My stomach somersaults. “What? Why?”
“I just signed my first NHL contract. I’m the league’s first female goalie. Ever.” She stares at me, emphasizing the point. “I don’t want the world focusing on my personal life. I want my career to stand on its own, and if I’m just another female hockey player who’s fucking one of her teammates,thatwill be the story.”
Pain radiates through me. Fuck.
She splays a hand over my cheek. “We knowthat’s not our story,” she says softly. “Weknow who we are to one another. That’s all that matters. Right?”
“And what am I to you?”
“You’re my best friend.”
I try not to let those words hit me like they do, but they’re like a knife to the heart. Yes, she’s my best friend too, but I want so much more.
“Adeline, I don’t want to just be your best friend.”
Her smile lights up her face. “I never saidjust.”
“Then what else am I to you?” I’m begging, but I’m not the least bit ashamed. I’m bursting at the seams with anticipation. Desperate to know whether this is as real for her as it is for me.
Her eyes glitter as her smile grows. “Our relationship can’t be defined by any one thing, because you are everything to me. You’re the person I want to spend my time with. Compete with. You make me better. You make me laugh. You make me happier than anything else ever has. You also annoy the hell out of me.”
A surprised bark of laughter bursts out of me.
“And you’re the man I love. The one I always have and always will love.”
My heart thuds against my sternum. “What?”
“I love you. You have to know that.” She says it so simply, like it’s always been obvious. And maybe if I’d been paying better attention, I would have known. I wish I had.
“You already know I love you,” I tell her. “That I’ll always love you.”
“As much as I’m loving all this communication,” she says with a pretty smile, “I’d really like to do something else for a little while.”
I chuckle, the sound dark, as desire courses through me. “You feeling needy?”
She tips up her chin for a kiss. “So needy.”
I press my mouth to hers. Where words might fail us, this doesn’t. I tell her with each kiss that she’s it for me. That things will be different this time. And she responds, telling me she knows. There’s a newfound trust, a choice in every brush of our lips.
Splaying her hands on my chest, she pushes me back against thebed. Long chestnut waves create a curtain as she leans against me, her jersey bunching at her waist. “Fuck, Adeline.” I run my hands up and down her warm thighs, reveling in the sight of her bare cunt.
“You’ve got quite a few tattoos,” she whispers, perusing the expanse of my chest.
A few are obvious. Standard, I guess. The symbol for the Boston Bolts. All the guys have that one. It’s a Bray special. Five yellow stars, just like my dad has inked on his skin. He started with three: one for him, one for my mom, and one for Chloe. Later he added one for each of us boys. There’s a shooting star among them, a symbol that represents Avery, because she’s my magic.
Adeline traces each one, and I relish every touch, my heart beating for her, need and comfort mingling in my chest.
“What’s this one?” she whispers, moving closer to the small triangle on my ribs. “JJ.” She lurches back, her focus darting to my face.
Silently, I smile. She’s smart enough to figure it out.
“Say something,” she begs, her voice strained.
“Kiss me anyway.” The words are in script and form a triangle.
For Addie Angles.
“Why?” she whispers.
