“What the…” Glad he’d changed out of his skates, Lock went after Gwen and grabbed her around the waist, hauling her back up the stairs.

“Put me down! She’s not doing this!”

“Who?” he demanded.

Jess motioned to the track again and Lock looked at Evie Viserate. Really looked at her. She had her hair in two ponytails and a bright white helmet over that. But when she smiled Lock could only cringe. Because he’d recognize that smile anywhere.

“Uh-oh.”

Gwen was still putting up a fight. “Put me down! Right now!”

“I’ll be back,” he said to Jess. “Hold our seats.” And then he hauled the crazed feline back up the stairs and out into the stadium hallway.

“How could she lie to me like that?” Gwen demanded as soon as Lock put her down on the ground in the hallway.

“Maybe because she knew you’d get a tad hysterical.”

“I’m not hysterical. I’m pissed off! She’s going to get herself killed out there.” She tried to go around him again, but Lock took one small step and immediately blocked her way with that insanely beautiful body of his.

“How do you know that?”

Arms folded under her chest, Gwen demanded, “Have you ever watched derby? Real derby? Not that full-human one,” which was pretty tough for a bunch of full-humans but, compared to shifter derby, totally lightweight.

“No.”

“Then you have no idea how bad this could get.”

“But you do?”

He really thought she was being a little drama queen for no reason, didn’t he? That her whole life was built around stopping Blayne from having any fun because she was Gwen the Fun-inator.

“Yeah. I do. I’m the daughter of The Rocker.”

Lock frowned. “The baseball player?”

Taking a deep breath, “No. Not the baseball player.” You pinhead! “The derby queen.”

His frown faded and she watched him try not to smile. “Your mother was a—”

“Yes. But not ‘a,’ she is the derby queen. Even now. She and my aunts ran the Philly league for years.

Just surviving bouts against the Philly Phangs was considered an accomplishment by most teams. For shifters, derby hasn’t changed that much. The uniforms are hotter, the girls cuter, but the rest of it is exactly the same.”

“And you don’t think Blayne can handle it.”

“I know she can’t.”

“Because you tried and failed.”

Gwen paced away from him. “Yeah. I did try.” She leaned against the wall. “I did fail.”

Lock stood next to her, still towering over her even as he leaned back. “That doesn’t mean Blayne willfail.”

“I’m not worried about that, her failing like me. I mean, I was eighteen and daughter of The Rocker. I didn’t stand a chance, and everybody knew it. Even my mother. The whistle blew on my first game and I froze.

Just froze. I’ve never experienced fear like that before.” She shook her head. “That won’t happen to Blayne.”

“Then what are you—”

“Her name was Marla the Merciless with the Pittsburgh Stealers—that’s ‘Stealers’ as in thievery. She slammed into me like a two-ton truck. I hit the ground and then she came down on me, breaking my leg in five places.”

“Ow.”

“My pelvis.”

“Uh…”

“My right hip.”

“God, Gwen—”

“My tailbone.”

“Okay, okay.” Lock shuddered. “I get it.”

“I woke up in the hospital.”

“Because you’d never go there on your own.”

“Exactly. It took weeks for me to fully recover.”

“Did you play again?”

“No. But not only because I was terrified, which I was,” she freely admitted. “But because when Marla was crawling off me and before I blacked out, she called me a ‘mixed-breed whore.’ And the way she said it, I knew whether I’d been the worst or best player out there, whether Roxy was my mother or not, she would have made sure she hurt me.”

“That was a long time ago, Gwen.”

“So? Nothing’s changed. Am I the only one who remembers Labor Day weekend? That Pack went after Blayne for one reason and one reason only.”

“Maybe. But Blayne’s entire team is mostly made up of hybrids. She’s not alone out there.”

“She’s the new girl, Jersey. Fresh meat.” She shrugged in frustration, knowing there was nothing she could do. “They’ll want her broken in right.”

“So when does the ball come into play?” Jess asked, earning a scowl from Gwen.

“There’s no ball in Roller Derby,” Gwen snapped. “That’s a movie—and I only acknowledge the James Caan version, not that other one.”

“If there’s no ball, then what are they doing?”

“Going around in circles,” Phil explained incorrectly. “Until someone dies.”

Lock could feel the feline bristling next to him, which only got worse when he started laughing. He hadn’t thought he’d be able to convince Gwen to come back in to watch Blayne—watch, not rescue—but he had. Now they sat with the wild dogs, and there was something quite entertaining about watching Gwen deal with them.