by Mignon Mykel
And I swear I hadn’t drunk anything.
“Ry, how much alcohol have you had?” Jason asked, leaning into me. His lips were probably too close to my ear. I think I felt uncomfortable with it.
My eyes automatically shifted to Noah. The man had been holding up the bar with his forearms all flipping night. I would know. My eyes autho-automatically moved to him a couple of times.
Giggly and slurry. Fun stuff.
Anyway. Noah. He was frowning. At me. Shitface.
Oh no, that was me.
Insert some witty sassy nickname here, because my brain wasn’t quite functioning that way.
Shoot, I don’t drink. “Silly, I don’t drink,” I repeated out loud to Jason.
“Okay… What have you had to drink?”
“Oh, some punch.” Somewhere in my fuddled brain I realized the mistake in that.
Obviously someone here didn’t go to high school parties, and that person wasn’t Jason.
“I think you drank the rum punch.”
I shook my head a bit too vigorously. “Nope. I don’t drink.”
Jason still looked amused and Noah still looked surely.
Men.
“How about we get you a room and you stay here tonight,” Jason offered.
“I can’t afford a place like this! Look, there’s a shana-chandelier.” This slurring and repeating hard words slowly was work.
“I’ll foot the bill.”
I jabbed a finger toward his chest, a silly grin on my face. “You gonna take a’vantage of me, hockey boy? Not my cuppa’ tea…”
Jason shook his head. “Nope. Just want to make sure you get there before—“
I started to tilt a little and would have fallen over if it weren’t for Jason catching my arm.
“Before you crash to the floor,” he finished.
With a happy sigh, I nodded. “Well, ok then.”
As Jason walked me out of the room, I couldn’t help but glance over my shoulder one last time for a parting look at Noah.
What a fool was I.
Chapter Seven
Something was ringing.
I tried to fight the unconsciousness pulling me down and struggled to lift my eyelids. What was that god-awful noise?
I lay belly down on what had to be 3000-thread count sheets, with a sheet, duvet, and comforter down by my calves. At some point, I must have kicked them down and in doing so, my dress rode up to my upper thighs.
This bed was heaven.
However, the ringing was far from heavenly and before I fixed the covers or my dress, I needed to do something about it.
I turned my cotton-filled head toward the sound, only to realize that the ringing now came from the other side of the room. Shit, that was my head.
With a groan, I buried my head in the pillow.
I, Ryleigh Scott, didn’t drink for a reason.
I was as light weight as they came, and the less alcohol you could taste in a drink, the more I would down it like water.
Suddenly a throat was cleared.
Instantly, my headache was gone and fear was in its place. Every vessel in my body stopped flowing blood, my heart stopped pumping, I stopped breathing.
Someone was in my room.
What could I do? I couldn’t pretend I was sleeping, because the intruder obviously knew I was awake. Oh god, oh god, oh god, what was I going to do?
“Ryleigh.”
Ok. Now was a better time for that chant. My name had been drawn out in a timbre that wasn’t quite baritone, but not quite tenor either. The voice belonged to Noah Prescott.
I knew his voice from various team events and interviews, as well as from hearing him yell out on the ice during games. But sometime last night, I must have truly tuned into his voice because it washed over me like a blanket.
Like the one not covering my hind-end while my dress fought the need to show my girly-bits.
Slowly, my headache came back. Careful not to further disturb my head but also to keep my dress from hitching any higher, I rolled over and sat up. Pulling the covers up to my hips and pushing my hair back out of my eyes, I prayed I didn’t look too ridiculous with what I was sure was a rat’s nest for hair and a raccoon’s mask for eyes.
Momentarily forgetting where I was, I searched for my glasses. Purely for vanity purposes at the moment, I assure you. I could see just fine with both eyes.
And I could see Noah sitting in the red velvet chair near the corner of the bed with a testy yet confused look on his face.
He was leaning forward slightly, his forearms resting on his knees and his hands hanging carefree between them. He was still in his slacks and shirt from the night before, but they looked slept in and he had rolled his sleeves up to his elbows.
With his muscled forearms and his almost carefree position, the man was delicious.
This entire encounter really ought to knock me back into my senses but he looked so gorgeous sitting there, all tousled with a slight shadow on his jaw, while here I sat, all -frumpy and shaggy and more un-gorgeous than I started out as.
When his eyes dipped, I followed their line of sight and saw that my dress was crooked on top, nearly exposing one of my boobs. Pretty sure the blush was a full-bodied one, but I managed to fix my dress and pulled the covers up close to my neck.
“So,” he said, finally lifting his eyes back to mine. I could now see they were a unique hazel. A little more green and gold than brown, but just enough brown to give them the hazel characteristics. “You and Jason, huh?”
I frowned. “Huh?” Me and Jason?
Me and Jason what?
“I’m a bit confused, is all. You seemed like this shy person but I decided I was going to try to get to know you. And then you show up with Jace? Guess the joke’s on me, right? No, you’re wrong.”
“Excuse me?” My frown deepened.
What the hell did I do last night?
I was torn between being embarrassed for being played, pissed for being played, and being fucking aroused at the sleeping beauty in front of me.
I only slipped into her room a few minutes before she woke. I was planning on waking her up; nothing is creepier than waking up with someone staring you down.
Don’t ask. I won’t tell. It’s creepy, though.
I didn’t know where to touch though, to shake her awake. She was half-naked in bed as with her dress riding up in some places and over in others.
So instead I did the gentlemanly thing and sat in the chair at the end of her bed.
And yes, I could see up her dress.
So maybe gentlemanly thing wasn’t the right term. Anyway, she woke up shortly later and it was semi-amusing watching her try to fix herself in front of me. I never understood the contradiction of shy gorgeous girls, but that was Ryleigh in spades. The sleep tossed hair with the blush she was rocking was a sight.
I had to keep reminding myself to think with my upper head, though.
“After some loosening up on the floor, Jason and you came back up here for your own party, right?” I smirked. I was probably being a jerk, but I was pissed. Here I was, contemplating making a move for this girl, trying to play things her way, and she goes and comes with Jason? “I would say you are a puck bunny, hun, contrary to whatever the hell it is you want to believe.”
As dick-ish as I was being, I wanted her to correct me, prove me wrong, anything. But when her face dropped, it pretty much confirmed what I said.
“I’m just returning your room key,” I said as I stood, the card Jason gave me to return between my index and middle fingers. I walked to the dresser and dropped it.
Just before I reached the door, though, her voice stopped me. “You read the note?” There was a hint of confusion and embarrassment in her voice.
I shouldn’t have, but I turned around anyway. “Yeah, I did.” That came out almost too matter-of-factly.
“B-but,” she stammered. “Guys don’t read notes!”
I crossed my arms and leaned back against the door, trying to go for cas
ual. It was work with the conflicting emotions in my head. “I had nothing better to do. Needed a good laugh.”
“You don’t look like you’re laughing.”
I said nothing, choosing to raise my brows slightly instead. After a moment of silence, I pushed out, “Ha. Ha ha.”
Ryleigh stared at me from across the room before squeezing her eyes shut tightly. Opening them again, she pulled herself out of the bed, pulling down her dress haphazardly as she walked toward me.
I won’t say it didn’t excite me to some degree.
I really wish my thoughts about this situation would line up together.
She stopped just shy of me to kneel where I noticed her purse was carelessly tossed. She pulled out what looked like ibuprofen and shook three out. When she moved closer to me, I merely lifted a brow.
Ryleigh was a good eight inches shorter than me, but she looked up at me with determined eyes. The blue reminded me of a clear lake in the summer. Winter, with the glassy sheen over them.
“You want to do me now too?” I couldn’t help the sarcastic retort.
Her face reddened again, a color I was coming to associate with her, but she managed to force out, “There’s a water bottle next to you.” She looked like she had more to say, but bit her tongue.
No, seriously, she bit her tongue on purpose.
The glassy sheen to her eyes though was starting to lose the hangover look, and look more like oncoming tears.
“One,” she started, her jaw jutting out and the tears refusing to fall. After downing the pills, she laid it on me. “I am not, nor will I ever be, a puck bunny. Two.” Her voice began to rise. “Who I decide to sleep with is none of your business. But because you decided to make it your business, I have no desire to sleep with any of you bullheaded hockey players. Ya’ll have been hit on the head one too many times. If you’d keep your gloves and helmets on while playing, maybe you would understand this.
“You can’t just come in here and expect me to wake up all Sleeping Beauty-esque and fall at your feet begging for forgiveness. I have done nothing that needs to be forgiven. You are the one who is somewhere you shouldn’t be. I didn’t give you permission to be here. Do you not think that I wasn’t humiliated enough in the first place with the note? It was a mistake, Noah! And now you’re here?! Oh, let’s just make a joke out of Ryleigh. What was it you said? Oh, yeah,” she said around a forced chuckle before mimicking my earlier dry tone, “Ha. Ha ha.”
I lost her after ‘one’.
She was sexy. That maybe made me an ass in thinking it, but it was true. Her eyes darkened to a stormy grey as she continued her rant and as she spoke, occasionally her lips would pucker during words that wouldn’t normally cause them to pucker. I moved my sight from her lips back to her eyes; they were still dark, but they were lightening a bit. The light color of her irises was such a stark contrast to the red-brown color of her hair.
I was starting to feel guilty about the way I reacted when she woke up. I honestly wasn’t intending on jumping down her throat the moment she woke up, but everything sort of just… Blew up.
“Besides,” she continued, irritation still evident in her voice. “Jason said you had a girlfriend so again, why does it matter who I sleep with?”
Now my attention snapped fully into the here and now. “What?”
“I had no right to give you the note and it was quite nosy of me to ask Jason if you had a girlfriend. It didn’t warrant an answer. I’m just a nobody. And you? You, Noah Prescott, are going to be a somebody. So why don’t you just go back to your girlfriend and forget the damned note that you weren’t supposed to read in the first place?” Then she muttered something that sounded like, “Damn fucking friends,” but I couldn’t be completely sure.
“Well, newsflash, but there is no girlfriend. I don’t know what the hell game Jason is playing, but there is no girl.” I stepped away from her before I could give in the urge to kiss her. Before pulling open the door though, I turned over my shoulder. “And as for the note? I’ll forget it as soon as you change your seats at the game.”
“How do you know where I sit?” She was frowning again.
I turned toward her again. “Ryleigh.” I was trying to not go with a sarcastic tone but it was still under the surface. “You sit in the same seat every game. There’s been countless games since the note, a few of which you brought your friend to. This bullheaded hockey player is where he’s at because he can take note of a situation.” I turned back to the door and opened it, finally making my way out.
Before closing it, though, I said one last thing. “Catch you later.”
Because I would.
This wasn’t over.
Chapter Eight
After a few choice words with Jason where he admitted to only wanting to rile me up, no pun intended, he added just a little bit more to this current fiasco.
He wasn’t in the hotel any longer, but rather, on his way to Chicago.
“Dude, you can give her a ride, right? I mean, it makes sense,” he had said. I wasn’t sure what about it made sense, and I told him as much. “Sure it does. You live like… a few doors down from her. She likes you. And it admit it, bro, you like her too.” Without giving me a chance to say anything more, he hung up after a quick, “Appreciate it, Prescott.”
Now I was stuck—
Ok, so stuck wasn’t the right word. But I certainly hadn’t signed up for this. I was all about facing your problems and that shit, but this had the ability to be super awkward after our… discussion… this morning.
I could have left her. It wasn’t my responsibility to get her home.
That would be a dick move, though, so here I sat at the base of the staircase in the hotel lobby, watching as people stepped off the elevators. I said a few things as teammates left, but other than that, I sat in silence.
When one of the elevator doors opened next, I watched for Ryleigh. Sure enough, she exited, freshly showered. She still wore the black number from last night and she hadn’t bothered with drying her hair, making the normally reddish-brown strands dark and wavy. She held her shoes in one hand by the heels and her other hand nervously readjusted the strap of her purse. Over her arm, she had draped a charcoal wool coat. She looked around the hotel lobby for Jason.
I stood and walked up behind her. Ryleigh nearly jumped out of her skin when I put my hand to her lower back.
“You’re stuck with me.”
She whipped around. The anger from her face was gone but she still didn’t look too happy to see me. “Why? Where’s Jason?”
“He decided to spend the day in Chicago.” I’d leave out all the rest. I got the feeling she’d feel abandoned as it was.
Ryleigh’s lips pressed together in a tight line and I could see her swallow.
“I’ll get a cab,” she told me as she began walking to the concierge desk.
“Nope. I told him I’d see that you got home. Besides, we’re going to the same place, right? Why take two vehicles to get there?”
“Because you and I are not friends,” she said, continuing her walk. She didn’t even tell me over her shoulder, refusing to look back in my direction. “You and I are not acquaintances. You and I, Noah, are going to go from this point forward pretending nothing ever happened.” She shrugged and finally looked back at me. “Nothing did happen.”
I made it to her and reached for her wrist. “Ryleigh, just let me take you home. You don’t even have to talk to me.”
This woman frustrated me.
But at the same time, she was intriguing as hell.
While I’d been waiting for her to come down to the lobby, her stormy eyes and loud determination, so different from the shy, placid Ryleigh I’ve been seeing, played on loop in my mind. It wasn’t the way I would have chosen to start talking to her, but it ended up being the opening I needed.
“No, Noah.”
“Then let me pay for your fare.”
Ryleigh groaned and tilted her head down to the floor, her hair
masking her face as she appeared to think. Finally, she looked back at me. “Fine.”
“Fine, I can pay your fare, or fine, I can take you home?”
“Fine, you can take me home. But only because Jason asked you to.”
After telling Noah what unit was mine, he pulled his black F-150 into a vacant spot in the front. The truck fit him. The interior was clear of clutter, only holding our items from overnight and his Enforcers issued hockey bag.
When Noah didn’t move after putting the truck in park, I folded my lips in, unsure of what I was supposed to do. I didn’t want to sit in the truck with him any longer than I needed to, so I reached over to unbuckle myself. Before I could open the door, though, Noah held up a finger.
“Stay put.”
I said nothing and watched as he got out.
Against my will, my heart began to slowly pound as I watched him round the front of the truck, coming to my door and opening it. As I climbed down, Noah took my elbow and walked me to my unit.
He was too close to me. I could smell the lingering cologne on him from the night before. I just knew I would –
Sure enough, as I went to grab my keys from my purse I fumbled them and dropped them to the ground.
“Excuse me,” I mumbled under my breath as I bent to retrieve them.
Noah stepped aside to allow me to grab them, but took the key ring from me when I straightened. I said nothing as I watched him unlock my door with sure and steady hands.
Even his hands were pretty.
I clenched my purse with both hands as I faced the door, somehow finding the nerve to turn and face him. Plastering what I hoped was a polite smile on my face, I attempted to say thank you. As nerves would do to me though, I couldn’t get the formed words out of my mouth.
Instead, I managed to laugh nervously and instead glanced down at his shoes. Like the word vomiting I could be known for, instead of thanking him I went with, “Damn, you make me nervous.” I bit my lip and took a deep breath, forcing myself to look up at him. “Thanks again for the ride. I’m sorry for causing you any trouble. And please. Please, please, please… Just disregard the note. It was nosy and very out of character for me.”
