by Meader, Kate
His eyes went cold. “Not when you find your bride-to-be getting railed by someone in the apartment you shared.”
13
Mia gasped and covered her mouth, and Cal almost felt sorry for breaking it so roughly. She looked so scandalized. “On your wedding day?”
“Yep. You know how you’re not supposed to see the bride before the ceremony? Well, that is 100% correct. Don’t do it.”
“Oh, Cal.”
He rubbed his mouth. “Yeah. I—well—shit. I haven’t actually told anyone this.” He didn’t want to now, but he and Mia were close. Closer than he felt with anyone else in his life right now, to be honest.
“You don’t have to now. It’s none of my business and I’m sorry I was so nosey.”
“No, it’s okay.” He took a sip of water. “We were living together in a condo in Montreal and I’d spent the night at Vad’s so she could have the place to herself, to get ready and all that. But then I remembered I’d left something behind. A gift for her. I checked with the bridesmaids to make sure she wasn’t there and got the all clear.”
“But she was there. With someone.”
He hauled a deep breath. “Yes, she was. She’d slipped away from her bridesmaids to have one last bang while single and that’s what she was doing when I walked into our bedroom.”
“In the dress?”
“I wasn’t wearing a dress.”
She gripped his arm. “I mean she was while … oh never mind. Who was the guy?”
Not going there. “Someone I know. Knew. Someone I thought I knew. They’d been at it for a couple of months and she swore this was to be the last time. A farewell fuck.”
“Oh jeez, that’s awful. I’m so sorry you went through that, Cal. Really. And I’m sorry I was pushy about the details.”
“No worries. Long time ago, and I’m over it. Everyone’s got some baggage, right? Like you and your hockey player asshole ex who didn’t cheat on you but turned you off an entire profession as a potential love interest.” He nudged her elbow. “While we’re spilling.”
“I’d—well, I’d rather not.”
Huh. He’d opened a vein and she was keeping it close to her chest. He felt a little foolish for sharing, but she wasn’t obliged to come clean.
“Sure, but anytime you want to talk about it, I’m listening.”
She nodded, waited a beat. “I don’t want to go into details, but so you know, I’m over it, too. I learned my lesson, but that culture of alpha bro-holes and toxic masculinity is one I’ve been trying to escape.”
“Mia—”
“I get it, Cal.” She touched his hand. “Not every hockey player is like that but enough of them are—enough pro athletes are—that I’d rather not roll the dice and risk it. Which is fine because there are plenty of guys who don’t play hockey who can make me happy.”
Like this guy she had her heart set on. This cool, sophisticated, business type.
He turned his palm over and squeezed hers. “This guy you’ve got your sights on might be an asshole as well.”
“Sure, it’s a risk. Love always is, but this is a calculated one. You miss 100% of the shots, etcetera.”
“The hockey player ex. Is he still around?”
“He still exists, if that’s what you’re asking.” Her eyes clouded over with bad memories. “He’s a nobody, who is no longer on my radar.”
“But …” He traced a finger along her palm. More interesting, she let him. “Did he get what was coming to him?”
Strange thing for him to ask. Bethany had never been punished. He’d protected her to the last, keeping the gritty details to himself. Until now. Yet the idea that someone would have hurt Mia in a similar way and got away with it made him rage.
Emotion flashed on her face for a second. “I snuck into his room one night and put fire ants in his underwear drawer. You can buy them online.”
“Good for you.” But was that enough? Cal didn’t think so, and he suspected Mia didn’t, either. Though Cal didn’t know the exact details, this asshole had done a lot more lasting damage to her psyche.
She thought all hockey players were assholes.
She would never give one a chance to win her.
She would never give Cal a chance.
Shit.
He dropped her hand. Had he really just thought that? With the way he reacted he may as well have said it out loud.
“We should eat. And then we can talk about strategy for the tryout.”
She smiled, a big starry grin that caught hold in his chest. Damn, he didn’t want to feel like this about her. But when she mentioned the guy who’d damaged her—this asshole, fucker, hellclown—he wanted to punch the world and anyone who had hurt her.
He placed their bowls on the counter with a couple of forks and gestured to the kitchen island. “Okay to eat here?”
“Perfect!” She stood up to grab the bread rolls he’d laid out earlier and a hunk of parm, while he got the grater from the counter and water for them both. They made a smooth team in the kitchen.
He almost wished they didn’t. How much better it would be if they were awkwardly bumping into each other so he could say excuse me, and you first, and maybe get a chance to press his body to hers and inhale her hair. Accidentally, of course.
Suffering Jesus. Stop this nonsense.
Taking his seat, he held up one of the forks. She clinked it with her own and smiled. They ate companionably, with Mia making appropriate—or inappropriate—noises of gusto about his food. He felt both proud and horny, his standard emotional range in her presence.
She insisted on cleaning up which meant he had to watch her. Well, he didn’t have to. But he chose to, sitting at the island as she chattered on about the players she might be competing against for spots on Team USA.
And when she bent over to put the dishes in the bottom rack of the dishwasher, he might have dipped his gaze to her sweet ass, currently hugged in tight-fitting yoga pants. They shaped her so damn perfectly he had to swallow his lust, and hell, it didn’t taste good. It tasted wrong.
He had the legit hots for Mia Wallace. Now his brain got in on the act as well as his dick.
She’s a child.
But is she? Because she sure looks all woman to me.
She’s your friend’s sister.
True that. But fuck if I care right now.
She wants someone else. Bad enough to ask advice from your dumb ass.
And there it is.
But he could still be her friend. Only eyes up here.
She turned back to face him, her eyebrows slammed together. “I need to talk to you about the charity auction.”
“The what?”
She knocked knuckles on his head. “The Hockey for Everyone charity auction? It’s in four weeks and that’s where I’m going to make my move.”
Ah. Back to the mission.
“What exactly does that mean? Your move?” He tried to sound light-hearted about it, though he felt anything but.
She tapped at her phone. “I have a couple of dresses. Which one do you think will work best?”
“I don’t know anything about this guy, Mia.” He could be a tits or ass man. He could be into a shapely shoulder or have a fetish for feet. But if he had even an ounce of common sense, he would be a Mia man.
“But you know what guys like. Should I go with something short? Slutty? Classy?”
“Classy,” he muttered, grabbing the phone from her. The first dress showed far too much skin. The second one, more of the same. “You can practically see this chick’s pu—underwear.”
“Are you saying that no man wants to see all the goods on display? That’s not been my experience.”
“Then why are you asking my opinion if you’ve already made up your mind?”
“Because you know stuff.” She took the phone back. “So I was reading this list of ways to snag a man in the fifties.”
He exploded. “He’s in his fifties?
“No, it was written in t
he fifties. As in the 1950s?” She tapped a few more times. “It’s ridiculously funny, actually. One of the tips is to walk into a room with a hatbox—”
“Is that code?”
She laughed, full and melodic. His dick reacted predictably.
“I know, some of the stuff is crazy. But a couple of things struck a chord. Like stand in a corner and cry softly so he’ll ask what happened.”
“That’s … ludicrous.” And a genius move. No man would resist asking a woman why she was crying. He took the phone from her again. “You want to go in sounding like a sad sack? What else have we got? Tell him funny stories. Wear a Band-Aid. Ask his advice.” He looked up and grinned, when inside he didn’t feel like grinning at all. He felt like snarling, then punching out all these idiots who needed to be strategized into falling for a woman. “Ah, Mia, is this a cunning ploy to seduce me after all? Does this guy even exist?”
Something changed the moment he said it. Maybe the funny old notion that she might be plotting to seduce him, Cal, and not this other guy, who he fucking hated at this point because he wanted her to think of Cal this way. To work this hard to get him. To want him the way he wanted her.
The charge in the air was thick, electric, so when Mia laughed, he heard her nerves, and it strangely excited him.
“Of course he exists.” She took a sip of her soda.
“But …”
“But, what?”
He tilted his head. “You don’t sound so sure. All this advice-asking could be your way of finding out what works for me. Like asking for a friend but the other way around.” His pulse was racing, not because he believed the nuts-and-bolts of this theory for a damn second, but because he wasn’t alone in thinking about the possibilities. Of them.
It had definitely occurred to her, maybe a vague notion of what it might be like. To touch, to kiss, to want ... a bolt of lust thrashed through him and knocked him on his ass.
“You’re crazy, Foreman.” It came out faint and unconvincing.
“Am I?”
“Would it work?”
“Would what work?”
Her voice was a whisper. “The cunning ploy to ask you advice about some guy?”
Sometime in the last sixty seconds, she had stepped in closer and he became vaguely aware of his thighs parting, accepting her into their embrace. An invite to get in good and tight against the part of his body that needed her so fucking badly.
“It might,” he said, warming to the hypothetical situation. “You talk about all the things you might be able to do to win him. To seduce him. To make him yours. And all this time, you’re really thinking of me. Of what might work to get my attention. And I’ll tell you here and now, Mia …”
“What?” She licked her lips and his cock turned as hard as the granite countertop he was leaning against.
“I wouldn’t need any games. No pretend crying. Or funny stories. Or wearing a Band-Aid. Or carrying a damn hat box. Because one look at you and I’d be all in. No seduction necessary.”
Her eyelashes fluttered, inky, sooty frames for those lovely eyes, ones he’d happily fall into. Drown in. Die in.
The air zipped with the energy that always existed between them, a thick, drugging force of knowing and what he now realized was recognition. Of seeing inside someone’s soul. He didn’t dare speak in case he ruined whatever was happening.
“No seduction necessary?” The words were a ghosted breath on her lips, almost disbelief in her tone.
“None. No one should need to be tricked into kissing you.”
“Hypothetically,” she whispered.
He watched her mouth, mesmerized by the plumpness of her lips, the dark pink color, the slight quiver that invited him in.
“Hypothetically,” he returned, his mouth so close to hers it would take an act of Congress to move him away. She would have to withdraw because he sure as hell was going nowhere. This was where he wanted to be.
Needed to be.
A small sound emerged from her throat, and with it some sort of plea. He took it as such and took her mouth with his.
Ah, sighed his heart, and hell yeah, shouted his cock. He had ventured no further than her lips but he already knew that this kiss would destroy him.
Knowing this, that his world would be forever changed, he went for it anyway. A hand on her hip, a tug forward, a moan of encouragement, and he was in deep, wrapped around her with his body and his mouth and what was left of his brain. She opened up for him, giving him all that sweetness with a generosity that shook him to his core. Her hands dug into his shoulders, branding him with fire and want. He liked that she was tall and he didn’t have to crouch. It felt like they were meeting this kiss as equals.
But they weren’t equals. She was his trainee, too young, an innocent in the ways of men and asshole hockey players. He was her mentor in more ways than one. And don’t get him started on who she was related to. Vadim would roast his balls over a bonfire if he ever found out.
This had to end.
But not yet.
Just a few more seconds to feel more alive than he’d felt in years.
He curled a hand around the nape of her neck and held her still for plundering. His other hand cupped the sweet curve of her ass and squeezed. Pulled her close. Let her know what she was doing to him.
Their tongues twined, and now it was absolute pent-up need exploding and expressed in a wanton, mouth-fuck of a kiss. His hand on her ass dipped between the cleft, rubbing against that thin, stretchy fabric, seeking to make her feel good. To create a memory she might store for later.
Her soft breasts smashed against his chest. Christ, she felt so good. Tasted better. Her moans became louder, her body cleaved to his, desperate to rub and get as close as two horny-as-hell people could get with their clothes on.
This had to end.
But not yet.
He pulled back and met her glazed-over eyes, smoky with desire, telling him all he needed to know. She would give him everything right now. Over the stool. On the counter. In the bedroom. He could take her, have her, own her, and she would be all in.
Then what? Awkward run-ins. Weirdness around Petrov. Not to mention his balls on fire, from either seeing her and being unable to have her or from her brother literally dousing Cal’s nuts in lighter fluid and setting them alight.
As awful a prospect as any one of these possible outcomes was, none terrified him as much as the one inevitable consequence of taking this to its logical, balls-deep conclusion.
He’d miss talking to her. There would be no more of that if there was any more of this.
“Wow,” she said, licking her lips. “What was that for?”
For me. For you. For a memory I’ll return to in my lowest moments.
This had to end.
He said, “For luck.”
“For—for luck?” Her eyes went round and hurt. Better now, gorgeous girl.
“With your tryout.”
She withdrew, and he wished she’d done that before he put his lips to hers. Now he knew what she tasted like and that memory was going to fuel a few more sessions with his friendly neighborhood dick.
“Right.” She laughed nervously. Touched her lips, also nervously.
“And to prove that you don’t need those tricks to get this guy you’ve got your sights on.” Remind her of the ultimate goal.
“Okay. Gotcha.” She looked around, evidently in a daze from Hurricane Fucking Foreman. An unfulfilled lust hangover. “We should clean up.”
“Nah, I got it. You go, get ready for your flight tomorrow. I’ve got to get an early night as well.”
Awkwardly, she stepped back, her face riddled with confusion that he would regret to his dying day.
“Thanks for dinner.”
“Any time.” Though he had a feeling this might be the last time. She’d avoid him now because he’d screwed up. So much for doing the right thing.
He didn’t have time to apologize before she was out the door.
14
The U.S. Women's National Team Evaluation Camp was a four-day event held at the University of New England in Biddeford, Maine, its aim to evaluate the top-tier talent in women’s hockey. Most of the players present were already playing at the pro level while others had recently graduated college. A select few—like Mia—were here by invitation because they were out of the mix for whatever reason.
Coach Lindhoff—Lindy to his friends, of which Mia was not one—had barely looked at her as she came onto the ice for the first scrimmage on Thursday night. The players were split into two teams, Blue and White, and would be put through their paces while assessed by the camp’s staff. Mia had almost forgotten the atmosphere of a locker room before a game, and had been nervous about running into former teammates from Harvard, ones she’d not kept in touch with over the last two years. How could she explain why she was doing figure eights in limbo?
Pressure is a privilege, said Billy Jean King, words that Mia lived by. Most people had assumed she’d gotten the yips at some point and lost her nerve. Not completely inaccurate. She’d buckled, maybe not at the first hurdle, but a little further down the track.
Yet she was here now, looking for a way back into the fray.
Coach put her on the first line as center on Team Blue. It felt like she’d come home. On her exit from the ice after the first shift, Coach gave her a nod. “Good work, Wallace.”
She took those words inside her heart. No matter how the camp went this weekend, she would know she had acquitted herself well during this first showing.
Back in the locker room, she checked her phone. She had several text messages, from her brother, from Isobel, from Kennedy the barista who was tasked with taking Gordie Howe for twice-daily walks and had sent her a pic of her puppy’s poop with the evergreen comment: That’s a lot for a small dog! She even had a couple from Tara. (Any idea what Reid Durand’s favorite beer is? and Any man wearing LL Bean is not worthy of your interest! Whatever that meant).
Just the one from Cal: good luck
Bastard.
He’d already wished her luck last night with that amazing, hot, panty-melting kiss. Only it wasn’t much of a panty-melter for him—or a briefs-melter, she supposed. Instead he had been trying to instill in her confidence for her run at Tommy and her tryout on the ice. Trying to tell her she didn’t need to play games, that she should be able to attract her target using her natural charisma.
