Delayed Penalty by Shey Stahl

22. Clearing the Zone

When a defending player sends the puck out of the opponent’s attacking zone, all the attacking players must leave or clear the zone to avoid being called offside when the puck reenters the zone.

Ami

What the hell was that about? Why was he so aggressive out there?

I ask Callie all these questions too, but she doesn’t have any answers either.

“I don’t know. I’ve never seen that side of him before.”

After jostling our way through the crowd in the arena, we spot Remy coming out of the locker rooms, half-dressed in the suit he wore to the arena, relief floods through me. Finally, someone I know. “There’s Remy!” I yell to Callie, pointing to him.

He must have heard us because he looks up, his eyes searching the crowd. With a few quick steps, he’s closer and takes a hold of both me and Callie in a protective manner, looking confused. “What the hell was that about?” I ask, realizing Remy didn’t even bother to button his shirt and I’m pressed against his bare chest. “Is Evan okay?”

“Fuck if I know,” Remy mumbles, shielding us from the relentless crowd.

“Where’s Leo?” Callie asks.

“With Mase.”

Outside the arena, we step into a nearly empty parking lot where the bus is parked. “Where’d they take him?” I ask, wondering why he hadn’t come out and Remy took us out of the building.

Remy’s focused on the parking lot and doesn’t look at me as he buttons his shirt. “Hospital.” He twists around, eyes wild and cheeks flushed. “Callie,” he barks at her. “Where’s the rental car?”

“In the parking garage,” she sighs, typing a message out on her phone. “We’re not getting out of there anytime soon.”

She’s right. There’s a steady flow of red surrounding the parking garage and every other exit. The slight chill in the air brings back a flash of memories from that night, words I hadn’t remembered coming back to me. “Where are you going all alone?”

The memory makes me sick again. The rush of blood to my ears blocks out the conversation that just began between Callie and Remy about what hospital they took Evan to.

I don’t know how they decide, but we end up getting an Uber to the hospital. The instant we’re in the car, I feel like I’m going to throw up. All I can think about is why that memory flashed in my head and why Evan did that to Dave.

When we pull up at the emergency entrance, there are four cop cars surrounding the circle drive and a dozen more inside, each one looking at us as we rush in.

“What room is Evan Masen in?” Remy asks the male nurse at the front desk.

“With the police,” the man tells him, and then turns to walk away.

What?

“Why would he be with the police?” I ask Remy when he walks back over to us, my words cracking.

Remy wraps a burly arm around my shoulder. “Probably because he was slapped with intent to injure in the game. He’s suspended.”

My heart sinks at his words. Suspended? Why would Evan do that in the playoffs? He knows his team needs him.

Callie steps to the desk, her hands resting on the counter, leaning in. “Hey, can we see him for a minute? We just need to know if he’s okay, and then we will have a seat and wait. That’s his girlfriend.” She raises her hand to touch my shoulder. “Can she at least see him for a moment?”

“No, sorry.” The man stares at his clipboard. “But I will let you know when you can if you would please just have a seat over there.”

Remy isn’t having it, gets in the guy’s face but when a policeman steps in between him and the nurse, he backs off.

We sit in that waiting room for two hours waiting to see Evan. Two fucking hours.

Leo comes out eventually and walks toward us.

“Is he okay?” I ask, standing from my place. I run my sweaty hands down the front of my jeans, shaking them out.

Leo nods. “He’s okay. Getting stitched up and waiting on a CT scan. He’s asking for you.”

I nod to the nurses’ station. “They won’t let me see him.”

Remy downs his second cup of coffee as he sits beside Callie. “Already tried but they said no.”

Leo smirks, as if this is a challenge he’s up for. “They’ll let her. I’m convincing.” With a swagger only Leo has, he approaches the nurses’ station, leans in and smiles. Remy rolls his eyes, but leans forward watching Leo sweet-talk the nurses. “I was just back there with Mase. That’s his girlfriend,” he tells them. “Can she see him?”

There’s a smile that works its way to my lips at the word and how Evan had used it to see me in the hospital the night he brought me in. And now here we are again.

To my surprise, and Remy’s annoyance, the nurse smiles at Leo. “Oh, yes. Go ahead.”

Remy sits back in the chair, groaning. “What a bitch.”

It’s a strange feeling being back in a hospital, both sickening and overwhelming as memories I haven’t had before keep looping in my head. The chill returns, and I find myself curling into my jacket to cover myself as I walk through the automatic doors into the emergency room. Each room has glass walls with a bed and monitors surrounding them and I remember the hum of the machines, the smells of the hospital and my stomach clenches.

Evan is in the one to the far left, sitting up on the bed in a gown with his feet dangling over the edge. His uniform has been removed and lying in a pile on the floor. He’s dressed in a white and light green hospital gown that’s open in the front. Bruises and blood cover his chest. That’s where my eyes go first and then to his face, but I can’t see it. He won’t look up. Even when he hears the glass doors open, he keeps his head down. Almost like he’s afraid to look at me.

Then I notice a police officer sitting in the chair beside him.

“Give us a minute,” Evan growls at the officer, his voice directed at the floor. He won’t look up.

The officer stands and moves to the door, without looking at me.

When we’re alone, I step to Evan. He flinches slightly when I touch his hand. “Broken,” he mumbles, confirming my thoughts when I notice how swollen it is.

Tears roll down my cheeks. I’m confused by everything and feeling bad that I touched his broken hand. “I’m sorry. Are you okay?”

Evan gasps, finally looking up at me, his body practically vibrating with anger, breathing deeply through his nose.

My brow furrows. “What’s going on, Evan?” I move to my knees in front of him since he won’t look at me. “Talk to me. What was that about?”

He lifts his head just enough to catch my gaze. For a moment he doesn’t take his eyes away from mine, searching for the words I assume.

Another doctor walks in and examines Evan’s forehead where he has a large piece of gauze tinged with blood taped to his head. Evan focuses on me, only me, as the doctor examines him, poking and prodding.

“Mase,” the doctor says, “we need to get that stitched up, but I’ll give ya a minute.” The doctor finally leaves the room, the glass door making a swishing sound as it closes behind him.

“Evan, what happened?” I beg him, reaching up to softly touch the raised skin over his cheek that’s turning purple, trying to return his gaze to me so I can decipher what the hell happened. His hand shakes, reaching toward me, and covers mine, pressing his cheek into my palm.

He fidgets for a second, then swallows, his gaze falling. “I’m sorry,” he says finally, his voice rough and shaking around each word.

“Why is there a police officer outside your room?”

Evan’s shoulders hunch a bit compared to his normal strong posture. His face, which I place my hand on trying to get him to look at me again, is covered in his playoff scruff. I suppose it can’t be called scruff with how thick it has grown in. My fingers scrape against it. “Mase… talk to me.”

He swallows again and then draws in a ragged breath. “Dave...” Evan gasps again, his head shaking. “It’s him. He’s the one....” His eyes find mine, glossed over and heavy. He’s holding on by a thread, rapidly blinking back tears. “Who hurt you,” he whispers.

Did you hear him?

Did he really say that?

Dave?

I watch his mouth move. I see the words form and fall from his lips but they don’t register. Not at first. It’s like I’m seeing a scene in a movie playing out in slow motion.

It’s like that feeling you get when someone tells you something but you’re not sure if what you heard was what they actually said. Your mind keeps repeating the phrase, trying to make sense of it. Then you ask, “What?” Even though you heard them the first time. You know exactly what they said, but your mind rejects the words as if they’re wrong. They had to be wrong, right?

Dave can’t be the same guy. There’s no way. I would have remembered something about him, wouldn’t I have? Wouldn’t something, somewhere have clicked inside me when I met him?

“What do you mean?” I ask, unsure why, but it’s the only word that keeps coming to my mind.

Evan swallows again and shifts on the bed, and I want to hand the poor guy water. Or a trash can because it looks like he’s about to puke.

“Dave is the guy,” he repeats. His brow furrows as he searches my eyes for a moment. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry I didn’t... I didn’t know it was him. I’m sorry I didn’t realize it sooner.”

The fight replays in my mind. I see it all clearly now. The way Dave looked at me when he skated by the glass. Him winking at Callie and the total disgust she has for him. The way Evan checked him at center ice and never looked back was his first warning to Dave. And then he’d dropped his gloves, defending me.

He has nothing to be sorry for. He protected me. He stood up for me when no one else did. My stomach drops when a memory hits me: dark, intense eyes, controlling and hovering over me, hands forcefully pulling at my clothes even after I said no. I remember, now. I begged him to stop as he ripped my panties away.

I swallow, trying to gain focus, pushing the memory away. I don’t want it. I don’t want to remember. I hold my breath, my lungs pushing against my ribcage, like at any second they’re going to burst.

Evan’s face focuses in front of me and I can’t even imagine what he must have been feeling when he knew it was Dave. For months, Evan has been carrying around the anxiety of not knowing who did this to me. And then to find out it was a friend of his, someone who had given him a place to stay his first season, someone he trusted, he had every right to be angry.

I stand up. Reaching out, Evan wraps his arms around my waist and draws me closer. “Are you sure it’s him?”

“I’m so sorry,” he says again, his fingers rubbing circles on my back.

My heart beats faster, a sharp pain stabbing my throat. “Stop, don’t be sorry,” I assure him firmly. His eyes snap back to mine. “You weren’t the one who did it. This wasn’t something you could have controlled. Dave did what he did because, well, he’s a fucker. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“I feel so fucking helpless.” His voice breaks. “I couldn’t stand back. I lost it when I heard him say... what you remembered.”

“What did he say?”

“In the locker room—” He pauses, drawing in a heavy breath. “Before the game he said, she liked it rough, and then it clicked. I looked at him, he looked at me and something deep inside me told me it was him.”

“Did he actually admit it though?”

He nods. “On the ice he did.”

That explains when Evan dropped his gloves.

His arms lower and I step closer as he slumps against me, resting his head on my shoulder and clinging desperately to my waist. “And he was my fucking friend, Ami. I trusted him and then he... I just can’t believe he could do something like that to you. So hateful, so brutal, so unthinkable.”

I can’t either, but I also can’t stand to see Evan so upset about it. Maybe it hasn’t hit me yet but all I can focus on is the one in front of me. “Mase,” I whisper, my fingers trailing down his jaw. “I love you. That’s all that matters in this moment. Don’t you see? You saved me. He doesn’t matter. We do.”

I can see a faint smile curve his lips as he brings me closer, his head bending to rest on my shoulder.

“Ami,” he whispers, his face serious again. “You were worth saving.” His fingers stroke along my cheek, his words shaking. “You are so fucking worth it, honey. I love you. More than anything else in this world.”

On any other day I’d tease him and ask, even more than hockey? But I don’t. When I look up at him, his expression keeps my words trapped inside me.

Staring at me briefly, he then lowers his face to mine, brushing his cheek against my own. With another soft smile, he draws back.

His actions make me nervous as to what he’s going to say. Is this the let down? Is this where he too tells me it’s too much? He can’t take the reminders of what he lost so he has to leave?

He’s not Josh… but the fear is still there.

I come with baggage. Not everyone wants that in their life.

He doesn’t speak but then his eyes move to my lips.

I lean in, as if I’m going to kiss him, and his eyes flutter closed. Then I kiss him on his swollen lip, the taste of blood present on my tongue from where his lip has been split open. Barely a breath away, he lives inside my heart.

“Ami… ask me,” he urges, breaking the kiss. “Ask me why I did it.”

My brow pulls together. “Why what?”

“Why I fought him in front thousands of people and might have ruined my career….”

My heart thuds louder that he’d risk his career over me. “Why did you? Evan, Oh God, please tell me you didn’t just ruin your career over that.” I step back, anger pulsing through me in waves. “Seriously. Are you in that much trouble over this?”

He shrugs. “Maybe. I don’t know. It’s for the league to decided.” He reaches for me again. “I did it because whatever made me walk down that alley took a hold of me, and I’m never letting go.” He pauses, his eyes begging me to trust him. “Don’t you see. You’re not someone I can walk away from. Ever.”

Tears roll down my cheeks. “I don’t want you to let go either. I need you,” I admit, feeling like given the circumstances, he needs to know that.

“Say it again.” His voice is so raw, so emotional.

“Don’t let go. I need you.”

His thumb brushes my tears away. “I love you.”

I would have said more, I want to say more, but his lips crash to mine instead, and I lose myself in emotion. For so long I didn’t want to rely on anyone anymore out of fear that they’d be taken away from me. But with Evan, I have no choice. He’s there, right in front of me, giving his heart, begging me to love him. Something about him and his boyish grin and big heart made me fall, when I had no business falling for anyone, let alone a guy like Evan. But I did, and I don’t regret it.

Evan has to get stitched up and needs a splint put on his hand so I step out. They tell him a retina specialist is going to come in and examine his eye before he leaves.

Callie’s waiting for me in the lobby, Remy, Leo, and the head coach tucked away in a room to the right. Suddenly, looking at Callie, I’m flooded with the memory of her telling me about a hockey player she hooked up with being rough and her ending up with a black eye. Now it makes sense.

“Callie…” Tears stream down her red cheeks, knowing what I’m going to ask. “Was Dave the guy who knocked you around?”

At first, she doesn’t say anything. I don’t think she wants to.

“Is he?” I ask again, working as much empathy into my words as I can.

There’s panic in her eyes. As if she tried to keep this from me, from everyone. But she can’t. Not now. Callie nods, tears flooding her eyes, unable to speak.

My heart hurts for her, letting guys treat her like that and not saying anything. Callie doesn’t sleep around to be a slut, though it appears that way. She just likes hockey boys.

But to be hurt by one, physically, one she trusted….

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

She chews on her lip, leaning into the wall beside her as she brushes tears away. “Look who he is, Ami. He’s an NHL player. It’s not easy to come forward and accuse someone of something like that. He has lawyers and all that shit. It’d start a war. One I don’t want anything to do with. So I stay away from him.”

“Evan thinks Dave is the one….” I let the words hang in the air between us, waiting for her reaction.

“I figured that’s why he reacted like that,” she admits, sniffing. “I’m sorry, Ami. I really am.”

“I’m sorry too.” My arms cradle around her, trying to ease her pain.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t say anything,” she begins, brushing more tears aside. She straightens her posture, squaring her shoulders. “If I’d known that Dave was the same guy who... well, I would have said something a long time ago. I feel so... angry that I didn’t say anything. I... I could have... I never realized, until now, how badly I could have been hurt. He almost killed you, Ami. He could have if it wasn’t for Evan, and knowing that—” Callie shakes her head, tears flowing more freely to the point she can barely speak. “I hate him, and I’m ashamed at myself at how careless I was, how easily I blew it off.”

I hold her face in my hands. “You didn’t know.”

I never knew Callie would have been so affected by what happened to me, just the same as Evan had been, but anytime something happens to someone else, it isn’t always easy to look at yourself and ask, “Could this have happened to me?”

The thought never usually crosses your mind until it’s too late.

Evan is released from the ER a few hours later. His retina is fine. They initially thought it might have detached but he only broke a blood vessel.

The ride to the hotel is quiet. He doesn’t talk, and I don’t force any conversation. What would I have said anyway? If I try to speak, my voice shakes and tears threaten to fall, so I stay quiet.

Evan’s hand, the one not in a splint, rests on my knee as we ride in the town car with Callie, Leo, and Remy. None of us say a word.

Glancing around the car, I see that Remy and Leo have their own battle wounds from various fights throughout the night. Apparently, there was an altercation outside the locker rooms between players. I don’t know. All I know is it’s a mess and I don’t know how much trouble Evan’s actually in.

Leo stares at Callie, who keeps her focus out the window, lost in her own thoughts.

Evan’s knee bounces beside me, letting me know he’s far from over this.

When we pull into the entrance, Leo and Remy get out and go separate directions. Leo wraps his arm around Callie and heads toward the row of elevators. Evan and I go the other way to mine and Callie’s hotel room since the guys room together. Not a single word is said by anyone. I think we’re all kind of in shock over what happened.

Back in our room, I sit on the bed and that’s when I lose it. My lip is between my teeth, my arms cradled around me, as I stare at Evan moving through the room looking for water. He leans down, opens the mini fridge, and takes out all the water and alcohol, laying them on the mattress beside me. “Take your pick,” he mumbles, reaching for what looks to be vodka.

I can’t. I can’t even move. It’s coming—my breakdown. I knew it would eventually hit, but I never expected it to happen here, with Evan, as I watch him chug mini bottle after mini bottle of vodka in a hotel room.

As I watch him, I want to know what he’s thinking, what he’s feeling, and what this means for us now. Maybe he’s nervous about what will happen to Dave. Or maybe he’s upset that it happened on the ice, a place where he’s comfortable. Maybe the drama of everything I bring with me is just another burden he doesn’t need. Maybe he’s upset that a suspension is coming in the morning.

“Stop,” he demands softly, dropping the third mini bottle to the mattress and turning to face me. He steps forward, staring down at me. I look up and his thumb brushes over my bottom lip when I release it.

“What?” I stare intently at the bottles on the bed, thinking maybe I should drink one of them.

“I can see you thinking. This doesn’t change anything. I’m not going anywhere. I never was,” he explains with a pained expression on his face, his eyes bloodshot and glossy, but swollen from the fight. He’s wrecked, both physically and emotionally. Dropping to his knees in front of me, he places his hands on my waist. “I love you. I’m not going anywhere. I promise. Nothing that happened changes my feelings for you.”

That might be, but the insecurities, the wave of emotion I’d been holding back all night builds and builds and pretty soon it’s too much. I can’t hold back any longer. I burst into sobs. It hits out of nowhere and with far more potency than I ever thought it would.

I cry for hours, and I don’t even know if I’m even crying over my attack. I might be crying for what Evan saw and how horrific that must have been for him.

I cry for my parents and Andrew. I cry for the future that was robbed from them, and me.

As the sounds of the rain outside mix with our breathing, Evan tucks me back in his arms and I fall asleep against his chest. I hear him whisper he loves me, and I have no doubt he does.

He holds me, letting me cry and never makes an attempt to move.

After what feels like an eternity, Evan shifts beside me, and I realize he’s getting up. Unconsciously, I grasp his wrist, not wanting him to move even an inch. “Don’t leave.”

His eyes find mine in the dim room, the television flickering against his face. “Honey, I need an ice pack for my hand. I’ll be right back.”

Moments later, just like he promised, he returns.

Scooting closer, he tucks me back in his arms.

“Do you feel... relieved?” he asks, his lips trailing lightly over my shoulder.

I think about his question. In a way, in a really big way, I am. The thought hasn’t crossed my mind until now. I don’t have to constantly think about the guy out there, doing harm to others. I don’t know what will happen to Dave, but I think, hope, he gets what’s coming to him. Nodding, I kiss the arm he has draped over my chest, securing me to him.

“Are you?”

He breathes against my cheek, his lips pressing gently to my temple. “Yes... and no.”

“I know what you mean.”

Sometimes I think Andrew brought Evan to me, and in more ways than one. He brought him to find me, protect me, love me, defend me, and most importantly, make me believe in love again. He brought him to me to show me that not everything is lost.

Andrew used to tell me there were angels on the moon. It sounds crazy coming from a guy like Andrew, who had fairly macho standards, but he would say things like, “It’s not luck that I have, Ami. It’s an angel on the moon.”

I never understood that statement. I always thought maybe he’d taken too many line drives to the head.

Until I met Evan.

Now I understand what Andrew had been talking about. The moon guides you through the darkest nights.

Evan is my angel on the moon.