PROLOGUE
Joey
I’m sitting in my office and wondering how in the fuck I got here.
I mean, I knowhowI got the head coaching job for the Sierra hockey team—same as I know that part of me will never be satisfied with how it was bestowed upon me.
I didn’t earn it.
Not wholly.
I’m the consolation prize, the diversity hire.
Or, at least, that’s what the sports bloggers are saying.
Sighing, I settle back in my chair—what has officially become my chair over the last days—and try to get my head together.
Tonight is my official first game as the head coach of the Sierra.
I’m the first woman to ever get here.
And I need to make itcount.
I need?—
There’s a perfunctory knock before the door opens and…
My lungs hitch.
Because the general manager of the Sierra, Damon Connors, walks in.
Tall, grumpy, sexy as hell, and built like a male model, the man is temptation personified.
I’ve wanted him from the first moment I laid eyes on him.
Which was approximately one second before I came to terms with the fact that I could never have him.
Not just because he’s my boss?—
But also because he’s untouchable.
The fallen hero who clawed his way from the shadows back into the light. The avenging…not angel, because he’s far from that, but the antihero with a savior complex, a soft spot for the women in his life, and a moral code that’s known only to him.
He’s everything I lust after.
In fact, he’s so perfect for me it’s like the universe peeped into my Kindle reading history and rendered a man from between the pages.
“You good?” he asks quietly, stepping close enough for me to see the scar crisscrossing his right eyebrow, the flecks of gold in his blue eyes.
I grab my tablet, loaded with everything I can possibly need to coach effectively tonight, and stand. “I’m good,” I confirm as I round my desk and move toward the door—which, invariably, brings me closer to him.
His spicy male scent fills my nose.
The heat that always seems to radiate outward from his body scorches my skin.
Those intent blue eyes fix on mine…and go soft. “Joey,” he says gently.
My fingers spasm, sending the tablet to the floor.
