"Really?"
"It's a little sentimental," he replied. "But in my defense, I am the captain so I am my players' biggest cheerleader." He heard her laugh from the passenger seat. "What?"
"Sorry, just imagined you in a cheerleader skirt with pom poms and pigtails."
"Not gonna happen," he replied seriously. "What else do you have there?"
"Draft picks for draft picks."
"Don't care."
"The captain of the Denver Mountaineers won't waive his no-trade clause to go to Manitoba."
Jordan shook his head. "He should've taken that move."
"Um, some guy named Andy wants to know if your groin is feeling better." He turned to see Charlotte giving him a look that was part surprise and definitely a bit awkward.
"Andy is our team trainer. Tell him I'm fine and he needs to wait until after the trade deadline to bug me about it." Charlotte started typing, her brow looking a little furrowed. "I know you want to say something, Charlie."
She paused and looked up at him. "I mean, after last night, I just... I didn't make things worse for you, did I?"
Really? It was another amazing night with her, and he definitely had nothing to complain about. But she genuinely seemed worried. Jordan would have to tell her some other time that he found it endearing.
"Don't worry. I can handle you," he replied with a smirk.
She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek as he stopped at the red light off the freeway. "I just wouldn't want you to get hurt because of me."
The phone in her hand beeped again and she looked down at the screen, the teasing smile on her face suddenly disappearing. "Bad news?" he asked. She just continued to stare at the phone in her hands. "Charlotte?"
Her head shook as if his voice was bringing her mind back from some far off place. "Huh?" She didn't even look up from the screen.
"You left me for a second there. Everything alright?"
Her head snapped up to look at him and he thought he could see a flash of fear in her eyes before it quickly disappeared. "Sorry, I was just uh... I was thrown off by this news tweet you got. Apparently, Declan Reed is, quote, 'excited to face those guys from Detroit again.' Whatever that means."
Jordan groaned. "I know exactly what that means. We played Los Angeles several months ago and he tried to pick a fight with a few of our guys. Now that he's been traded back to New York, we have to face again this season. That's why I'm not looking forward to it."
Charlotte's eyes narrowed as she looked at him. "What do you mean by 'pick a fight' with them?"
He signaled and turned his Land Rover onto her street. "He's a pest. He just tries to get under your skin and with the adrenaline from a game pumping through you, it's not always easy to keep a safe distance."
Charlotte simply turned back to his phone and began wordlessly scrolling through his messages. She seemed to relax again a bit, but he could tell she had been unnerved. He should've told her about the injury. Between that and Declan threatening his team, Charlotte probably had started to fear the worst. He had been with some girls who had loved the idea of being with a hockey player but couldn't actually stomach the injuries or stitches or any of the bad physical stuff that came with dating a hockey player. He thought Charlotte was tougher than that, but maybe he was wrong. He hoped he wasn't.
Jordan slowed down and pulled up into the driveway in front of Charlotte's building, and she unbuckled her belt and handed over his phone.
"Thanks for being an excellent text writer."
"I hope I helped," she replied.
"Tremendously. I will have to find a way to pay you back," he said in a low voice.
"I thought that little incident in your kitchen was pre-payment for services."
He deliberately pushed himself into her personal space. "Then I hope it was worth it."
He leaned over to kiss her, her mouth responding with an audible hum. He would never get sick of that. On the other hand, he already was very sick of his phone interrupting him at the most inopportune times today.
Charlotte pulled back from him and smiled. "Alright, captain. You need to answer those and I need to go pack."
