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CHAPTER 1
Gareth
Icouldn't feel my fingertips.
We'd moved up our monthly poker game by a couple of weeks so we could be in Lake Tahoe for New Year's Eve, and Asher’s snowboarding event had lasted two hours past acceptable. The thick ski gloves had done their best, but even at the game I’d barely been able to hold my damn cards.
At least the game had been uneventful, seeing as at the last one, Crossland and Doyle had pulled their cocks out and put both of their NHL teams on the line.
Thank fuck Cross had won, but I knew Doyle wasn't going to let that shit slide. He'd been uncharacteristically quiet tonight, and we'd ended the game before midnight so my friends could go ring in the new year with their significant others.
I couldn't believe that they all had a constant partner now, but I wasn't about to crash their party as the one single person left in our inner circle.
Despite the quick shower I’d taken before the game, the cold still clung to my bones. The chill from the slopes had worked itself into the very marrow, and now that I had nothing on the agenda, I jumped right back into the scalding hot shower and took my sweet ass time.
It wasn't like I had a date waiting for me, even though I could’ve secured one. I just wasn't in the mood. And even though I was up-front with all my casual dates about what they were, sometimes on holidays like New Year's Eve, they got other ideas.
Ideas like I was boyfriend material or worse, marriage material.
I was the furthest from either.
Not because of my bachelor tendencies, or because I traveled more than I stayed in one place, but because of my past. I'd done my best to eradicate the darker aspects of my history, but shadows always have a way of surfacing. Like old enemies looking for a weak spot against my family, enough to ensure I never made things serious with anybody.
Not that I'd ever dated anyone who made me think it'd be worth the risk.
When the shower water shifted to lukewarm, I shut it off and stepped out, wrapping a towel around my waist. I finally felt warm again and was seriously contemplating punching Asher the next time I saw him.
I loved adrenaline rushes as much as the next person, but staying outside in frigid temperatures for six hours? No fucking thanks.
A knock on my door sounded. I glanced at the bedside clock and saw that it read fifteen to midnight, and I hurried over, more than ready to dig into the room service I’d ordered before I got in the shower.
I swung the door open, the breath stalling in my lungs. It wasn’t a hotel attendant that had every muscle in my body locking up.
It was Serenity O’Brien.
The soft-spoken, drop-dead-gorgeous daughter of one of my family’s biggest rivals. The daughter of the most insufferable bastard to ever gain a seat at our invite-only poker game.
The woman who had a starring role in my most forbidden fantasies.
Her long blonde hair hung in waves over her shoulders, the same hair that had gotten caught in my cufflinks at one of the first games she attended. The incident had put her in my arms for a brief moment, and I hadn’t been able to get her out of my head since.
Her bright blue eyes looked up at me with all sorts of emotions I couldn’t even pretend to read, and a cream-colored trench was cinched tight around her supple waist, the tie loose and desperate to unravel under my fingers. One tug and I could slide my hands inside, smooth them over her no doubt warm, soft skin.
I furrowed my brow, stopping the vision in its tracks. “Why are you in a trench—never mind, what do you want?” I used the tone I'd constantly kept with her—low, sharp, and to the point.
I couldn’t allow myself to show her anything else. Anything other than someone she didn’t want to fuck with. Because if I showed her the truth? It'd be like inviting an innocent little bunny into a wolf den.
It didn’t matter that I’d wanted her since the first moment I saw her. She belonged to a rival family and was a sweet little virgin who deserved a sweet little guy.
Not someone like me.
Before she could answer, my room service arrived, and she shifted out of the way as the resort employee awkwardly wheeled in the tray and left it there, his eyes shifting between us in question before he practically sprinted back to the elevators down the hall.
I glanced down at myself, realizing I was still in just a towel. Was that why Serenity's eyes had been raking over my chest, snagging on every inch of ink I had?
“Serenity?” I asked.
She visibly swallowed, dipping her delicate fingers into her coat pocket and retrieving something that she promptly shoved into my hand.
