Dakota wasn’t sure who was more excited about the hockey game, her or Zinny. Neither had ever been before. The Dragon Arena was a shockingly beautiful structure. Oval in shape and with an organic yet modern architectural flare, it boasted a mostly burnished golden metallic finish. She’d driven past it before, but always during the daytime. At night, the walls became a giant video screen, upon which a magnificent red Chinese dragon undulated, as if soaring in the sky. She and Zinny stood and stared at the ever-changing graphics for a while, taking in the typical sports animations featuring the team and the NHL logos, short clips of cheering fans, young and old, fireworks galore, and a selection of live-action hockey bits, one of which featured Cam.
“Zinny, did you see that? That was Cam on the screen!”
Then of course, they had to stand there for a few more minutes until he reappeared. Zinny shrieked when she saw him. “It’s Cam! It’s Cam!” She started running around in circles and Dakota let her, thinking she needed to get rid of some of this insane energy before she was cooped up in her seat.
When they finally started moving again toward the entrance, Dakota noted how many people were here. She hadn’t thought hockey was a very popular sport. It barely got a mention on the evening news, but judging from the long lines to get in and the excitement in the air, there were plenty of fans.
As promised, Cam had emailed the tickets, a parking pass, and a fifty-dollar food voucher that could be redeemed at one of the arena food venues or at their seats. At their seats? Dakota was appalled at first. Surely that was way too much money for one adult and one child for dinner. She sincerely hoped he wasn’t out of pocket for any of this. Hopefully, the players got an allotment of free tickets included in their contracts. Even so, she intended to pay him back by bringing him some healthy, home-cooked food to put in that mostly empty fridge of his. It wasn’t good for an athlete to eat nothing but take-out or frozen dinners. Ellen did most of the cooking, but Dakota could make anything if she had a recipe in front of her.
Zinny got a hot dog, chips and apple slices. Dakota got a grilled teriyaki chicken sandwich. When they exited the tunnel and entered the arena proper, Zinny gasped and looked around in obvious awe.
“Big place,” Dakota remarked.
Zinny nodded.
They found their seats and Dakota marveled at how great the view was. They could see the entire rink. Some loud electronic music was playing. People had gathered near the glass apparently anticipating some event, and that’s when Dakota remembered the entire reason they’d come so early. Cam promised to throw Zinny a puck when the players came out to warm up.
“Pardon me,” she asked the woman sitting one seat away. She had a little boy with her about Zinny’s age. “Do you know what time the players come out to warm up?”
“Any minute now,” she said.
“Thank you,” Dakota replied. “Your son is adorable, by the way. How old is he?”
“Thank you,” the woman replied. “Nico is six.”
“I’m Zinny. I’m six too!” Zinny said, ketchup all over her mouth. Dakota handed her a napkin. “I like your shirt.”
“It’s not a shirt,” Nico replied.
“It looks like a shirt to me,” Zinny said with a little attitude.
“It’s not. It’s a jersey.”
Dakota smiled as the kids argued and Nico’s mom smiled back.
“Sometimes they call them sweaters,” the woman said. “I’m Natalie, by the way.”
“Dakota. Nice to meet you.”
Zinny frowned. “But sweaters are fuzzy.”
“They call them sweaters because that’s what they used to be a long time ago,” Nico said. “They used to wear real sweaters to play hockey, but things are different now and now they don’t.”
Zinny appeared impressed with this knowledge. She turned to Dakota and whispered in her ear, “Can I sit next to Nico?”
Dakota whispered back, “Yes. After the players warm up, we can switch. Now, eat your dinner.”
She and Zinny savored their food while chatting with Natalie and her son. Nico was very knowledgeable about the game and answered every question Zinny fired at him. Dakota noticed both mother and son wore jerseys with the number twenty-one on them.
When warm-ups started, Dakota and Zinny found a spot near the glass. Zinny had to stand on her tiptoes to see over the wall.
“Koko, there he is!” she shrieked, waving madly.
“Where? What number is he wearing?”
“Seventeen.”
Dakota spied him on the other side of the rink, but he circled around quickly, obviously intent on—what a surprise—warming up. He looked a lot different. A lot different. First of all, he looked huge. In retrospect, that made a lot of sense. She didn’t know much about hockey, but she knew it was not a particularly polite sport. The play was pretty rough, hence the obvious padding. Plus, they had sticks and giving competitive men big sticks was a recipe for violence if she’d ever heard one.
There was an intensity about him tonight that she hadn’t seen before. Back at his house, he was laid back and friendly. But here at the Dragon Arena, he’d transformed into a man with purpose, power and skill. As she watched him on the ice with the other players, occasionally shooting pucks, her respect for him grew. It was one thing to be acquainted with a hockey player. It was quite another to actually see him in uniform under the bright lights of the arena.
Not for the first time, she wondered what it would be like to be held or even made love to by a man like Cam. He was in peak physical condition, for heaven’s sake. Her last boyfriend—the one who’d callously broken up with her shortly after she took over Zinny’s care—hadn’t been anything special in the stamina department. If someone had told Mike to drop and give them twenty, he’d have been hard pressed to complete three. Compared to Cam, Mike was positively scrawny.
As she watched Cam skate, she began to feel warm down below, which was probably a little dangerous. She already wondered if she liked him too much. Often she found herself wanting to put on a little show for him like she sometimes did for other clients. For those guys, she did it to increase the tip, but with Cam, she just wanted him to notice her and to acknowledge that she was a woman, not just his maid. But she didn’t. She didn’t want to be obvious or pathetic. He wasn’t interested in hooking up with her. He just wanted his house clean.
Wide-eyed, Zinny had her face right up on the glass. Dakota was pretty excited too. Neither had ever been to a professional game of any sort. Often when Zinny was hyped up, she babbled like she had when they were in line for their food. She’d always been extremely verbal, but right now she was too busy taking it all in. The awestruck silence didn’t last long.
“They’re so fast, Koko,” she said. “How do they go so fast?”
“The ice is slippery,” Dakota answered. “And they’re very strong.”
“Why are some of them laying down?”
“They’re stretching. I think if you stretch your muscles before exercising, you don’t get as many cramps. We’ll have to ask Cam about that.”
After a few more minutes, warm-ups seemed to end and players began peeling away to leave the ice. Dakota thought Cam had forgotten about them, but no. He went to the net where a couple dozen pucks sat and scooped one with his stick as he skated toward them.
Squealing, Zinny jumped up and down and waved her hands. “Cam! We’re here! We’re here!”
He grinned and gestured with his hand.
“He wants you to go up the stairs, Zinny,” Dakota prompted.
Zinny skipped up three steps and turned around. Cam showed her three fingers then made a shooing motion, and Zinny correctly interpreted that to mean she had to go up three more steps. Cam flashed her a thumbs up and then performed a trick that demonstrated just how skilled he was. He took the puck and guided it in front of him as he circled to the other side of the ice, then headed right back. When he was about ten feet away, in one fluid motion he somehow lofted the puck over the glass right into Zinny’s waiting hands. People applauded and Zinny did a victory dance clutching that puck to her chest like it was made of gold.
Dakota tried to convince her to put it in her purse for safekeeping, but Zinny would have none of it. She showed it to Nico, but the little boy seemed unimpressed. Luckily his disinterest didn’t bother Zinny.
The game started and, holy moly, the action was nonstop, even when they changed players. No one even paused. Guys hopped over the wall to replace the guys coming off the ice while the game was still being played. It was crazy. Even though she didn’t know the finer points of the game, she knew enough to understand when the Dragons had the puck, it was good and it was even better when they scored. Zinny pelted Nico with questions during the game. A woman who was clearly Natalie’s friend had arrived so Dakota just watched the game and listened to Nico and Zinny’s conversation.
At the end of the first period, the Dragons had zero points and the opposing team had two. The players left the ice, grim-faced, but Nico was optimistic.
“Don’t worry, Zinny,” Nico said. “There are two more periods and my dad’ll score.”
His dad?
“Which one is your dad?” Zinny asked.
“Number twenty-one. He’s the captain of the team.”
Dakota glanced over at Natalie. So she was the wife of the team captain? She looked so normal, Dakota would never have guessed. For some reason she’d thought wives of professional athletes were more glamorous looking. After all, those rich jocks could probably pick and choose among the cream of the crop.
After the game, Cam changed as quickly as he could and met Dakota and Zinny on the sub-ice level in an area designated for friends and family, wives and girlfriends, special guests, and staff members. The place was a loud, chaotic jumble. Every five seconds someone took a selfie. He was ridiculously anxious to see Dakota. He hoped it didn’t show.
He spotted Zinny right away. She looked fucking adorable wearing a tiny cap with a Chinese dragon head attached to it by a spring. The VIP pass that hung around her neck was almost as big as her face. Dakota looked great too. Her cheeks were pink from the cold and she was smiling at him. Damned if his heart didn’t start beating faster.
“Hey, Zinny. Hey, Dakota. I’m sorry we lost, but did you guys have fun anyway?” he asked.
“I had so much fun!” Zinny exclaimed. “I made a new friend and Aunt Koko let me put so much ketchup on my hot dog!”
He exchanged an amused glance with Dakota.
“But how was the hockey?” Cam asked. “Did you like watching the hockey?”
She put her gloved hands over her mouth and gave him a giggling nod.
“How about you, Aunt Koko? What did you think?” He asked it casually, but inside, he found himself anxious for her answer.
“I thought it was really exciting. Thanks again for inviting us.”
“Dakota!”
Cam looked to see who had called out. He would have sworn he was the only one she’d know here.
Unless it was one of her ECM clients.
The thought of that happening made him feel more than a little irritated. Except he realized belatedly that it was a woman’s voice and that a client would have called her Suzette, not Dakota.
“Nico!” Zinny darted forward and hugged Paul Nordbeck’s son, Nico. Paul’s wife, Natalie, was close behind.
Of course. Team services had given him tickets in the friends and family section of the arena.
“Hey, Cam,” Natalie said, standing up on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek.
“Hi, Natalie. Hi, Nico. You met my friends, Zinny and Dakota?”
“We did,” Natalie said with one eyebrow raised in curiosity. “Nico and Zinny had a great time together.”
“We both collect rocks,” Zinny announced.
“You collect rocks?” Dakota asked Nico.
“Yes. I’m gonna be a geologist when I grow up.”
“I’m impressed that you know what that is,” Dakota said.
Natalie laid her hand on her son’s shoulders. “His daddy is hoping he’ll fall in love with hockey, but so far, no luck. Nico takes after his mommy who is prone to falling on her butt when wearing ice skates.”
Zinny tapped Nico on the shoulder. “I have four rocks in my collection.”
“Only four?” Nico asked, which made Zinny frown.
“They’re travelling rocks. My mommy and daddy got them on trips they took. That’s why there aren’t that many.”
Nico looked at Dakota. “That’s not your mommy?”
“No. My mommy and daddy are in heaven. Auntie Koko and Nana take care of me now.”
Natalie gasped softly and sent Dakota a look of sympathy. “I’m so sorry.” Then she knelt in front of Zinny. “My parents are in heaven too, sweetheart. Maybe they’re all looking at us right now and are happy we’re friends now.”
“You should come over to my house. I’ll give you some of my rocks,” Nico declared. “I have some I don’t want any more.”
“Nico, that’s…not polite,” Natalie said.
“Why?”
“Because…I’ll explain on the way home. Let’s find Daddy. It’s late.”
After they said goodbye, Dakota said, “We should be going too.”
“Before you go,” Cam said, “tell me a little bit more about the travelling rocks. You get them on trips?”
“Yes. Rose and Thomas got the idea from that commercial about the trucker,” Dakota said. “Remember that one? He would gather rocks on his travels and write the location on them and at the end there’s this heartwarming moment as you realize he was collecting them for his kids.”
“Oh yeah, I do remember that commercial.”
“Well, Thomas thought it would be a fun thing for them to do as a family.”
“What’s the best rock you’ve got?” he asked Zinny.
A sly smile curved her little rosebud mouth as she glanced at Dakota.
“The Disneyland one, right?” Dakota asked and Zinny nodded.
“Why is that the best one? Does it have a picture of Mickey on it?”
“No. That one’s the best because…” Zinny crooked her finger at him and he knelt so she could whisper in his ear. “Because we had to make sure no one saw us take it.”
He whispered back, “You stole a rock from Disneyland?”
The expression on her face as she nodded was priceless—a combination of guilty, giddy excitement.
“You know, I travel all over North America and Canada as part of my job. Thirty cities. Would you like me to get you some rocks?”
“I don’t think—” Dakota started to say, but Zinny interrupted and exclaimed, “YES, PLEASE!”
Dakota had a pained look on her face.
“It’s no bother,” he said. “How hard can it be to find a few rocks on a road trip?”
“Sometimes it’s really hard,” Zinny said. “Like if you’re in a city. The rock has to be big enough to write on.”
“You leave it to me. By April you’ll have…” He did a quick tally of the games they’d played as visitors so far. “At least twenty rocks.”
Zinny squealed as she hugged his legs with more strength than he gave her credit for. “Thank you, Cam. Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
In a better mood than he probably should have been, considering they’d lost the game, he said goodbye to Dakota and Zinny. As he entered the players’ parking area, someone called out to him.
“Cam!”
He looked to see a pretty blonde waving at him. Jennifer, if he remembered correctly. She knew someone in the front office, one of the VPs, and often attended games. Wearing a dress that only just covered her butt, she was not dressed appropriately for spending three hours in an ice rink, but then again, she wasn’t here for the game itself. She was here for the players.
“Hey, Cam, lookin’ good out there,” she said.
“Thanks,” he said, even though his performance had been mediocre at best.
She drew close for a cheek kiss and lingered, not pulling away. He could smell her heady perfume and she let her hand brush against his backside—a brief touch, but long enough to send a clear message.
“But you always look good.” She licked his neck. “You always taste good too.”
Pretty sure he tasted like the shower gel the team provided in the showers, but he gave her butt a little conciliatory pat before stepping back. “Hey, sorry. I’m kind of tired tonight. Some other time, okay?”
“Aw, come on.” She put her mouth right next to his ear and palmed his groin. “I’ll do all the work. We can just go to your car and…”
He removed her hand and kissed it. “Not tonight, Jennifer. Try Stoner. He might be up for some fun.”
Huffing out a sigh, she rolled her eyes. “Party pooper.”
Not bothering to watch her walk away, he headed toward his car again. Truth was, he wasn’t all that tired. He just didn’t feel like faking his interest in her. She was a nice girl. The one time they’d hooked up, she hadn’t overstayed her welcome or gotten pushy. She just liked getting off with hockey players and in the past, he’d been happy to oblige, but tonight he wasn’t interested.
The only woman he was interested in was on her way home with a certain dragon-capped little girl and he couldn’t wait to see her again. Dakota had said she’d enjoyed herself, but he wanted more than that. He’d wanted her to come away with a whole new respect for him and what he did for a living. Was it sad that even though he had lots of admiring fans, he wanted one more? Because every time he saw her, the attraction only got stronger. In the beginning, he told himself it was just because he wasn’t used to having a scantily clad woman in his house, but that wasn’t it. The non-encounter just now with Jennifer proved it. He didn’t just want a woman. He wanted Dakota.