Page 32 of Pucking Your Best Friend

He gave her a nasty look. It was bad enough he had to go on a date at all. He certainly didn’t want an audience.

Besides, he’d decided last night that maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing if he were open to the idea of the date going well. Maddie was good at matching people and lately, Matt wasn’t as opposed to the idea as he had been a year ago.

Here was the thing: Dax was taken now. He spent a ridiculous amount of time with Lucy. Maddie wanted to date, too — and he knew that once she started seeing guys, one of them would quickly realize what a fantastic catch she was.

He gritted his teeth and looked out over the ocean. Yes. She wouldn’t be with him forever. Sure, they could continue to befriends when she was married and had kids, but things changed. They’d changed with Dax and it would be the same with her. He would…lose her. Not completely, but a little. And maybe…maybe he shouldn’t be opposed to trying a serious relationship. He wasn’t good at maintaining them, but he shouldn’t rule them out completely, right?

“Is that a no?” Lucy asked innocently.

“That’s ago to hell,” Matt snapped back.

She laughed. “My goodness, you are grumpy today. You’re supposed to be the best version of your alter egoCharming.”

“That name is utter bullshit!” he complained loudly.

“I like it. It’s easy to sell. Besides, youareone of the more charming players.”

“Only because everyone else is a bunch of brutish baboons!” he replied in disbelief.

“Well…yes. But that doesn’t change the fact that you are a natural in front of a camera, while it’s best to place duct tape over Leon’s mouth whenever there’s one around.”

He groaned. He had the urge to sling someincrediblycharming words at Lucy. There would be so much press today, though, that he probably shouldn’t risk it.

“Oh, I forgot how much fun it is to annoy you,” Lucy said, linking arms with him. “We need to do something together again. Dax, you, Maddie, and I. We could invite Jack. He and Dax need to practice being brothers again and I’m happy to help.”

“Hm,” he muttered because, if he was honest, he missed spending time with Dax. He loved Lucy, she was great, but he hadn’t been able to hang out with Dax these last few weeks. He could really use his best friend to tell him it wasn’t a problem to be friends with a woman you were sexually attracted to. He needed to hear it was perfectly normal to have a few dirtythoughts about Maddie since finding out she hadn’t been averse to jumping into bed with him back then.

Fine. The last week had been good – easy and pleasant, just like everything with Maddie. Nothing had changed.

“Wow, Maddie looks good. She must have dressed up for the reporters.”

Matt blinked, glanced up…and groaned inwardly. Maddie was wearing a sunny yellow dress that clung tightly to her upper body and fell around her hips in a wide skirt. She wore her hair down so that the ocean breeze blew it around her face. He knew the dress. She liked to wear it when she went out in the evening. It wasn’t particularly provocative. It was nothing compared to the short skirts and crop tops that the rest of the world seemed to be wearing at the moment. Yet it made her face shine and accentuated every single one of her curves just right…curves he hadn’t cared about until now! He had noted them and then hadn’t thought about them any further. That was then; now was different.

“Wow, amazing how many people are interested in your love life,” Lucy murmured, and Matt let his gaze wander.

Two reporters with big cameras and equally big grins and a TV crew were present.

That was good for Maddie and explained why she was nervously fiddling with the hem of her dress. Oh shit! They were not seriously planning on airing this on ESPN?! No sports fan would find it interesting that he had signed up with a dating agency. Or would they? He was an ice hockey player! As long as he didn’t date a puck, it was completely irrelevant.

“Hey, hero,” a voice greeted him from the left. It was Hailey, whose dark curls shimmered in the sunlight.

“More like victim,” he corrected and hugged her in greeting.

She laughed. “Victim of Maddie’s powers of persuasion?”

More like a victim of Maddie’s doe eyes. However, he didn’t get to reply because Maddie had spotted him and was approaching.

“You’re on time,” she said with relief and ran both hands tensely through her hair. “Thank God and…” She paused. Her gaze landed on his face. Specifically, his right eye. “What is that?” she asked, mortified, raising her hand and gently touching his cheekbone.

“Ouch,” he exclaimed and flinched. “It’s a bruise, Maddie.” He might not have been half as charming on the ice yesterday as Lucy liked to claim.

Her eyes widened. “You got into afight?”

“You don’t fight on the ice. You show off your skills,” he stated.

“Your skills at fighting!”

Well, yes, that too. “It’s nothing, Maddie. It barely hurts.”

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