Page 26 of Puck Me Twice Over

“He’s gone?” she breathed.

I nodded, knowing she didn’t mean my grumpy ass of a coach. “Come upstairs with me?”

Flick sat in the corner of the brightly lit bathroom while I showered the scent of death from my skin, and curled into my arms beneath a heavy blanket afterward as I burned everything we’d worn. Her body heat sank into me, and we woke together with the rising sun mere hours later to a pile of smoking ash.

“Come on. Bed.” I nudged her gently.

Flick pressed her body tighter to mine. “I’m good here. Can we just stay? For now?” Her voice was soft and sweet with no evidence of a strain.

I traced over the red marks around her throat the cord hadn’t cut through and she seemed okay for now.

“All right. If that’s what you need.”

She hummed softly and burrowed in, tugging the blanket higher.

When she begged all pretty like that, who was I to deny her? Talking could come after.

CHAPTER NINE

FELICITY

A handful of sequestered days back in Knox Vandevere’s arms—vetted by his coach and select teammates—seemed like eternity. Maybe that’s how it was always supposed to be. Maybe I was stupid for running away from him in the first place. But I had a good reason back then. At least, it felt like a good reason. Now, looking back? The logic of seventeen-year-old me bore a cobweb of holes all through it.

I was smarter than that. I’m supposed to be smarter than that.

But a teenager’s logical sequence didn’t have a decade of hindsight and life experience to play back on. Mistakes were made. Other relationships. Or in my case, just the one.

One that ended badly and publicly, right in the middle of the Chimeras’ parking lot a few nights ago. Right in front of Knox Vandevere.

That last part couldn’t be scripted if I’d tried. I wanted so badly to believe in fate, but this perfect ending fell in all too well. I didn’t deserve that. Not one bit. Not for the way I treated him.

“Penny,” Knox said softly, topping up my coffee mug. He wizened up and gave me an oversized one, this time.

I cuddled the mug decorated with tiny hockey pucks—what else?—all over. “I was just thinking about why we broke up.”

Knox’s gaze weighed heavily on me. “You wanna tell me your reasoning, sweetness? Because you never did share that with me.”

“You never asked.”

“I didn’t want to be the asshole.”

I squeezed my mug so tightly that it creaked. “You were always the good guy, Knox. That was the problem.”

He blew out a long breath. Warm, rough hands closed around mine. “That’s the first time I’ve heard that one, Flick. Gentle with my mug. It was a gift when I first joined the team, okay?”

“Huh?” I stared down at my coffee that was practically vibrating in its container. “Oh. Sorry.”

“Yeah. Don’t you go murdering my mug.” He considered for a moment as he swapped the mug out of his gentle hold on my hands. Knox rubbed his thumbs in slow circles across the backs of my hands, then the insides of my palms. I shivered at the display of intimacy, and he sent me a knowing look. “So. I was too nice, and that made you run away to Garry-boy. Who decorated my nice windows.” Knox nodded toward the graffiti that obscured the view of the city still blanketed in a light haze of rain, though the deluge had faltered, for now.

We’d come back to his condo, the one where I spent my first night back with him, to find one window in his garage smashed and several cans of spray paint lifted. Those had been emptied across the front of his gorgeous home. Apparently, Garrett—supposedly—had a tantrum that didn’t stop with my assault, though we kept that piece of information to ourselves. He must have vandalized Knox's house before he followed us out to the cabin where we had our ‘dirty’ weekend ala midweek, together. The Chimeras backed us on the dates for our alibi, and Ward Bishop, as Knox’s coach, was suitably pissed in public about his absence. All that was recorded in the media during an interview carefully hosted under Cora’s supervision since she handled all of the team’s PR. And Valentine was right there beside her, of course.

The police arrived and checked for prints, collecting a few. The perpetrator would be charged and apologies plus a few selfies made their way around—also public. Knox played the perfect host. The rich boy version of him knew how to do that to perfection but media training kicked in and he played it up.

And all the way along as they hid their secret, my heart stung that I’d invaded his home and brought this level of damage to his door. By the time everyone left, the sun was close to setting on the last of our hours solitary promised together before his training resumed.

I kicked off my jeans the moment we were alone, leaving the denim to puddle on Knox’s floor in a heap. He didn’t seem to mind—the reverse, actually, appearing to delight in the fact I made myself at home in his house, disrupting his sanitized space. I curled on his sofa wearing only his shirt. He delivered me coffee while I stared at his mutilated windows.

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, heartbroken for the effect my reappearance had on his perfectly compartmentalized life. “I knew he was controlling and an— an⁠—”