“Does that seem casual to you?” she asks, but her voice is gentle.
“You’re not babysitting me through this, doc. I’m a big boy, and I understand what I signed up for. We’re not hiding. I don’t see what the big deal is if I go with you.”
“It’s just new…”
“It’ll be new and then it’ll be over.” I rotate onto my back and massage my forehead with my fingers. “We’ll go out in public together tonight, and it’ll be what it’ll be.”
“People might think we’re more serious than we are if we go together.”
“I have never cared less what other people think than I do in this moment.” I turn my head to make eye contact, so she knows I mean it. “We understand what we’re doing. Fuck anyone who doesn’t get it.”
“I was brought up to care,” she says. “I can’t help caring or noticing what people say. It’s ingrained in my DNA.”
“Maybe caring a bit less will be good for you. Worry about what you want and not what everyone else wants. If you want me there, I’ll be there. If you don’t, I won’t. Your choice.”
“You won’t be mad if I say I don’t want you to go?”
“Never,” I say. “Disappointed. But as long as you come over to my house afterward, so I can admire you in private, I can handle it.”
She runs her thumb along my cheekbone. “I want you to come as long as you won’t hate it.”
“You’ll be there, so I definitely won’t hate it.”
“Oh god,” she says, flopping onto her back. “The family chat is going to be a mess when I tell everyone.”
“Why not surprise them tonight?”
“I’m going to need my brothers and sisters on defense with all the curious gossips circulating. This might not be a big deal to you, but given who I used to… People are going to talk.”
“I’ve never been part of a scandal that wasn’t hockey related.”
“Gossip runs hot and wild in Bellerive. Part of the small island vibe. I think…” She looks at me and bites her lip. “Our training sessions need to stay professional. It’s important to both of us that the training we’ve been implementing doesn’t suffer, right?”
“Yeah,” I say, as though I haven’t already been thinking about all the places I can fuck her in the training room at her office. “Of course. Goes without saying.” But I’m glad she said it because we could have gone off the rails quickly without that reminder. Which is weird for me to realize—that I might have prioritized my need for her over my training—because I’ve never put anything or anyone above my hockey goals before.
I really hope I haven’t fucked up my whole life by agreeing to this arrangement.
Chapter Twenty
Sawyer
Logan Bishop is a sex wizard who is actually centuries old. It’s the only logical explanation for his ability to almost literally snap his fingers and have me come. It’s unnatural.
When the season ends, I don’t know how I’ll go back to regular sex with a normal man. Logan has ruined me. Set the standard so impossibly high when other men aren’t likely to rise to the challenge like Logan would. Most people aren’t hypercompetitive about every aspect of their lives.
But I have to say, it’s working out well for me so far.
Logan’s gone to practice, and I’ve been putting off dropping the update I need to set free in the family chat. Given that I was dating Dalton—quite seriously as far as anyone knows—a few months ago, showing up with Logan at the cocktail party will create a stir.
With the chat open, my fingers hover over the keyboard, and I try to think of the most blasé version of my life.
Just a heads-up. Logan Bishop and I are dating. Super casual. But he’s coming with me tonight.
Doesn’t he hate those things?Ava’s the first to reply, which makes sense because her phone is an appendage.I’ve asked him to a bunch of stuff, and he keeps saying no.
Doesheknow it’s casual?Gage drops in next. Like Ava, his phone is constantly in his hand, but at least that’s caused by all his real estate deals.Because if he’s coming tonight and he hates those things, you might be casual, but he’s not.
I close my eyes as my phone begins a continuous vibration. Rather than reading the rest of their replies, I set it on the counter face down. Their negativity is not what I need in my life. Coming off the back of my disaster of a relationship with Dalton, incredible sex and low commitment is exactly what I want. Logan and I have an agreement, and I’m not letting my family shit all over it as though we’re not two consenting adults.
