Kissing Micky (Washington Guardians Hockey Book 1)

by Ellen Devlin

  Tom was caught off guard. “Yeah. Why?”

  “Just surprised. I guess I always assumed she was dating someone.” He paused and raised an eyebrow. “Shit, is that why you only sleep here about half the time?”

  Tom must have looked pissed off, because Sven raised his hands and backed off, saying, “Sorry, forget I asked.” As he turned to walk away, he added, “Latest cable bill is on the fridge. And you got a package from Amazon.”

  Tom took a long shower, trying to convince himself this was not a big deal; he could handle this. He just needed to take it in stride. No problem.

  Yeah, right. Because that’s the way I always handle things.

  ***

  At the next practice the first person that approached him was Zee. Fuck.

  “Mick, I gotta know. How did you get her to go?”

  Tom just looked at him. “I asked her.” Technically, Chris had asked her for him, but Zee didn’t need to know that.

  “You just asked her. Really? That’s it?”

  “That’s it.” Tom’s tone was not inviting more conversation on the matter.

  “Huh.” Tom was ready to walk away when Zee added, “So is this a thing? You two?”

  “Why?” It came out sounding rather more threatening than Tom had intended.

  Zee faced him without flinching and said, “Because if it’s not, there’s more than one guy that would be interested in that information.”

  Tom said curtly, “It’s a thing.” And walked away. God damn it.

  ***

  After the initial flurry of interest in his personal life, including multiple inquiries as to whether Liz had a sister, things calmed down somewhat, and Tom was able to get back to his normal routine. Practice, game, practice, road game, practice…repeat as necessary.

  There was an underlying pressure, though. A casual comment of “Hey, are you going to see Liz tonight? Tell her I said hi,” was enough to make him clench his jaw. He was finding reasons to see her less, even though he always felt better when he was with her. She was no longer his secret escape.

  It wasn’t helping that he was in a bit of a playing slump. Nothing horrible. Most players had highs and lows throughout the season, and this was not the first time it had happened to him, but it was feeding his foul moods, which were becoming more and more common. The team was still having a good season, but right now they were having trouble putting more than two wins together back to back, and the stress was taking its toll.

  Liz texted him while he was in the locker room one night after a particularly bad home loss. He had had an awful game. He had taken a few penalties, lost concentration, and gotten slammed into the boards hard enough that he knew he was going to have a great-looking bruise and, worst of all, missed a pass that resulted in a turnover and a score for Carolina. He was so pissed he had slammed his stick on the doorway overhead on his way into the locker room hard enough to snap it in half.

  Liz: Are you coming over tonight?

  Tom stared at the text for a full minute. Complete sentence, including punctuation.

  He was so fucking angry. He should go see her; he hadn’t seen her in days, and he missed her.

  From behind him, Tom heard Zee start a phone call. “Hey. Did you see the game? Please tell me something funny happened to you today.”

  Tom saw red.

  Tom: No

  He didn’t throw the phone across the room and was grateful that he wasn’t actually strong enough to crush it with his hands.

  Liz: Tomorrow? Please, Tom. I miss you.

  She must have Zee on speaker, because she was texting him, and he knew she was talking with Zee. He could hear Zee’s end of the conversation, and it felt like it was gnawing at his skull.

  Tom: Maybe

  Maybe he would feel better tomorrow.

  Tom finished getting ready to leave in a silent, hot rage.

  He sat in his car in the garage for at least five minutes, realizing that he was too angry to drive. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He looked over at his phone, arguing with himself, and finally sent another text.

  Tom: R u awake

  His phone rang almost immediately.

  “I’m awake.”

  “Hey.”

  “Hi, handsome.” She paused and then said quietly, “I think I have a bag of frozen peas for your shoulder.” Another pause. “I’ll look around, but I think I could find other things for the rest of you.”

  He felt the beginnings of a smile. “I’ll be over soon.” He paused a moment before adding, “I’ve missed you too.”

  “I’ll see you when you get here.”

  ***

  Liz greeted Tom at the door dressed for bed—wearing a very oversized t-shirt over her underwear. They didn’t say anything. She wrapped her arms around his chest and held him for a moment. He tucked her under his chin and breathed in her hair and kissed the top of her head and felt the rightness that he always felt when she was in his arms.

  She stepped back, took his hand, and pulled him gently into her bedroom. Sitting him on the edge of her bed, she took off his jacket and then his shirt and winced. The bruise was already forming, starting at the top of his left shoulder and spreading down his shoulder blade. It was going to be very colorful before it was done.

  She touched it gently. “I wasn’t kidding—I’ll be right back,” she said, walking to the kitchen and bringing back a bag of frozen peas. Instructing him to kick off his shoes and lie face down on the bed, she put the bag of peas on the bruise.

  Then she climbed up and sat on him—on his rear, basically. He grunted. She responded playfully, “I’m not that heavy,” and began massaging his lower back. Then he groaned.

  She didn’t have any oils so she had just gotten out her hand lotion and was using that. He was strong and muscular, but there was also incredible tightness, and she was able to lean into him with her weight to try to work out some of the knots that seemed to be all over, but especially in his neck and lower back. He made sounds of relief and pleasure as she worked on him. It felt so good to be touching him again.

  When her hands and arms were too tired to keep massaging with any force, she simply stroked his back and neck. After a while, she took the peas from his shoulder and climbed off to put them back in the freezer for him to use again in the morning if he wanted to.

  When she got back to the bedroom, she saw that Tom had fallen asleep and found an extra blanket to cover him up. She smiled as she took a moment to watch him sleeping, noting how much younger he looked in sleep despite the thick beard and how beautifully long his eyelashes were. Afraid to wake him, she carefully touched his hair, tucking some behind his ear, and then turned off the light and climbed onto the other side of the bed.

  His body was warm, but he was sleeping on his stomach, which didn’t make for easy cuddling, so she turned on her side and backed into him so she could feel his warmth and solid form at her back as she drifted off to sleep.

  ***

  Liz woke in the morning to the wonderful sensation of being spooned. Tom was wrapped around her. He had apparently awoken during the night and taken off his jeans and socks, so she was surrounded by the heat coming from his warm skin.

  When he realized she was awake, he rumbled, “Thank you,” into her ear. “That was wonderful.”

  “You are very welcome.” She relaxed into his arms and sighed. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  He had started nuzzling into her neck. The arm that was wrapped around her waist had started to wander around—his hand was currently on her hip. “I’m getting happier to be here every minute.”

  He pressed closer to her, and she started breathing faster. Liz could feel him getting aroused, could feel him growing against her. He started gently biting her neck where it met her shoulder.

  He was getting harder. It excited her so much to feel him, knowing he was getting turned on by her. It was like a positive feedback loop. Feeling him getting a hard on was guaranteed to make her slick and ready. She pressed back and wriggle
d against him, and he chuckled and pulled her t-shirt off.

  Tom slid his hand inside her panties to check and see if she was really getting turned on by this and found her hot and wet. He was now at full attention and took off her underwear first, then his own. Liz moved her top leg up and back over his hip, and he slid into her easily.

  She gasped, and he growled softly and began to move. Slowly. There was no urgency. Tom held her around her waist, breathing in her scent under her ear, kissing her there softly, placing small bites on her shoulder as he stroked in and out of her smoothly, slowly.

  Liz exposed her neck so he could have access to as much of her as possible to kiss. She held his arms around her and reveled in the feeling of his body sliding against hers, into hers.

  He wanted this to last as long as possible. Tom kept the pace slow, and they moved together in a kind of timelessness. But eventually his soft kisses and bites changed to open-mouthed breathing against her neck, and his slow strokes turned into thrusts.

  Tom held her tighter, driving into her faster and harder. Liz was gasping, and Tom was nearing the end. He pressed her over further so that she was more facing down on the bed and rode her, powerful and grinding, reaching under her to press and rub her clit while he shouted his orgasm and finished inside her. Liz jerked and cried out, and Tom felt her spasm around him. They both fell asleep again soon afterwards.

  When they awoke, it was time for Tom to leave, so he could get to his place and then to the rink for practice.

  “Thank you.” Tom kissed her for the first time since arriving the night before. He stopped and then smiled, said, “Shit,” and kept kissing her for a few more minutes.

  “I’m so glad you came over.” She held him tight.

  “Me too.” He breathed in her hair, kissed her on the top of her head, and left.

  Chapter Seventeen

  It would have been nice to think their time together that night had somehow changed things, helped to fix what had broken between them when their relationship had stopped being secret, but neither one of them seemed to be able to slow the unraveling.

  Tom was still in a skating slump. He was frustrated, not playing well, getting less ice time, and taking bad penalties, including a nasty game misconduct. Part of him wanted to blame the relationship, even though he knew that wasn’t really fair.

  Except things were continuing to deteriorate between them, and it was getting to be a distraction.

  His jealousy and suspicion were becoming an issue in a way that they never had been before. Never very happy with Liz’s male friends, including ex-boyfriends, now it appeared to Liz that, with the exception of Chris, they all were categorized as threats. Even the married ones. It made no sense to her.

  “Why do you stay in touch with them? I don’t understand.” They’d had this conversation more than once already.

  “Tom, they were important in my life. These guys weren’t one-night stands. Some were friends of mine before we dated, and we stayed friends after we broke up. I don’t understand why that’s an impossible concept. I liked the guys that I dated or I wouldn’t have dated them in the first place.”

  “All of them? You’re still friends with all of your ex-boyfriends?” The emphasis was quite obvious.

  “Yes. I’m still friends with all of them.” Liz was trying very hard not to fall into this and start arguing back, but it was becoming difficult to keep her cool. “It’s not like there were that many. I’m closer to some than others. Some of them I just keep in touch with on Facebook; one or two I see in person. And for a few of them, I get along with their wives better, so we are the ones who keep in touch.”

  “Right.”

  “Okay, I’ve got to go to work. I know you’re going to be gone for Columbus before I get back.” She looked at him, at his scowl. “I don’t want to leave like this.” She touched his face and reached up to kiss him.

  He didn’t return the kiss immediately, but when she gently bit his lower lip, he bent his head down to hers, wrapped his arms around her, and they kissed goodbye like they meant it.

  ***

  “So maybe you could stop by my office for a few minutes before you head to the rink for the game tomorrow?” Liz worked only a few metro stops or a short cab ride from the arena. Tom had never been to her office. Not once. No one she worked with knew anything about him. She looked over at him and saw he had bristled at the suggestion. “What? It wouldn’t take long at all. We could grab a quick bite if you wanted, and you could meet Jason.”

  She had worked with her boss for more than eight years, and he had become a good friend. Tom and Jason would get along really well, if they ever met. And hell, Tom wouldn’t even consider Jason a threat, unless he considered Jason’s husband, Paul, a threat too. “Why do you look angry that I’m asking this?”

  “I don’t understand why you’re suddenly making relationship demands.”

  Liz was stunned. “Relationship demands?” She had to consider that for a moment. “Really? Is that how you think of what I just asked? That it’s a ‘relationship demand?’” She looked at him, asking him seriously.

  He just stared at her.

  She said, “I guess if you consider me asking that you act like you’re in some kind of relationship with me to be a ‘relationship demand,’ then yes, that’s what’s going on.”

  His staring now could be described more as glaring.

  “I have friends that I care about, that care about me, that don’t know anything about what’s going on in my life. People you’ve never met and who you apparently have no interest in meeting.”

  “Yes, you have lots of friends. I’m aware.” Heavy sarcasm.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Tom gestured to her laptop, open to Facebook, sitting on the countertop. She was in the middle of a conversation with James, a friend from college, planning a trip to Richmond to visit him and his wife while Tom would be on a road trip with the team. “Another trip to visit another guy while I’m away. You don’t even bother trying to hide it anymore.”

  “What? Hide? How? I don’t understand. I’m not trying to hide anything. I’m going to see friends while you’re away, so I can spend time with you when you’re here. Would you rather I leave on a trip when you’re here?”

  “I’d rather you not travel around seeing other men.” Tom was starting to raise his voice.

  This was ramping up into a full-blown fight.

  “I’m having lunch with him and his wife. I have much more in common with her than with him. And then she and I are seeing a show in Richmond. That’s the whole reason for the trip. We both like the show, so we are going together.”

  “How about last month’s trip to Pennsylvania to visit your ex-boyfriend who owns the gun range? Did you have him give you shooting lessons? I’ll bet that was cozy. How close did he have to hold you to make sure you hit the target?” Now he was sounding venomous.

  Liz was horrified. “He owns the range. His wife is the nationally ranked sharp shooter. So if anyone was going to teach me, it would be her. But I’m a pretty damn good shot, which you might know if you ever bothered to ask anything about me.” She was getting angry enough to take some jabs herself, which she immediately regretted. She took a breath. “Sorry.” Escalating this on her side wasn’t going to help.

  It was too late, though. Tom looked bitter and furious. It was almost like she was looking at a different person.

  “I’m sorry, Tom. I didn’t mean that.” She spoke calmly, trying to explain herself. “You know my friends are important to me. I won’t give them up because you’re jealous.”

  He absolutely glared at her.

  “There is nothing to be jealous of. They’re just my friends. Nothing has changed in that regard since the day we met. I love my friends. I hug them. I want to spend time with them. But that’s all.”

  Silence stretched between them. Liz was at a loss.

  Tom finally spoke. “I need to take a break from this. From us.” He wa
s clearly still incredibly angry, but he wasn’t yelling. His voice was strained.

  “Oh.” Her heart sank to somewhere near the floor.

  “I need to focus on hockey.” He wasn’t looking directly at her. “We’re coming up on the playoffs. I’m already in a slump.” He looked her in the eye. “And this isn’t helping.”

  She nodded. He was so angry. She still didn’t understand that, but this she understood. He was a pro athlete.

  “Is this a break?” she asked quietly, “Or the end?”

  He looked away again. “I don’t know.”

  “Okay.”

  He looked back at her again, jaw set, ready for a continuation of the fight, and found her just looking at him, eyes slightly too bright. She saw the slight shift in him, the subtle easing, as he realized there wasn’t going to be a confrontation about this.

  And then her phone rang on the counter. They both turned, and Zee’s name popped up on the screen. Liz reached to turn the ringer off, and by the time she turned back, she could barely recognize him.

  “Motherfucker!”

  She had never, ever seen him this angry. He turned away from her and started toward the door.

  Liz panicked. “Tom!” She grabbed his arm. “Tom!” She put herself in front of him at the door. “Please. Just give me a few minutes. Please. I just need a few minutes to tell you how I feel. Then you can leave. I swear I won’t try to stop you. Please, please. You don’t have to say anything. Just listen.”

  His jaw was set.

  “Please.”

  “God damn it.” He ran his hand over his face, glared, took a breath, and then turned and sat on the couch.