I’m hoping she’s decent enough to hear me out, too.
CHAPTER NINE
arden
“Hello?”
“Arden. Hey.”
I rub my eyes, leaning back further on the couch. I don’t recognize the number or the smooth voice on the other end of the line.
“Who is this?”
“Oh, right,” the deep, silky voice responds. Hot voice, to be honest. “It’s Carter. Carter Forkerro…from…the other night?”
My eyes snap open. I jolt upward on the couch, my stomach flipping. I take it back about the hot voice. It’s a crazy voice. The voice of an absolute jerk who will also defend your honour to a terrifying point. It’s a man who lies on national television.
Aboutme.
“Are you using me as your one call? Because I’ll warn you now, that was a waste.”
Surprisingly, he laughs. The sound makes my stomach feel all twisty again and I don’t like it. He’s hot. Terribly so. But he’s also a professional hockey player with a bad reputation.He’s a guy who used one of my most embarrassing stories against me when he didn’t get his way.
He’s a jerk.
“No. I got your number from Declan,” he explains.
I perk up a bit. I’m shocked that Declan kept it at all.
I’ll say this about Declan Lowes—he’s a good guy. Very nice, smooth-talking, attentive in the few moments that we were locked on each other. Magnificent kisser, but I’m glad it ended there. He was clearly working through some things when our lives crossed paths. I could taste his broken heart in his mouth, feel his yearning for whoever she was in the way he touched me.
But he was kind. Respectful. I didn’t expect a call back, and I hope that whatever he was going through worked out in the end. I might hate him a tad now, though, because he gave my number to the man who hit on me and then insulted me in the next breath.
“Arden?”
“Mhm?”
“Oh, okay,” he murmurs. He sounds nervous. Is he nervous? What the hell for? “Look. I don’t know if you keep up with hockey, or if you’ve seen anything in the news lately.”
There it is. This call is about what he said in that stupid press conference.
“Of course I do,” I lie. I don’t care about hockey and I definitely do not keep up with it, but my best friend does. “I have to be a supportive girlfriend now, don’t I? Just finished stitching number forty-two onto the back of all my jackets.”
I hear his wince. “I’m number sixty-one.”
“Sorry, honey. I’ll remember that for next time, maybe when I’m walking down the aisle toward you in a white dress.”
“Alright, so you’ve seen it,” he mutters.
I sit up, clutching my phone. He is unbelievable. “Yes,I’veseen it, Carter. What iswrongwith you?”
A long sigh slips through the receiver. “Clearly, a lot.”
“Yeah. Understatement of the century,” I glower.
“I didn’t say your name.”
“Because you didn’t know it.”
