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Wells chortles. “You gonna start hosting games and winning a bunch of food bets?”
“Absolutely. Then I might move to someone cleaning my condo.”
“Owww, damn,” Byron chimes in. “Better watch out for what the other person asks for. You might find yourself in some precarious positions.”
“Speaking of positions,” Wells says, leaning an elbow along the table and giving me his full attention. “How did you like tonight’s game?”
“I loved it,” I extoll. “There was action on and off the ice. It was crazy cool.”
“Ah, well, good thing Reid brought you to a hockey game because anything else you might have found boring. We’re just a bunch of assholes with a bunch of passion, pent-up aggression, and needing to get our hands on something, ya know? On and off the ice.”
I might be slow when it comes to guys. I haven’t been on a date in a long time, and this is the most conversation I’ve had with several that weren’t clients or with Reid, but I know what Wells is doing.
He’s trouble. Walking around and taunting the bear that’s sitting on the other side of me.
It’s not hard.
Reid pops off within seconds, and I know it’s coming. I can feel the straining tension riding off his shoulders, and the last thing I want him worrying about is protecting me.
Or feeling obligated that he has to.
“Well, you can keep your hands off my food,” I retort simply. “Because I’ve been waiting for this all night.”
“That’s all, huh? Food?”
I nod toward the massive plate in front of me. “Do you see how good it looks?”
“No,” he replies with a cocky smirk. “I was too busy staring at something else.”
I feel Reid move again, and I shove the mini burger in my hand inside Reid’s mouth to keep him from popping off at his teammate.
I can handle myself.
I’ve been doing it since I was seventeen, and my father checked into rehab for addiction to alcohol. My mother left us when I was twelve, running away with another man, and she never looked back.
Dad is on and off the binge, but he fights it, and that’s all I can ask for in the end.
“You’re giving yourself away,” I announce flatly. “The playboy persona. The innuendos about what you can do when you’re playing and when you’re not. I’ve read enough books to know guys like you inside and out.”
Wells perks a brow. “Do you?”
“All the time.” I jerk my head toward Reid. “Ask him.”
He doesn’t, though. Still keeping his lucid green eyes wrapped around me. “Fictional boys have nothing on me, sweetheart. I’m sure I could give them a run for their money.”
I smile at him because I’m not one to want to find out, and I’d never do that to Reid with how much he’s already subtly hinted that he’s not going to be fucking around with any hands-on nonsense. “There’s a blonde that’s been eyeballing you for the last five minutes. Hot pink dress, pretty smile. I think you’d find a better chance of proving it to her. Because I’m about to make love to all the food, and I eat like a teenage boy going through a growth spurt. You’ll find yourself wanting to look elsewhere.”
Wells plucks a mozzarella stick off my plate and takes a bite before sliding off his stool. “I knew I liked you.”
He gives me a playful wink before—I assume—heading toward the woman that I may have potentially given him a one-night stand to. It only gives me an excuse to stop talking and dig into my appetizer, that’s growing colder by the second.
“Is it good?” I ask Reid, eyeballing the potato skins with a burning lust because I mean it when I say that I am starving.
Reid doesn’t say a word, which causes me to glance over at him to see what his problem is now.
I wouldn’t know by first glimpse. His stoic expression is painted on thick as he chews the burger I shoved in his mouth. The man…he’s not like a book. His chapters aren’t printed out into words. He leaves no clues as to what he’s thinking or what kind of problems he’s having.
I’d need to be a mind reader to know all those things.
