“Only if you want to give me an actual peek at the list, Ms. Turner.”

I chuckled, shaking my head and moving his hands from my hips, keeping hold of one with my hand. “Why are you so interested in the list?”

“Why wouldn’t I be? If I’m number seven, I can’t imagine what else made it on there.”

I playfully smacked his chest. “Overconfident much?”

He squeezed my hand. “Haven’t you read the blogs? I’m Rory-fucking-Jackson. The only person I’ve ever loved is myself.”

I squinted my eyes at him, noticing the crease between his brow appear again for a split second as he tried to play off the joke. I was quickly becoming aware he didn’t have a clue about his small tell, and it made me feel like I had a piece of him no one else did.

This time when I touched his chest I used it to balance on my pumps as I pushed up on my tiptoes to kiss him. I kept myself in check, not slipping my tongue in his mouth like I ached to, but inside teased his lips with mine just enough to make him sigh. Pulling back, I locked onto his blue eyes. “Fuck the blogs. The papers. The magazines. They don’t have a clue who you really are.”

He smirked. “And you do?”

I licked my lips, happy they tasted like him. “I’m starting to.”

His eyes widened as if the prospect was more terrifying than the hits he took on the ice. I laughed, tugging him back toward the party. “It’s almost time to clean up. How good are you with your hands?”

“Figured you could answer that by now,” he said, following me behind Jeannine’s line of tables.

“Jury is still out.”

“Ouch. Red, you are hard to please.”

“And you’re hard—”

“Whoa, kids, we don’t need to hear all of that,” Jeannine cut me off, and I chuckled. “Or maybe we do.” She waggled her eyebrows again as she handed me a dishrag. I smacked her thigh with it before tossing one to Rory.

“You think you can manage to clean some dirty dishes? Or do you have practice?” I asked.

He nodded. “Practice isn’t for another few hours. And you know I’m really good at taking care of all things…dirty.”

Heat rushed to my cheeks as I took up my spot at a full tub of dishes. Those non-existent butterflies were back, and try as I might to explain to them that Rory was nothing but a business arrangement, the fucking things kept on flapping until I felt like I was soaring.

 

 

Chapter 7

 

 

Rory

 

 

Gage controlled the puck and headed toward the goal, the opposing team’s enforcer, Mathison, zeroing in on his back as he took off after him. Big fucking mistake. Coach had pulled me off the bench and gave me the green light to play my heart out in this game.

I raced across the ice and crashed into the shithead just as he jerked his stick in front of Gage’s skate. The punk went down so hard his helmet smacked off the ice with an audible crack, but Gage barely missed a beat, regained his footing and passed the puck to Warren who shot it in for a goal to tie up the score.

“Fuck yeah!” I screamed, fist bumping Gage’s glove and then Warren’s as we rounded the ice for the next faceoff. The crowd roared, fueling me with the kind of adrenaline that only hockey could give me.

The Blackhawks—damn them—held their ground, their goalie blocking two more attempts. Sweat soaked everything underneath my gear, pushed harder than I had in weeks. That was the thing about this game; the second Coach said I couldn’t play it, only made me want it that much more. I shredded the ice, knocking players into the boards, on their backs, and anywhere an opportunity presented itself. No one was getting at one of my guys, not today.

The breath was cold and quick in my lungs as I flew across the ice, slamming a guy into the boards before he could do the same to Warren. As the ref called offsides, the whistle blowing so we could faceoff at the blueline, a flash of red hair caught my eye. I looked up at the glass and nearly fell on my ass. It was a rare occasion that I’d seen Paige outside of her usual business attire, but seeing her in my jersey? Holy fucking shit it was the sexiest thing I’d ever seen. And it wasn’t like there weren’t fourteen other puck bunnies wearing the same number in the stands because there was. It just looked ten times hotter on Paige.

Was that because we’d struck a deal? Because she’d been off limits until recently? Because she was out of my league in too many ways to count? Or was it because ever since I’d gotten that first taste of her in the penthouse, she was all I could think about? Her scent filled my head even though it’d been two days since I’d seen her last. Her laugh echoed in my ears despite the action of the game surrounding me. The woman was under my skin all the ways I’d never thought would happen and I hadn’t even fucked her yet.

“Rory!” Gage shouted, snapping me out of thoughts. “Get your fucking head in the game!” He pointed at a defenseman going after one of our wings, and I bolted toward him, barely stopping him before he got our guy on his back.

Fuck. Lock it up, man!

Paige wasn’t the first gorgeous woman to show up to watch me play. Hell no. Beautiful women went hand and hand with being a Shark. Not once had I ever let any of them distract me and yet one glimpse of Paige and I was out of position and out of my fucking mind.

I flexed every single one of the muscles I spent hours at the gym sculpting, pushing myself harder than ever, forcing myself to focus on the game and ignore the redhead in the stands. I swore I could hear her screaming my name over anyone else in the crowd, but that was impossible. Fuck, I was in trouble.

Smack! Another goon bashed against the boards, dropping to the ice after my bone-crushing hit. I grunted, adjusting my mouthguard that had come loose underneath my helmet. In the two seconds it took to move it in place, I glanced upward where I knew she was in the stands. I just wanted a glimpse of that fiery hair, those emerald eyes…the man chatting her up as he stood over her in the aisle. Motherfucker was leaning…coming on to my woman. A rage I was all too familiar with bubbled near the surface, the urge to leap the boards and let the guy know who the fuck he was talking to, battled in my head.

“Jackson!” Coach yelled this time, and my head snapped around, following his angry face to his jerking hand motioning toward the opposite end of the ice. Before I could skate two inches Gage had been taken down so hard I fucking winced. The player stole the puck while Gage tried to recover, and shot it in for a goal. The buzzer sounded at the same time the lamp lit, the sound shoving my heart to the bottom of my gut as the game ended 3-2.