She sets her hands on my hips, squeezing a little and pressing into me enough that she can feel exactly what this kiss is doingto me. “Then you better get me alone quick. I think I’d like my hands all over you too.”
As the rest of the blood in my body drains right to my dick, I wrap my arm around her waist and lead her straight out of the bar, into the night that awaits us both.
CHAPTER ONE
MADDY
“Oh, holy hell,” I mutter, glancing in the rearview mirror. Stopped at a red light, I look again to make sure I’m seeing what I think I’m seeing and yep. A reddish-purple mark, right on the spot where my neck meets my shoulder.
A hickey. I have a damn hickey like I’m in high school again. Granted, I never had any hickeys while I was actually in high school because when you play ice hockey, the guys see you as one of them, instead of as someone they want to give a hickey to. But if I was the kind of girl who got hickeys in high school, they probably would have looked exactly like this.
I run a finger over the bruise, shivering involuntarily as I’m suddenly assaulted by the image of the mystery man from the bar sucking on this exact spot last night while he slammed into me from behind, one arm wrapped around my waist and his other hand around my throat, his big, hard body curled over me where I was bent over the back of his hotel room couch.
I shift in my seat, my clit throbbing at the memory.
“Get your shit together, Maddy,” I order myself as the light turns green. I turn up the volume so “Where Does My HeartBeat Now” blares out of the car speakers and reach for the iced coffee in my cupholder, taking a long sip and letting the music and the caffeine jolt soothe me. There’s a reason I crept out of that hotel room at four this morning while the mystery man was asleep, and it’s so this exact thing didn’t happen.
Thethingbeing me getting attached to a nameless guy on account of some sex and a few orgasms.
The best sex of my life.
So many orgasms I probably would have needed all my fingers and at least half my toes to count them.
He was really good at sex. A sex savant. The orgasm king. The perfect blend of sweet and demanding. Growly, in the really, really sexy way. He played my body like it was a damn Stradivarius, and I lost count of the number of times I begged for more.
Me.
I begged.
I probably whimpered too, Jesus Christ.
My only saving grace on the express train straight to embarrassment city is that he whimpered too, and let me tell you, you haven’t lived until a six-foot two wall of muscle whimpers into your ear as he comes inside you.
For the third time in two hours.
I shake my head, trying to erase this entire line of thinking. If no names or phone numbers were exchanged, it means that there’s no reason for me to obsess over last night or whether he’ll call. And he had a hotel room, which means he’s not from here, which means I’ll never see him again, so problem solved. I’m thirty years old and about to start the job of my dreams. For sure I can have a night of fuck-hot sex and be totally casual and cool about the whole thing.
I mean, I’ve never been casual or cool one single day in my entire life, but today seems like as good a day as any to start.
My stomach shimmers with nerves as I park in front of the sports complex that houses the Renegades’ front office and practice facilities. Opening my emergency makeup bag, I flip downthe visor and dab concealer on the hickey, before touching up the pound I already have spackled under my eyes on account of my four a.m. hotel room escape.
I could have slept for an hour once I got home, but my brain wouldn’t shut off, so instead, I used my contraband key to get into the hockey team’s practice arena and skated for an hour with my girl power playlist blasting in my ears before I got ready for work in the locker room.
It's one of my favorite ways to start the day, but it also means I’m operating on almost no sleep, and that’s a tall order for a concealer stick I bought on sale at Sephora.
Glancing at the clock on the dashboard, I see it’s just before seven. I don’t actually need to be here for another hour, but I’m getting an early start in hopes that I can avoid any errant family members who might get a wild hair to show up for my first day.
I grab my bag and my coffee and jingle the tiny disco balls hanging from my rearview mirror for luck before hopping out of the car, straightening the short black jacket I’m wearing over jeans and a plain white T-shirt—I love Maya, but no way in hell was I wearing a dress to walk the halls of a professional football facility. I click the fob to lock the doors and then pat the hood of my beloved cherry-red Jeep Wrangler. “Wish me luck, Celine.”
All the cool kids name their cars after nineties pop stars.
Straightening my shoulders, I stride to the entrance, doing my best cosplay of Dr. Maddy Wright, sports psychologist who absolutely knows what she’s doing and definitely has her shit together.
“There she is.”
The second I open the door to the complex, I groan internally. With a grin on his face, my uncle Brian stands in the middle of the lobby, watching as I walk across the wide stone floor.
I should have known better than to think I could get all the way to my office unseen. Meddling is practically an art form inmy family. And also, I don’t know where my office is, so that’s a whole thing.
