She laughed and Novikov said, “You’re such a fan, figured you’d know Bare Knuckles Ma—”
“No!” And the grizzly and the hybrid male snarled a little at his outburst, both pulling their females back from the hysterical polar. “No, no, no, no!”
The feline’s grin was wide and happy. “Come on, baby, don’t be like that.”
“No! You cannot be Bare Knuckles Malone. You cannot be. You”—and he pointed at her with an accusing finger—“cannot be the daughter of the greatest player ever. And you cannot be the most feared enforcer in the league right now. You? No!”
“I’m sensing I should be insulted by that tone.” The feline grinned. “But I’m not! Because I have such a giving and loving nature and you are just so cute. We will have such adorable cubs. And since I’m never home, my little girl”—she raised her hand barely to her waist to illustrate her child’s height—“can raise them.”
“I am not cute and I’m not having kids with you!”
“You guys, you guys.” Blayne slipped between the pair. “There’s no reason to be angry.”
“I’m not angry.” Flinging her arms out and turning in a circle like a little girl, the feline exclaimed, “I’m in love!”
“That’s it.” Crush stepped away. “I’m leaving.”
“You can’t run from our love!”
Crush had almost reached the elevators when Blayne leaped in front of him. “Don’t go, Crush.”
“I can’t stay. The game’s about to start, I need to get to my seat ... I can’t stay.” He reached around Blayne, punching the elevator button. When he leaned back, he realized that the wolfdog was staring up at him. And the more she stared, the sadder she looked.
“What? What’s wrong?”
Then she looked mad. He assumed she was mad at him, but when she grabbed his hand and walked back over to the others, it was the feline who received Blayne’s wrath.
“Why are you being mean?” Blayne demanded.
“I’m not being—”
“Bullshit! I know when a feline’s being mean, and you’re being mean. I don’t like it.”
“Now ask me if I care if you—owww! You bitch!”
Blayne had dropped Crush’s hand to latch on to the feline’s hair, digging her fingers in and twisting.
“Get off me!”
“Excuse us,” Blayne said before she stormed off down the hallway, dragging the feline with her.
Crush watched the pair disappear around a corner; then he looked at Novikov. He knew the man had the same expression Crush did, and they both started off at the same time to follow, but Gwen grabbed their arms. “Don’t get in the middle.”
“Yeah, but—”
“You’re not listening to me. Do not get in the middle of this. Trust me.”
“It’s really not that big a deal,” Crush felt the need to explain. “She drives me nuts, but Blayne didn’t have to get so upset about it.”
“Blayne felt she did, so you might as well not get in the middle.” Gwen glanced at him. “Rough couple of days, Crush? Maybe a rough couple of years?”
Crush, feeling uncomfortable, asked, “What are you talking about?”
“Whatever Blayne Thorpe saw, she’s worried about you.”
“Worried about me? Why? I mean, life is what it is.”
“Ooooh.” Gwen cringed. “Yeah, if Blayne asks you a similar question, I wouldn’t give that response.”
“Do not give Blayne that response,” Novikov agreed. “Otherwise, she’ll make me adopt you.”
“That would be kind of weird cause I’m older than you.”
“Is that really the only reason you can come up with of why that would be weird?”
Blayne stalked around the corner, the feline following behind, eyes rolling, feet dragging. Stopping between Crush and Gwen, Blayne waited for Malone to reach them, her foot tapping.
Once the feline stood in front of them, she said, “Now what was it you wanted me to say again?”
Blayne went for Malone’s throat, but Novikov caught her first, yanking the swinging, spitting, and screeching wolfdog away.
“Is there anyone,” Crush asked, “that you don’t irritate?”
The feline looked him over, and grinned. “Come on.”
She grabbed his hand, but Crush immediately yanked it back. “I’m not going anywhere with you. I’m going to my seat and forget I ever met you and then I’ll decide whether to sue the makers of delicious Jell-O products or just the MacDermots for using Jell-O in a clearly despicable way.”
“You really are cute, you know?” And for once it didn’t sound like the feline was mocking. “My suggestion is to go after MacDermot and Llewellyn. The Jell-O people are probably a huge conglomerate that will have you tied up in court for years. And I need you to come with me because I’d prefer not to end up on the wrong side of Blayne Thorpe.”
“You already seem to be on the wrong side of Blayne.”
“If I was really on the wrong side of Blayne, I’d be in little consumable pieces for the hyena population. You wouldn’t want that, would you?”
“Morally ... I guess not.”
“Morally, huh?”
“Should I get a dictionary so you can look up the meaning?”
Laughing, the feline grabbed his hand and started walking. “According to Blayne,” who was watching them walk by, panting hard, fangs out, “I owe you for being so mean to you. You apparently have a broken heart that needs to be mended.” She glanced back at him. “Just break up with your girlfriend or something?”
“No.”
“Well, she thinks you’re wounded and my tormenting you is beneath me.”
“So you two just met then?”
“I like how your sense of humor comes out when it’s to make fun of me.”
“You need to pick up the step, Malone,” Novikov yelled after her. “We’ve got a game to get to.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
After a few minutes of following along, Crush asked, “So where are we going anyway?”
“You’ll see.”
“If you’re just going to find another way to publicly embarrass me, can we do it at another time? Like after the game?”
“I don’t waste my time embarrassing anyone when I’ve got a game about to start.”
“And why is that?”
“Because embarrassing others is a pastime and pastimes are for after the game. Like video games or going out to clubs.”
“Can you be more cat?”
“Not even if I tried.”
She took him down a small set of stairs to a door manned by a couple of very large security guards. “Hey, guys.”
“Hey, Cella,” one said while opening the door for her.
“He’s with me. This is ...” She stopped, looked at him. “What’s your name?”
“You’re just asking me that?”
“Yes.”
“MacDermot didn’t tell you?”
“She did but”—she shrugged—“it slipped my mind.”
Knowing that if he tried to make a run for it, she’d just hunt him down, Crush decided to just get this insanity over with. “Name’s Lou Crushek.”
“I thought Blayne called you Crush.”
“My friends call me Crush, and since you’re not—”
“Crush it is then.” She yanked him inside the big room with the giant windows overlooking the rink and dragged him until they reached the plush leather seats.
“You’ll watch the game from here.”
Crush took a quick look around. When the Sports Center first opened years ago, Crush had taken what Conway still called “a sports geek tour of the place.” So he knew this room, although he and the other tourists had only been allowed a very quick walkthrough. “But ... but this is the—”