And I fucking knew what that felt like because I’d felt it the second she walked into this damn locker-room.
“I’m going to skip this one,” I said. “Head home. Catch up on sleep.”
Pathetic excuse, but it was all I had.
Rory flashed Gage a knowing look, and they turned around, stopping before me.
“All right, man,” Gage said. “Want to tell us what is really going on?”
I sank onto the bench, raking my hands through my hair.
“She was everything to me,” I admitted on a long breath.
Gage sat down beside me, Rory and Warren filing in on the other side.
“And?”
“And nothing. She wouldn’t come with me when I went to college. She moved on. So I did.”
“But . . .”
“Fuck,” I hissed. “I still love her.”
There.
I fucking said it.
It was out in the world.
“I never stopped.” Okay, sure let’s just keep piling it on. “And I never once thought she’d come here. Work for the team.”
“Fucking hell,” Rory snapped. “This is bad.”
“No,” I said, my tone shaky. “I’ve got this under control.”
“Do you?” Warren asked. “’Cause you just bailed on drinks because she was there.”
“I know. Fuck me, I know.”
“It’s fine,” Gage said. “Just tell Coach.”
“And lose the ice-time I’ve worked my ass off to earn? Fuck that.” I shrugged. “Besides. Nothing is going to happen.”
Gage eyed me like he knew better.
“She doesn’t want me back. Not in that way.” I think she wanted her friend back, nothing more. “It’ll be fine. We were friends before we were . . .” I sighed. “We’re going to try to be friends again.”
Gage nodded. “You sure about this? You could just tell Coach about the history.”
I shook my head. “I can’t do that. Not yet. Not without talking to her. Her job is on the line, too. And why stir up trouble? Absolutely nothing has happened.”
“And nothing will,” Rory added, but even he sounded like he didn’t believe it.
Gage clapped me on the back. “I hope so, Rookie,” he said. “I’d hate to lose you from the team just when you’re finally getting up to our level.”
I laughed at the joke, flashing him a thankful look at taking off some of the heavy.
“Now get your ass up,” Rory demanded. “You’re getting that drink with us. Prove it to yourself and Chloe that you are really just friends.”
Warren laughed while Gage whistled, and I found my dumbass following them out of the rink and into the parking lot.
Twenty-minutes later we walked inside one of our favorite dives—a small place with great food, good drinks, and most importantly no press. It was a place that let us be without all the flashing lights and constant questions.
And there, tucked into a back-corner booth, right next to Bailey, Paige, and Jeannine, was the love of my life.
Her black hair slightly mussed, as if she’d tossed it a few too many times. Her cheeks rosy, likely from the collection of empties that littered their table. And that laugh. Fuck me it was enough to shake up my soul and make me see.
I felt like I hadn’t seen clearly in so damn long—like this past decade I’d had a film over my eyes and it only lifted when she came crashing back into my life.
Friends.
I’m happy to see my friend.
Nothing more.
Then why the hell was my heart racing the closer we got to the table?
“Babe!” Bailey said, throwing her arms around Gage.
Warren and Rory received similar greetings—the buzzed vibe at the table not lost on any of us.
Before I could choke out an awkward hello Chloe had hopped out of the booth and thrown her arms around my neck. I caught her in a blink, her body fitting perfectly against mine as I wrapped my arms around her hips, her feet slightly off the floor from her jump.
“Bent!” she practically squealed.
For a few seconds I wasn’t here, in this bar.
I was back there—under our tree, laughing and listening and kissing and holding.
“I was just telling the girls about that time we stole your dad’s truck and caught an Aerosmith concert in the city over.”
I chuckled, reluctantly setting her on her feet when I caught Gage’s raised brow in my direction. “That so?”
“Mmhmm,” she said, her smile so much younger than it had looked yesterday. Like the alcohol had shed her of whatever haunted her. “Remember how sick you got?” She turned to the booth, our audience hanging on her every word. “We think his drink got spiked or something. Anyway, he threw up so much I seriously thought he was going to die. Like, I almost took him to the ER, but he didn’t want to get caught so we drove home.” She snorted. “He puked the whole way out the window.”
“Really?” Rory asked, motioning for her to sit back down. “Please, do continue with more embarrassing stories of the rookie.”
“Or don’t,” I said, taking a seat on the other side of her.
“Oh, that wasn’t embarrassing. I felt so awful for him.” She placed her hand on my forearm, which flexed underneath her touch. “Though, I think I took pretty good care of you.”
“Yeah,” I said gruffly, remembering just how well she had later that night when I’d started feeling better.
“That was the night I realized I’d be good at helping people,” she said. “I guess we could say that Bent here is the reason I’m a PT.”
“And the reason you love hockey,” Jeannine said, eyeing me.
Oh hell, what all had they talked about?
I glanced at the guys, half panicked, but they each just shook their heads as if to say just go with it, dude, you’re out of your realm.
That was the fucking truth.
“You were saying?” Rory drew Chloe’s attention. “Embarrassing details about the rookie . . .” he urged her.
Paige smacked his chest. “You’re as bad as Nine!”
Rory bumped his fist against Nine’s. “We’re besties for a reason,” he said.
The whole table laughed, though Chloe’s stood out the most to me. And as I sat there, drinking beers and watching them all interact, I realized just how much shit I was in.
Because it felt right.
All of us together—easy.
Good people, good times.
Chloe at my side most of all—happy and free and talking like the decade that separated our lives never happened. Like we were the oldest friends we’d always been.
And fuck me, I wanted more.
I wanted her.
I wanted my heart back.
And she was the last person on the planet allowed to give it to me.
Chapter 8
Chloe
“Heads up,” Nine said, stopping us before we entered their favorite club Phantom. “I invited the Rookie.”
“What?” I didn’t mean to whine.
Bailey and Paige quickly entered the club, flashing me a few totally innocent glances on their way.
It’d been two weeks since I went out with the girls to the bar—and got massively drunk which resulted in flirting way too much with Bentley. Since then, the girls and I had gone to lunches, a few dinners, and I’d even tagged along on play-dates. They had quickly become some of the best friends I’d ever had—in the female department anyway—but I was seriously contemplating throat punching Jeannine.
“I had to,” she said, giving me puppy-dog eyes.
“Why?” I sighed. “You know how much I—” I stopped myself short.
The girls knew my feelings for him were intense and complicated and had no chance of ever going away. They also were aware that what I wanted was forbidden.
I couldn’t be with him—the coach had forbade any of the players from going after me, and he didn’t even know my history.
Nine did. She kne
w about my ex—an Ontario hockey player—and the threats he liked to casually remind me of over text every week or so.
“You’re miserable,” she said. “You are so far gone for that man.”
“So?” I hissed, wrapping my arms around myself. The air was cool, but it was my insides that had dropped a few degrees. “Maybe I should go,” I said, spinning on my heels.
“Please,” Nine said, gently clutching my elbow. She tugged me out of the way of other patrons entering the club. “I’m sorry. I can’t help myself. Ask Bailey and Paige. I interfered when they were miserable, too. And hey, that worked out pretty damn well.”
I chuckled but tension clung to my muscles.
“Look,” she said. “You’re in a shit spot. No one is denying that. Rules are rules and history is history, but I’ve seen you these past two weeks and I’ve seen him. The friendship thing is one blink away from combusting.”
She wasn’t wrong.
Bentley and I had seen plenty of each other at work.
Enough that we’d come to this comfortable and professional kind of friendship that only made me miss him more as opposed to ease the craving.
But we couldn’t cross that line. We both needed our jobs too damn much.
“I can’t do anything about it,” I said.
And while I looked forward to seeing him every morning at work, I had avoided seeing him outside of the rink. I was mortified at how easily I’d fallen into our old banter when he’d showed up at the bar and I was already four bottles into buzzed—something I hadn’t done in a long time, in public anyway . . .
He never allowed it. Terrified I’d embarrass him.
An entirely new wave of cold crashed inside me with the thought.
He’d sent a text two nights ago.
I’d ignored it, but his threat rang clear in my mind.
You’re mine. I catch you with anyone and I’ll make sure you never work again.
He could do it, too—that is what was most terrifying.
He was charming, convincing, and one of the best players on the team. Money, power, sexual appeal. The holy trifecta. The man had it all. The charm had pulled me in so deep, I’d been drowning before I’d even noticed the red flags.
All six-hundred of them.
“You can do something about it. You can choose,” Nine said, clutching my shoulders. “Your life. Your body. Your business.” She eyed me, sincerity flashing in those baby blues. “If you’re the one in control then it won’t sneak up on you. Because with the way you two look at each other? One of you is going to slip and it’s going to be in the locker room or your office and then you will get caught.”
My soul clenched.
She was right.
We’d been tiptoeing around this line we’d drawn between each other since the day I came here. And how many times had I already fantasized about him locking my office door and taking me on the table?
Too many to count.
“Fuck,” I whispered.
“I know,” she said, wrapping me in a side hug. “I’m trying to help.” She motioned toward Phantom. “It’s pretty discreet. You could be with him without anyone noticing. Or, you could not be together and just be friends. Your choice. I was just trying to give you the option to breathe.”
I smiled at her. “You’re an incredibly good friend.”
She shrugged. “It’s my curse.”
We walked with our arms looped into the club, the massive, low lit place pulsing with music and hundreds of conversations. The dancefloor was packed, the bar more so, and glancing around at all the sparkly sequin cocktail dresses and mini-skirts, I suddenly felt totally underdressed. I spared my outfit a look—my red pumps, black leather leggings, and a breezy white blouse that hung off my shoulders.
“You look smoking hot,” Nine whispered in my ear, noting my self-appraisal.
“You do,” I said.
The woman could easily be a model with her mile-long legs, gorgeous blonde hair, and sky-blue eyes. She’d opted for a sleek black strapless dress, while Paige wore a more conservative red, and Bailey a hunter green.
I headed toward the bar, but Nine shook her head and tugged me toward a set of roped off stairs. The bouncer didn’t hesitate to lift the barrier and let us pass. Each step up toward one of the few VIP balconies increased my heartbeat—not because it was a challenge walking up the stairs in heels, though it was always a bit of an effort—but because I knew who was waiting up there.
The balcony looked over the dancefloor, the pulsing music filtering up in wave. The air was crisper with the lack of packed bodies, and a waiter was currently setting a bottle on one of the small round tables that sat nestled between lush leather couches and chairs.
Bailey perched in Gage’s lap on the couch, Rory and Paige on the opposite end. Warren leaned causally against the railing, his eyes lighting up the second he set them on Nine. There was so much love flying around up there I almost felt sick.
Then I turned and spotted Bentley, looking sexy as hell in an all-black suit, his muscles straining against the fabric. He held a drink—looked like whiskey—in one hand, the other resting easily against his knee in the chair he occupied. Lost in thought—thankfully, because he didn’t register my complete lack of breath at his presence.
Jeannine’s words rolled through my mind on repeat. Each time they made a little more sense.
If we wanted to explore what was between us . . . then we should.
Because if we kept fighting it . . . it would blow up in our faces.
Or this could all be me.
He may not feel a thing.
The reality of that thought dropped my stomach, and I halted my steps, standing there like I didn’t know where the hell I belonged.
“Chloe,” Bentley’s voice washed over me like warm honey. He’d blinked out of his daze, immediately rising from his seat and meeting me in a few strides.
I swear the air crackled around him, shooting out tiny sparks that made chills race across my skin.
“You’re here,” he said, gazing down at me.
“And sober,” I said, the joke coming out more awkward than funny.
Brilliant.
He laughed anyway. “I didn’t mind it,” he said, and my smile deepened.
Maybe I wasn’t alone in feeling the buzzing, begging, thing between us.
“Are you drinking tonight?” he asked, motioning to where he’d been sitting.
“Maybe just a tiny one,” I said, taking the chair opposite his, the small round table between us, and the couches and other chairs a few feet to our left.
Jeannine was tugging Warren down the stairs, likely to dance, while Bailey and Paige were laughing and chatting with their husbands. I imagined it was a rare treat—to get to steal a few hours of freedom to just be a couple instead of mom and dad.
Bentley poured me a drink and slid it across the table.
“You call that tiny?” I asked, scooping it up. “That’s at least three fingers.”
“I know you’re partial to two,” he said and wetted his lips. My heart crawled up my throat. “But I feel like you can handle it.”
I took a sip, allowing the warm, slightly sweet liquor to soothe my tight lungs.
“You’d be surprised how much I can handle,” I teased, setting the drink down. “I’m so much stronger than that girl you knew.”
“I can tell,” he said but there was no tease in his tone.
Those eyes locked onto mine, seeing right through me.
Like always, I was certain he knew there was something haunting me.
Something more than our past—which was a huge contender.
There were countless times these past few weeks I’d parted my lips to tell him the truth about why I hadn’t followed him all those years ago, but I’d always shut the words down. It was in the past.
He’d ended up where he was meant to me.
He rested his elbows on his knees, drawing closer.
I crossed one leg over the othe
r, unable to sit still with him looking at me like that.
Like I was . . . dinner.
“You ready to talk to me, yet?” he asked, his mouth so close I could smell the sweet liquor on his breath.
Teasing, tempting.
All I’d have to do was lean down and take a taste.
“I thought that’s what we’ve been doing,” I said, a soft smile on my lips.
“Memories. Old times, sure, but I’m talking something real.”
I swallowed hard, reaching for my drink and taking a deeper swallow.
“What do you want to know, Bent?” I asked with a slight shrug.
“Everything, Chloe. Everything.”
I sighed. “That is an awful lot.’
“What can I say?” he asked, a sly smirk on his lips. “I’m a man who likes to have it all.”
“That’s never changed,” I said, chuckling.
He’d never settled in life, and he shouldn’t. He worked his ass off since the day he learned how to skate. He deserved everything life had to offer.
“And I’m glad. You’ve gotten everything you ever dreamed of, Bent.” I raised my glass toward him. “NHL, sponsorships, a slew of women vying for a permeant spot at your side.” The last part stung more than it should—but I’d known about his conquests since college. Sometimes the internet was a torture device. “Cheers,” I said, forcing the word around the sting in my chest.
He clinked his glass against mine, took a drink, and then shook his head. “I don’t have everything I ever wanted.”
I licked a few drops of whiskey off my lips. “What’s missing?” I asked, thinking about all the things he’d wanted when we were kids. “A bigger, better truck?”
He sighed. “You.”
The word was practically a whisper, but it crackled in the space between us like a bolt of lightning.
He shifted closer, his knees touching mine, causing a thrill of heat to snake into my blood. Sparing a glance at his friends, and noting they were properly engaged with each other and not our conversation, he turned back to me. “Why didn’t you come with me, Chlo?”
My lips parted and tears pricked my eyes.
There it was.
The question I never wanted to answer.
Rookie Page 7
