Cold as Ice (16 page)

* * * *

Luc got out of Jake’s car and walked into his high-rise building. As he waited for the elevator with no sign of Carter around, he tapped out a staccato beat on his thigh. He’d never seen Carter like this. Of course, he’d never seen Carter stay with one woman longer than it took to order dessert, but still.

He decided to give it a few days and see how Carter reacted the next time they were with Eva. He was scheduled to get a massage tomorrow after practice and wondered if the other guys were, too. The thought of Eva’s hands on him, even in a purely therapeutic sense, made his knees weak, and he leaned on the wall beside the elevator. Finally the doors whooshed open and he stepped inside, wondering idly how many of Eva’s former boyfriends had asked her to give them free massages. Assholes.

If anything permanent became of this relationship, would she want to continue on with her massaging practice? Kelly still had the restaurant, but that was different. Even the notion of her massaging other guys made him want a put a hole in the wall. He doubted she would be appreciative of any attempts he or the other guys made to tell her what she could and couldn’t do, though, so if massaging made her happy, he’d support her.

He fell into bed and woke up to his cell phone ringing. It was his agent calling about a new endorsement deal, and Luc told the man for what seemed like the thousandth time that he didn’t change equipment in the middle of the season. That was just asking for trouble. In the end he promised his agent he would look at the company’s offerings, but not until the off-season. By the time he got off the phone he only had time to grab a protein shake to go and hop in his car for practice.

When he arrived, he hurried to put on his gear and get out on the ice. He liked to set a good example as captain, and scurrying into practice at the last minute wasn’t the way to do it. It would be a hard practice, he was sure, since Tom wasn’t at all pleased with their level of play, with good reason. Luc just hoped the head coach wouldn’t do a bag skate. With only the protein shake in him, trying to keep up with set after set of wind sprints would surely kill him, or at the very least, make him puke. Neither one was a very captain-like reaction.

Carter avoided him, which was probably just as well. Luc hadn’t gotten much sleep, lying awake much of the night wondering what he and Jake would do if Carter wanted out of the relationship. Would Eva be interested in just the two of them, or would she call it quits to the whole thing? His stomach churned at the thought. Normally he wasn’t a worrier like Jake was, but this thing was turning him inside out.

They started a shooting drill, and when Carter’s turn came up his shot rocketed off his blade and Scott hit the deck to avoid getting it right in the mask. As he sat on the ice, he pulled said mask to the top of his head and said, “What the fuck, Carter?”

Scott was pretty easy-going like Carter, but Luc didn’t blame him for being annoyed at nearly having his head taken off. Tom glared at Carter, who’d turned away and skated toward the opposite end of the rink. Then Tom turned his glare on Luc and jerked his head toward Carter.

Great…this is just what I need.

He dutifully skated down to where Carter was turning slow circles around the faceoff dot. “What’s up?”

Carter looked at him briefly before returning to his skating. “Nothing, man.”

Luc rolled his eyes. “I can’t tell him why you’re pissed, bud, so give me a plausible excuse.”

“I’m not pissed. You know as well as I do that shots sometimes go wild.”

“Yes, I do, and that’s not what just happened.”

Carter spun to face him. “So why don’t you tell me what the fuck
did
just happen? I guess you can read minds now, huh?”

Luc took a deep breath, trying like hell to stay calm. In a quiet voice so their conversation wouldn’t carry over the ice and attract even more attention than it already had, he said, “Of course not. But I know you’re not all right, so what am I supposed to tell Tom?”

“Tell him whatever you want.”

“You know that won’t fly.”

Carter leveled a gaze at him. “I’m fine.”

“Bullshit.”

Carter dropped his stick and charged him, getting in his face. “Let it go, Luc.”

Luc stood his ground. He really didn’t want their personal crap getting in the way of team productivity, but it didn’t look like he had much of a choice.

“Look, dude. Just leave your problems at home.”

“How the fuck can I do that when my problems are here at the rink with me every day?”

That got the attention of the rest of the team, and Luc closed his eyes and counted to ten before opening them again. Jake had come over. “What’s going on, Carter?”

“Oh, you, too? Jesus.”

“We’re just trying to help,” Luc said.

Carter pushed him. “Well, stop trying to help!”

Jake tried to get in the middle, but Luc pushed Carter back and soon both of them had thrown off their gloves. The situation had escalated before Luc could even wrap his brain around fighting with a teammate.

One of the assistant coaches skated over and shoved them apart. “To your corners, assholes,” the man said with a growl.

Carter seemed to realize what he’d done, because he retreated immediately and went to pick up his gloves. Tom skated over. “Nice job,
captain
.” He pointed at both Jake and Carter. “Hit the bikes. I don’t wanna see either of your ugly mugs for the rest of the day.”

Carter and Jake trudged off toward the bench and Tom’s gaze followed before swinging back to Luc. “You know what’s bothering him.”

Luc glanced at the rest of his teammates, who were almost falling over themselves on the ice to hear the conversation between himself and the head coach.

“I have an idea, but it’s not something I want to discuss in front of everybody.”

“Then get your ass on the bike until you’re ready to talk,” Tom snarled, and Luc quickly stalked into the exercise room to find Jake and Carter on bikes as far as away as they could get from each other.

“Very nice,” he told them, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “We need to lift weights when we’re done here and then we’ll all go get some lunch and talk. That wasn’t a request, by the way.”

He heard grumbling from behind him as he headed over to his own bike. After a while he hopped off and went over to the weight bench. One of the other guys came in and offered to spot him, and he returned the favor a few minutes later. Usually working up a sweat during practices and games helped calm whatever internal turmoil he was facing, but not today. Today he was a mess.

He was using the chin up bar when he heard a crash behind him. Jumping down, he spun around and saw Fredrik on the ground with free weights scattered around him. He was convulsing. “Go get the trainers. And call 911!” he screamed as he rushed over. “Did anyone see what happened? Get me a towel.” One of the guys tossed him a towel and he gently inserted it into Fredrik’s mouth so he wouldn’t bite his own tongue. Fredrik was expected to retire within the next couple of years—if he made it that far. Luc forced himself to ignore that macabre thought as the trainers rushed in and took over and he stood there helplessly while they worked.

After a little while Fredrik’s seizure stopped, but his eyes were still rolled into the back of his head and Luc had to turn away. He knew he needed to be strong for his players, but this was yet another weird occurrence, and coming on the heels of Leo’s episode it was bound to make the guys jittery. Hell, combined with whatever was happening with his heart, he was plenty jittery, too. What was going on?

Fredrik was rushed to the hospital and the rest of the team slowly made their way to the showers, the rest of their workouts forgotten. Jake and Carter followed him out the door without complaint, which he would’ve been grateful for if there hadn’t been such a horrible episode that predicated their obedience. In the car on the way to lunch, it was Jake who spoke first.

“I don’t think all the shit that’s been happening lately is a coincidence. I’m worried about there being a connection.”

“What do you mean?” Luc asked him, glancing into the rearview to meet his eyes.

“I think there’s something tying together all these physical problems guys on the team are suddenly having.” He cleared his throat and continued. “You know, since you had the racing heart thing, Luc, I’ve been watching you and the other guys. There are two or three others who do the same thing you do, you all kind of rub your chests and breathe hard.”

“So?”

“I’m telling you—other guys are having the same trouble.” Luc’s eyes narrowed as he looked at his teammate again, but Jake continued nonetheless. “Or were, and with Leo and Fredrik both having these weird freak things happen, I dunno. Maybe there’s something to what Eva said about those new supplements we’re on. We haven’t really changed anything else.”

“Maybe,” Luc assented. “But I’d rather talk about what went on before that out on the ice.” He glanced over at Carter, who glowered back at him. “I’ve never seen you like this. Usually you’re the most easy-going of the three of us, but right now you’re wound so tight I’m surprised you’re not a corkscrew.”

“Everyone has a bad day,” Carter said.

“Come on, man. We’re your best friends. We’re all in this relationship together, too, and when Jake and I started talking about making things more permanent you freaked out. No matter what you say, you haven’t been the same since.”

“What do you want me to say? You want me to admit the idea of settling with one woman, who, by the way, would be settling down with my teammates, too, bothers me? Shit yeah, it bothers me. But I’m also afraid if I don’t just jump into this with both feet you guys will and I’ll lose my chance with her forever.”

“If you need some time, dude, take it,” Jake told him.

“Oh, sure, then you and Luc can get all cozy with her.”

“It’s not like that. We’re all in this together.”

“Are we?” Carter twisted in his seat to face Jake and Luc hoped the conversation wouldn’t bloom into another fistfight. Jake was the natural peacekeeper of the group, but even he could only be pushed so far. “Do you honestly expect me to believe that if I backed off, if I took some time to really think about things and what I want, you and Luc would just go into a holding pattern with Eva?”

Jake blew out a breath. “I dunno, man. I can’t promise anything, but like we said in the beginning, this relationship can’t compromise our friendship. We’re friends and we’re teammates, and we can’t let our feelings for Eva drive a wedge into that. We all know it already has. Hence this lunch idea our esteemed captain thought up.” Luc winced when Jake mentioned the word “captain,” remembering how Tom had said it earlier with derision.

They arrived at Chris’s, one of their favorite delis, and Luc parked the car before turning to his teammates. “Look, let’s just go inside, have some lunch, and talk about it. We’re all grown men who can calmly and rationally work through a situation.”
He led the way into the restaurant to a table in the back that the owner knew they preferred so they could have some privacy.

Once they were seated, Luc looked at both Carter and Jake.
“Now, let’s figure out where we are with Eva and what we want. I’ll go first.” He took a deep breath. “I’m pretty into her. Maybe I’m even falling in love with her, I dunno. She isn’t like the other women I’ve dated or the ones we’ve shared in the past. She’s different. She’s special. And as far as the three of us go, if we decide to try a more permanent-type ménage relationship with her, I know it’s not gonna be easy. But look at it this way, the payoff could be enormous.”

Jake nodded. “I agree. I mean, I love sex, but there’s just something different about sharing it with my closest friends, knowing we’re all contributing to the woman’s pleasure. And having that woman be Eva just makes it sweeter for me. I’m on board with introducing the idea of a more permanent relationship and seeing how she feels about it.”