by Meader, Kate
“Nice to be asked, though,” Violet commented, her sharp green eyes missing nothing.
“Even when it’s out of obligation?” Elle knew Theo’s history, how his mother had kept her identity from him, how his father didn’t want to know him. He was determined to be the opposite of a sperm donor and it colored every interaction between them. Not trustworthy by nature, Elle was always going to look askance at any offer like that. Theo wasn’t looking for a bride. His interest in Elle was half-sexual, all paternal—meaning the baby was the prize.
“Maybe there’s more to it,” Addison said. “Solid relationships have been based on less.”
“Like anonymous mutual orgasms on adjoining hotel balconies with the hot stranger next door?” Isobel offered a pointed look at Addison.
Elle’s jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”
Addison flushed, but recovered enough to tell the story of how she’d met Ford, a tale right out of high-quality porn.
The first period ended, the Rebels still two goals in the hole. Addison went to check on the kids, Isobel opened her iPad to analyze the game’s plays, which left Elle to help Violet with the next round of snacks in the kitchen.
“This was really nice of you to ask me over even though I’m not officially one of the WAGs.”
Violet’s expression was kind. “What’s official? A ring? I think a bun in the oven is about as official as it gets.”
Something about Violet gave Elle hope that maybe she could make it through this. She got the impression that the youngest Chase sister was once as much an outsider as Elle herself. “Theo said you didn’t grow up with your sisters. That you didn’t even know about them until a few years ago.”
“Oh, I knew about them because I knew about Cliff—that’s our dad. But he wasn’t interested so I didn’t connect with my half-sisters until after he died. They’d found out a couple of years before and Harper tried to make the effort but I wasn’t up to building bridges. And when I did come visit, I only stayed because Cliff’s will required I pitch in with running the team to get my cut of the inheritance. I mean, me running a hockey team. Laughable!” She shook her head, amused at the memory. “I didn’t need a new family and frankly, I felt kind of guilty because my mother had gotten pregnant on purpose.”
Elle froze. “Are you kidding?”
“No! Here I was, ready to collect, and I had to get to know the marks.”
“Did they know about that? About your mom’s plan?”
“Eventually. I felt guilty, so I told them. But really I was telling them to make them turn on me. I didn’t like how much I was falling for them. For Cade. For Bren. For his girls.” She smiled. “You know how sometimes you’re not sure you deserve to be in the place you’ve ended up in, especially because it feels too right? And all your life, your instincts have been out of whack so you can’t trust them?”
Hell, did she. She nodded.
“That’s how it felt. Like I was in the right place, with the right people, in love with the right man, but I didn’t trust it. Sometimes we don’t want to believe the good when it feels too perfect.”
“Waiting for the other shoe to drop.” Elle knew what that was like. That draft on the back of her neck was the ghost of her past catching up to her. Trusting that this might be her future—that Theo would be around for the long haul—required more faith than she was capable of conjuring.
“Yup. It’s the worst feeling in the world—uncertainty.”
It was up there, but Elle could think of worse.
“Game’s starting again,” Isobel called out.
“Elle,” Violet said. “I don’t want to force my busybody friendship on you, but you’re always welcome to hang out here with me and the girls anytime. I’m not trying to turn you off motherhood—”
“Bit late for that.”
She grinned. “But it has its perks, at least in my position as wicked stepmom. And this one …” She rubbed her stomach. “She’ll grow up with Cade and Dante but I want to be part of her life. We’re all pretty tight-knit around here, but that doesn’t mean we can’t add a couple of inches to the Rebels quilt. Theo’s one of us, so that makes you one of us.”
Elle’s chest tightened at the thought of her circle widening. Violet grabbed the tray of cookies, the one Elle had brought. “But like I said, if you feel it’s all too much, then just tell me to fuck off. We can be awfully overbearing.”
“No, you’re all lovely, really. It’s just …” She swiped at a tear. “These hormones.”
Violet squeezed her arm. “I know! We’re a mess. I really miss Bren, then when he’s here I want to kill him whenever he opens his mouth. And the man hardly speaks. God knows how you’re standing to be around Kershaw. Good thing he’s pretty.”
Elle sniffed. “He’s kind of a saint, to be honest. I keep pushing, looking for his limit.”
“The men must be tested, their balls of steel forged in the hell-fire of their pregnant womenfolk’s fury,” Violet intoned before she added with a grin, “Cookie?”
Elle enjoyed the company for the rest of the game, though she wished it could have gone better. The Rebels lost 4-3, putting them behind 3-1 in the series. Afterward, the ladies’ phones blew up with texts, the players checking in with their loved ones.
Everyone’s phone but Elle’s.
Wanting to give them privacy, but really not wishing to stand out like a sore thumb, she stepped into the kitchen and stared at her screen.
So she didn’t know anything about hockey. She would probably be the last person Theo would contact for comfort after a hard loss. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t make the first move.
So far, Theo had been making all the moves.
She hovered over the screen, trying … just trying.
Bad luck tonight
Sorry you lost
Wow. Bummer, man.
Finally, she settled on: How are you, Kershaw?
A few seconds passed, then a few more. Finally the telltale dots of an incoming reply appeared.
And disappeared.
Her phone lit up with Theo’s handsome face, a shot of him grinning with his Santa hat on. She answered with embarrassing haste.
“Hey!”
“You texted, Elle-oh-Elle. You never text first.”
“That’s not true.” It was. “I’m sure I’ve texted first in the past.” She had not.
“Takes a shitty loss to make you come around, I see.”
“Sorry about that. The game.”
“Well, them’s the breaks. We’ll get ’em next time, etcetera, etcetera.”
That was strangely fatalist. “What’s going on?”
There followed a pause, in which she could hear Theo readjusting the phone to his ear. “Ah, nothing. Just in a mood.”
He was allowed to have them, of course, and his team had just suffered a stinging defeat. She wanted to be there for him just like he was for her.
“If you want to moan about it, my bar’s always open.” Her legs and heart, too, if she wasn’t careful.
“I’ll be fine. This is me we’re talking about! So what are you wearing?”
“Really?”
“I just lost a game. It’s the least you could do.” Another voice echoed close by, and Theo answered with a “yep.” “We’re heading to the airport now, so I’ll take a raincheck on the phone sex. See you tomorrow?”
“Sure. Safe travels.”
“Night, Ellie.”
21
The hockey gods giveth, the hockey gods taketh away.
Their season wasn’t over—yet. But they’d lost both games in Boston and were on the butt end of a 3-1 score in the series. The Cougars defense was a many-horned beast and Chicago couldn’t make enough of an impact to come out ahead. The plane back was quiet, everyone preferring to process the loss in their own way.
“You want to come over for a beer?” Erik asked Theo as they got off the bus in the player’s parking lot at Rebels HQ.
It was almost four a.m. but it
wouldn’t have been the first time Theo’d drowned his game-day sorrows in an early morning booze-up. But right now, he needed something stronger.
He needed Elle.
He wanted to crawl into bed with her and inhale her scent when he buried his nose in the crook of her neck. His memories of that early Christmas morning had fueled plenty of fun-times with his right hand. It wasn’t just how good it had felt to slip inside her in the dark. He’d felt connected to her, and he’d thought she felt it, too.
Wishful thinking, said the devil on his shoulder. Without the baby they wouldn’t even be talking to each other, even with the mutual orgasms of a few days ago. He’d been given this opportunity to team up with another person, ostensibly for Project Hatchling, but they could be so much more—if she’d only let him in.
“Think I’m going to call it, Fish. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Everyone went their separate ways, and Theo drove until he found himself on the main drag in Riverbrook. He parked a block from the Empty Net. The town was quiet—not as silent as Saugatuck—but still barely awake.
He opened up his phone and checked the text he’d received this afternoon from Nick Isner.
Good luck tonight.
Brief and impersonal, yet three words he’d have killed to hear the night before his NHL debut just four years ago. To have heard before his first NCAA game at Vermont. Today those three words had done nothing but throw him off his game in Boston and made him second-guess the most basic of decisions on the ice. Did Bio-Dad really want a relationship after all these years? Theo wasn’t sure he had the bandwidth to deal with this right now.
He opened up Instagram and searched for a profile: @Deke111. Most kids used Insta for comments or contest entries, but not his half-brother Jason. He actually posted photos. Also, his account was open! Theo really should talk to Nick about that.
The photos here weren’t the posed, sanitized family pics that Alderman Nick posted to his Facebook. These were the real thing. Jason scarfing down Gino’s East pizza, his face half-covered in sauce. Older brother, Sean, looking like he’d just woken up annoyed. Was that their usual sibling dynamic? A ten-second video of them trying to teach their border collie to jump on his hind legs. Nick appeared at the end, laughing proudly at their efforts.
Theo played that one over more times than was healthy.
It was too late for him and Nick, but he wouldn’t mind getting to know his brothers. Maybe they’d enjoy being uncles to the hatchling. While Theo had never felt an absence of love, he wanted his son to have every possible family connection. The more the fucking merrier.
Shutting his phone down, he looked down the street, taking in more details. How long had that light been on in the Empty Net?
He clambered out of his SUV and put his face to the glass windows in the big oak door. What he saw did not please him.
Elle. Dusting liquor bottles. On the top shelf.
The top shelf.
His fists balled and moved toward the door before he realized that pounding the oak might give her a fright and make her fall from the stepstool she was perched on. Instead, he continued to watch, getting angrier and angrier until she finally descended to safety. Then he connected a fist with the door.
She jumped, squinted, and came forward. “Theo?”
“Open up.”
She did—a little slower than he’d have liked, but finally that big, wooden barrier was no longer between them. “What are you doing here?”
“What am I doing here? Want to tell me what you’re doing here at four thirty in the morning?”
She looked over her shoulder for an answer, and not finding one, she faced him again. “I couldn’t sleep so I thought I’d do a little cleaning.”
“On a ladder where you could just—just—fall off!”
“It’s three feet off the ground. Two and a half.”
“Are you kidding me with this?”
She tilted her head. “Listen, I know you’re upset about the game but—”
“I am not upset about that. I’m upset that the mother of my child is working at all hours on a fucking ladder in this shitty dive bar when she should be getting rest and looking after herself. What did you eat tonight?”
She blinked at him. “Eat?”
“For dinner. What did you eat for dinner?”
“We had snacks at Violet’s place. Pizza bagels. Hummus with celery and carrots.”
Okay, that was something. “Did you eat all the vegetables?”
“Most of them. Not really a fan of carrots. Theo, you need to stop worrying. Dr. Patel said the baby’s fine and everything is developing as expected.”
“Does Dr. Patel say anything about how much sleep you’re getting or how you’re on your feet for ten hours at a time or how dusting bottles of Grey Goose is probably not good for your health?” Or his sanity.
She placed a hand on his arm. “I’m not an invalid, I’m pregnant. And I need to feel I have agency over my body and this situation.”
Everyone wanted that, but when a kid was involved, you didn’t always get what you wanted. He inhaled a deep breath. Anger leeched out of him, slowly, with curiosity moving in like a gentle wave to replace it. “Is that what the army was like? No agency? Always following people’s orders?”
“I didn’t mind that. I signed up for that. To give back, to do something good.”
He was ready to ask more but for once, she continued without prompting. “Before, I didn’t always feel like I was in control of my decisions. My family has a certain way of doing things. Expectations for how I should contribute.” She smiled, beautiful yet forced. “And now, I want to contribute my way. Be a good person. Raise a good person.”
So she considered herself a bad person? She’d hinted at that before, that she might not be worthy in some way.
“You’re going to be a great mom.”
Her face crumpled, her eyes filled with tears.
“Ellie.” He gathered her into his arms, gratified when she sank into him. For the last couple of months, he’d felt helpless, like all he could do was throw money and smoothies at the situation because she insisted on doing it her way. He had so much more to offer. Comfort. Strength. His body.
Holding her tight yielded a sob against his chest.
“Hey, now, it’s okay.”
“You—just—got—through—telling—me—I’m—a—screw—up!”
“No, I didn’t.” He held her back so he could look her in the eye when he asked, “When did I say that?”
She wiped at her eyes, more anger in them now than sorrow. “You accused me of not eating all my vegetables!”
“You’re right. I was a jerk.”
All the fight seemed to go out of her. “You’re too nice, Theo. I really don’t deserve you. I mean, look at you. The hottest athlete on the planet. And a decent person, too!”
“You’d rather I was a jerk?”
“It wouldn’t hurt. Or if you were a touch less hot.”
He thought on it. “You want me to complain about my problems, maybe put on a few pounds. Anything else?”
“A zit might work. Eat more fried foods and do less of the skin care regimen.”
He hadn’t broken out since he was a teen. He was blessed with beautiful skin that not even a French fry could threaten.
“Not sure I can be less hot but how about I work up the jerk stuff?”
She looked hopeful. “Really?”
He moved in, crowding her against a low table near the bar. “Sorry I’m so handsome.” He nuzzled against her temple and whispered, “Sorry I’m so perfect.” A nip of her ear sent a shiver through her. “Sorry I’m such a goddamn saint.” His lips found a sensitive spot below her chin.
Slowly—so slowly—he worked his sainted way around her jaw, to the corner of her mouth, where he nibbled and sipped. “So. Damn. Sorry.” And then he apologized some more with his mouth stamped over hers, contrition in every luxurious swipe of his tongue with hers.
He’d
intended—in as far as he was capable of forming intent—to be tender with her. A minute ago, she’d been sobbing, highly vulnerable. Now she was kissing him with a need he felt all the way to his dick.
She pulled back, licking her lips. “A jerk wouldn’t apologize. A jerk would just take what he wants.”
Parting her thighs with his knee, he stepped between them and dragged her flush against his erection. “Like this?”
Her breath hitched. “Yes. Like that. He’d punish me for … for not eating my vegetables.”
“You naughty girl. I’m going to make you suffer and then I’m going to make you eat … kale.”
He placed a hand over the V of her T-shirt, so his palm covered her upper chest, the heel nestling in her bountiful cleavage. With his other hand, he squeezed her ass and lifted her onto the table.
She moaned, soft and yearning. He cupped the back of her neck and positioned her for the plundering. She clearly liked the power he exhibited, the jag-off dominance he was showing. He should feel silly but he didn’t. It felt good to take control. But then she had a mouth that would make anything feel right.
Her tongue twined with his, and the sweetness of it—of her need for him to be anything less than a gentleman—fired him up. She was looking for less than perfect. He would give her the illusion of it, because it would be perfect all the same.
He yanked down her leggings and flirted with the edges of her panties.
“These come off,” he growled.
“They’re not …” she panted. “Sexy.”
“I’ll decide what’s sexy.” Who the fuck did she think she was telling him her underwear wasn’t sexy? They were currently on her body, next to her skin, standing between him and sweet oblivion … nothing was sexier in this moment.
Except, he must have been rusty because he was having the hardest time de-briefing her. He pulled at them, tugged a little more. No go. “Are these things welded on?”
“They’re a bit tight. I’ve put on weight.”
Probably because she hadn’t bought any new underwear, given that she was so adamant about not spending a dime on herself or taking his money. Her too-tight, bonded-to-her-skin, chastity-belt underwear was a symbol of everything that was wrong here!
