Chapter 5

Eliza's POV:



I waited until Friday to finally suck it up and go find Max. I hadn't seen him the entire week and figured that I should suck it up, find him and ask him about the plans for Saturday night. Once I told Mia about his invitation she freaked out and got really excited because apparently, Paul was a big Pens fan. So of course he got on the phone and spent 10 minutes thanking me profusely and asking me what he should wear before Mia wrestled the phone away from him and told me that they would be in Pittsburgh by 8pm on Friday. I was excited to see them and spend time with Mia and had double checked my apartment to make sure it was perfect before I left for work that morning. Now that I was here though I didn't know what to do. Did his offer of hanging out with the team still stand because I was kind of a dead-beat compared to them and actually didn't blame them if they were apprehensive too. I was their lawyer after all. Maybe I should just let it go and take Mia and Paul out to dinner instead. We could probably check out a club on our own or something..

A knock on my door startled me out of my thoughts when I looked up and saw Mary the receptionist standing there with a stack of files in Manila envelopes.

"Hey hun. I know you're busy today but these files just came in from the marketing department and they need you to have some players sign off on new campaigns."

"Did they need contracts drawn up or is that done already?" Please god, not more work.

"I'm pretty sure they want you to do that too hun. Everything explaining the details is in the top folder. If not, just call Mr. Lemieux since he has his hands in this project. The whole campaign is to promote next years ticket sales but we still need contracts and signatures for player permission."

More work on a Friday afternoon. Awesome. At this point I won't be able to even leave until 7pm and it was already 3:30

"Okay, thanks Mary. You can just leave them on that cabinet there and I'll get to them today."

She smiled sympathetically at me before closing the door and told me that she'd brew me some more coffee.



Two hours later I had managed to finish my last project and draw up a contract just generic enough to work for the 5 main players who would be heavily involved in the campaign. I figured that I could make it more iron-clad early Monday morning and have it back to the marketing team then. It's not like they'll even look at it this weekend anyway.

I glanced at the clock and knew most of the players would be around by now. They had a game tonight at 8 and around 5:30 they were all at the arena usually getting taped or stretching. Max was one of the players I needed a signature from so I figured if I went down there and he happened to mention the unresolved plans for Saturday then it would work itself out. If he didn't mention it, then I sure as hell wasn't going to do it either.



Here goes nothing.



Max's POV:



I was just pulling on my pants in the locker room when I heard a distinctly female voice call out "Everyone decent? I need to come in!"



"Eliza! My favorite and best lawyer! What brings you here this evening? Come to give me a good luck kiss?" Staal was already flirting with her and she was barely even in the room. As usual, she took his flirting in stride and only blushed a little from the attention she was getting.

"If by kiss you mean sign some papers, then yes Jordan. That's what I'm here to do." He pretended to be wounded before grabbing her in a sweaty hug making her squirm disgustedly but laugh at his antics.

"I heard you're finally coming to hang out with us!" I heard Kris yell from the other side of the room where he was taping a stick. I figured that at this point that was my cue.

She had been hard to track down all week and I didn't have her cell phone number to call her when she wasn't locked up in her office working. We had also been on the road until last night from games in Montreal. I continued to dress while I watched her engrossed in conversation with a bunch of the guys who had formed around her. How could she not think that they would want to hang out with her? She was pretty, funny in her own sarcastic way and most importantly had not shown even the slightest puck bunny symptoms. That alone made everyone like her 10 times more. I pulled a t-shirt over my head before grabbing her out of the crowd and their discussion about the Flyers who we were playing that night. They had all been teasing her to make sure she wasn't secretly a Flyers fan since she had lived there during her college years. I wouldn't remind them that she had also lived in D.C. with our other rivals, the Capitals.



"What did I tell you about pulling me everywhere?" she said after I had maneuvered her out of the group and over to my stall. She looked at me expectantly and the hand I still had on her arm.

"Don't worry, I'm not in trouble. I just wanted to know if we were all still on for tomorrow night. As you saw, the guys are excited."

"Um yeah, my friends are up for it and that sounds fun." Why did she look nervous again?

"You do know that we genuinely want to hang out with you and your friends right?" She didn't look at me and instead stared after some of the commotion from the other side of the room. I sighed, why was she being so weird about this? Grabbing her shoulders I made her face me.

"Okay, stop being insecure about this. Where's feisty Lizzy? Just come out with us tomorrow and have fun."

She finally smiled up at me and I was struck by how gorgeous she looked when she genuinely smiled. It was nice to have it aimed at me for once.

"Okay, that sounds good. Should we meet you somewhere tomorrow night?"

"Nope, leave it all to me. I'll pick you guys up at 9 at your place. Just plug your cell number and address into my contacts." I watched her plug her information into my phone and looked up to see Flower and Sid smiling at me and then at each other. Before I could glare at them Eliza was giving her phone back to me and talking.
"So are you going to tell me where we are going tomorrow night?" Jesus, this sounds and looks like a date. A big, confusing group date.

"No where fancy. Just wear jeans or whatever. And I'm not telling you until we get there because knowing you, you'll research the place and worry about it- NOT that there is anything to worry about!" I corrected myself after I saw her look of panic when I mentioned her having something to worry about. She seemed to relax a little about this and had me sign papers before she went off to talk and get the signatures from a couple of other guys. She wished us all luck before smiling and moving out of the room in those heels she never seemed to be without. How many shoes did she actually own? The guys waited a whole ten seconds before turning on me with smirks and cat-calls.



"Getting pretty cozy with our lawyer, eh Max?" Since when did Sid start teasing me? I brushed every one's comments off and ignored them. I had a game to get ready for anyway. I reassured myself again that Saturday was nothing even close to a date. There was nothing going on anyway.



Eliza's POV:



It was now Saturday and I was more than a little nervous. Mia and Paul had arrived last night providing a good distraction from everything. We had had so much to catch up on and also they were an adorable couple who never stopped talking. Talking to them made me realize how much I needed my friends old and new in my life right now. Around 1 am Mia finally made Paul go to bed in the spare bedroom and her and I ended up talking until 3 in my bed where we both finally fell asleep. Now it was 8am and I was the only one awake and moving around my apartment. I thought about making breakfast when I heard my phone buzzing on the counter beside me. Who's calling me now?



I picked up immediately when I saw that it was my Mom calling me.

"Hey Mom, what's up?" I figured that we could chat while I started to make Mia and Paul breakfast.

"Hey baby. I just wanted to catch you this morning and see how you are doing."

"Same old, same old. Mia and Paul arrived last night and now I'm making them breakfast before I run out and do some quick errands. I need to pick up dry cleaning and that kind of stuff before Monday." I decided on scrambled eggs and hash browns while we chatted about each other's weeks and my mom's new job. She had decided recently that she needed to stay busy and found a job as an accountant again. I agreed that this would be good for her and she had always loved crunching numbers anyway.

"So anyway honey, I did sort of have something I had been meaning to ask you. Now that I've gone through all of your fathers stuff and the house is on the market, I was wondering if you were ready to pick up the things I saved for you? I know you didn't want to talk about it earlier this week but I really think it will be good for you to have some of his things. It was very therapeutic for me to go through everything and I think it will be for you too."



I didn't understand why we were going through this again. I didn't want to talk about it Monday night when she called, or Wednesday and I still didn't want to talk about it now. I could feel my eyes tearing up again as she tried to talk to me about it. I loved her unconditionally and our family had always been super close but right now I didn't want to think about him and keep feeling sad. Ever since he had died that was all my family ever talked about to the point where dinners with my aunts and uncles were torture and I found myself making up excuses to get out of them.

"You know maybe we should even see a grief counselor Eliza. Maybe it would help both of us reconnect again and heal over your father." Wait what? Since when did she want to see a grief counselor? No, no, no and no.



"Mom!" I said sharply. "I don't want to talk about this with you or anyone else. Do you really think I'm going to lay on a couch and talk about all of this with a stranger? I don't want his stuff, I won't be coming to dinner tomorrow night and I will NOT see a counselor." I couldn't believe that I had just yelled at her. We had always been vocal with each other but I didn't ever say anything malicious like this.

Her side of the line was quiet but I could still hear her breathing.

"Eliza? What's going on?" Great, now Mia had heard part of the argument too.

"Mom, I have to go. I'll talk to you next week." I hung up and prayed that Mia would leave me alone.

"I made breakfast and if you want to eat later you can just microwave it then. I need to run out for a bit but I'll be back soon."



With that I grabbed my keys and shoes and got out before Mia could see that I was crying. Since when had I become such a colossal bitch?

And damn it. I still didn't know what I was going to wear that night.