Mmm, mmm. There’s that tall, long-haired Russian. “Curious Georg,” as he’s known on Instagram. Or was known, before his account went stagnant. Kind of a bummer. His account was pretty fun to follow. Georg in big sunglasses and a silly hat. Georg pouring a bottle of Russian vodka over some half-naked woman’s stomach. Georg half undressed, asleep on a purple couch, a mustache drawn on his face in black marker.

What can I say? I’m a sucker for trouble.

We went on a date once. Kind of twice. The first time doesn’t really count because we were just the plus-ones to our friends Evan and Holly. The second time, we sucked face up until that big dummy Viktor started a fight. Fight notwithstanding, I still think the sucking face elevates it to a date.

Anyway, I saw him at Evan and Holly’s wedding a few months ago but he mostly just stared at me with a brooding look on his face. Which was hot, I guess. I mean, who doesn’t like being stared at intensely by a guy who can rock a suit with no tie while he nurses vodka on the rocks? No one likes that? Oh. Well.

Not gonna lie, I totally flip through the gossip sites looking for pictures of him. I’m a sad little groupie. Not quite a puck bunny. More like a Georg-specific bunny. Though I’ll lie if anyone ever calls me out on it.

My mother would say that I shouldn’t waste my time on a guy who’s probably drunk eighty-percent of the time he’s off the ice. And I know I shouldn’t. So, I won’t. I mean, the prohibition on fraternizing with team members sort of stops me anyway, since I’m on the staff now.

Yeah, boy! I’m the Crush’s newest athletic trainer. Grad school is done and my good friend and social media guru, Holly, put in a good word with Max Terry, the team’s owner and got me an interview. Which I nailed. Because I am awesome.

“You excited?” the guy next to me asks? We’re both in athletic polo shirts emblazoned with the Crush logo on the front.

“About the job? Or the hockey?” I ask.

He gives me a funny little half-grin. Guy is pretty cute, actually. Blonde, blue-eyed, muscular and fit. He’s wearing black chinos and trainers. “Um…both?” he says with a laugh. He holds out a hand. “Dale Moncrief.”

I shake his hand. “Pamela Jenson,” I say. “And yes, I’m excited about both. The Crush had an amazing season last year, so I’m thrilled to be part of the team.”

“What will you be doing for the team?” he asks, running a hand through his hair. It’s short on the sides and in the back, but a little longer on top. Boyish. Rakish.

“I’m a physical therapist,” I say. “Just finished grad school at UCLA. I worked really closely with the soccer teams there.”

“Awesome. I’m an athletic trainer.”

“They really seem to be beefing up the training staff this year,” I say.

“Well, when you have a championship-level team, you tend to want to make sure they stay in winning form,” Dale says. “Did you follow the Crush before you started here?”

“I did. But only because my best friend is the social media manager here. She just married one of the players.”

“Oooohhhh, a breaker of policies,” Dale says conspiratorially. “Bad girl.”

I laugh. “She’s about the most rule-followingest person you could meet,” I say. “If you knew her…”

“What about you?” Dale asks, leaning over and nudging my shoulder with his. “You follow all the rules?”

I bite my lip and lower my eyelids flirtatiously. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

A crash on the glass turns my attention back to the ice, where Georg and last year’s star rookie Mikhail have had a run-in during scrimmage. Mikhail the hothead throws off his helmet and starts yelling about penalties while Georg just grins and wiggles his rear end at his teammate, telling him to lighten up. Then he looks over at me and winks. This makes me crack up for some reason and Dale asks, “You know him?”

“Kind of. Not real well, though.”

“Well, he is known to be a bit of a womanizer,” Dale says. “Be careful of that one.”

“I can handle myself, but thanks.”

“I’ll bet you can,” he says with a wide grin. “No doubt about that.”

The head of our team of therapists, trainers, and nutritionists gives us what I suspect is the every-year start-of-season pep-talk. He talks about keeping our players in top form, of communicating with each other about concerns that might cross the borders of what we do. He reminds us that we’re always to be professional–with each other and the players.

As the scrimmage goes on, he points out different plays and tosses out stories about specific injuries that he’s seen from each type of play. He talks about concussion protocol and stresses that we are not a team that puts players back on the ice before they’re cleared by a doctor. Dale makes snide remarks under his breath every so often. Some of them are funny, but others miss the mark. I think he’s trying to paint himself as a rebel or keep my attention from the Russian player who keeps looking my way. Either way, I wish he’d stop while he was ahead.

My mind goes back to Evan and Holly’s wedding. It was so beautiful, set in the mountains, on a vast deck with an incredible view. I’ve never imagined myself settling down with someone like that. My eyes wander. My interest wanes. I’m not like Holly, who has always been cautious about relationships. I’m in and out, and always on the lookout for the next shiny boy toy.

I’m not a slut, though. Seriously. Just wanted to put that out there.

After our first day on the job, I head to my new condo, which is Holly’s old condo in a cute little suburb of Vegas. It worked out perfectly for me to take over her place after she moved in with her hubby. I looked at Evan’s apartment, too, but decided I liked the quieter pace of the suburbs. After living in student housing for the past six years, I was ready for something private and quiet. Evan’s building was full of young professionals, athletes and performers, all with a penchant for partying in common. I like to party too–don’t get me wrong–but I want to be able to get away from it sometimes, too.

I didn’t have a lot of furniture that I wanted to lug here from Los Angeles, so my first order of business was to go straight to the store and pick out some new stuff. I’ve been sleeping on an air mattress for the past week, so you can imagine how pumped I am when the delivery truck pulls up.

Bonus! The two movers are buff and tan. I flirt shamelessly while they unload my new bedroom, living room, and dining room sets. I probably splurged too much, honestly, but I really felt the need to have my own space, my own stuff. And not stuff I found at the Goodwill, which is stop number one for any poor graduate student.

One of the movers wears a wedding ring but the other, a redhead with bright blue eyes, flirts right back at me.

“New to town, then?” he asks.

“Yep, just moved here. I work for the Crush,” I say, leaning against the doorframe while he and his partner put together my bed frame.

“Good gig,” he says appreciatively. “You a cheerleader?”

“Ha,” I say. “Hockey teams don’t have cheerleaders.”

He grins, a super cute dimple in his cheek. “I know. You’re just too cute to be, like, their accountant or something.”

“Awww, flattery will get you everywhere, my man. I’m actually a physical therapist. So I get to work on muscly dudes all day for a living. Not bad.”

“Well, I’m a muscly dude,” he says. “I’ve got this pain in my shoulder…”

The other guy snorts and says, “Stop flirting and help me out here. We’ve got two more deliveries before we can be done for the day.”

I slink away, down to start myself some dinner, and the guys head out shortly after. Of course, I find the guy’s name and number on my new nightstand later that night.

Oh, Vegas is going to be so much fun.