Page 23 of The Au Pair Affair

After the divorce, he’d invested even more of himself into the sport, mentally and physically. Without it? Now? He didn’t know what life would look like. Didn’t know how he’d beuseful, especially knowing he sucked at being a family man. Hockey—he was good at it. The only thing he was good at. And he just wanted to be himself as long as possible.

Gauthier dropped onto the bench beside him, staying quiet while he rooted through his Bearcats duffel for a T-shirt, pulling it on over his head. “Advil isn’t going to cut it for long.”

“It’s not cutting it now.”

“At least go see a private doctor, man,” Sig said. “You could be making it worse.”

Burgess was already issuing a grunt of denial. “Leave it.”

“The way you left Corrigan on his ass?”

“Yup. Just like that.”

“Those fucking sweatshirts.”

“I say we burn them.”

Sig raised an eyebrow at Burgess, as if to gauge whether he was serious. When Burgess remained totally straight-faced, Sig got to his feet and padded to the end of the row of lockers, presumably to double-check if the rookies were still in the showers, which, of course, they were, since they probably didn’t have any responsibilities to get back to at home. The sound of a towel snapping, followed by a pained yelp, echoed through the locker room, strengthening Burgess’s theory.Christ, these shitheads.

Satisfied that they weren’t going to get caught, Sig found Corrigan’s and Mailer’s bags on the floor of the next aisle down and returned with the sweatshirts wrapped in a towel. “Here, you take one, I’ll take the other.”

Burgess accepted the Orgasm Donor sweatshirt and shoved it into his bag, covering it with his sweaty socks. “I’m too old for this,” he muttered.

“Fuck you, mom jokes. You’re never too old for this.”

“Touché.”

Not two seconds later, Corrigan and Mailer went strolling into their row, midconversation about—what else?—women. “What can I say, I’m partial to blondes,” Mailer drawled, earning him a snort and a shove in the back from Corrigan. “Hold up. Speaking of blondes,” Mailer called in Sig’s direction. “Gauthier, is your stepsister coming to the season opener? I saw her on your Instagram and she is fine as hell.” He jerked his chin. “You going to introduce me?”

“Bring her up again and I’ll introduce you to the fuckingfloor,” Sig said, training a deadly look on the younger man. “And she’s not my stepsister.”

“Yet,” Burgess reminded him while pulling a pair of briefs up beneath the towel, then dropping it completely.

“Yet,” Sig repeated with forced calm. “Teammates’ families are off-limits, rookie, unless express permission is given. You don’t have it now and you won’t have it ever.”

“You just said sheisn’tfamily yet,” Mailer pointed out.

“I know what the fuck I said,” Sig snapped.

Mailer raised an eyebrow. “Doyou?”

Sig turned an incredulous look on Burgess. “I’m going to kill these fucking kids.”

Burgess bit back a smile. “You were exactly like them your first year in the league.”

“Nope. Uh-uh.”

“Yup. Worse, even.” Burgess finished fastening the button of his jeans and tipped his head toward the exit, dropping his voice to a low rumble. “We should get out of here before they realize their dumbass sweatshirts are missing.”

“I’m right behind you.”

Simultaneously, they snapped their lockers shut, throwing their duffels over one shoulder and sailing toward the side entrance of the room, which emptied into the team parking lot. “Say hi to your mom for me, Corrigan,” Burgess called over his shoulder, smirking over the resulting wave of laughter throughout the locker room.

“Too old, my ass,” Sig muttered, following him outside into the September dusk. They happened to be parked beside each other and they wordlessly got to loading their gear into the rear cab of their SUVs. “Listen, uh... speaking of Chloe,” Sig said after tossing his bag into the interior and shutting the door. “I hear she didn’t quite pull off the whole cheap room ruse. Apparently, Tallulah saw through it pretty fast.”

Burgess experienced a twinge of pride that he really had no right to feel. “I should have known she would. She’s smart as hell.”

Sig shook his head. “She must have chewed your ass out.”

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