Chapter Seven
It was the first intermission of the final game of their regular season, a homer against Minnesota, and the Dells were in low spirits. They were already down by three and most of the guys were starting to lose hope.
Jacob was feeling pretty lost himself. He could see their playoff dreams dwindling before his eyes. The morale in the locker room was downright abysmal and he had no idea how to boost it.
Lucky for him Dino was doing just that, going around from guy to guy and cracking jokes and putting on a brave face despite the grim outlook.
He hadn’t quite healed from the game on Saturday, but he wore his bruises proudly. He kept sneaking cautious glances over at Jacob whenever he thought that the captain wasn’t looking.
Jacob was always looking.
Dino had played a solid first period. He was toeing the line between his rugged playing style and Jacob’s cleaner one. He hadn’t taken any penalties or gotten too rough with anyone, but it was clear that he was holding himself back.
Jacob knew that he was doing it for his sake, which made him feel warm and uncomfortable, but he appreciated the gesture nonetheless.
After what felt like no time at all, they were being called back on the ice. Jacob’s line took a few shifts to no avail. They were fast, but they just couldn’t manage to clear the line. They were spending way too much time defending their zone and Pulks was getting tired.
About thirteen minutes in, Dino had a stroke of luck and ended up with the puck. Jacob and Spark were too far back for him to pass to and the paths to Rocky and Salad were obscured so Dino tried to skate the puck himself. He didn’t get too far before a real nasty Minnesota D-man tripped him up with his stick.
Dino went sprawling out onto the ice and Jacob saw red. He didn’t wait for the whistle or check to see if Dino was okay. Something inside him just snapped. He only had eyes for the man who had intentionally tried to hurt the second D-man who had inexplicably wormed his way into his heart.
Jacob dropped his gloves and stick onto the ice and then, faster than anyone could register what was happening, he punched Dino’s assailant square in the face.
The man, Jacob thought his name was Richardson, recoiled as blood spewed from his nose. The roaring of the crowd grew loud enough to overtake the pounding in his ears. He stared down at the hunched player before him and did not hesitate when the linesman came and grabbed him by the shoulder, escorting him to the box.
Rockaway looked at him curiously as he settled down inside of the Plexiglas enclosure, but did not say anything as the announcer listed his name, number, and crime. He’d drawn blood so that was an automatic five minute major. The first one of his career.
Jacob watched with his heart in his throat as his teammates went on the defensive. The rest of his line stayed on for the penalty kill, but Dino had been swapped out for Toner.
Jacob turned to the coach.
“Is the kid all right?” he asked.
Rockaway nodded without looking up from his clipboard.
“Winded. I’ll put him back in in a bit.”
The ball of anxiety in Jacob’s stomach eased a little and he turned back to the game. A minute went by before Salad iced the puck, allowing for a line change, and true to the coach’s word, Dino went back in.
He was focused on the penalty kill, but kept furtively shooting Jacob glances. Jacob desperately wanted to know what thoughts were going through his mind.
Then, two minutes and thirty-five seconds into his penalty, Jacob got his answer.
Dino managed to wrestle the puck away from Thorne and get it out across center. He skated in toward goal faster than Jacob had ever seen him. Thorne was on his tail, but he wasn’t fast enough. Dino was one-on-one in front of the net. He gave a wrister and the puck went slamming into the top right-hand corner, just a second before the goalie’s glove.
The horn sounded. The crowd cheered. The guys surged forward to congratulate Dino on his very first goal.
But Dino didn’t seem to care about that. He was too busy giving Jacob an open, but shy smile from across the ice. Jacob could practically hear him whispering, “That was for you, Cap.”
Two minutes later, he did it again.
The crowd was out of their mind. Two back-to-back short-handed goals by a rookie stay-at-home defenseman. Jacob didn’t think that had ever happened before—at least not in the eight years he had been playing.
This time instead of smiling Dino skated up to the sin bin and tapped the glass.
Thirty seconds later, Jacob was back on the ice. He felt like someone else was in control of his body. He skated hard and fast, making it through his shifts on autopilot.
He felt the buzzer all the way down to his bones.
He handed his helmet and stick to one of the equipment managers and headed back to the locker room with everyone else, already working through things he wanted to say to them before the start of the third period, but Dino stopped him from going in with a hand on his shoulder.
“Can I talk to you?” Dino asked.
Jacob nodded and followed him out into the dim hallway.
“Are you okay?” Jacob asked.
Dino raised his non-stitched up eyebrow. “Feeling pretty good. Are you okay? What the hell got into you back there? I thought you were Mr. Ethical. Since when do you go around punching guys in the face?”
Jacob pulled off his gloves and rubbed at the back of his neck. He tried to think up words to explain, but everything kept getting all jumbled up and complicated in his head. Fifteen minutes wasn’t nearly long enough to say all of the things he wanted to say to Dino. To explain the instant rage and fear in his heart when he’d seen him go flying.
But it was enough time for one thing.
Jacob reached up and placed his hand over Dino’s jaw, careful not to press too hard into any of his bruises. Then, despite his insecurities and the fact that any teammate or staff member could come walking down this hallway at any moment, Jacob leaned in and gave Dino a kiss.
When he pulled away, Dino’s cheeks were red and he had an adorable half smirk on his face. It was almost like he was trying really hard not to smile, but simply couldn’t help himself.
“I outta get hurt more often,” he said, breathing hard.
Jacob let out a startled, genuine laugh. “Please don’t.”
He snaked out an arm and wrapped it around Dino’s huge waist, pulling him close.
“I’m done holding back,” Jacob said, eyes trained on Dino’s face. “From you. From myself. From the team. Never again.” He shook his head to illustrate his point and gave Dino the most heart stoppingly wicked smile.
“Let’s go win this fucking game.”
The Dells ended up winning four to three with Jacob scoring the winning goal in shootout. The crowd was so uproarious over the Dells’ first playoff run in franchise history that no one even noticed the first and second stars of the game leaving the rink hand in hand.