Hunter was grinning at him. “Why doesn’t this sound like a hypothetical scenario anymore?”
“Because it’s not. Which you damn well know.”
Hunter laughed and shook his head. He hadn’t taken his shot yet, but nobody would dare rush him. They knew better.
He took a club from his caddie and examined it. “So what does the guy do?”
“He teaches physics and astronomy. He has a Ph.D.,” Logan added, mimicking Ephraim’s pompous tone.
“Ah.” Hunter nodded wisely. “Hence why he would be her fantasy guy.”
“Because he has a doctorate?” Logan growled.
“Because he shares her passion for astronomy.” Hunter studied Logan’s eyes in that unnerving way of his. “That’s really what’s bothering you, isn’t it? You’re afraid of her having more in common with the professor than you. You’re afraid of them sharing such a powerful connection that they end up getting married and having little astronomer babies with genius IQs.”
Logan swallowed hard and gritted his teeth, a muscle in his jaw ticking like crazy as Jupiter’s gut-wrenching words replayed in his head. Since I didn’t become an astronomer, marrying one would be the next best thing.
Hunter took a couple practice swings he didn’t need. “By your own admission, you and Meadow are just friends. Your outing together might qualify as a date, but it was a platonic one. Which I’m sure she conveyed to the professor during their conversation. In his mind—and hers—he wasn’t disrespecting you by asking her out. But you already know that.”
Logan just stood there silently fuming.
Hunter stepped up to the ball. “Wherever you go, whether you’re in uniform or not, you not only represent the Denver Rebels, you represent all hockey players. You know how strongly I feel about defying stereotypes and showing hockey players in a positive light. Going apeshit on some poor professor would have been a colossally bad move. Not only would you have embarrassed Meadow, you also could have seriously hurt the guy—”
“That’s kinda the point,” Logan grumbled.
Hunter wagged his head at him. “What have I told you about letting your temper get the best of you?” He pointed to Logan’s fists, which currently had a stranglehold on his golf club. “Those hands are lethal weapons. It’s one thing to use them against similar-sized opponents in the heat of a game. But pummeling some astronomy professor just because he asked your ‘friend’ out on a date?” Hunter gave him a you-know-better-than-that look.
Logan scowled at him.
“What am I always telling you? Unleash the beast on the ice. Off the ice, always be a gentleman.” Hunter swung his club in a perfect arc, drilling the ball straight down the fairway and into the heart of the cup.
Cheers erupted from the crowd of spectators.
As expected, Hunter ended up winning the match.
After finishing their round of golf, everyone headed to the clubhouse for dinner. As members of the exclusive country club, they always received VIP treatment and today was no exception. As soon as they entered the posh restaurant, they were shown to a private shaded terrace overlooking Biscayne Bay.
There was a formal table set for seven and a separate lounging area with contemporary couches. This was where everyone gathered with their cocktails, enjoying the cool ocean breeze as they discussed their tight race for first place in the Central Division. With one week left in the regular season, they had a seven-point advantage over Nashville. But they would be on the road for their final three games while the Predators’ remaining contests were at home.
“We can’t worry about that,” Hunter pronounced. “We just need to stay focused on the task at hand, not the daily change in the standings. If we go out there every night and take care of business, there’s no reason we can’t lock up the division and secure home ice advantage.”
“Exactly,” asserted Reid, the team’s alternate captain. “We’ve been in this position before. But we’re a much better team than we were last year. We’re smarter, stronger, more focused and more determined than ever.”
“Absolutely,” agreed veteran goaltender Sergei Vasiliev. “The key is to keep moving forward. No more looking over our shoulders. Just full throttle ahead.”
“Damn straight.” They all clinked glasses and drained their drinks, trading nods and broad grins.
Two pretty waitresses brought out their appetizers, laughing when everyone pounced on the steaming platters of food. The girls hung around fawning and flirting, stopping just short of handing out their numbers before they finally sashayed off, giggling and whispering to each other.
When Viggo’s phone rang, he dug it out of his pocket, checked the screen and made a pained face. “Damn. It’s my mom.”
Reid grinned. “Uh-oh.”
“Tell me about it,” Viggo muttered grimly. “I used to enjoy talking to her, but ever since we started planning the wedding, I’ve been dreading her calls. I never know what the hell to expect.”
“Give me your phone,” Dubinski joked. “If you don’t wanna talk to her, I will. Your mom is hot!”
Viggo scowled at him. “Fuck off.”
Dubinski laughed.
Viggo rose from the couch. “I know these appetizers will be gone before I get back, so—” He scooped up a handful of stuffed mushrooms, shoveling two in his mouth as he mumbled into his phone, “Hej, Mamma.”
After he retreated to the other end of the terrace for privacy, the conversation drifted from hockey to families.
“I can’t wait to see Jenna and the kids in Vegas,” Sergei said with a sigh. “Wednesday can’t get here soon enough.”
Reid gave him a sympathetic look. “It doesn’t get any easier, does it? Being away from them?”
Sergei shook his head. “I wish I could tell you otherwise, but I’d be lying. I mean, obviously, I can’t speak for other guys, but I miss the hell out of my family when I’m on the road. Those five-game series are the worst because it means we’re gone for at least ten days.”
“Yeah.” Reid grimaced. “Those are brutal.”
Logan frowned. He was already missing Jupiter, and they’d only been apart less than a day. He couldn’t imagine being away from her for ten whole days. Fuck.
Reid grinned, blue eyes twinkling. “I’m trying to convince Nadia that we should start our family next year instead of waiting two years like we originally planned.”
Hunter gave him an amused look. “And how’s that going?”
“Good, I think. I’m slowly but surely wearing her down.” Reid bit into a crispy ring of calamari. “By the time our wedding rolls around, I’m hoping to have her bargained down to six months.”
The group burst into laughter.
“You guys are crazy,” Dmitri Fedorov declared in his thickly accented voice. The Russian defenseman was Reid’s partner on the ice. “All of you are too young to be settling down with a wife and kids.”
“Says who?” Sergei challenged.
“Says me.” Dmitri scraped his longish black hair off his forehead, mischief glinting in pale blue eyes that matched the water surrounding the resort. Hockey reporters were fond of calling him and Reid “blue-eyed bandits” who terrorized opponents on the blue line.
Dmitri drawled, “When I’m finished, how do you say, sowing my wild oats? Then, and only then, will I settle down with a nice girl from Russia. Preferably from my hometown of Chelyabinsk.”
Sergei gave him an indulgent smile. “And what if your future wife isn’t from Russia?”
“Then she won’t be my future wife,” Dmitri said unequivocally. “The woman I marry has to be Russian.”
Sergei chuckled. “I thought the same thing. And then I met Jenna, and all bets were off.”
“No shit,” Dubinski joked. “Jenna is hot as fuck. I woulda made an exception for her, too.”
“Watch it,” Sergei warned mildly. “That’s the mother of my children you’re talking about.”
Everyone laughed and reached for more appetizers. At the othe
r end of the terrace, Viggo was speaking rapid-fire Swedish into his phone.
Dmitri jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Another reason not to get married. You see all the trouble he’s having with his wedding?”
Sergei chuckled. “Reid doesn’t seem to be having any problems.”
“That’s because we hired a wedding planner who knows how to put my bossy mother in her place,” Reid asserted with a satisfied grin. “Scarlett’s mother is handling most of their wedding planning and she doesn’t want to offend Viggo’s mom, so she’s letting him deal with her.”
An angry exclamation from Sandström had everyone cracking up and shaking their heads.
“Uh, yeah, I think I’m good on marriage for a while. In the meantime,” Dmitri said wickedly, “I’m just gonna act like I’m at a twenty-four-hour ice cream shop enjoying all the different flavors of pussy on display. Right, bro?” he cackled, elbowing Logan.
“Right,” Logan said with a halfhearted grin, trying to play along. He didn’t miss the knowing smirk Hunter gave him.
Viggo stalked back across the terrace looking thoroughly frustrated.
Dmitri grinned at him. “More wedding drama?”
“Ja! Min mamma är galen! Hon bjöd in—” Viggo broke off sheepishly, remembering to revert to English. “Sorry.”
Everyone laughed.
As the Swede plopped down on the couch, Reid clapped him consolingly on the back. “What’s going on?”
Viggo puffed out an aggravated breath. “My mom’s driving me crazy with this fucking guest list. Every time I talk to her, she’s adding someone else. I just found out that she invited a member of the royal family—”
“Holy shit,” Dubinski interrupted. “The Swedish Royal Family?”
“Um. Yeah.” Viggo rubbed his golden beard, looking slightly embarrassed. “We met the family several years ago when my grandfather received some prestigious award from the king. During the ceremony at the palace, my mom and Crown Princess Victoria sorta hit it off—”
“No fucking way!” Dubinski exclaimed in disbelief. “Your mom is besties with the heir to the Swedish throne?”
“Not besties. Friendly acquaintances. Anyway,” Viggo continued irritably, “my mom took the liberty of inviting the crown princess to my wedding. She says she did it on a whim and she never expected Victoria to accept the invitation. So she was flabbergasted when she checked her mail and saw that Victoria had RSVP’d for herself and her husband. So now my mom is totally freaking out and telling me that we need to talk to the palace’s security team to coordinate heightened security measures for the wedding, and it all sounds like one big fucking headache.” He scowled. “As if Scarlett and I haven’t made enough concessions already. I mean, I agreed to have the family crest printed on the invitations, we’re doing a Viking wedding ritual, we’re having horse-drawn carriages—”
Dubinski whistled. “Holy shit, Sandström. Your wedding just got a helluva lot more interesting. Not that it wasn’t pretty awesome before. I mean, you’re getting married at a castle, your woman is gorgeous as fuck and your sister’s supermodel friends will be there.” He paused. “I’m still invited, right?”
“Still?” Viggo raised one eyebrow. “When were you ever invited? Have you received an invitation in the mail?”
“Well, no, but…I just assumed—”
“That was your first mistake. Never make assumptions.”
Dubinski looked around at everyone and let out an uneasy laugh. “You’re kidding, right?”
Viggo’s face was deadly serious. “Do I look like I’m kidding?”
“C’mon, Sandström,” Dubinski whined protestingly. “How can you invite the whole team and not me? That’s really messed up! What am I supposed to—”
Viggo broke into a chuckle. “Relax, man. I’m just fucking with you. You’re invited. Scarlett insisted.”
Dubinski laughed with relief. It was a running joke on the team that he acted like Viggo’s little bitch, always craving his approval and acceptance. Sometimes it was hard to argue with the evidence.
“Jävlar.” Viggo leaned his head back against the couch and pinched the bridge of his nose. “My mom has always been a calm, levelheaded, easygoing woman who respects boundaries. She practices yoga and she’s always talking about the importance of finding your inner peace. I don’t know where that woman went, but I’d sure as hell love to have her back. Seriously. What is it about weddings that turns some women into raging lunatics?”
Everyone laughed sympathetically.
“Don’t be so hard on your mother,” Hunter said, smiling. “You’re the first of her six children to get married. Of course she’s excited.”
“This is beyond excited. This is borderline fanatical.” Viggo shook his head grimly. “I’m starting to see why Scarlett hates weddings so much. She keeps talking about eloping—”
“Don’t do it, bro,” Reid warned. “Your mothers would never forgive you.”
“I know, I know. It would totally break their hearts.” Viggo lifted his head off the couch with a wry smile. “I can’t say I haven’t been tempted by the idea. I mean, the thought of not having to deal with all this wedding madness definitely sounds appealing.” He sighed. “But I think Scarlett would eventually regret choosing elopement over a traditional ceremony. So I’m giving my baby the fairy-tale wedding she deserves.” He paused before adding darkly, “I just hope I don’t end up strangling my mother in the fucking process.”
Laughter erupted around the terrace.
When the waitresses returned with their meals and another round of drinks, they moved to the table to eat.
Halfway through dinner, Logan’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his pocket and grinned when he saw Jupiter’s picture on the screen. He excused himself from the table and walked to the other end of the terrace as he answered the phone. “Hey, Jup—”
“Logan Francisco Matías Brassard!” she screeched so loudly he had to hold the phone away from his ear. “Did you put twenty thousand dollars in my PayPal account?”
He grinned as he brought the phone back to his ear. “I told you I would take care of your expenses for the Vegas trip.”
“But twenty thousand dollars?” she yelled in disbelief. “Are you out of your mind? I can’t accept that kind of money from you! And twenty grand is way too much money to spend in four and a half days!”
“No, it’s not. Vegas is expensive—”
“You think I don’t know that? I’m from Vegas too, remember?”
“Then you should know how expensive it is.” His grin widened. “You can transfer the money to your bank account—”
“I’ll do no such thing!” she shrieked. “Take it back!”
“Nope. Can’t do that.”
“Why the hell not?”
“It’s already been added to my monthly expenditures. If I put the money back it’ll throw everything off, and my accountant won’t like that. He’s very anal.”
“I don’t care! I’m sending the money back to you!”
“Don’t bother,” Logan drawled. “I’m just gonna refuse the payment. If you try to resend it, we’ll keep going back and forth until you either accept the funds or one of us gets our account deactivated.”
Jupiter screeched in frustration. Her normally smoky voice was reaching octaves he didn’t know it could. It was both amusing and fascinating. And kinda hot.
He tried to reason with her. “Even if you don’t spend all the money in Vegas—”
“I’m not!”
“—you can use whatever’s left to tide you over until you get your first paycheck, which probably won’t be for at least three more weeks—”
“How did you even get my PayPal email?” she cut him off.
“I have my ways.”
“Did Bianca give it to you?”
“No.” Yes. “Look, just take the money, Jupe. I want you to have a good time on the trip, and you’re doing me a huge favor by coming to our last game. Your presence will really
mean a lot to me.”
She was quiet.
He smiled, thinking he’d finally gotten through to her.
But then she resumed ranting. “Don’t try to sweet-talk me, Logan Brassard! I let it pass when you paid for the DNA kit and the pizzas. But now you’ve really gone overboard! Seriously! I mean, it’s not that I’m ungrateful, but this is getting ridic—”
“What was that?” Logan said loudly, pretending there was a bad connection. “I can’t hear you. You’re breaking up.”
“What? I can hear you just f—”
“Sorry, babe. We’re losing our connection. You must be coming up on a dead spot or something. I’ll talk to you later.” He hung up on her and pocketed his phone, sighing as he stared out across the bright blue waters of the bay.
Maybe Jupiter had a point. Maybe the twenty grand was a bit over the top. But he couldn’t help himself. He had an overwhelming compulsion to take care of her every need, to protect her and provide for her, to give her the whole world on a silver platter. This was totally new territory for him. Frankly, it was pretty fucking scary.
But he found himself grinning as he returned to his seat at the table. The others were laughing and heckling Dmitri about something, so fortunately they weren’t paying any attention to Logan.
Or so he thought until Hunter leaned toward him. “Everything okay with your friend?” he murmured, putting an amused inflection on the word friend.
Logan nodded. “Yeah. We’re good.”
“Are you sure?” Hunter prodded, his eyes twinkling. “Because I could have sworn she was yelling at you.”
Logan brought his glass to his lips, hiding his grin. “If she was yelling, it was out of excitement for the upcoming Vegas trip.”
Hunter chuckled and shook his head. “You’re so full of shit.”
Logan grinned unabashedly and wolfed down the rest of his porterhouse steak.
After their plates had been cleared and dessert ordered, Dubinski rubbed his hands together and grinned lecherously at Logan and Dmitri. “Can’t wait to hit the club tonight.”
Sin Bin Page 25
