Conditioning Loan: The Games We Play - Season 2 by L.A. Witt

Author:L.A. Witt [Witt, L.A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: GallagherWitt Publishing LLC
Published: 2025-10-07T00:00:00+00:00

That defenseman did try to exact retribution from Vasily near the end of the third, but it didn’t work out the way he’d hoped. Vasily took the punch and didn’t retaliate, and we wound up with a power play while the dumbass went to the box for roughing. The defenseman’s pride and Vasily’s refusal to take the bait gave us the chance to score a power play goal, which tied the game in the final minute.

And then in overtime, Brown—who’d still been beating himself up over his costly penalty in the first period—potted his first PHL overtime goal. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him celebrate more exuberantly. In the bar at the hotel, he wasn’t even drinking all that much, but he was grinning the whole night.

Good for him. Penalties happened, but it never felt great to be the one in the box when the other team scored on the power play. A little redemption went a long way sometimes.

We didn’t stay out super late that night. We were all still wiped from flying in last night, and we had to practice again tomorrow before getting on the bus. Road trips were not for the faint of heart.

I slept hard that night. Even thoughts of Vasily couldn’t keep me awake, and I passed out the second I hit the pillow until my alarm went off. Then it was downstairs to breakfast before the bus took us to Calgary’s rink for an earlyish practice. After that, we filed onto the bus for the four-hour drive (maybe five, given the snow).

I was honestly surprised we were taking the bus from here to Edmonton in January. Both cities were experiencing snow because, hello, Alberta in January, but the roads were reasonably clear and there were no storms in the forecast. Hopefully that held; my major junior team had been stranded in Buffalo once because a massive storm had dumped a massive amount of snow on the city the morning after we’d flown in. I wondered to this day if the coaches and chaperones had ever recovered from wrangling a team of restless teenage hockey players stuck in a hotel for two solid days.

Well, so far so good on this trip. We’d see what happened on the much longer bus ride from Edmonton to Winnipeg.

I’d just taken a sip of my coffee, and I very nearly spat it out when someone took the seat next to mine.

“Did you miss the snow when you lived in Vegas?” Vasily asked, casual as could be.

I somehow didn’t sputter my coffee, and after I’d swallowed it, managed to sound relaxed and normal. “Sometimes. But then I’d visit my parents in Michigan during Christmas and remember how much I hate ice that’s not inside a hockey rink.”

Vasily laughed. “I didn’t like the cold the whole time I was a child. In Russia, in Canada—” He shook his head. “But after one fucking season in the desert—ugh. Give me the goddamned snow.”

“But what about Seattle?” I asked. “It doesn’t get much snow.

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