Luca: A Chicago Blaze Romance

by Rothert, Brenda

  I laugh. “Not getting much sleep?”

  “Not with three-month-old twins in the house, man. Laura’s idea of a hot Friday night these days is a shower and an early bedtime.”

  “I get it man. The tiny terrorists can wear your ass out like nothing else.”

  Denny nods. “They’re the bosses now. But it’s good, you know?”

  “Yeah, I do. I didn’t want kids for at least another ten years, but I can’t imagine life without those rugrats now. I miss them already.”

  “Have fun tonight, though,” Denny says. “You deserve it.”

  “Thanks, man. I plan to.”

  * * *

  I get to the Waldorf bar a little early and order a beer, a glass of red wine for Abby, and a couple different appetizers for us to share.

  She likes to be the one taking care of the details. Setting up the plans. But I want her to know it’s okay to let me handle that stuff, too. Maybe even good on a day she’s been busy with work and I’ve been mostly taking it easy.

  After my meeting and interview, I did some shopping, picking up gifts for the kids and ordering a few things from a furniture store downtown. I’m not used to having down time for myself like that, and it felt kind of strange.

  Overall, though, it was nice. I had lots of time to anticipate my evening with Abby. By the time I see her walking across the hotel lobby toward me, nervous excitement is pumping through my veins.

  She’s wearing a simple, sleeveless blue dress that shows off her toned arms. Her hair is loose around her shoulders, just the way I like it.

  “Hey, you look great,” I say as I get up from my seat to kiss her.

  “Thanks, you too.”

  She does look great. If I were seeing Abby for the first time, I’d think this blond, blue-eyed beauty had it all going on. But seeing her now compared to the Abby I met at the Palmer House, I feel a little concerned.

  Since I last saw her a month ago, she’s lost some weight, and she didn’t have much to spare. She also looks tired—makeup and caffeine hide the circles under her eyes and keep her going, but I can tell she’s still not getting enough sleep.

  That’s not really my concern. She’s just my casual hookup. Still, I suddenly feel more like taking Abby out for a good dinner and seeing that she gets to bed at a decent hour than fucking her brains out.

  “Everything okay?” she asks, seeming to sense my concern.

  “Yeah…hey, are you hungry?”

  “I am.” The bartender sets down our appetizers and Abby reaches for an oyster as soon as she sits down. “Thanks for ordering, this is great.”

  “My agent got me a reservation at a new place not far from here. You feel like getting dinner?”

  The corners of her lips curve up in a smile. “That sounds an awful lot like a date, Luca.”

  I shake my head. “Not at all. I’m being completely selfish, actually. Just want to make sure you can keep your strength up later.”

  “I’m never gonna live down that night I was tired, am I?”

  “Let’s just have a nice dinner. It’ll be good, I promise.”

  Abby’s brow furrows with concern. “I don’t want to go to a high-profile place where I might be recognized.”

  “Recognized?”

  “I mean, where you might be recognized and someone could take photos of us together. It could get out that we’re dating.”

  I nod, amused. “And then you’d have to demand a correction from any publication that reported that. Make them say we’re only fucking.”

  “Right.” She laughs lightly and tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. “So let’s avoid that. Room service, maybe?”

  I shake my head. “I’m taking you out for dinner, Abby.”

  She takes a long drink of her wine before saying, “How about pizza? I know a great little place.”

  “Sounds great, I love pizza.”

  As we make small talk over our drinks and the appetizers, Abby starts to relax. She tells me general stuff about work—a big project is going well and a lady she works with went into labor at the office yesterday—and about her morning workouts with a trainer.

  “Trainer slash sadist, actually,” she clarifies.

  “I had a conditioning coach like that once. He said puking during a workout was good for us.”

  “Ugh, it’s the worst.”

  “My teammate once threw up in that coach’s gym bag when he wasn’t in the locker room. He just zipped it up and left it for him to find later.”

  Abby cringes. “That’s so gross but it sounds like he deserved it.”

  “Wish I could’ve seen him open it.”

  “Hey, whatever happened with your teammate and the tattoo thing?”

  I smile gleefully. “Vic is now sporting a tat of a masturbating monkey.”

  “What?” Abby laughs heartily, and I love the sound.

  “Yep. We took lots of photos as he got it. He’s flipping us off in most of them. Didn’t think we’d actually make him go through with it.”

  “So where did he decide to get the…masturbating monkey?”

  “It’s on his ass cheek. And I laugh my ass off every time I see it in the locker room.”

  “You’re terrible.” She laughs again.

  We finish our drinks and food and decide to walk to the pizza place, which is less than a mile away. Abby looks so pretty in the lights of the city that I reach for her hand and hold it as we walk.

  Gianulli’s is a small place with white tile floors, red walls and barstools lined up around every table. It’s busy, but we find a small table and have just placed our order when my phone rings from inside my pocket.

  I’m assuming it’s Jack wanting to FaceTime again—he never gets enough of it, and I’m planning to ignore the request and text him that I’m busy, but when I look at the screen, I see it’s actually Sheila calling.

  I’m immediately concerned. In all the time she’s been babysitting for me, Sheila has never called me. She can handle just about anything.

  “I’m sorry, I have to take this,” I tell Abby across our table.

  “It’s no problem.”

  “Sheila?”

  “Luca.” Her voice is tinged with worry. “Everything’s okay, but we’ve got an injury I think we need to go to the hospital for. I’ve got the paperwork you gave me that says I can authorize treatment, but I thought I should let you know first.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “Cora got into a fight with a neighborhood boy. There’s a deep cut in one of her eyebrows and I can’t get the bleeding to stop. I think she needs stitches.”

  Sheila’s voice gets muffled as she says something to one of the kids. My mind is spinning as I walk outside the restaurant to get away from the noise.

  “A fight?” I ask, incredulous. “Cora got into a fight?”

  “Yeah, with the Coulson boy…hold it just like that, Jack. Press hard. Emmy, can you find my car keys?”

  “Okay.” I take a deep breath. “Get her to the hospital. I’ll catch the next flight home.”

  “I think we’ll be o—Cora, honey no. Please don’t pass out.”

  “Fuck.” I look up at the night sky, feeling helpless. “I’ll call the Jacksons to come over and help.”

  “I had Emmy run over there; they aren’t home.”

  “Just get her to your car and get her there, Sheila. I’ll pay for your car to be cleaned up if there’s blood in it. I’m going to the airport. Have Jack call me when you get to the hospital.”

  “Okay. She’ll be okay, Luca.”

  She ends the call and I run into the restaurant.

  “Everything okay?” Abby asks.

  “No. I’m so sorry, but I’ve got an emergency and I have to get back home. I’m getting a cab to the airport right now.”

  Abby looks at me with concern in her eyes. “How can I help?”

  I look at her helplessly. “Just cross your fingers that I can get a flight tonight. I’ll buy someone’s seat from them if I have t
o.”

  “My company has a plane you can take. It’s just a small, private plane, but it’s on standby. I can get you right on it if I go to the airport with you.”

  “Your company lets you use their private plane?”

  She grabs her purse and slides down from her stool. “Come on.”

  I absently throw some cash on the table for our order and follow her out of the restaurant. Abby has to be more than a salesperson at her company if she can command a private plane. But right now, it doesn’t matter what her job is. All I care about is getting home to Cora.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Abby

  “You shorted me a burpee, give me ten more,” Percy says.

  “I did not!”

  “Want fifteen more?”

  I scowl and resume my burpees. It’s definitely my least favorite exercise.

  “You seem extra salty this morning, Abby, what’s up?”

  I exhale hard after a burpee. “My night of epic sex got cancelled last night.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Yeah.” I finish my set of burpees and get a drink from my water bottle. “And then to make matters worse, he got personal on me. I specifically said I wanted to keep things impersonal.”

  “Whoa, hold up.” Percy gives me a skeptical look. “Tell me the whole thing.”

  I grab the front of my shirt and lift it up to mop the sweat from my face.

  “We just have a casual thing. When our schedules align, which isn’t much, we get together for great sex. So last night he wanted to have dinner first, which hello…personal. But I was hungry, so I said okay.”

  Percy’s smiling in amusement.

  “That’s not the only thing, though,” I continue. “We were at the pizza place and he got a call about a family emergency. He needed to get home to Chicago quickly, so I told him he could take my company plane.”

  “Damn, girl. You’ve got a plane?”

  “It belongs to the company; I’m not the only one who uses it or anything.”

  “Still pretty badass.”

  I keep going with my story. “Anyway, we’re on the way to the airport and he invites me to come to some charity game he’s playing in. He’s a hockey player. And that’s very personal. I don’t want to be meeting his teammates and all that. We’re just hooking up.”

  Percy’s sigh is annoyed. “First of all, does he play hockey recreationally, or…?”

  “No, he plays for the Chicago Blaze.”

  “Uh huh. So you’re pissed that a pro hockey player you have amazing sex with wants you to come to his game?”

  I throw my hands up in frustration. “It’s personal. And I’m not one of those women looking to score a man so I can post cute selfies of us. We agreed it would be sex only.”

  “Maybe you’re the one who opened the door by letting him borrow your private plane to get home. That’s pretty personal, don’t you think? Impersonal would be like, ‘go get you an Uber, fuckboi.’”

  I laugh, a little uncomfortable. “I hadn’t thought of it like that.”

  “No.” Percy’s tone is mocking. “Abby Daniels, being obstinate?”

  “Keep it up, and I’ll stay up all night tonight drinking Mountain Dew.”

  “Oh God.” Percy cringes hard. “Don’t even joke about that poisonous beverage.”

  “It just caught me off guard is all,” I say, sitting down on a weight bench.

  Percy sits next to me. “What did you tell him when he asked?”

  I shrug. “I said that if I’m in town that night, I might come.”

  “Good.”

  “You think so?”

  Percy stretches her legs out in front of her and I admire her perfectly sculpted muscles.

  “I think usually, after you’ve been hurt badly, the things that scare you the most are the ones you need to do the most.”

  I think about that for a few seconds. “I’m scared of lots of things, though. And a lot of it is self-preservation. When my wounds get re-opened…it’s just too much.”

  “One step at a time. When is the game?”

  “In two weeks.”

  “Go. Take a girlfriend with you. Have a good time.” She lowers her brows in question. “Do you have a girlfriend who would go?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t have time for friends. I could take my assistant Anthony with me, though.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Percy offers.

  “Really?”

  “Hell yeah, girl. Can we take your plane?”

  “Probably. I guess I could schedule it.”

  Percy elbows me. “You look so serious, Abby. What if we just go and have fun and don’t overthink it?”

  “I just don’t want Luca thinking I want to be his girlfriend or anything. I’m independent. I like being alone.”

  “He’s the one who invited you. I say you go. What do you have to lose?”

  “I guess…nothing. I’ll think about it.”

  “Good. Let me know if you want me to come.” She stands back up. “Let’s go do some sprints.”

  Ugh. Sprints are almost as bad as burpees. But I get up without protest, because my mind is elsewhere.

  Our evening was cut short last night, but I really enjoyed my time with Luca. He’s sweet and thoughtful but still manly and sexy. If I ever did want more than sex with a man, I can see wanting it with him.

  But therein lies the problem. If Luca and I got closer and he found out about my past, he’d feel sorry for me. I’d no longer be the sexy, confident woman I saw reflected back in his eyes when he looked at me last night.

  Those looks from him make me feel better than anything has for a very long time. I won’t give that up. Even if it means keeping him at arm’s length.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Luca

  I growl at my reflection in the mirror as I scrub a washcloth over the glitter on my neck. This shit is like superglue—and it’s all over my house now.

  The party planner my new friends Henry and John recommended for Emerson’s sixth birthday party last weekend did a great job. All the kids loved her rainbow unicorn theme. I did, too. I thought rainbow-colored glitter sprinkled all over the tables set up in my backyard was a nice touch.

  I didn’t realize it clings to the skin like a fucking leech, though. This stuff isn’t like the glitter that strippers leave on your face during a lap dance. It doesn’t smell powdery and sweet. And the kids must’ve dragged ten thousand multicolored bits of it into the house that day.

  “Uncle Luca, how do I look?” Emerson twirls into my bathroom wearing a red and white tutu and a t-shirt that has the Blaze logo on the front and my name and number on the back.

  Anton’s girlfriend Mia had shirts made for all three kids to wear to my games. Emerson’s extra excited about this charity game. The team PR people had the players’ kids help make posters, and Emerson’s been dying to see hers hanging in the arena.

  “You look great, peanut,” I tell her.

  “I can’t find my ruby slippers, though. Will you help me look?”

  “I can help for a little bit, but I have to leave soon. Is Sheila here yet?”

  “Yep, and she brought doughnuts.”

  “Nice.”

  When Emerson and I get down to the kitchen, the two older kids are having a heated debate about who gets which doughnut.

  “I called it first,” Jack says bitterly.

  “Yeah, but I have a scar,” Cora gestures at her eyebrow.

  “The doctor said it will go away, big baby.”

  I interject. “Hey, guys, cool it.”

  “She thinks she should get everything she wants because she has a scar!” Jack cries.

  That’s true. Since the fight, Cora has milked that wound and subsequent scar for lots of ice cream and special treatment. And because of the circumstances, I let her, even though the doctor said she’s not likely to have much of a scar there since it’s in her brow line.

  When I got back to Chicago that night a couple weeks ago on Abb
y’s company’s plush jet, I raced to the hospital filled with emotions. I was mostly worried, but also ready to break that little Courson punk in half for punching my niece in the face.

  Those feelings intensified when Cora told me what happened. Aiden Courson told her that only soldiers who come back home from wars are heroes, and that the ones who get captured or killed are just weak.

  She cried fresh tears as she told me, enraged he’d said that about her father. I was enraged, too. I went down to the Courson house the next day and let them know it better never happen again. And then I enrolled Cora in kickboxing classes so she’ll be able to block any other punch that comes her way and knock out the Aiden Coursons of the world.

  I look down into the doughnut box and then glance back up between Jack and Cora, exasperated.

  “You guys, this is a box of a dozen identical doughnuts. They’re all chocolate with sprinkles.”

  “Yeah, but I want that one,” Jack says.

  “If you called it first, it’s yours.”

  Jack reaches for the doughnut with a triumphant look at Cora.

  “I took a punch to the face for the honor of this family and no one even appreciates it!” Cora huffs.

  “Okay, drama queen,” I say. “Eat and then help us look for your sister’s shoes.”

  “Why should I, no one ever helps me,” she grumbles.

  My niece is on the verge of adolescence, and it’s a real treat sometimes.

  “Hey, sorry,” Shelia says, coming around the corner. “I was starting some laundry. What’s all this fighting over a doughnut? They’re all the same.”

  I already had bacon and eggs this morning, but I consider eating a doughnut, too. I decide against it because the sugar high might affect my game. It’s just a charity game—retired Blaze players against current ones—but I need to be sharp anyway. Some of the older guys are still damn good.

  “Have you seen Emerson’s ruby slippers?” I ask Sheila.

  “On a shelf in her closet…I think,” she says. “I’ll go look.” She turns back to face me on her way out of the kitchen. “You need to get going, Luca. I’ve got things handled with the kids, don’t worry.”