Hockey With Benefits(28)

They continued to rib each other as I went over to the counter. Cruz stepped up next to me as I was paying. “She’s on our team.”

I glanced at him, surprised because his tone was firm and authoritative. But he wasn’t looking at me, he was watching the doorway, and I saw Flynn Carrington coming in. Cruz didn’t give me a choice. He turned back to the girl, who had paused at his command. He motioned to the vest. “Change her team. She’s on ours.”

She looked my way. I gave a nod.

She made the switch and my vest lit up neon blue instead of green. Cruz took my gun, and I pulled the vest over my head as I followed him back to the group.

“What?” Gavin saw my vest. “She’s on our team.”

Atwater and Barclay both looked over, but didn’t hoot to rub it in. They were quiet, looking Carrington’s way before shifting, just slightly so they were standing between Cruz and the rest of the Alpha Mu guys.

“Daniels is with us.” Cruz was saying it like that was final.

He handed my gun to me, and as I took it, he touched my arm, urging me behind the rest of the hockey guys. I knew what he was doing, and I got it. He wasn’t even eyeing me, seeing if I was going to start balking at the possession he was laying claim to me, but I wasn’t going to. I saw the look Carrington gave me when he walked in, and the look had changed slightly at seeing Cruz handle me.

“You going to give me slack for this?” he did ask when we fanned out, putting more space between me and Carrington.

“No.”

His head turned to me. “Really?”

“I know what you’re doing. Thank you.”

He continued to eye me, but I ignored him, getting familiar with my laser gun.

“You know anything about laser tag?”

“I know enough not to shoot my teammates.”

The side of his mouth lifted up as the rest of the guys came over. They formed a huddle.

Labrowski took control, going over the rules first, which was basically that you needed to be hit twice before you were considered dead. And when you were, you had to lay where you died. You couldn’t return to your team’s base and tell them any information. The chips in the vest let us know when we got hit and what team was winning, etc.

That was it.

He ended with, “We cover each other as we fan out just like on the ice.” He looked at me. “You up for going high?”

I nodded. I actually preferred that, and well, that was the team meeting. We went to our end and started running inside. The guys worked well together, teams of three worked as they ‘cleared’ each corner. Cruz moved with me, and I wasn’t surprised that Barclay and Atwater were also with us. When we got as close to the middle as possible, they found a ledge, and all three of them formed half of a human ladder for me to climb up. I stepped up on Cruz’s shoulder and he hoisted me the last of the way, but I’d been on the dance team in high school. I knew how to tuck my body for being thrown in the air. When I got up, I looked over the edge and saw three guys coming their way.

I leaned over and made a motion to get their attention. They looked and I held up three fingers, pointing in the direction they were coming from. The guys immediately got into hiding spots. I went back over to the other side, laying as flat as I could and setting up my position like I was a sniper, my gun on the ground in front of me.

Pow! Pow! Pow!

“Got you–AGH!”

“You’re dead.”

There was cursing, and then the guys moved off to the side. I used to play this with Zeke and our group of friends. Kit and the other girls didn’t like it as much. They mostly went to flirt with the guys or try and rub up against them in the dark corners. Not me. I actually enjoyed this stuff, so I fully got into character.

I could see a farther corner up ahead, so as they came around it and paused before looking around the next turn, I could take them out. They wouldn’t know who shot them.

Two more Alpha Mu guys did just that, and I thumbed off rapid shots, getting hits so fast they couldn’t regroup fast enough. Both were dead.

Two more and I repeated the process, until one guy saw me and dove out of the way. I had to scurry, knowing he’d come for me right away, but as he took two steps my way, Cruz materialized out of the shadows and got his two hits in. The guy growled, but he fell where he was taken out.

Cruz moved back, hiding again, and there was a burst of sounds from the far left. Shouts and curses sounded out, but then out of nowhere, five Alpha Mu guys burst around the corner. I got two. The other three paused, not spotting me, but I couldn’t get to them. They were edging along the wall where I was hiding, but they weren’t looking up. One turned the first corner, and suddenly a barrage of shooting happened. Atwater and Barclay swept in. Cruz was coming up from behind.

Atwater was dead, but Cruz and Barclay were still good to go. They were making some hand gestures to each other, not speaking. Cruz looked up my way, motioning they were going to move ahead. I nodded to let him know I got the message. It was time to advance now.

They were soon around the corner. For the rest of the game, I picked off any Alpha Mu that got past them. I checked my vest to see how many remained for each team. We had eight guys left, and they had two. Gavin was dead. Carrington wasn’t. The other one still going was Leander.

I saw someone going through the maze, but they were too far away. They were going fast and were hunched over so their vest couldn’t get hit so easily. Smart.