Beauty and the Beefcake

by Pippa Grant

  Got an apartment. Rented it a while ago, when I knew Gracie and Manning were tight, before Murphy asked me to watch Felicity. But it’s not home.

  Gammy’s house isn’t home either.

  It’s where I sleep.

  Where Felicity’s hiding.

  Hiding from doing what she’s supposed to do with her life.

  Hiding from idiots like me and her brother.

  “Good drugs?” Frey asks.

  I lift a shoulder.

  Don’t feel the pain. It’ll come, but it’s not there now.

  I’m just numb.

  Numb and alone and confused.

  Didn’t want to hit anybody in the team suite when that asshole propositioned her, or later in the tunnel when that reporter touched her. Don’t fight off the ice. Don’t fight much on the ice, because Z’s the only dude in my class.

  Don’t have to fight. Don’t want to fight.

  But I would’ve killed her ex.

  And she’d already taken care of him.

  More voices.

  “That’s enough visitors,” one of the nurses says.

  “Go on and try to kick me out.”

  I dig my palms into my eyes. My sister’s back.

  Must’ve hopped a plane.

  I get a brief surge of hope that Joey brought them. That she brought Z too, but he’s not here.

  “We’ll go,” Gracie says. She squeezes my hand. “Text us if you need anything. You’ll be back on the ice before you know it.”

  No, I won’t.

  And even if I am, it’s not enough.

  I don’t want to be just a hockey player anymore. I want to be—

  I want to be who Felicity thought I was.

  Something cold presses my face. A phone.

  “Talk,” Ambrosia orders.

  “Ares?” Z says in my ear. Tinny. Too far away. “Fuck, man.”

  I pop open one eye, take Ambrosia’s phone, and point to the door. “Out.”

  Ambrosia bristles. “I’m not—”

  Chase clamps a hand over her mouth. “Need anything?” he asks me.

  Yeah.

  I need something.

  I need to know Felicity’s okay.

  And then I need to know how I’m going to get over her.

  See a lot. Know a lot.

  That look she gave me when they were putting me in the ambulance?

  This is my fault. You’re hurt because of me. I’m tired of people hurting because of me. Go, Ares. Get better. Get back on the ice. You’ve always known who you are. I won’t take that from you.

  I can’t tell her she’s wrong. She’s not right. But she’s not wrong.

  And I don’t know where the line between right and wrong is.

  Chase and Frey share a look. They both nod.

  I glare at the nurses and doctors until they leave too.

  Finish off with the two coaching staff who are waiting for me to be released.

  They leave the door open.

  Chase pulls it shut for me. Me and Loki.

  A man and his monkey.

  Always thought it would be a dog, but a monkey fits better.

  I’m not normal either.

  “Ares?” Z says. “You there, man?”

  I draw a shuddering breath. “I’m out.”

  “Couple months of vacation. You heal, you hit the PT like a beast, you’re gonna be back and better than ever.”

  He’s shaking.

  Can feel it.

  Doesn’t matter if he’s in his dinky-ass apartment in New York, at some hotel for an away series, or if he’s sitting two feet from me. He can feel my ankle hurting as much as I felt his heart crack when he thought Joey was done with him.

  He knows.

  He knows I lost more than a season.

  Probably felt my heart crack too.

  Because I’m not good enough either.

  Murphy’s not wrong.

  “Can’t just be a puckhead forever,” I grit out.

  “Everybody gets hurt. You’re not out. You got another decade, at least.”

  And then what?

  Bodyguard detail for a pop princess?

  Sweeping floors in a school back home in Wishberry Lake?

  Join the circus as the strongman?

  Not much different from what the Thrusters management wants from me. You don’t have to say much, Ares. Just enough to make them want more. You’re already a legend on the ice. We know you’ve got it in you to be a legend off the ice too.

  “You can do any fucking thing you want,” Z says. “You hear me? Any. Fucking. Thing. You. Want.”

  I swallow.

  I know what I want.

  But I can’t have it.

  Have her.

  I’m just one more in a long string of guys with more muscles than brains. Hit first, ask questions later.

  What she always goes for.

  What she always walks away from, because it’s not what she needs.

  Not what feeds her soul.

  Not the way she feeds mine.

  “Saw him touch her. Wanted to kill him,” I admit to Zeus.

  Didn’t give her a chance to finish him on her own.

  She could’ve too. Got a perfect hit to his nose before I crushed him. Crowd was there. Cops close enough to come running.

  I lost my head.

  I lost my fucking head.

  I might not be a smart mother pucker, but I don’t lose my head.

  Ever.

  “Women make us fucking insane,” Z says. “Ouch. Dude. I wasn’t talking about—okay, yeah, I was talking about you.”

  I grunt a hey for Joey. She’s keeping Z in line. Been good for him.

  He’s happy.

  Happier than he’s ever been.

  Deserves it. He’s a good guy under all the bluster.

  Scuffles carry through the phone.

  I almost hang up. Z’s got a life. Something to live for off the ice.

  But he always did.

  He didn’t zip himself up like I did to keep people from getting close enough to disappoint. He put himself out there. Owns his mouth. Owns his fuck-ups.

  Me?

  I don’t fuck up.

  Don’t go outside the box far enough to fuck up.

  Until now.

  “Sorry, Ares,” Joey says on the phone. She’s softer than the world gives her credit for. “Say the word, and I’ll knock Zeus out and get him on a plane to Copper Valley in a heartbeat.”

  I growl.

  Z’s not taking time off just because I have a busted ankle. He’s the best fucking defender in the league. His team needs him.

  “He said you’d say that,” Joey says. “You know you’re more important than hockey, right?”

  I squeeze my eyes shut again. “Hockey’s my life.”

  “If Zeus needed a kidney, but donating one meant you’d never play hockey again, what would you do?”

  I growl over the hiccup in my chest, because fuck.

  No question.

  More scuffling on the phone. “You’re getting on the plane with Ambrosia and Chase,” Zeus orders. “Get your ass up here to New York. Need some bro time.”

  Time away.

  Distance.

  Perspective.

  I look at my phone again.

  Keeps dinging.

  But I keep going back to the message from Felicity.

  I’m sorry, Ares. This is my fault. I’m so sorry.

  Not her fault.

  Not her fault.

  Not her fault.

  I can’t make myself reply.

  Don’t know what to say.

  I never know what to say.

  Not when it matters.

  45

  Felicity

  My brother is everything that’s wrong in the world.

  He’s a pigheaded oaf whose idea of commitment is finishing an entire carton of ice cream in one night. His social media following exploded—as did his fan mail and unsolicited blowjob offers—after he started po
sting his favorite dirty fan letters on Instagram. Everyone knows his vengeance isn’t just cold, it’s fucking Antarctica.

  He interferes with my love life while going through women like they’re M&Ms.

  He’s lazy in practice.

  That’s right.

  Nick’s a lazy turd who does the bare minimum, but because he delivers every single fucking game, he gets away with it.

  Actually, he gets paid millions for it.

  I was blessed with brains.

  He was blessed with hockey instincts.

  So now I live in Gammy’s drafty, dusty, ghost-infested row house, while he lives here, in a warm, cozy, energy-efficient apartment downtown. His furniture is overstuffed brown leather, his floors bamboo, his lights don’t buzz, and his bar is stocked with top-shelf everything.

  Which I guess isn’t so bad.

  Since I’m currently sporting a gin-and-tonic buzz that looks damn good on my swollen knuckles.

  Or something.

  “I’m moving to a shack in the mountains,” I announce.

  And I mean it

  Because I’m not that buzzed.

  Just buzzed enough to see life clearly.

  “You can’t do that,” Nick tells me. “You can’t afford the mountain.”

  I flip him off, because he’s right. My bank account can get me through another few months, but I was supposed to have a full-time job lined up at the end of those few months, and it’s becoming increasingly obvious that neither the Thrusters, nor anyone else, will ever want to hire me. “I can afford it after I blackmail you.”

  “Blackmail away.” He grins. Or maybe that’s his piña colada grinning for him. “Charm school will make it all better.”

  “Will Ares still have to do charm school?” I whisper.

  I can’t say his name any louder than a whisper, and even then, his name makes my chest dip like I’m on a roller coaster and my heart pound like I’m trapped in a dark room with snakes.

  A whole-body shiver passes through me.

  I miss him.

  I miss him so much I can’t breathe without feeling the bruise in my heart. It’s been six hours, and he hasn’t answered my text.

  Everyone else in the world is texting me.

  But not Ares.

  Of course he’s not texting. He’s doing things like getting x-rays and consulting with doctors about how much longer he’s out and—

  And I can’t go on.

  Because there’s no amount of alcohol in the world that could block out his pain.

  And the knowledge that it’s my fault he’s hurt.

  Nick’s watching the Colorado-Boston game on the big screen TV above his gas fireplace, sipping his piña colada.

  Ignoring my questions.

  I throw a pillow at him, think of Loki, and promptly burst into tears.

  “Shit! Fuck. Stop it. Stop!”

  Nick’s drink goes flying as he leaps out of his chair. “Here. Chocolate. Have some chocolate.”

  I shove away the Hershey bar. “It’s not vegan, you asshole.”

  Which is uncharacteristically mean of me—I don’t expect the world to cater to my veganism—but I hurt.

  And I don’t know how to fix it.

  He thrusts his hand through his hair, making it spike. “Even if I knew what he did wrong, I can’t kick his ass for you, Felicity. You won’t let me. Coach would kill me. And I already have to have extra sessions with the anger management counselor, which is total bullshit, because I’m not mad, I’m just devious. There’s a difference.”

  “This isn’t about you!”

  “Fuck. Right. Sorry.” He dashes to the compact kitchen and swings open the cherry cabinet. “Here. You want some powdered sugar?”

  I gape so hard my eye twitches. This is where Lucy or Tim or Harold should say something for me, but I don’t want to vent.

  For the first time in my life, I don’t want to talk out the side of my mouth, possibly ever again, and I don’t know what this means other than that maybe I’m dying.

  He frowns at the box in his hand. “Why do I have powdered sugar?”

  Undoubtedly because one of his puck bunnies wanted to do something with it that I don’t want to think about.

  “Whoa, hey, hold up. I don’t bring girls here.”

  What, now I’m talking without moving—or not moving—my lips?

  “Judgy McJudgerson,” he grunts. “You’re fucking impossible, you know that? I can’t even make you quit crying with chocolate or ice cream like a normal—fuck. Shit. I didn’t mean that. Felicity—Felicity, wait—”

  He catches me in a stranglehold before I can stomp out of his house.

  It’s not his fault either.

  He’s right.

  I’m not normal.

  And that’s the entire problem. I’m why he gets in trouble. I’m why Ares is hurt.

  And I don’t want to know who I’m going to hurt next.

  “I would fucking hate having a normal sister,” he says. “You’re the awesomest of the awesome. You make every other sister in the world look like a boring pansy-ass. If I had to get a real job, I’d take you to interviews and make you talk for me even though you’d tell them all I had herpes and like to suck my own dick, because that would be fucking hilarious.”

  I quit struggling.

  Mostly because it’s hopeless. He’s made out of steel. I hate his muscles.

  But I manage to get in a good pinch to the back of his elbow.

  He yelps.

  “I guess you’re not so bad,” I grumble.

  “Your friends love me.”

  I pinch again, because sometimes he’s really dumb and he doesn’t learn. Doesn’t learn to dodge my devious pinches, or to not suggest he’s got something going on with any of my friends.

  “Also, I’d totally kick Berger’s ass for you—oof.”

  He grins, rubbing his chest while he lets me go. “Nice one.”

  Only my brother would compliment my shoving skills.

  Or maybe not. I could see Ares appreciating his sister getting in a good kick or shove.

  Dammit, my eyes are leaking again.

  “It’s not his fault I’m a freak,” I mutter.

  For once, Nick doesn’t have a quick comeback.

  He watches me like he would a wounded monkey.

  Dammit.

  If I never see Loki again, I’ll…I’ll…shit, I don’t want to cry again.

  “Why…” He trails off and sighs. “Why aren’t you at the hospital?”

  I stare at the stupid poster he keeps on his wall of himself from his rookie year with Minnesota.

  Where Ares is from.

  “Fuck, Felicity…are you dumping him?”

  Isn’t that the question.

  I didn’t say the words.

  But Ares—he knows people.

  He knows me.

  The EMTs were loading him into the ambulance—the team’s doc insisted, because he knows Ares too—and we locked eyes, and I saw it.

  He knew exactly what I was thinking.

  That I’m not normal. That me wanting him makes him not normal.

  That I’m a complication.

  Not an asset.

  That he’s better off without me.

  That’s the last thing I thought before the doors closed.

  And he saw.

  He saw me.

  He’s Ares.

  He knew.

  He knew I called him just as much of a freak as I am. He knew that I had to let him go.

  He knew that I won’t be responsible for taking the rest of his career away from him the way I’ve probably taken the rest of this season from him.

  That I make men crazy.

  Look what I’ve done to my own brother.

  “What the fuck, Felicity?” Nick mutters.

  “He can do better,” I whisper.

  “No, he fucking can’t.”

  I jab Nick in the gut this time. “Because there’s something wrong with him? Because he d
oesn’t talk much? Because you think he’s stupid? He’s not stupid, you moron. He’s not dumb. He’s heart. He’s commitment. He’s integrity. He’s loyalty. He is. He just is. He’s perfect and right and so much more than most people can ever conceive of being. And he doesn’t need a mess like me bringing drama into his life and threatening his career.”

  Nick’s rubbing his gut, his glower getting darker and angrier with every syllable out of my mouth.

  “Or maybe,” he growls, “the one person in the entire world who’s looked deeply enough to see him as something more is exactly what he needs.”

  “No, he—”

  “Hockey isn’t life. Even for Berger. For a really smart person, Felicity, sometimes you’re really dumb.”

  He shoulders past me, snatches the remote, turns the TV off, and stomps to his room where he slams the door.

  I don’t know what just happened, but I’m crying again.

  And I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to stop.

  46

  Felicity

  Saturday morning is a bitch.

  My head hurts. My tongue’s swollen like cotton left out in the rain and then dried in a dust field. And my friends are tiptoeing on pins and needles around me while we have mimosas at Maren’s condo.

  They know.

  They all know about Ares.

  “I’m flying out to San Francisco tomorrow,” Alina’s saying, “but I thought we could grab Indian tonight.”

  By silent agreement, we’re not going to the game.

  Nick’s not playing—it’s the fourth game he’s been benched for, though he’ll be back on the ice Tuesday night in Philadelphia—and since the entire world knows what happened outside the arena last night, it’s safest if I don’t get within a mile of downtown.

  “Oh, yes.” Kami nods emphatically. “Naan is life.”

  I can’t agree, but I nod anyway.

  Maren pokes Alina. “Would you get your phone already? The buzzing is annoying.”

  “That’s not mine.”

  “Sorry,” I mutter. I cross her cozy living room to dig into my purse, intending to shut my phone off.

  It’s been going off every few minutes.

  But the last reason it buzzed is displayed front and center, and every muscle in my body freezes.

  Except my heart.

  It swells and pounds and twirls.

  My lungs are still working too. They gasp out a breath.