And it stands out because …
Well, because.
I haven’t beenintoanyone in a while. And as much as I hate to admit it, I’m into Tate. Figures. The one person I’m this attracted to in a long-ass time, and it’s an obsessive psychopath. Yeah, I picked that up, because, clearly, he’s decided I belong to him, or some shit.
The behavior of a psychopath.
He didn’t say it in so many words. But it was in the air. The way he touched me. The way he had to fucking mark me. I skim my fingers over the throbbing bruise where he viciously sucked my neck. My cock is so damn hard.God.I liked it.
I don’t want my cock hard because of him. I want to rage at Tate and throw things. I don’t want to imagine him pushing meagainst the wall in his office, yanking down my gear, and fucking me till I can’t walk right.
But I am.
Fucking goddammit.
I punch the wall until I’m sure a knuckle’s broken or at least heavily bruised. What am I gonna do now? All I can think about is Griff’s face at meals. Head down, staring at his plate, wearing that fucking mask. He’s allowed to remove it for meals, but he wouldn’t eat until fuckhead Rowan intervened. Probably on behalf of his dad.
He won’t speak to me. Won’t even look at me. I don’t blame him, this is all my fault, but not being able to protect him or do anything about it is driving me to insanity. I need to fix what I broke before it breaks him.
Joining this league was pure idiocy. But I had to do something, and I had to do it fast.
There’s a knock on the locker room door. Buddy with the firearm tucked into his belt pokes his head in. “Boss says to hurry up.”
I sneer. “Tell your boss he’ll be lucky if I show at all.” I bend down to unlace my skates.
The man laughs. “You’re hilarious, bud. You’ll be going if we have to drag you. You get five more minutes. The boss is not a patient man.”
I toss the skate, blade side out, at his head. He dodges, narrowly missing a skate to the face. Glaring at his back, I move my ass—guess I’m not showering—tearing off my gear and changing into my civilian clothes: A loose pair of jeans, a fitted gray T-shirt, and black boots. I couldn’t care less about Tate’s impatience, but I want this over with. I need to figure out how I’m gonna tell the guys that the psychotic dickhead that owns this place won’t let me on the ice.
I haven’t even had time to process the fact that it’s Tate VanCourt, mild-mannered college hockey coach. I mean, I figured out over the summer that he isn’t who he pretends he is, but I’d never have guessedowner of an underground hockey ring.
The door creaks open again. “He’s shouting in my ear to tell you to make sure you wash your face.”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I mutter. But this locker room’s fancy enough, it has clean towels, and a rack filled with lotions and shit. Guess I can see why he wants my face clean—I look rough, face smeared with blood that probably isn’t mine.
And, what the…?Motherfucker.I knew there was going to be a hickey on my neck, but it’s the largest one I’ve ever seen. If my father sees this, he’s going to murder me. If anyone sees this and tells him, I’m gonna hear about it.
We drove an hour to get here, and when we arrived, it was chaos. The ground level is a massive brewery; that’s where we entered. Beckett had us on some list, so that part went fairly smoothly, but there were only the five of us, and the eccentric blond man who checked us off the list strongly suggested that we recruit more team members.
“The likelihood of injury is high,” he’d said.
“Up to you, Cap,” Becks said, because apparently, he only spearheads illegal activities; he doesn’t actually see them through.
There were more than enough stragglers who’d showed up with gear, hoping to get a spot with a team, but without having seen them play, it was hard to hold on-the-spot tryouts. I ended up choosing based on how big they were. If they were shit players, they could be bruisers. Except Jonathan. He was a little smaller, but something about him screamed hockey player. From what I’d got to see in the first period, I was right.
The pushy security guard enters just as I’m tossing the wet washcloth into the bin. “Time’s up. Let’s go.”
For the love of fuck. “Okay,” I say, stepping toward him. He moves as if I’m a fire. Huh. That’s interesting. “You’re not allowed to touch me, are you?”
… if someone else touches you like he did, there’s gonna be a massacre on the ice.
Those words lit up my insides. I liked it. I don’t wanna look too deep into why I did. But looks like it’s not just the guy on the ice; Tate doesn’t want anyone touching me.
“We can if necessary,” he says. “Will you move it, already?”
“I have one more thing to do.”
He huffs, but I’m right—he’s gonna have to wait unless he wants to drag me, and he’s gonna do his best to make sure it doesn’t come to that. I pull my phone out of my bag, opening it to my chat with Griff. He might be silent, but our chat never is.
