Page 39 of Pucked In Vegas

Maybe… it’s the only thing that’sreal.

We collapse together, a sweaty, satisfied mess of tangled limbs and racing hearts.

I roll us over so she's draped across my chest, her hair tickling my chin as she catches her breath. My hands stroke up and down her spine, mapping the curve of her back, the dip of her waist.

I should feel guilty. I should be thinking about the draft, about my career, about all the ways this could blow up in my face.

Instead, all I can think about is how right this feels. How perfectly she fits against me, like she was made to be here.

My phone buzzes on the nightstand for the third time in five minutes.

"Popular guy," Cassie murmurs against my chest.

I reach over and silence it without looking. "Just Keller and Donovan wondering where I disappeared to."

"Your buddies from the pool?" She raises an eyebrow. "What would they say if they knew you were with your wife right now?"

"They'd never let me live it down," I laugh, pulling her closer. "Keller's probably already drafted the best man speech for a proper wedding."

"Best man speech?" She smiles against my skin.

"Hey, we did this backwards. Might as well keep breaking the rules." I kiss the top of her head, ignoring another buzz from my phone.

The annulment papers sit on the nightstand, forgotten for now. But they won't stay that way forever. Eventually, we'll have to talk about what this means, about who we really are to each other.

But not yet.

For now, I'm content to hold her, to breathe in the scent of her hair and feel the steady rhythm of her heartbeat against my chest.

"Jax… You know this doesn't change anything," she whispers against my skin after a few silent minutes.

"Doesn't it?" I ask, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.

She doesn’t answer right away. Just breathes and thinks to herself so loudly I can practically hear every thought circling inside that beautiful mind.

Then she shifts, propping herself up on the bed to look at me.

"You were at the event today," she says, and there's something different in her voice now. Like she's just figured all of it out. "I saw you in the ballroom. You were talking to people. Hockey people."

"Yeah," I admit carefully, threading my fingers through her hair.

"You know about the draft. About how things work…"

She trails off, brow furrowing as she pieces something else together. God, she looks beautiful even when deep in thought. How am I ever supposed to end this?

“Jax…” she says softly, like she’s on the edge of something she’s not sure she wants to know. “Are you—”

She stops, and then she doesn’t bother to finish the question.

Because she’s looking at me like she already knows.

And, with the way her lips twitch, like she's forcing herself to let it go tells me she doesn’t want the answer.

Shit.

I could lie.

I could tell her I was just helping with the event. That I know people in the league, maybe through a cousin or a friend. That I’m just some guy who happened to end up in the wrong room at the wrong time.

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