Page 94 of Risking the Pucking Defense

HAYDEN

Arap on the door has my head turning, but any fantasy of Hailee slipping into the room and joining me in the shower are soon shattered when she shouts, “The food’s here.”

I nod, letting my arms hang limply at my sides, trying not to be disappointed. I’m currently naked in Hailee Caldwell’s apartment after watching her get off in my lap, wearing only a bra and leggings. It’s hands down one of the best nights of my life. Finishing in my boxers like a teenager aside.

“Fuck,” I groan, dragging my hand down my face as embarrassment rushes through me once more. I really didn’t need another reminder of why I have no place being here with Hailee. Not only am I almost a decade younger than her, but she’s also incredibly beautiful and successful, and everything I want in a woman. Not to mention our jobs. That should be enough to stop us from doing this, but I’ve dreamed about her since the day I first stepped into the LA Vipers arena. There’s no fucking way I’m not taking this chance when it’s handed to me. And Hailee…she’s an incredibly smart woman. She knows what she’s doing. If she didn’t want me here, then I wouldn’t be. If she didn’t want to be in that closet with me earlier, she wouldn’t have been. If she didn’t want to be grinding down on my lap earlier, she wouldn’t have been.

“I’ll be right there,” I bellow, despite the fact that she’s probably long walked off, before turning her shower off and stepping out.

I cast an eye at my pile of discarded clothes, my ruined underwear.

Get it together, Monroe. No woman wants a boy who can’t control himself.

Dressed in a fresh pair of boxer briefs, those gray sweats I teased her with, and a thin white Vipers tee, I head out, the scent of those wings and the garlic bread I added at the last minute making my stomach growl.

My footsteps falter the second my eyes land on her standing in her kitchen in nothing but an oversized T-shirt.

Hearing me coming, she glances back over her shoulder. The second our eyes connect, I swear I stop breathing.

The air crackles between us, and my cock threatens to start tenting my sweats.

Slowly, so freaking slowly, she turns before her eyes drop from mine in favor of taking a leisurely trip down my body.

My temperature soars as I bite on the inside of my cheeks in a pathetic attempt to get control of myself.

Her gaze freezes on my crotch—as if that’s going to help my fucking situation.

“Good choice,” she murmurs before turning back to the containers of food as if she wasn’t just looking at me like she wanted to devour me instead.

“I could say the same thing about you,” I rasp as I move closer and breathe in her sweet, floral scent.

Like me, she’s rocking Vipers merch, but damn, it looks so much better on her. The soft fabric drowns her, the sleeves hanging to her elbows and the hem almost at her knees, but as loose as it might be on her, it’s impossible to miss that she’s braless beneath it. The sight of her nipples pressing against the fabric has my mouth watering.

“I’m not sure I’m hungry for the wings anymore,” I confess, stepping up right behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist and resting my chin on her shoulder.

Contentment surges through me. It’s such a simple, insignificant move, but fuck, it means everything to me. To have her here, to be here with her after the night I’ve had…I don’t think she’ll ever understand what she’s given me in the last few weeks. Just how much she means to me.

“You need to eat,” she says firmly.

“Mmm, a machine this good needs fuel.”

“Such a hockey player,” she teases, twisting out of my arms and carrying two of the plates she’s put together toward the coffee table.

She has a perfectly good island and a dining table on the other side of the room, but she ignores both and drops to her ass in the middle of the room.

“Are you coming or what?” Her smirk tells me that her comment isn’t entirely innocent, and embarrassment threatens again.

Lock it down, Monroe. Move on.

“Oh, I’m coming,” I quip, grabbing the plate in front of me and moving to join her.

She watches me, her hazel eyes glittering with mischief. It’s a look I’m becoming entirely too obsessed with.

“You don’t need to be embarrassed,” she tells me softly.

I shake my head, losing the battle as heat creeps onto my cheeks.

“It’s not great though, is it? I’m meant to have better self-control than that.”