by Elise Faber
It was the one thing she had always wanted most in the world and also the one thing she desired that she would never admit to anyone.
To do that would make her vulnerable, and if Anna had learned anything in her twenty-nine long-ass years, it was that being vulnerable was dangerous to her heart and soul.
No, it was better to keep her distance, to keep those yearnings safely locked away.
Safer to have people relying on her and not the other way around.
“Max,” she said. “I didn’t set out to be a nanny my whole life. I want—” She bit back the rest of the words. It didn’t matter what she wanted. It never had.
“What?” he murmured, reaching over to tip up her chin when she let her gaze drop to the ground. “What is it you want, kiddo?”
Anna’s mouth curved. “I’m not a kiddo.”
Max gave a chagrined smile. “I know. I’m sorry.” A shrug. “Force of habit.”
Considering, Anna had found herself calling strangers “kiddo” after getting so used to using it with Brayden, she couldn’t be mad. Hell, the other day she’d told her barista, “Thank you, bud,” and the barista was a woman.
Autopilot was a real thing.
Which was also why she needed to make a clean break with Max.
Before they got too comfortable and used to each other, before they began to rely on one another—
No. Not they. Her. Before she did any of those things.
“Okay, not kiddo,” he said. “Tell me what it is you want.”
“I’m going back to school.”
His face lit up. “That’s great! I can—”
“No,” she said. “You’ll enjoy your fiancée and son—that’s what you’ll do.”
“Anna. I’ll pay—”
God, she loved this man. The older brother she’d never had, caring and sweet and a huge dork. “You already paid me a fortune. I can do this on my own.”
He sighed, stared down at her. “I’m not going to change your mind, am I?”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
“Stubborn.” Another sigh. “But I know you’ve got this, Anna. You’re fantastic at anything you put your mind to.”
Her heart skipped a beat, but before she could open her mouth to poo-poo that notion, Max continued talking.
“You’re smart, and I know you’ll nail it.” He grinned, probably because they both had an extreme fondness for the cooking competition show on Netflix of the same name. “What do you want to study?”
She bit her lip. “Elementary education.” The big lug’s eyes warmed, and Anna found her own getting a little misty. She swatted his chest. “Stop that.”
Max pulled her into a hug. “I’m proud of you.”
Her own arms tightened for just a second before she let go and stepped back. “I haven’t even started yet.”
“You’ll finish.” A beat of quiet, broken by the buzz of his phone. He tugged it out of his pocket, glanced down at the screen, and smiled. “Angie says if you won’t come back then you at least have to promise to have weekly pizza nights, whether or not the team is in town.”
“Oh. I couldn’t—”
He held up the screen, and her protest died on her tongue.
A picture of Brayden was there, bottom lip stuck out, pleading expression on his face.
That expression made her cave like a cheap suitcase.
“Angie’s mean.”
“She learned from the best.” Max snorted. “But seriously,” he added after she made a face at him, “I’m not going to cramp your style. Just turn up every now and again. Or preferably, more often than now and again, ‘kay?”
She nodded. “Only if you let me get pineapple on the pizza.”
He made a retching sound. “I’ll order you your own pizza for that poison.”
“Poison?”
An affronted question that had them both laughing. Then Max tugged her into another hug.
“Don’t be a stranger,” he murmured before giving her one more squeeze.
“I won’t.”
A wave and Max was gone, and Anna did not feel sad. She definitely did not feel sad.
Except, she did.
“Well, that’s the story of my life,” she whispered. “Isn’t it?”
It was, and so she straightened her shoulders, blew out a breath, and went back into her apartment to grab her laptop.
She had colleges to apply to.
Six
Blue
“What’s up, man?” Max clapped him on the back, and Blue hurried to shove his hand back into his pocket.
Deep into his pocket, forcing the scrap of black lace to the bottom so his teammate wouldn’t know he’d held on to the piece of fabric. Or worse, that he’d found himself bringing it with him everywhere like some perverse keepsake. He didn’t understand why he hadn’t been able to throw out the lace after finding it under the corner of his rug a week ago, why he’d picked it up, why he’d gotten into the habit of running it between his fingertips and wishing that it was as soft as Anna’s skin had been.
Well, he didn’t know why except that perhaps he’d lost his fucking mind.
One and done had been his promise to himself.
One night and moving on.
He snorted, turning fully to face Max, giving his bud a quick, but manly hug. Because forgetting about Anna was a fucking joke. As his conscience had predicted before his dick had taken over, pretending the night with Anna hadn't happened had worked about as well as a blind backhand drop pass at the blue line.
That was to say, it didn’t.
Or at least, that he hadn’t been one of the rare lucky ones that actually did work.
“Fuck,” he muttered. “I have got to get the fuck out of here.”
“What was that?” Max asked, turning from where he’d been making goo-goo eyes at his fiancée, Angie, who admittedly looked gorgeous in a stunning and skimpy black dress, and so luckily, he hadn’t fully heard Blue.
“Are those—?” Blue frowned, leaning closer to get a better look at Angie’s dress. “Are those droids?”
Max grinned. “Fuck yeah, they are.”
Blue’s emotions tempered, the angst and frustration over his draw to Anna fading as he recognized how damned lucky his friend was. “She’s perfect for you, man.”
Max’s expression went all soft. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, she is.”
Blue punched Max hard enough to wipe the dopey look off his face. “Get it together, bro. Yes, she’s great, but fuck, at least try to pretend like you’re a tough hockey player.”
They were at an annual Gold fundraiser for season ticket holders. It was an evening of really good wine and food the team’s nutritionist, Rebecca, wouldn’t let them eat during the regular season that culminated in a live auction.
And this year, Blue had somehow ended up as the prize.
“First, Angie is a fucking goddess,” Max said. “And second, I’m not the one who’s agreed to be auctioned off to the highest bidder.”
Truth. Despite how unfortunate it was.
Blue lifted a brow. “Have you ever managed to dissuade PR Rebecca from getting something she really wants?”
Two Rebeccas in the Gold organization was a lot to keep track of and so the guys had come up with a way of acknowledging who was who in any given conversation.
PR Rebecca and Nutritionist Rebecca.
Super original, albeit effective.
A knowing glint in his friend’s gaze.
Max lifted his hand, palms up. “Fair point. PR Rebecca is a shark. But I still say it’s a trope more along the lines of a cheesy rom-com than one belonging to a big, tough, hockey player.”
Blue swung his gaze around the room, drifting it quickly past an older woman whose makeup and clothing screamed cougar, but both of which were overshadowed by the predatory look on her face. “If you’d paid attention to anything other than your gorgeous fiancée,” he said. “I think you’d have given me credit for showing up at all.”
<
br /> “What?” Max glanced around the room and froze, as though seeing the plethora of skintight ensembles and predatory expressions for the first time. “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Blue said. “Oh.”
“I think this might be the first mistake I’ve ever seen PR Rebecca make.” He nodded at a particularly aggressive looking female. “Because that one looks like she’ll tear you to shreds between the sheets.”
Blue grimaced. “I mean, more power to her,” he said. “She’s beautiful and—” He shook his head. “I just don’t think PR Rebecca and they”—he swept a hand in front of him, indicating the group of predatory men and women—“had the same thing in mind when she proposed the date.”
Angie had come up to them as they talked. She laced her arm through Max’s and smiled at Blue. “You mean PR Rebecca was imagining something more along the lines of romantic walks on the beach and not visits to that one’s Red Room?”
Blue glanced in the direction Angie was looking.
The woman took a sip from her wineglass, making the simple act look obscene.
Max whistled. “She’s going to eat you up and spit you out, Baby Blues.”
Long past his annoyance with the nickname, Blue focused on the important details.
Because, fuck, both of them were right.
PR Rebecca wanted this to be a cute photo op with a reasonably attractive fan, not an X-rated film—
“Did she just do that with her tongue?” Angie whispered.
“Holy shit,” Max said. “Can you—”
Angie smacked him.
“I think I need to talk to PR Rebecca,” he said.
“I think you’re right,” Angie agreed.
Except as Blue moved around the room, dodging hands that seemed to have an eerie accuracy for his ass, he couldn’t find Rebecca anywhere. “Fuck,” he muttered, pushing through the door that led to the kitchens and hoping that she was just chewing out the caterer.
But the kitchens were empty of the stiletto-sporting, famously hard-ass publicist, and he had half a mind to just slip out the back door and remove himself from the auction block.
Except, he wouldn’t do that to Rebecca.
This event was her baby, and so he would get on that stage and parade his ass around to get that high bidder, and then he’d go on a date. A very platonic date in a very crowded place.
Sighing, he turned and started to push back through the swinging door—
Thunk.
The thunk wasn’t him.
Or rather it wasn’t because he’d crashed into something. More like he’d shoved the door into something.
Something human.
Something female.
Something tall and slender and blond that was glaring through the porthole window at him with piercing blue eyes.
He slipped through the partially opened gap.
“Shit, Anna,” he said, carefully placing himself between the door and her so she wouldn’t get hit again. “Are you all right?”
Her hand came up, rubbed a spot on her right shoulder. “I’m fine.”
Pale pink nails scratching up his chest, trailing down his stomach—
He blinked. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t—”
“I’m fine,” she said, dropping her hand to her side and stepping back. “I should go.”
“Wait.” He snagged her arm. “I—”
She froze, eyes on his, waiting for him to finish his sentence. Or perhaps to say something semi-articulate. Or maybe to explain why he’d left her that morning when he’d really, really wanted to stay.
He waited too long.
“Bye, Blue.”
“Anna.”
She paused but didn’t turn to face him.
“I’m—”
And nothing.
He had absolutely nothing. Not one good thing to say. Except—
An announcement came over the loudspeaker, PR Rebecca declaring that the live auction would begin in five minutes.
“Bid on me,” he blurted.
Blue moved around to her front, keeping his eyes deliberately on her face and not on the sexy little black dress she was wearing.
Anna frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m the last auction item,” he said, words coming faster now. “I promised PR Rebecca that I would go on a date, and I meant it. I didn’t care if it was a man, a woman, or someone non-binary, I was happy to do it for the charity . . .”
“But?” One blond brow rose.
“But those women out there, the ones who keep making their intentions clear with very inappropriate overtures to their wine glasses”—he shuddered—“are scary.”
Her lips curved.
“I’m serious.”
The curve turned into a full-blown smile. “You? Blue Anderson is afraid of a few men and women?”
“I’m terrified.”
Not even a lie.
Her husky chuckle unlatched something inside him, unfroze him, had him reaching up and twining one finger around a strand of her hair. “Please, sweetheart.”
Her eyes twinkled. “I don’t think I have enough disposable income for the purchase of one Blue Anderson.”
He tugged. “As much as I like the sound of my name on your lips, sweetheart, I don’t have time to play.”
“Hmm.”
“Baby.” He was all but begging now. “I’ll reimburse you. Please.”
Crossed arms, cool expression, his gut sinking as several long moments passed. He stifled a sigh. She wasn’t going to do it. Okay then. He just needed to deal—
“Fine.”
He gaped. “What?”
Her ponytail flipped over one shoulder as she flounced away. “Get ready to make a big donation to the Gold’s charity, Anderson,” she called.
Fuck, he’d double it if only he got to see her walk away in that dress again.
Seven
Anna
She felt a little bad making Blue sweat about the auction once she caught a glimpse of the crowd surrounding the stage for the live auction.
That was a lot of sexual energy.
A. Lot.
And little Blue, whose cheeks were topped with the slightest hint of an embarrassed flush, was going to get eaten alive. Anna shook her head. How a man with his skills between the sheets, who’d whispered some dirty enough things in her ear that she’d been the one to be blushing, was so uncomfortable in this situation was beyond her.
Confident. Hot. In absolute, total control.
That was how she would normally describe Blue.
Which meant that this glimpse of vulnerability was a dangerous, dangerous thing to her emotional well-being.
His eyes found hers in the crowd, and her breath caught. She’d always thought them such a pretty shade of blue—light, like the pale cerulean of a morning sky or the gentle cobalt of a bubbling brook or—
She was literally going insane.
How could she, Anna Hayes, possibly be writing poetry in her mind about a man’s eyes?
She couldn’t. She had to be hallucinating.
Because she couldn’t be hung up on Blue, not when he’d left her so easily, not when he fucked anything with a vagina and two legs—hell, she wasn’t even sure that the two legs were a requirement.
So, no. No poetry. No ballads or odes to his lovely eyes and his yummy dick—
But damn, what a cock.
She’d never had a man who was built like that, who knew how to use his God-given parts in ways that had so efficiently catapulted her into the heavens. Repeatedly—
Oh shit, they were bidding now.
And Anna had been off in La La Land fantasizing about how good Blue had fucked her—
“Going once,” the auctioneer said.
Focus.
She raised her paddle high into the air, waving it to catch his attention.
The auctioneer nodded at her. “Twenty-five,” he said. “Do I hear twenty-six?”
A woman in a tight red dress with a fur vest and
sky-high heels yelled, “Thirty!”
“That had better be thirty dollars,” she grumbled, narrowing her eyes up at Blue, whose panicked expression was almost priceless. Because if it was thirty thousand? People were insane. “Thirty-one.”
The woman glanced over at her. Okay, she glared at Anna. “Thirty-five.”
She flicked her gaze over to Blue, who was giving her a look she could only describe as please-don’t-make-me-go-home-with-her. “Forty,” she declared with a flick of her paddle.
“I hear forty,” the auctioneer said. “Do I hear—?”
“Forty-five,” the woman gritted, a sheen of sweat breaking out on her forehead.
“Fifty,” Anna countered. This was kind of fun, like playing with Monopoly money.
“Fifty-five.”
A wave of her paddle. “Sixty.”
“Sixty-five.”
Eyes back to Blue’s, still reading the please-don’t-stop-vibes. She was beyond hoping they were talking in tens of dollars and had moved on to praying they were talking about sixty-five hundred dollars—
But she’d seen an autographed jersey go for more than that during an in-game auction. This was for the live man—
Whose expression was all but begging her to not stop bidding.
Except the woman in red didn’t show any signs of slowing down in her pursuit of Blue.
Still, Anna had promised.
“Seventy,” she declared.
“Seventy-five,” the other woman snapped, and now the sheen of sweat was on her upper lip, her cheeks flushed almost as bright as her dress. Were they finally getting to the top of her budget?
Anna decided to test that.
“Eighty-five.”
The slightest dip of shoulders in response. “N-ninety.”
Anna studied her closely, almost feeling bad now.
“Do I hear ninety-five?” the auctioneer asked her.
She glanced at Blue, who gave the slightest nod.
“One hundred,” she said.
And, yup, Anna had broken the other woman’s budget. Her shoulders sank, her paddle dropped to her side, and she shook her head at the auctioneer when he asked for “One hundred and five.”
“Going once,” he said. “Going twice . . .”
Anna held her breath.
“Sold.”
