointed his cane at Derek. “You can stop now. I think you’re ready for some passes.” He walked into the garage, and when he returned, he had a hockey stick in his right hand. He thrust it toward Chelsea. “Derek, you’re going to feed passes to Chelsea.”

“Me?”

“Her? She’s a girl.”

“That’s right,” Mark agreed, and she half expected him to say something sexist. “She’s little and quick, so you better watch yourself.”

She took the stick and pointed to her feet. “I’m in three-inch heels.”

“You don’t have to move. All you have to do is stop the puck.”

“I’m wearing a skirt!”

“Then I guess you’re going to have to be really careful not to bend over.” Beneath the shadow hitting his top lip, he grinned. “I wouldn’t mind, but we have to keep it clean ’cause Derek’s a minor and I promised his mom.”

“The things I do for this job.” She kicked off her shoes and lowered her sunglasses to the bridge of her nose.

Mark walked several feet away and pointed to Derek. “Move down ice. Bring the puck up and just feed it to her.”

Derek moved down the driveway, barely able to stay up on his skates. Not only couldn’t he skate, but he got tangled up with his stick. A few times he nearly fell, and when he finally did shoot, it went wide and Chelsea had to run after it.

“You’re watching the puck,” Mark told him. “Keep your head up and your eyes where you want the puck to go.” He tried again, and once again he barely stayed on his skates and Chelsea had to run after the puck. After the fourth straight time, she was getting a little irritated.

“I’m tired of running after your pucks,” she complained as she brought the puck to the middle of the driveway.

“Derek, what is the first rule of hockey?”

“No whining, Coach.”

Chelsea frowned and looked from Derek’s flushed face to Mark. “Is that in the official rule book?”

“Yes. Along with the importance of trash talk.” Keeping his right leg straight, Mark bent down and picked up the puck. “So let’s hear some chatter,” he said as he handed it to the kid.

“Okay, Coach.” This time as Derek skated toward her, he said, “Your hair is stupid and you have a stink eye.” He shot, and the puck hit Chelsea’s stick and bounced off.

“I have a what?”

“Stink eye.”

She raised a hand to the lenses of her glasses. “I do?”

Derek laughed and Mark shook his head. “No. Trash talk doesn’t have to be true. It just has to be distracting.” He picked up the puck and tossed it to Derek. “That was a good one. You do better when you’re not trying so hard.”

This time when he skated toward Chelsea, she was ready for him with something she figured was age-and Derek-appropriate. “You’re so skinny, you can hula hoop with a Cheerio,” she said, thinking she was pretty clever.

Derek shot. It went a little wide but she was able to stop it without have to run too far. He shook his head. “That was stupid.”

This from the kid who said she had a stink eye? She looked at Mark and he shrugged. “Maybe you should work on your trash talk.”

She wasn’t the only one. Other than stink eye, Derek didn’t have any other insults in his repertoire, and after he’d called her that three more times, she was ready to whack him with her stick. So when he got tangled up in his skates and fell, she wasn’t exactly feeling bad for him.

“Ouch.” He rolled onto his back and looked up at the sky.

“Are you okay?” Mark asked as he walked toward the kid.

“The stick hit my nuts.”

“Ohh.” Mark sucked in a breath through his teeth. “That sucks. Ringing the berries is the worst thing about hockey.”

The boy didn’t look too hurt. He wasn’t writhing in pain or anything, and Chelsea could think of a few things worse than berry-ringing pain. Like the puck hitting your face and getting your teeth knocked out.

“It really hurts.”

“I thought there was no whining in hockey,” she reminded them.

Mark scowled as if she’d said something really insensitive. “You can whine about a smashed nut.”

“Is that an actual clause in the rule book?”

“If it isn’t, it should be. Everyone knows that.” He got down on one knee beside the kid. “Are you going to be okay?”

Derek nodded. “I think so.” He sat up, and Chelsea was pretty sure if she hadn’t been standing there, the kid would have cupped himself.

“Then let’s call it a day,” Mark suggested, and helped Derek stand up.

Chelsea was certainly ready to quit. She walked back to where she’d left her shoes and dusted off the bottoms of her feet. She leaned on the stick as she slipped her feet inside her pumps.

Derek changed out of his skates and shoved them into his backpack. He handed Mark his stick and carefully climbed onto his bike. “Are you going to be okay to ride home? Do you need a ride?” Mark asked, and Derek shook his head.

“I’m all right, Coach.”