Tiger Threat (6 page)

He jumped on my back.

I really wanted to go turtle. To hunch over and put my arms over my face to protect myself. But all game I'd been thinking it was better to give than to receive.

I rolled. And rolled again. Somehow I came up on top of him. I pushed off and got to my feet again.

One last time I tried to throw off my gloves.

Then I realized what the problem was.

I had been so filled with panic that my fingers had immediately formed themselves into fists. It's impossible to throw off gloves when you've already made fists.

I straightened my hands. With quick movements, I flung my arms out again. This time the gloves sailed off.

Now I could take a punch back at him.

Too late.

One last big overhead punch came in with such force it felt like a meteor landing from outer space.

It caught me in the center of the forehead. My feet popped out from under me. I landed on my butt and on my elbows.

Finally the linesmen came in and grabbed the Winter Hawk defenseman. He glared over the linesmen's shoulders at me. I saw blood dripping from his knuckles.

I sat up. Blood trickled down my chin. I felt something loose with my tongue. The temporary cap that Dr. Dempster had put on in the morning.

I slowly got up. I tried to glare back. The linesmen pushed him away.

“Oh, yeah,” I said. I spit the piece of tooth on the ice. Felt tough doing it.

“Oh yeah, what?” the defenseman said back to me.

“Don't mess with me again,” I said. My lips were split so badly I could barely talk. But I was mad. I was ready to keep fighting. “Or you'll get more of the same.”

For some reason, he thought it was funny.

So did the guys on the ice. And the guys on the bench when the guys on the ice told them what I'd said.

But I had the last laugh.

The trainer put ice on my face. After my penalty was over I was able to go back on the ice. I managed to score another goal to win the game.

The Winter Hawk defenseman?

It turned out that a lot of the blood on his knuckles was his own blood. From splitting his skin against my teeth.

And he'd broken a finger with the last punch in the center of my forehead. So he had to leave the game and didn't return.

Yup. Like I told the guys later, it didn't pay to mess with me.

In the dressing room at the end of the game, all the aches and pains caught up with me. I guess during the heat of the game you don't notice as much. But when it's over...agony.

I sat on a chair, towel draped over my shoulders. My body felt like it was filled with the glass of broken lightbulbs. My nose was throbbing like I was Rudolph on Christmas
Eve. And the painkillers for my broken tooth weren't doing much except leaving a bad taste in my mouth.

Still, it wasn't going to stop me from meeting Amanda to go for a milkshake. It had taken a lot of nerve to ask her to go to the game and Dairy Queen after, and I was glad she had agreed. I just hoped she'd remember the two goals I scored and not how I'd been a punching bag for the Winter Hawk defenseman. Maybe, if I were lucky, she'd been at the concession during the one-sided fight. But then she would have missed the power-play goal.

I groaned as I stood to get dressed.

“Good game,” Coach Thomas said, loud enough for the other guys to hear. “Next time, though, try ducking.”

“Hah, hah,” I said. Even talking hurt.

The other guys laughed.

Vlad walked up to me. He was already dressed. Jeans. Black T-shirt. Leather team jacket that matched mine. I'd made arrangements for one of the other guys to take him home.

Vlad stopped in front of me. He stuck out his hand, waiting for me to shake it.

I did. I winced because I'd moved too quickly.

“Glad to meet you,” Vlad said in a thick accent. “Me, La-Dee-Dah. You, Nail.”

“Huh?”

He pointed at himself. “La-Dee-Dah.”

He put his finger in my chest. “Nail.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I get the whole introduction thing. But my name isn't Nail.”

He kept smiling.

“You, La-Dee-Dah,” I said, imitating his accent. “Me, Ray-Ray.”

Some of the guys were giggling.

“You, Nail,” Vlad said. He made some punching motions. “Him, Hammer!”

Now all the guys busted out laughing again. I knew they had coached Vlad on what to say.

I couldn't help it. I started laughing myself. I mean, could I deny it? Next time I'd make a fist after my gloves were off, not before.

“You, Nail,” Vlad said again with a broad smile.

“Yup,” I said. “Me, Nail.”

It was great to be part of a team.

“You're lucky not much worse happened,” Dr. Dempster said.

I had finally showered and changed. Dr. Dempster was standing over me, using a flashlight and dental mirror to check my bottom teeth. He wore rubber gloves and had wiggled all of my bottom teeth to see that they were still secure.

“In fact,” he said, “I should be able to glue that cap back in place until you visit me
again on Monday morning for a more complete exam.”

He put the dental mirror back into his bag of emergency dental equipment.

He spoke as he looked inside the bag for the special dental glue. “I would, however, still advise you to come to my office right now, where we can make sure everything is fine.”

I shook my head.

He grinned. “Amazing how much a girl and a Friday-night date can motivate a person to deal with pain.”

I had told him about my date with Amanda. I had asked her to meet me in the parking lot.

I nodded. And it was amazing how much a person was motivated if that person thought he might get cut from the hockey team.

“This won't take long,” he said. “And it's just as well. I won't mind going straight home tonight.”

He was right. A minute later the cap was back in place.

“You're good to go,” he said. “Just don't do anything dumb again tonight.”

“Dumb?” I said. The glue tasted a little weird, but it was better than going on a date with Amanda with half a tooth missing.

“Yeah,” he said. “Like putting your head in the way of anything else that might hurt you.”

If only I had paid more attention to his warning.

“Amanda,” I said. “Thanks for waiting.”

She was in her car, a green two-door Cavalier. She had rolled her window down. The night air was relatively warm. I was wearing my Medicine Hat Tigers team jacket, and the wind didn't bother me at all.

“What can I say?” she said. “I'm addicted to Dairy Queen milkshakes.”

“Oh.” So it was the milkshake she was interested in?

She grinned. “Not that I'd go to DQ with just anybody.”

“Oh.” That made me feel better.

She pointed at her watch. “It's getting late, though. Maybe I should just follow you there. Saves us the trip of coming back here.”

I'd hate for you to sleep in and miss school tomorrow,” I said. I was being sarcastic. It was a Friday night.

“It's my mom,” she said. “She worries about me.”

I nodded. The Tigers didn't have a Saturday-night game, so maybe the guys on the team would be getting together. I'd use my cell phone to try to hook up with them after Dairy Queen.

“Let's go,” I said. I was in a good mood. I'd have a chance to hang out with Amanda, then catch up with my friends. I'd survived my first fight, and it looked like Coach Thomas was happy with my new style of aggressive hockey. Things were shaping up nicely.

Until I glanced over the top of Amanda's car and saw a big white van at the corner of the parking lot. Just like the one that had pulled up to the Moores' house the other night.

A large man was walking toward the van. A very large man. I knew that because he had a grip on Vlad's arm. Vlad was tall, but this man was much taller. Much wider.

It didn't look like Vlad really wanted to go to the van.

The large man opened the rear doors of the van. He shoved Vlad inside.

Then he got into the van and began to drive it out of the parking lot.

“Amanda,” I said, “have you got your cell phone?”

“In my purse.”

“And you've got my cell phone number?”

“Sure,” she said. “Why?”

“Call me, please. I don't have time to explain. I can talk to you as we're driving.”

“We're not going to Dairy Queen?”

I had begun to unlock my Jeep.

“Not yet,” I said. “Vlad might need our help.”

The white van stopped in a parking lot at Riverside Park, near the Medicine Hat city hall. Here, on a hot summer day, there might be a band playing. There would be moms and dads and kids on the grass, enjoying the nearby river.

On a winter night, however, there was no one. I kept driving and spoke into my cell phone.

“Amanda, keep following me, all right? I'm going to park just down the road.”

She and I had been on the cell phone the entire time. I'd explained to her how I'd seen Vlad go out to this van in the middle of the night from the Moores' house. I'd told her that I had no idea what was going on, but that I didn't think it was anything good.

One of the things that bothered me about the van was that it was a rental. From two cars back at one of the stoplights between the arena and the park, I'd noticed the sticker at the back. Was the guy from out of town?

Another thing that bothered me was that paper had been taped on the inside of the rear windows of the cargo van to cover the glass completely. What was in there to hide?

There was only one way to find out.

“Amanda,” I said into the cell phone, “would you like to park right behind my Jeep and go for a walk with me?”

We held hands as we walked. I had told her that if the guy in the van saw us coming, it wouldn't look too suspicious. Actually, I liked the excuse to hold her hand.

The stars were bright and, except for the wind, it was nice and quiet. Too bad this wasn't just a walk. Too bad I was so nervous about the situation with Vlad.

We walked closer to the van. The driver wasn't in the front. Neither was Vlad.

“That's weird,” I said to Amanda. “We didn't park that far away. I didn't see either of them leave the van.”

“Are they in the back?” she asked.

We were close enough to hear some angry words from the cargo van. Words that sounded Russian.

“That answers your question, doesn't it,” I said.

“Do we call the police?” she asked.

“Maybe,” I said. “But we should know what's happening first. If it's nothing, it will be embarrassing to have the police here. If it's something, maybe the police would get here too late.”

“So we look inside,” she said.

“Not we,” I said. “Me. How about you go back to your car.”

“But—”

“I don't know if anything dangerous is happening or not,” I said. “You—”

“Don't treat me like I'm a weak girl who needs protection,” she said.

“That's not what I meant. If there's danger, it would be smart to have you in a place where you can call the police.”

She patted my arm. “Smart thinking.”

“I'll call your cell phone from mine,” I said. “If neither of us hang up, I'll be able to keep it in my pocket and you can hear everything. If it sounds like I need help, hang up and call the police.”

She nodded.

As she walked back to her car, I rang her cell. She answered. I put my cell in my pocket as planned.

Then I snuck toward the van.

I wondered how I was going to see inside without getting noticed. I didn't want to go around to the front of the van and peer through the windshield.

Then I smiled at myself.

Side mirrors. When a person drove, they sat inside and looked backward through the
mirrors. So it should work in reverse. I should be able to stand behind the side mirror and look back into the van.

That's what I did. I walked very quietly up beside the cargo van. Because there were no windows on the side, I knew I wouldn't be seen. I crouched beside the van and looked into the side mirror.

It was easier to see inside than I expected. Mainly because there was a light in the back of the van. It looked like a flashlight.

It took a couple of seconds to make sense of everything. But when I figured it out, I didn't like what I was seeing.

The big man was standing in front of Vlad. He had a pair of pliers in his hand. And he was reaching into Vlad's mouth.

This was not a situation to call for the police and wait for them to arrive. I knocked on the door. I didn't see any other option. I didn't, however, plan to get into a fight with the monster-sized guy who was holding a pair of pliers. If that happened, I'm sure I would have earned my new nickname of Nail all over again.

I knocked again. There was still no reply from inside.

“Hey, Vlad,” I shouted. “Dude! What's happening?”

That would at least let them know inside it wasn't an accident that I was outside the van.

“Vlad! Team party!”

That was the only excuse I could come up with on short notice. Friday night. A Tigers' win. The guys were getting together somewhere. We'd join them.

“Vlad!” I shouted. Knocked on the window.

Finally, movement from inside. I knew this because the van shifted slightly. That gave me a clue as to how big the guy inside was.

He crawled into the front. I heard the locks unclick as he pushed a button inside.

I stepped back from the door as he opened it.

He moved outside. Spoke to me in Russian. He didn't have the pliers in his hand. I knew because it was the first thing I'd looked for— because it was the last thing I wanted to have gripping my nose or my ears.