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“Oh, fuck,” Rowan groaned hoarsely. “I’m about to come sofuckingdeep inside you, princess.”
And that was all it took to push me over the edge. I felt the tsunami of pleasure that was building inside me, building, building, and then I closed my eyes and let myself get lost inside the storm.
21.
Rowan
I lay there in the dark, long after they’d both drifted off, and watched her sleep. Somehow, I felt like I’d known this woman my whole life. This woman I’d only met a few days ago. This woman, who was very much in love with somebody else.
I’d always been the one who couldn’t be tied down, the one dancing just out of reach. Now I understood how those girls had felt, the ones I discarded as soon as I grew bored with them. I was just a toy, a plaything, to her. I could have been anyone. But to me, she was rapidly becoming everything. I’d never felt like this before.
And I was not a fan.
The smart thing to do would be to get out of this bed, drive home, and tell Jamie the next time I saw him that I was done. I needed to be done. With anyone else, I would have already been long gone. But I couldn’t even bring myself to get out of this bed to go relieve my bladder. For this brief moment in time, I was allowed to lay here and watch her sleep. There was nowhere else that I would rather be.
22.
Hope
The buzzer was so loud it made my brain hurt. I plugged my ears, watching Kane Devereaux skate away from the opponent’s goal. He’d just lit their lamp for the fourth time this game, and I could tell by the set of his shoulders that he was feeling like a real stud.
“Rowan Wilder is staring at you,” Jeannie Skinner muttered in my ear. My eyes jumped from Kane to Rowan. She was right. Those intense hazel eyes were tracking my every move. Shouldn’t he be watching the game?
I couldn’t stop the blush from rising up my neck as I turned back to the ice.
“So?” I asked, doing my best to sound casual.
“So?!” Jeanine repeated incredulously. “How is it possible that someone whose brother AND boyfriend are professional hockey players doesn’t know the first thing about the sport? Rowan Wilder is a hockeygod.” I gave her an exaggerated eye roll, even as heat built up in my core at the mere mention of his name. I wasn’t aware of his reputation, but I wasn’t surprised that he was a dynamo on the ice, given how excellent he was in bed.
The precious, chubby baby in Jeanine’s lap gave the first warning mewl of an impending tantrum. Even with his tiny noise-canceling headphones, it was still too loud in the barn. Jeanine bounced him on her knee, shushing him even though he couldn’t hear her. His face screwed up, his vivid blue eyes locked onto his mother, and then the wailing started.
“Come on, honey,” Jeanine cooed. “We’re watching Daddy play. You’re okay. Shh-shh-shh.” I smiled. Even when he was screaming, he was pretty damn cute.
Lars wasn’t getting a ton of playtime today, but every time his skates hit the ice, he pushed us closer to victory. I was honestly impressed by how well the Hawks were playing, given that this was just their ninth game together as a team. Only the lifers, including Jamie, remained from the previous season, when we’d made headlines across the country with our underdog story. I knew that Jamie wanted to show out and whip the team into shape now that he was the captain. But he’d confided in me that it was difficult to ever get a development team into a good rhythm, because the owners shoved players in and yanked players out with no concern for how it might affect the team as a whole.
Speaking of Jamie, I picked him out as he tore away from our goal across the ice toward the opposing goalie, staying in lockstep with Kane, who I had to admit was an impressive presence now that he had his legs under him.
Watching Kane skate, I flashed back to that team-building night at Copper’s a few weeks ago, his mysterious smile and the implication that he knew more about me than I might want him to. He had single-handedly sent me into a spiral of self-doubt. But, just like Kane did on the ice, I had Jamie by my side, and I knew he wasn’t going anywhere. I knew that together, we could do anything. I could explore any wild fantasy as long as I had him there to hold me up and keep me safe.
Despite the neck-and-neck game taking place in front of me, my attention kept jumping back, of its own accord, to Rowan. Jeanine was right. Usually, his laser focus was trained on the ice during a game. But he was definitely staring at me.
We’d all agreed to keep our dirty little secret just that—a secret. But he was being downright obvious. Then again, who would guess the truth just from that burning look? That he and my boyfriend, Captain James Larsson, were tag-teaming me every chance they got.
I felt a tingling between my legs that grew as I met Rowan’s eyes and held them, challenging him to look away. He didn’t. I was getting hot under the collar. I rocked forward in my seat and clamped my thighs together, trying to get myself under control. But it had the opposite effect. I nearly moaned out loud at the sensation pared with the way Rowan was eye-fucking me.
Finally, an official’s shrill whistle broke his concentration. Something was happening on the ice, and I saw immediately what that something was. Kane was screaming at the official, who was blasting his whistle right in Kane’s face. He’d decided that the last goal was no good. Jamie was standing beside them, watching the exchange with a grim expression. I knew what would happen before it happened. The official, officially fed-up, flung a finger toward the penalty box.
Now Kane really exploded. I could hear his booming voice over the crowd as he argued with the ref’s decision. Jamie didn’t have a choice any longer. He had to step in.
He grabbed his teammate by the elbow, jerking Kane away from the ref and pushing him in the direction of the sin bin. Kane kept turning back, trying to talk to him, and Jamie kept shunting him forward. And then, a collective gasp filled the arena, quickly followed by silence. Kane pushed away from Jamie and cocked his arm back, punching him square in the chest. Jamie stumbled backward and nearly fell. Behind his helmet guard, I saw his face go white and my stomach dropped. Now Rowan was getting involved, stepping out onto the ice in his loafers and his designer suit, screaming at Kane the way Kane had just been screaming at the official.
Jamie recovered himself while Kane was arguing with Rowan. I saw my boyfriend’s hands clench into fists and knew that if he were a few years younger, or hadn’t just been made captain, Kane would be getting a taste of Jamie’s rare but infamous rage. As it was, he just watched as Kane threw his hands up in the air and skated hard over to the penalty box, throwing himself down on the bench.
The Hawks played on without their flashy new star center, who was forced to watch, scowling, from the sidelines as Jamie knocked another goal in. This one was good. The crowd erupted in cheers, and then Jamie pointed to me, and heads turned from every direction to see who he was pointing at. I sank down in my seat, my face burning. I hated crowds and any kind of public speaking. That was a big part of the reason I skipped as many of these games as I could without coming off as an unsupportive girlfriend. The last thing I wanted was to be pointed out, but Jamie didn’t seem to care. I could see the glint of his teeth as he grinned behind his cage, keeping his finger trained on me for another second before he turned his focus back to the game.
“You’re little miss popular today, huh, girl?” Jeanine teased me. She’d managed to stave off the tantrum, but little Micah was looking thunderous. I smiled and made faces at him so I wouldn’t have to meet Jeanine’s all-knowing eyes. She knew exactly what my best friend had been up to last season. The connection was easy to make, that I might be doing the same thing.
But for Jamie and I, this bedroom game was purely sexual. I wasn’t looking for a harem of rough-and-ready hockey players to make me their queen. That sort of thing suited Lola to a tee. She never minded being the center of attention. In fact, the center of attention was where she thrived. She had no shame, no embarrassment, over her sexual proclivities. As close as we were, we were also polar opposites. I was habitually self-conscience, stressed out, and uncertain. I admired her, but I could never be like her.
