A fuckboy with a conscience? One who respects women while working his way through them one by one? Unlikely.
“I find the very statementsweet fuckboyto be a contradiction. Besides, the way everyone worships the hockey players around here is weird.”
She laughed. “Trust me, if they’re as good as Jia says, I bet you’d sing a different tune, girl. Don’t knock it ‘til you try it.”
I pulled out my phone to check my email. I was supposed to interview Leo in two hours but given what I’d just witnessed, I figured it was safe to assume he’d cancel on me at the last minute. Sure enough, I had an email from him.
Hey,
Any chance we can move our interview to Harrison’s Bar and Pub? It’s the only time I’m going to have to eat a meal today. We can grab lunch. The food there is great. I eat for free, so your meal is on the house too.
Let me know,
Leo
I groaned again and showed Alyssa the phone. “He eats for free at restaurants? Come on now. Is this because he’s a future Bruin?” In addition to Leo’s legendary bedroom prowess, everyone—and I meaneveryone—on campus knew he’d been drafted by the Bruins at eighteen and was set to sign a contract with them at the end of this season.
“Probably.” Alyssa shrugged. “Look, I’ve gotta run to class. The interview will be fine and now you’re getting free lunch! At least enjoy the view while you sit across from him.”
“It’s going to be hard to do that when I’m so distracted by the giant pedestal under his ass.”
Alyssa said goodbye and bounced off toward her class while I returned his email.
Leo,
I can meet you there. I enjoy their food, but I’ll pay for my own lunch.
Sophia
I sent the email and decided to head to the gym to do my daily workout. My uncle was a retired Navy SEAL who’d started working out with me when I was in high school, and I’d kept up the lifting and endurance training he’d taught me since coming to college. I’d never been interested in organized sports, but I was an avid surfer when I was home in Hawaii and had always kept up a strict exercise regime. I enjoyed the challenge of beating my own records and watching myself get stronger.
What kind of regime does someone like Leo need to maintain to play hockey the way he does? I bet it’s intense too.
Perhaps the guy’s dedication was a positive character trait. I wasn’t sure how much more this interview would reveal in his favor, but I could at least go into it with an open mind.
After I finished up at the gym I stopped at Ackerson’s for another iced vanilla latte on my way to Harrison’s Bar and Pub. I knew it wasn’tgreat to show up at one restaurant with food and beverages from another, but I’d done it without thinking once and the woman behind the bar had told me not to worry about it since the two places had the same owners. If I was going to show up with coffee from somewhere else, it was a good thing my two favorite spots in Boston were owned by the same people—though nothing could compare to my stepmom’s café in Oahu.
I pulled open the door to Harrison’s and nearly pinched myself to see if I was in a dream. There was Leo Harrison, sitting in a booth and scrolling on this phone—I looked at my watch—ten minutes early.
Well, this is an unexpected development.
Damn it, he really is ridiculously attractive—not to mention the appeal of his punctuality.
I took a moment to admire him before I walked over to his table. He had a light complexion with dark hair that had a bed-tousled look and made him look deliciously fuckable. And his ridiculous biceps? He looked like he could smash a watermelon with his bare hands. Men with biceps like that should be forbidden from getting tattoos. He only had one that I could see on his right arm—an infinity symbol with words in it that I couldn’t make out—but the dark ink wrapped around his bulging muscle in a way that felt sinful.
He turned toward me. This close, I realized what it really was about him that made women melt: it was the dimples surrounding the smile he gave me, paired with blue-gray eyes that stood out against his dark brown hair.
This fuckboy is gorgeous. I have to get through this interview before I become one of his bedroom prizes.
When he stood up to greet me, I was pretty sure I wanted to be just that—not that I’d ever give him the satisfaction of letting him know.
Chapter Two
Leo
Who the hell isshe?
After a rough start to my day, the last thing I felt like doing was getting grilled by some wannabe reporter from the school newspaper. The paper’s staff had wanted to do a feature on me several times over the last few years and I’d kept blowing them off until Coach Alvarez told me to shut up and do it. He wouldn’t have had to give me a lecture about getting used to interviews before my rookie season with the Bruins if he’d just shown me a picture of the reporter. If the girl who’d just walked through the door was the one interviewing me, I’d sit here all day and answer every question she had—if I could think straight with her across from me.
