Page 73 of The Pucking Coach's Daughter

He lifts one shoulder. “I think she could benefit from it.”

His abuela tsks. “If you insist. Room three. I have paperwork to complete. Come see me before you leave.”

“Why does she call you Gabriel?” I ask him once she’s gone.

He smiles. A nice one. It’s directed at his abuela, obviously, not me. I’ll be damned if he ever smiles at me like that. Seems to be a similar sentiment between them, although he doesn’t act bothered by her cold demeanor.

“It’s my middle name,” he says. “Mom is white. Dad is first generation Mexican American. My parents agreed to name me Oliver because it was her father’s name, so he chose my middle name. My dad’s side of the family mostly calls me Gabriel, but Abue set the tone for it early.”

“Got it.”

Oliver Gabriel Ruiz. There’s no L there, unless we count the two in his first and middle names. I don’t think that’s enough to entirely clear him of being L., but… Stop thinking about him.

He leads the way through the door his abuela came through. The hallway is wide, and there’s a long row of shelving on the right. He goes to it and plucks items from cubbies, handing me first a hard hat, then a pair of safety goggles. He moves farther down, taking an apron made of thicker rubber off a rack. He hooks one over his neck, then passes me the other.

“I don’t really understand what’s going on.” I tie the apron at the small of my back.

We go to the third door on the left. It has a white light on over it, unlike the others. Their lights are off. One is red.

He opens the door and ushers me in, his hand briefly touching my back.

I scoot in quick.

The room is… a kitchen? Minus the sink and appliances. The cabinets have no doors, but there are stacks of plates and glassware on every shelf. There’s also miscellaneous stuff: picture frames lining the counter, a collection of vases filled with water and flowers.

Oliver taps me on the shoulder.

I turn.

He didn’t touch me with his hand—there’s a baseball bat in his grip, and he offers me the handle.

I take it with a silent question on my face.

“Rage rooms.” He takes a glass from one of the cabinets and throws it on the floor.

It smashes. I do my best not to flinch at the sudden noise, but I don’t think I succeed. Glass goes everywhere, and he kicks one of the larger chunks toward the wall.

“How did you feel when you realized it was me?” Oliver goads.

“Angry.”

“And when Penn said some bullshit about treating you nice?”

“Like I was going to crawl out of my skin.”

“Because it was so fucking easy to pick you up off the street and get you in the trunk,” he says. “Right? Because you didn’t know how to stop Bear from grabbing you, you didn’t react quick enough, you didn’t scream loud enough. You weren’t enough.”

“Stop it.”

He holds out a plate. “How does that make you feel, doll?”

“Frustrated.”

“Helpless,” he corrects, his tone biting. “You’re so fucking helpless. That’s why you’re a doll. You run a mile or two every other day and call yourself athletic, but you have no muscles. Andi fucking Sharpe taped you down to a toilet with the help of one other person.”

He comes closer and squeezes my biceps with his free hand. To prove a point.

I knock him away and grip the bat tighter. “Stop.”