Delayed Penalty by Shey Stahl

6. Crashing the Net

With full steam, players head to the front of the net into the goalie’s space and into the goal. It can also be known as crashing the crease.

Evan

I have Friday off before we head to Ohio to play the Blue Jackets again. That gives me a whole night to spend with Ami and bring her that burger she’s been dying to have. I’m also avoiding my team and Leo in particular. He keeps calling, and my parents are starting to ask all sorts of questions. It doesn’t matter. I have one focus.

A girl in need of someone to be there for her.

Ami’s in her room when I get there, having just gotten back from another scan. Her spirits are good and every time I walk into that room, her pretty, starry eyes light up the same way. It leaves me with a stabbing sensation in my heart every fucking time. It doesn’t even matter how long I was away, five minutes, five hours, five days, she acts as if I’m the only the person she’s waiting on to return, and when I do, everything about her lights up.

“Holy crap, you brought me the golden ticket.”

I hold the bag up, grinning. “You gotta share.”

She pats the side of her bed. “I will.”

So we share two burgers and fries and she tells me it’s the best thing she’s ever had in her life.

“I wasn’t sure you’d come back.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” I ask, dipping a french fry into ketchup.

She chews slowly on the last bite of her burger. “You don’t owe me anything. And I’m sure you have a life outside of coming to see me.”

“I do, but we’re dating, remember?” I wink at her, something I know she likes because every time I do, her cheeks blossom. “That’s what boyfriends do.”

She laughs. “In that case, I’m a lucky girl.”

No, honey, I’m the lucky one.

An hour passes and it’s as if she can sense the doom. The part when I have to leave.

“Do you want to watch a movie?” she asks, as if she even has to ask.

“Are you trying to get me in bed with you again?”

She snorts. “I’m certainly not getting much action in here.”

I laugh, even though I don’t want to think about anyone touching her ever again. What I love is that Ami loves to tease and joke, and fuck if I don’t give it right back.

I put a movie into the DVD player in her room. The lighting is low to keep her headaches from returning and I end up bumping my thigh on the bed when I move around it to take a seat next to her.

Standing to the side of the bed, I look down at her. “This bed is small.”

She smiles, looking up at me, her lashes fluttering. “It’s not that small.”

“We’ll see about that. Can I?” I motion to her hand and she nods, eagerly. I take her hands, move one around my shoulder, and then situate her legs over mine so we can both fit in her bed. The touch is casual but intensely intimate at the same time. I’ve never felt a sensation quite like that when her hand comes to rest on my stomach. That’s when her giggles fill the room, but then her hand slips when she’s squirming to get comfortable in my lap and goes lower, just above the waistband of my jeans. Instant fucking hard-on.

Most embarrassing moment of my life and I’m very angry with my fucking dick. Traitor. I’ve been trying to take care of him for a month and he hasn’t cooperated. And now he’s all up and ready.

Fuck you, asshole.

Unfortunately, Ami notices. Honestly, I don’t mean to brag here, but there wasn’t any way she wouldn’t have noticed. I try to play it off, as does Ami, but the red in her cheeks tells me she knows. “Okay, point taken. It’s small.” She gasps, but it comes out a giggle. “The bed I mean.” Jesus Christ. Now my cheeks are red. I’m about to move when she grabs my hand and forces me to stay there. “Two can fit in the bed.”

Clearing my throat, my brow furrows slightly, trying to decipher if she wants me to move or not when she relaxes against me, her head on my shoulder. It does nothing for the hard-on, but my heart melts a little.

“Thank you, Evan. I really mean that, too. You’re a pretty cool guy to keep coming back and checking on me. I know you’ve probably got shit to do.”

“You gotta stop thanking me, Ami,” I whisper, my voice shaking for reasons I don’t know. “I did it because it’s what anyone would have done given the chance. And yeah, friends check on friends.”

“Clearly not everyone would do the right thing, Evan,” she says, motioning to the bandage still on her head, “but I wasn’t referring to saving me. I was referring to this... being with me in here... making me laugh.”

“No problem.” My eyes shift to the table beside her bed, looking for the remote when I see Detective Paulsen’s business card there. My heart beats in my throat. “Was he here today?”

Ami glances at the card and then at me. “Yeah, he was asking questions about what I remember. I wish I could remember more, but I think it’s probably a good thing. Looks like I got the crap beaten out of me.” She rolls her eyes. “I hope I at least gave the guy a black eye or something.”

“Still no memory of anything that night?”

“Nope. The last thing I remember about the night was leaving the dance studio, dinner with Blake, and then walking past Redfish. I remember the sign. I don’t even know where I was going. I had been staying with my dance instructor, Blake, and his wife. I assumed maybe I was going to catch a cab. I don’t know. I remember something he said to me. The guy did, or at least I think he said something.”

My heart is beating so hard I bet she can feel it next to me. “What do you remember hearing?”

“He said, ‘You want it, don’t you? I bet you like it rough.’” Ami stares at me, her voice shaking around the words, wavering much like my self-control to not lose my shit. She takes a deep breath. “I can see his eyes sometimes... they were dark, almost black. Or maybe it was the darkness in the alley? I don’t know. Or maybe that never happened and it’s just a dream.”

My fucking gut is in knots as I picture the guys standing outside Redfish that night, wondering which one of those assholes was the guy. I want to go back to that night and kick the shit out of all of them for either doing it or standing by while such a brutal attack took place.

“Did the doctors tell you what happened? Like all of it?”

She pauses for a second. “Unfortunately.” Her voice is filled with sadness. “They said I’d been raped and had a nasty head injury. Believe me, the headaches tell me so.” She motions to the lighting in the room and the drawn curtains on the window.

I can feel the blood rising to my face, anger taking over, but I don’t want to scare her. Any time I think of that night, it still infuriates me beyond belief. I can’t even think about it without my pulse racing and my stomach dropping to my knees.

Her expression shifts, and I can see the anger and confusion. “I just can’t believe this even happened. I thought I was smarter than that. Walking in an alley late at night, that’s just not something I would have ever done.” Her words shake, with each one more difficult than the next. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

Dread pulses inside me and I blow out a breath. “God, I’m sorry, Ami. I didn’t mean to bring it up.”

“No big deal. Blake came to see me today, so I had to deal with that.”

“What? He did?” Immediately my heart is pumping harder and I’m pissed off. He had the nerve to come here?

“He did. Wanted to see how I was and ask if we were dating.”

I smirk. “Whoops.”

“I told him we were.” She pauses and her eyes flick to mine. “So we’re both liars now.”

My shoulders shake, amusement working through me. “We’re going to hell.”

“Probably.” She stares at her IV and then me. She motions toward the television. “Let’s watch a movie.”

I’m learning quickly she is getting good at distractions. And I can’t blame her. I’d want them too.

This time I push Play on the movie and settle in beside her. My arms cross over my chest and Ami leans into me, our bodies aligned in the small bed.

“You’re different than I thought you would be,” I whisper, moving my arm around her again for more comfort. Bullshit. I just want to be touching her in some way. “For what’s happened to you, you’re different than I thought you’d be.”

She sighs. “I have to be. I don’t want to think about it because I’ll think about all the problems in the world. The big ugly problems. The ones that end careers and take families or a girl’s innocence when she’s trying to move on.”

“You put up a good front.” I give her a smile, squeezing her arm lightly.

“It’s not a front, Evan. It’s the way I am. The fears are there, but it’s not worth it for me to dwell on it. I have wants. I wanted to be a dancer. I still do. I wanted to see my brother play in the majors and sadly, I’ll never see that. I wanted my mom to get that big landscaping bid she was working on when she left with Andrew. I’ll never see that either. I wanted my dad to have the satisfaction of knowing Andrew and I were the way we were because of him. That I can do because he’s still watching me. I have a chance now.”

She’s absolutely right. You can’t live your life worrying about the past. Unfortunately for me, I’m still caught up on the retribution part. I want to make them pay for what they did to her. I want them to pay for taking any ounce of happiness from this girl.