Brooke flashes a broad smile. “Oh, you’re coming home with me, are you?”
“You said you like me to be in control, so yes…I’m coming home with you tonight and your guest might get an earful if you can’t keep quiet.”
Tipping her head back, Brooke lets out a deep laugh. When her eyes come back to mine, wet with hilarity, she brings her other hand up to my face again—and fuck it feels good there—and nods. Her voice is but a whisper. “Yes…I do like you in control and I’m glad you’re coming home with me tonight.”
Chapter 17
Bishop
Finally having my breath return and the strength in my arms to do so, I roll off Brooke and collapse to my back beside her on the bed. With my eyes on the ceiling, I feel her move rather than see her, a slight shifting of the pillow we share.
“It was nice not to have to keep that quiet,” she says in a voice raspy from too much screaming.
My head rolls and I look at her. Her face is inches from mine, those amber eyes with gold specks staring right at me and her mouth forming a crooked smile. I grin back at her before giving her a quick kiss. “Always better when you can just let it all out.”
And since Nanette hadn’t come back with us, Brooke held nothing back. I might have roared to the heavens myself when I finally let loose and came so hard I was convinced I’d stroke out.
“Let me go get cleaned up,” I tell her as I roll off the bed.
“Okay,” she murmurs, and rolls the opposite way. She’ll put on panties and a T-shirt to sleep in as has become her habit. Makes it a little more difficult in the morning to get to her good parts—because I love waking her up that way—but I like a challenge.
By the time I make it back out of the bathroom, Brooke is sitting cross-legged in the bed with the comforter pulled up over her lap. Head bent over her phone, her thumbs are flying over the screen.
“There’s a bottle of water on the table,” she says to me without looking up.
I slip under the covers without bothering with my underwear. I don’t mind sleeping nude or clothed, but since I’m already naked, I just dive right in. I grab the bottle, open it, and take several long pulls. By the time I’ve returned it to the table, Brooke is leaning over to put her phone on her nightstand.
“That was Nanette,” she says as she turns back to face me, still sitting cross-legged. “Texted to say she’s staying with Dax tonight.”
“Now that’s surprising,” I muse out loud as I lean back against the headboard, placing my hand on Brooke’s knee. No clue why…just feels right. “I really thought it would be Erik.”
“Me too,” she says with a laugh.
When Brooke and I called it an early night after two beers, we’d left Nanette happily accepting the attentions of three hockey players. She told Brooke not to wait up for her or worry. I gave meaningful looks to all three of them, then added to Dax as I walked out, “Make sure whoever she goes with tonight gets her home safe.”
“Always, brother,” he said in return.
I just didn’t think it would be Dax.
Not that Dax wouldn’t have been good enough for her. In fact, he’s the best dude out of the three, in my opinion. I just thought Erik would win the evening, as he’s the most aggressive and charming at the same time.
But good for Dax. Hope whatever he gets tonight is good and worth having to listen to Nanette to get it.
I feel comfortable saying this to Brooke, because I didn’t sense any major warm fuzzies between the two women tonight. Nanette only paid attention to the men, which was fine by me. That meant I had Brooke’s attention.
“Can I ask you a question?” I think it’s a given I can, but I sort of want to set the tone that this is somewhat serious.
“Yeah, sure.” Her expression is open and unguarded.
“Maybe it was just me…but Nanette sort of seems full of herself,” I say to Brooke, deciding not to pull any punches.
“Picked up on that, huh?” she says with a laugh, but then her expression sobers slightly. “But that wasn’t a question.”
“I guess I’m curious as to why you’re friends with her.” My hand squeezes her knee. “You two couldn’t be more different.”
It took only half an hour of watching and I knew the type of woman she was. She flirted way too heavily and suggestively, pulled her mirror out of her purse twice to put on lipstick and fluff her hair, also checking out every other aspect of her face. If the guys tried to include Brooke in the conversation, Nanette would interject and turn the spotlight right back onto herself. She was conceited, and to my surprise, slightly vapid, yet she tried to overcompensate for what she lacked upstairs with her looks.
“We worked together for over five years,” Brooke explains. “We went out together sometimes at night, often with other work people. Had lunch at other times. She was a friend. A coworker. But we weren’t close. I think you know what I mean when I say Nanette isn’t the type to get close to other females.”
“Because her self-esteem can’t handle not having the attention taken away from her,” I conclude. “So why in the hell would she come visit?”
Brooke shrugs. “I expect it’s so she could take a few days off, have a free place to stay, and have access to hot hockey players.”
“How long is she staying?” I ask.
“A week,” she returns with a groan, and leans back against the headboard, lacing her fingers over her stomach. She rolls her head to look at me. “Let’s hope she stays with Dax the whole time.”
Chuckling, I nod toward her nightstand. “Turn your light out.”
She does, and then I’m pulling her into my arms as we settle down into the pillows. I’ve found I like her slight frame resting against me at night, and she snuggles in before twining her legs with mine.
Reaching an arm out, I turn off my light and her arm tightens around my stomach.
It’s silent for a moment, but I’m not tired and I have no intention of going to sleep right now. I still have one thing I need to talk to her about.
“I had an interesting conversation with your dad after the San Francisco game,” I tell her, the darkness somehow making it easier to talk about this.
Brooke’s head lifts from my chest to look at me, but all she’ll see is shadows. I press my hand to her head, forcing it gently back down. I continue. “I didn’t say anything at first, but I’ve been thinking on it a lot and I think we might have a problem.”
Before I can process it, Brooke is scrambling out of my arms, rolling in the bed, and the light on her side comes on. I blink against it for a moment before I can focus on her. She merely turns back toward me, bracing her head on her palm. Her eyes are expectant and she waits for me to continue, not saying a word about why she turned on the light.
I expect it’s because Brooke doesn’t want any secrets at all between us, and potentially there could be something hidden on my face in the dark.
Taking in a deep breath, I turn on my side to face her, also resting my head on my hand so we’re staring at each other, eye to eye. “He really pressured me about the engagement after the game.”
“Like how?”
“Wanted to know what was going on, and when I told him we were talking about it, he blustered a little. Didn’t understand what there was to talk about, said I should have just bought you a ring already.”
“Damn,” Brooke mutters, and her eyes go soft with apology. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t,” I warn her with a growl. “This isn’t on you. But when he kept pushing at me, he asked me point blank if I loved you.”
Brooke winces.
“And I had to say yes, Brooke. I had to look him right in the eye and tell him I did, and that you were my everything.”
She doesn’t say anything for a moment, her gaze dropping to my chest. When she looks up at me, her voice is hesita
nt. “Well…another week and we can put this all behind us. We can just hold on a little while—”
I shake my head and reach out to take the hand that’s resting on the mattress. I lace my fingers with hers. “Don’t you see, we can’t do this next week, Brooke. I just looked your dad in the eye and told him I loved you. We break this off next week like we’d planned, your dad is going to know I’m full of shit.”
“Oh God,” she says in a small voice as the realization of what I just said hits her. “But—but—what are we going to do? Should I just cop to my dad that this was all my stupid idea?”
“No fucking way,” I say gruffly, not willing to let Brooke take the fall for this. We were in it together now.
And then she does what I sort of hoped she would. “Maybe we should keep this going for a little while longer. I mean, the team is doing so well and I don’t want anything mess it up.”
Oh yeah…I like that idea a lot. More time with Brooke while we figure out a good way out of this shit.
“I think we should do a fake engagement,” I say with determination.
Her eyes bug out. “A fake engagement?”
“Yeah, keep your dad off my back completely. Give us some breathing room. He can concentrate on being a coach, and I can concentrate on the game and—”
“It’s a good solution,” she breaks in on me, and I let out a slow and silent breath of relief. “Is that weird?”
“Totally not weird,” I assure her with a wave of my hand, but this is the weirdest fucking thing I’ve ever been involved in in my life. I am absolutely aware of just how harebrained this entire thing is. I would never say it out loud, but fuck, we should have come clean the moment he busted into her office and caught us, and probably a million times after that.
We should just goddamn come clean right now.
But instead I’m plotting a fake engagement because I don’t want it to end yet, but I also don’t know where I want it to go either. I just know that this past week has been amazing with Brooke and she’s the only woman I’ve ever been with that makes me excited to see what tomorrow will bring.
So yeah…fake engagement it is.
“How would we go about this?” Brooke asks, her voice sounding a little too brisk and professional as if we’re negotiating a business deal.
I slide my fingers across her cheekbone, over her ear and to the back of her head to hold her in place. Leaning in, I give her a devilish smile. “That’s for me to figure out. I’ll handle the details.”
“You can’t buy a ring,” she says looking horrified.
“Stop worrying about it, Brooke,” I murmur, and lean in to kiss her.
She pulls back. “But—”
“Stop talking, Brooke, or I’ll occupy that mouth with something that will make it impossible for you to say anything.”
I get a husky laugh and she leans in to nip my bottom lip.
That leads to another kiss, deeper this time, and before long we’ve forgotten about fake engagements, her dad, Nanette, and everything else in the world.
Chapter 18
Brooke
My house is quiet when I walk in, my ears open and receptive. “Nanette?”
No answer. I set the grocery bags I’d been carrying on the kitchen counter, then walk through the living room. “Nanette…are you here?”
“In your bedroom,” she calls out.
My little three-bedroom, two-bath Mediterranean-style bungalow with red tiled roof and stucco walls is actually one of the big things I cherish about moving here from New York. It’s only about sixteen hundred square feet, but that seems monstrous to me after living in half that size for years.
And yet it’s just still not quite big enough to give me space from Nanette. She’s been here three days and I can’t wait until Sunday when she flies back to New York. I feel terrible at the same time for thinking that, but these last few days have reminded me why we weren’t the best of friends.
In looking back on our relationship spending five years at the same job together, I realize I could handle Nanette in small doses. At work that may have been a few encounters throughout the day. Nanette mainly did assistance on photo shoots for the magazine and some days I wouldn’t see her at all because she’d be away on location. The times we went out for a meal or drinks were just as sparse, and usually with a group of people. During those periods, it’s almost as if she had a “good behavior” tank filled up that fortunately for me never got depleted in the short snatches of time we spent together. But I think the tank was empty by day two and the real Nanette was exposed: a lazy, freeloading visitor who was trying all of my patience.
Bishop came by the arena today to take me to lunch, and I basically complained the entire time. He loved teasing me about it too.
“She seems pretty nice to me,” he’d said with a sly smile.
“Despite the fact she has nowhere to be, she gets up before I do, and uses all the hot water in her shower,” I grumbled, and then added, “She does it on purpose.”
“Oh come on, Brooke,” he’d teased me. “Really?”
“She threw a tantrum that I only have 2 percent milk in the fridge versus fat free.”
Bishop chuckled and took my hand in his, giving me some comfort by stroking the back with his thumb, all while his eyes glittered with amusement.
“She talks about herself nonstop,” I complained to him. “I know way too much detail about her hair, skin, stomach intolerances, her alcoholic daddy, her overachiever sister who she can’t compare to, her last ex-boyfriend who she actually trolls on social media, an affair she had with one of the assistant editors at the magazine, and her sex life.” I added that last bit with a slight shudder. “Let’s just say I don’t know if I can look Dax in the face again, as she was way too explicit about what they’ve been doing together.”
Bishop at least had the grace to look a little sympathetic before stating, “Well, that ship has sailed. Dax isn’t going back for more.”
“Because she has a certain level of crazy, right?” I asked, feeling vindicated.
“Actually, he said she wasn’t that great in the sack,” he told me truthfully. “But yeah, I think she was also latching on to him a little too hard after just a few days.”
Bishop went on to tell me that Dax politely told her last night after he dropped her off at my house that he would be too busy to see her again before she left to return home to New York. I didn’t know this firsthand, as Bishop and I were sleeping when she came in, and this morning, she was secured back in her room after taking an early shower along with all the hot water.
Now she’s in my bedroom.
Steeling myself and willing my nerves not to get too frazzled, I head in there to join her.
To find Nanette going through my closet.
My gaze sweeps the room to see several of my outfits laid neatly out on the bed with shoes on the floor below each, as if she’s putting together a wardrobe for a fashion show. She has all my jewelry pulled out and spread across my dresser.
“What—” I say, getting ready to follow it with the fuck is going on, but I catch myself. She’s a guest in my home, but more important, she’s carrying around a big secret about Bishop and me. I have to tread carefully. So I cough and say in just a generically curious tone, “What’s going on?”
She gives me a sharp expression then looks back to a dress she’s holding up to admire. Nanette then brings it up to her body and turns to look in the mirror on the back of my door. Without looking at me, she answers, “I’m just trying on a few of your things. I know you wouldn’t mind me borrowing them.”
My fingers curl inward, my hands balling into fists. Still, I keep a pleasant smile plastered to my face. “Oh yeah?”
She nods. “I’ve got a job interview next week.”
“What?” I gasp in shock.
Her eyes finally come to me in the mirror. “Yeah…I was out last night with the guys—”
“The guys?” I ask, having no clue what she’s talking about, as I thought she was out with Dax.
“Erik, Legend, Dax,” she says with a shrug. “And there were some others who work in the organization there too. I can’t remember all their names, but I met Sebastian Parr. He’s the director of merchandising, and well…he told me about a job opening in his division.”
What in the hell?
There was no job opening there. Sebastian had me doing some temporary work to determine if they could fit me into the budget in that department.
And then it hits me. My eyes narrow as she shoves the dress back into the closet and pulls out another. “Was, um…Sebastian kind of flirting with you?”
Nanette doesn’t look at me but nods with a purring type of laugh. “Oh was he ever. And I was flirting right back. It’s how I got the interview.”
I just bet. Sebastian is a flirty guy, but it’s always seemed harmless to me and I never engaged. But if Nanette was giving it back to him, I could see her “persuading” him to give her an interview.
I poke at her a bit more. “But I thought you were with Dax last night.”
“I was,” she says casually, and then turns to me. “And let me tell you, he’s got it so bad for me, Brooke. But I just don’t want to be pinned down, so I kind of broke things off last night. I’m thinking about calling Erik, though. He could totally be a nice diversion.”
Oh, just…gross. I’m all for women having the same sexual liberation as men, but in the span of just a few minutes, she’s practically told me about her using three men with no shame at all. I’m really glad Dax wiped his hands of her, and now I feel the pressing need to give Erik a serious heads up.
“What do you think about this one?” Nanette asks as she turns from the closet to face me, holding up, ironically, a Nanette Lepore silk A-line dress with an asymmetrical hem. It’s not one of my favorites so I shrug.
“Why are you interviewing for a job here?” I ask her.
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