Page 98 of Holding Penalty

Vaughn’s expression darkens. “Yes.”

Steiner was a player who Vaughn had an infamous on-ice rivalry with early in his career. They’d talk trash and mean-mug each other all game long when their teams met. Steiner and Vaughn even threw punches during a game once, which is practically unheard-of for a goalie.

There’s a stretch of silence as Piper and Hallie continue to giggle and titter with each other, until Piper finally says, “Hallie wrote a story about you two.”

Vaughn’s brow drops. “Us two? Me and Steiner?”

“Right,” Piper answers, choking back a laugh. Hallie’s hiding her face again, but I can see its color has moved on to something even deeper than scarlet.

“Why?” Vaughn asks, like he can’t even imagine a possible answer but is afraid to hear whatever it is.

“I had a hockey romance obsession at the time,” Hallie explains.

Vaughn quirks an eyebrow, like that was hardly an explanation. “But why would you …”

“It was an MM romance story,” Piper says. Hallie covers her face with her hands.

“Em-em …?” Vaughn questions.

“Male-male,” Piper says.

“I wrote a gay romance story about you and Callum Steiner,” Hallie explains, her eyes pressed shut like she can’t bear to face anyone while admitting it.

Vaughn’s jaw drops.

Hallie stands up. She’s a little wobbly. “Alright, that’s probably my cue to head home. Thanks for the most embarrassing moment of my life, Piper.” Even as she says that, she and her sister are still laughing together.

“I’ll walk you home,” Piper says. “Nash, just pick me up from Hallie’s place when you’re ready to go home.”

Vaughn still looks borderline shell-shocked while the girls walk away.

I’m ordering a rideshare to drive Piper and me back to our place, so I stay out a bit longer and have a couple more drinks with my teammates.

I walk to Hallie’s place after, and Piper and I order our ride from there. We drive out of the city on the same road where I pulled over and told her to get into my truck all those months ago.

That was the first time I had her in my passenger seat. And more than ever before, I realize I don’t want there to be a last time.

46

PIPER

The windows are rolled down. A cool wind whips through my hair on this hot, humid night while Nash drives us back from the country bar where we just spent the evening dancing to a local band.

Nash’s Adam’s apple bobs underneath his prickly stubble as he sings along to Brand New Man by Brooks & Dunn playing on the radio. I never thought I’d see Nash Miller belting out a country classic with a smile on his lips while driving me down an empty country road.

But I never thought I’d be married to him either, so maybe where Nash Miller is concerned, I should stop being surprised by anything that happens.

My gaze ticks up from his lips mouthing the words of the song to the cowboy hat resting on his head. They were selling them at the bar, and I couldn’t resist buying one for him.

When I planted it on the crown of his head and saw my husband with his scruffy, overdue-for-a-haircut hair spilling from under the brim of a cowboy hat, I almost pushed him down onto the worn wooden floorboards of the bar and rode him like a rodeo while the band played a George Strait classic.

It was hard to resist going through with it, considering how Nash looks tonight.

A pair of blue jeans that frame his ass to perfection.

A plain white t-shirt tucked into the jeans, the sleeves rolled up even more to expose his muscular arms, and the thin fabric stuck to his broad chest from the sweat we worked up on the dance floor.

Cowboy boots on his feet, which I bought him last week, ostensibly as a return present for an absurdly expensive candle he heard me talking about, but really because I wanted to see how he’d look in them.