When we arrived at the pier, everyone piled out of the van with Kaner paying the cabbie. I looked
around and saw that Jackie’s cab had already arrived and they were waiting for us. I noticed the size of the group and it was larger than the group we had left with.
“Sophie!” Jake Dowell said quite loudly as he ran to give me a hug.
“Hey, Jake. How’s your face?” he chuckled and gave me a pointed look. I felt like I knew him for years rather than just meeting him yesterday.
“It kind of hurts, especially since I just yelled out to you. But I have had ice on it all day, hopefully it will feel better tomorrow,” he replied with a small groan.
“Poor baby,” I replied as I pushed my arm into his shoulder. He was barely affected but chuckled at my attempt. “Where to now, guys?” I look to the Captain for some kind of direction.
“Harry Carey’s of course,” he said as if it was the simplest thing in the world. I just let out a small giggle and followed the team inside. Once we were shown to a table, well an arrangement of tables, I was sandwiched between Crawford and Toes (yes I meant to spell that incorrectly here). Bickell and Skille were sitting across from me as was Kaner. The waiter, a guy who looked to be gay, came and took our drink orders before disappearing and leaving us all to talk.
“So, Bicky, where was that goal I wanted last night?” I said to the forward sitting across from me. Skille let out a quick chuckle at the nickname I gave his friend and linemate. “What’s so funny, Mr. Skille? You didn’t score either.”
“I kind of like Bicky,” he said with another chuckle.
“So do I,” Bicky himself said which got Jack to stop chuckling and become serious again.
“What about the goals, guys?” I added once more to get the two of them to stop glaring at each other.
“I couldn’t outsmart the stupid goalie,” Jack said referring to his penalty shot.
“You almost had it; one step further would’ve gotten it for you. Maybe even one more deke,” I
responded quickly, hoping the guys wouldn’t really notice my terminology.
“Do you play hockey?” Bicky asked.
“Nah, I only skate for fun. I have never actually tried hockey myself.”
“We should get you on the ice while you are here,” Kaner added in for the first time in this conversation.
He had Sharpie on his other side and had been engrossed in that part of the table’s conversations before
this.
“I don’t have skates,” I replied.
“What size are you? We probably have a spare at the practice rink?” Kaner said.
“Size eight in women’s.”
“I can check when we have practice tomorrow in the late morning. What time are you heading out?”
“It depends on if Jackie has to work or not. I kind of sprung this on her without really asking questions. If she works, we leave when we have to in order for her not to be late, if she doesn’t, we have all day.”
After that, the conversations kept rolling but in between bites of food. There were multiple
conversations going on, so I was happy to be sitting at the end of one table so I only heard one. But I kind of felt left out when the middle part of the table, where Jackie was sitting, burst out laughing but then the guys on our end of the table just picked up on bad pickup lines. I had to laugh at some of those, they were super bad.
“You ready to go, Soph?” Crawf asked as I saw Jon helping Jackie put her coat on. I nodded and he helped me into my pea coat. I buttoned it up considering it was later and we were on the pier. We all headed out and we broke off into smaller groups to explore the pier with a promise to meet back at the hotel by ten. I ended up with Crawf, Sharpie, Tazer, Jackie, and Kaner. We did a lot of walking around the outside of the pier, even though it was chilly. When we need to warm up, we headed inside but didn’t stay long in there because there were more of a chance the guys would get recognized there and we would have to stop for them to be in pictures or do autographs.
At about nine thirty, our group decided we had enough and we headed to the cab pick up. We hailed the first van that came by and hopped in. When we arrived, the guys suggested we take a dip in the pool after hours and got it okayed by the manager. So we headed up to the Penthouse and changed into suits, the guys happened to all bring one too, so we headed down once the pool officially closed to the public.
We were the first ones in and before I could finish taking off my cover up and flip flops, I was being thrown into the water by none other than Patrick Kane. I splashed Kaner in the face for doing that to me before stripping out of the soaking cover up and threw it out of the pool. Next went the flip flops, after aiming one of them at Kaner of course. Jon and Jackie entered the pool room a little later and after checking for electronics, we ended up splashing them both. Jon jumped in to get his revenge while Jackie gave us a dirty look that only I caught as their captain scolded his teammates. We were in there for about an hour when the guys decided they should probably dry off, change, and get going so they had plenty of rest for tomorrow’s late practice. I said goodbyes and headed upstairs, leaving Jackie and Jon to go up separately because I knew they were majorly flirting and it shouldn’t end early. I was hoping he would ask her out.
I hit the elevator button and waved goodbye to the last of the team I could see from my spot and went up one floor before it was stopped to let an elderly man on. He hit his floor number, the top floor below the penthouse. He had a hoodie around his face, so I couldn’t really tell what he looked like. But when we reached his floor, he turned and grabbed me before running to the stairs down the hall from the elevator. I tried to scream, but somehow it got muffled. He kept running and eventually, we met the stairs. He stopped to check the halls at the lowest level and then took me out the back door into an alley. I was instantly cold, considering I was still in my bikini and towel. I was thrown into the back seat of a car and locked in. Another person’s hand came over my mouth and I felt a pinch on my neck. I don’t remember what happened after that.