Page 31 of Mister Hockey
“My place.” He gripped and regripped the wheel. The only body that had been in his bed for over a year had been his own. If he had a hookup, he preferred to keep it in neutral territory, like a hotel on the road. Or if in town, at the girl’s place.
“Oh. I see.” But it was clear that she didn’t.
He turned on music. A deep beat. Thumping. Hard. Mirroring what was happening inside him. Anticipation had honed his insides to a sharp edge.
Breezy reached out and flicked off the music. The uncomfortable silence that followed filled his ears to a deadening roar.
“I’m waiting,” she said quietly.
No more elaboration was forthcoming. He’d pissed her off. That much was obvious from the flush on her cheeks and the crackle in her eyes. And he’d been around the block enough to know that when a woman was angry and not saying why, then his ass was in a world of trouble.
“You’d rather to go home?” he ventured at last.
She made a small huffy noise that might as well be a game show buzzer. Wrong! Next choice.
He eased up on the gas. “Mind helping me out? I’m not great at the whole twenty questions thing.”
“Or asking, period.”
There was a hint in her testy tone. But shit, he wasn’t smart enough to pick up whatever she was selling.
Asking. Asking. Asking.He ran the word through his brain, hoping it would spark some idea. Some dim part of him realized he was panicking, that in his interest to get her home and strip her down to her socks, that he’d forgotten—
“Oh. Shit. I didn’t ask if you wanted to come over.”
She raised a brow, but didn’t disagree.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ladies and gentleman, we have a winner.
Trouble was, figuring out his blunder only got him to the playing field. This was going to have to be an apology knocked out of the park or he wouldn’t be getting to a single base.
She mashed her lips together, probably noticing him over here dithering. He was blowing this harder than a fucking popsicle stand.
There was only one way to salvage this. A straight up, from the heart, no bullshit apology.
He pulled the car over and turned off the ignition. Turning, he reached, taking one of her hands. She didn’t recoil. Progress.
“I should have asked you to come over. Not assumed, just because.”
“Look, Jed.” Her voice quavered on his name. “I get it okay. You’re like you or whatever.You.Westy. Big deal. And I am so happy to be here with you. I am. It’s just... being around my mom flushes my self-esteem down the toilet. And then it seemed like you were here, ready to make decisions for me and I felt devalued.”
Devalued.The word socked him in the gut. He’d done that. He himself alone.
“That wasn’t ever my intention. I don’t know how to talk about the hockey shit without sounding like a stuck-up asshole. So I’ll do the only thing that I know. Which is to call it like I see it. I’m on television. Yeah. All right. I play a professional sport game watched by lots of people. But I didn’t get into this work because I wanted to be a star. I did it for one simple reason. I love the work, or used to. Skating is my life. My passion. It’s in my blood. Or at least it has been, for most of my life.”
“I’m being touchy. And it’s hard to navigate. To be ordinary and to be with you, it takes time to get used to.”
“Let me tell you one thing. You need to quit saying that. You don’t have a drop of ordinary in you. You couldn’t be average if you tried.”
Her eyes welled with unshed tears, but her smile was something else. And the knot in his gut relaxed. He had a sense he was forgiven for some of his stupidity.
“You said ‘used to.’”
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Used to love hockey. You don’t feel that way anymore?”
His hand went right to his head, the body language betraying him even as she looked on without a clue. “Slip of the tongue,” he lied smoothly. He liked Breezy. A lot. She was a good listener. A smart woman. But he wasn’t dropping that steaming pile of shit on her door. And besides, he had to be careful.
