Breakaway (23 page)

Remi had a feeling they weren’t making a bet on who’d pay
for dinner after.

The ref dropped the puck and Jason smacked at it, but didn’t
get control. The camera followed the puck, but then the crowd was screaming,
the whistle blew and the television screen filled with an image of two players
going at it, gloves off, fists flying, shirts wrenched.

“Oh dear God.” She felt her eyes go wide and her mouth hung
open. She covered it with her hands. It was Jason in a fight.

Delise and Remi both sat forward, the popcorn forgotten.
Remi couldn’t breathe and her heart accelerated.

The two men continued to hammer at each other and she swore
she felt every punch that landed on Jason as if they struck her own body. She
flinched and tensed. The refs circled them, the other players drifted over to
the boards near their respective benches.

Then Jason dropped the other guy to the ice and fell onto
him, punching at his face with fierce, frenzied blows.

“Jesus!” She pressed her hands to her mouth, wanted to cover
her eyes, look away. She couldn’t stand it. “What are you doing?” she shouted
at the television, as if he could hear her. “Stop, Jason. Stop it!”

The refs finally pulled Jason off the other player and
dragged him away, bleeding from his face, chest heaving, hands still in fists.

They went to a commercial.

She shook her head, beside herself. She wanted to teleport
herself to St. Louis, find him and scream at him. She just did not get it.

She knew fighting was a part of hockey, a big part. She and Jason
had talked about it, how he didn’t condone fighting just for the sake of
fighting, but with high adrenaline and intense competition it was going to
happen sometimes, and it was okay if it was for some noble purpose like
defending another player or protecting the goalie. Although she didn’t exactly
get what was noble about beating someone up.

She’d never seen Jason fight, but then she’d only seen a
couple of games. He wasn’t known as a fighter. He was known as a smart player,
big, but quick-thinking and intuitive, a player who used finesse rather than
his fists.

Delise looked at her, her lips rolled in. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head. She didn’t even know what to say. She
stood. She walked back and forth in front of the television until the game came
back on, arms wrapped around herself.

Jason had, of course, been given a penalty. She didn’t
understand it all, apparently he got more than one penalty, but in the end, the
Wolves were shorthanded for the rest of the game. And guess what? St. Louis
scored.

And won the game, thanks to Jason Heller’s stupid penalty.

“Think, Remi, think.”

She replayed everything over in her head. “He asked me to
think about moving in with him,” she told Delise, meeting her eyes. It shouldn’t
have been enough to scare him into panic-mode and send him running the opposite
direction, but she didn’t rule that out, because she knew why he’d broken up
with Brianne.

“For some reason he ended up out with his hockey buddies
Saturday night. He must have had a lot to drink for him to drop his pants in a
restaurant and create a scene like that.”

“Maybe he was celebrating making the playoffs,” Delise
suggested, her face somber.

Remi paced around her living room, not really seeing
anything.

“No.” She shook her head. “The playoffs already started. I
can’t imagine why he’d do that. But clearly, he got carried away, drank a bit
too much, got arrested…” she rolled her eyes, “and was too embarrassed to tell
me. But that doesn’t explain why he played so little tonight or why he got in
that fight that cost the game.”

“I don’t know, Remi.”

“Something’s wrong.” After examining all the facts, she
concluded that something was definitely wrong. Clammy-hands, heart-freezing,
gut-churning wrong. And if he wasn’t going to tell her what it was, she was
going to go to him and make him.

Except he was in another city. Dammit. And he wouldn’t be
back in Chicago until Thursday.

* * * * *

Jason sat down in his coach’s office, his insides a mass of
twisted nerves.

“Okay, Jase. What’s going on?”

He was getting tired of that question. Tired of hearing it,
tired of trying to talk his way around it.

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit. You go out and get wasted last weekend, act like
an asshole, get arrested, show up for practice the next day so hungover your
face was green and you could barely skate. Then you get in a stupid fight and
take a dumbass penalty that cost us our first playoff game. Last night you didn’t
play much better.”

Jason slumped in the chair, unable to meet Dan’s eyes.

“You’re saying that’s nothing?”

He shook his head.

Dan waited. “Fuck.” He shook his head, his mouth tight. “Okay,
then. If nothing’s wrong, get your shit together and act like the professional
you are. We’ve got another game tomorrow night, and if we lose, we only have
one more chance. We need you, Jase, but I won’t hesitate to bench you if you
aren’t able to get your head in the game. This is not the time to be out
drinking and partying and acting like an irresponsible teenager.”

Jason winced.

He rubbed his forehead.

“You’re better than this, Jase,” Dan continued, his voice
easing.

Shit. Jason’s stomach rolled over.

“Are you sure you don’t want to tell me what’s wrong? Maybe
I can help.”

And that did it.

Jason leaned one elbow on the armrest of the chair and
covered his eyes while he tried to get his tight throat to relax enough to
speak. He tried and nothing came out. Cleared his throat. Swallowed.

“I found out on Saturday that my ex-girlfriend is pregnant.”

Silence. Then, “Jesus.”

“Yeah.” Jason took his hand away and met Dan’s eyes. “It’s
not that…I don’t want…fuck.” He swallowed again. “I don’t know what to do. I’ve
been seeing someone else—someone I really care about. Christ! I don’t want to
hurt her.”

Dan nodded and leaned back in his chair, arms folded across
his chest. “Yeah, I guess I see the problem. So she’s pretty upset about this?”

“She doesn’t know.”

“Oh. Jesus, Jase. You gotta tell her.”

“I can’t tell her.” Anguish slammed into him like a body
check. “I don’t know what to tell her, because I don’t know what I’m supposed
to do. Am I supposed to break up with her so I can be with Brianne? So we can
get back together and be parents to this baby? Am I supposed to ask Brianne to
marry me?” His voice cracked.

“Oh, man.” Dan rubbed his eyes. “I don’t know the answers to
those questions, Jase. I can’t tell you what to do. But a couple things I can
tell you. First of all—you have to deal with this. We’re in the playoffs. We
need you here and present, mind and body and soul, every game, all sixty
minutes. You can’t let your personal life interfere with your professional
life.”

Jason nodded. “I know.” He felt like dog crap on the
sidewalk about how unprofessional he’d been. He tightened his mouth.

“And I can tell you that you’re a good man. You’ve got a
good, solid background—your parents brought you up right. Yeah, you’re young.”

“I’m twenty-nine.” Not a kid. Not like Remi’s younger
brother wanting her to bail him out of missing an exam. Jason was old enough to
be taking responsibility for his own mistakes, just like he’d urged Remi to
make her brother do.

Dan waved a hand. “From where I’m at, you’re young. But you’re
right. You’re a grown man and you need to figure this out. You need to do the
right thing.”

“I don’t know what the right thing is. The right thing for
me is different than the right thing for Brianne. And for our child. And for
Remi.” He rubbed the ache in his chest. “I don’t want to be selfish, but…I just
don’t know.”

“Go,” Dan said. “We’re done with our practice. You’ve got
the rest of today and tomorrow to figure this out. Go do what you need to do,
but I expect you here tomorrow night for the game, a hundred percent ready to
play.”

Jason nodded and stood. He felt like a teenager in trouble
for staying out past curfew, except this was a way worse infraction than that.
He left Dan’s office, trying to keep his head up. He got what Dan was telling
him. They paid him big bucks to play hockey, not to mope around with his head
up his ass, pouting because things weren’t going his way.

Yeah. He had to deal with this. He still didn’t know exactly
what he was going to do, but one thing he knew—he had to tell Remi.

Chapter Fifteen

Usually Remi loved having kids visit her after class. Some
of her current students stayed and some of her former students, now in grade
seven or eight, often came after school to hang out in her classroom, sometimes
helping her mark spelling tests or clean up, good kids who she enjoyed talking
to and laughing with.

But today she had to get out of there, like now.

“Sorry, everyone,” she said, packing her briefcase. “I have
to leave early today.”

Well, it wasn’t early, but it was early for her since she
usually stayed late.

“Aw, Ms Buchanan. Not already.”

She smiled at them. “Go home. Go play video games and eat
junk food or something. Go bug your parents.”

They all laughed, knowing she was kidding. Slowly they
started to make a move to leave, but not fast enough for her. She tapped a foot
and resisted the urge to get up and drag them out.

Then a big shadow appeared in the door of the class room and
the kids all yipped. “Hey! Jase!”

Her heart stopped. Then thudded fast and hard, making her
dizzy.

God, he looked rough. Dark beard shaded his jaw and tension
drew down the corners of his mouth. He clearly hadn’t shaved since she’d last
seen him. His tousled hair stuck up in all directions and he wore the most
faded, ripped and ragged pair of jeans she’d ever seen, along with his
expensive lamb-soft leather jacket. Most impressive of all was the black eye.

His eyes met hers, but he gave the kids smiles and talked to
them for a minute.

“What? It’s not Wednesday?” he asked. “You mean I’m here on
the wrong day?”

“Stars for Reading is over!” they told him.

“Oh no!”

They all laughed. His eyes met Remi’s across the room.

Thank god it was over. Dropping his pants in a restaurant
and getting himself arrested wasn’t exactly being a good role model for the
kids. They would have kicked him out if the program was still going.

“Hey, I need to talk to Ms Buchanan, so scram.” He grinned
at them, a strained grin, but they listened to him better than they’d listened
to her, which made her want to pout briefly, and in only seconds the classroom
was empty and she and Jason were alone. They looked at each other. She had a
hard time getting air into her lungs.

“You’re probably pissed off at me,” he finally said.

She debated how to play this. Like a mother whose child has
disappeared while shopping, found safely moments later—should she be furious at
the disappearance? Or happy and relieved he was okay? Emotions churned inside
her.

“Should I be pissed off?” she asked, trying to hold his
gaze, but he let his eyes drop.

“Yeah. You should.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m a big, stupid jerk.”

She felt a fist squeezing her heart.

“No, you’re not.”

He moved toward her and put his hands on her waist and she
let her briefcase drop to the floor. Then he bent his head and kissed her. Much
as she wanted to kiss him back and never, ever stop, she couldn’t just pretend
nothing had happened. She put her palm on his chest and pushed.

“What’s going on, Jase?”

He lifted his head and gazed down at her, his mouth a
straight line of grimness, eyes dark.

“Nothing.”

She shoved harder at him and he took a step back. “Bullshit.
Something’s obviously wrong.”

“I should have called you on Saturday,” he said, pushing his
hands into his pockets and elevating his shoulders like a little boy. “I’m
sorry.”

“That’s it? You’re sorry?”

“Yeah.”

She stared at him. That wasn’t good enough for her. How
could he think it was?

“Wanna get some dinner?” he asked.

She felt her eyebrows descend and put her fingers to her
temples. “Dinner?”

“Sure. Something quick.” He moved toward her again and
traced his fingers down the side of her neck and over her collarbone in the
opening of her blouse. She shivered. “And then we can go back to your place and
I’ll make it up to you that I didn’t call on Saturday.”

She lowered her chin and looked up at him through her
lashes. He was going to do this—act like nothing big had happened.

Jennifer appeared in the door of the classroom with some
papers in her hands. She stopped short upon seeing Jason. “Oh, hi Jason. I didn’t
know you were here.”

He shot her his most charming grin, made especially bad-boy
sexy by the shiner, and she smiled in return. Remi wanted to roll her eyes, but
didn’t. “Just came to talk to Remi.”

She eyed them. “Well, I can talk to you about this tomorrow,
Remi.”

“Okay. Thanks. We’re just leaving.”

This was not the place to be discussing Jason’s problems,
whatever they may be, so she grabbed her coat and purse and briefcase and they
walked out of the school together.

“Let’s just go to my place,” she suggested. “If you’re
hungry, I’ll make you something, but I don’t want to be having this
conversation in a restaurant.”

He frowned. Good. Just so he knew they were having a
conversation.

He followed her home and once the door had closed behind
them, he reached for her again. His mouth was warm and delicious on hers, then
he kissed his way over her cheek and jaw and the side of her neck, sending
shivery delight over her body. It was so hard to resist his potent sexual
charm, but she grabbed hold of his big biceps and tried to push him away.