Page 9 of Hard to Handle

“Yep.” He holds a finger up to the bartender and doesn’t have to even say what he wants, his regular status here when they’re in town ensuring immediate service.

“You enjoy all that time in the penalty box?”

“Dickman’s a dick. It’s even in his name,” he says, referring to the member of the opposing team he traded punches with on the ice earlier. “He had it coming to him for blindsiding Hunter on that play. It was uncalled for and total bullshit slashing him like that.”

“It was definitely dirty,” I say, glancing over his shoulder to where the rest of the team is, looking for the man in question.

“Everything that asshole Dickman does is dirty.” He snorts and takes a sip of his beer. “So, tell me why you’re making house calls when we’re on a road trip. There has to be a reason.”

Yeah. One I don’t want to acknowledge.

CHAPTER FIVE

HUNTER

UNABASHED.

Unyielding.

Uninhibited.

Those three words describe the woman sitting at the end of the bar to a goddamn T.

I take in her black high heels, her pale pink sweater and black slacks, and the sweep of her pale hair sitting atop her head. She’s elegant but feisty, gorgeous but unassuming, composed but so damn infuriating . . . and nothing if not all-business.

And not a single one of those things diminishes the firsthand knowledge I have of every inch of her body.

Dekker Kincade.

Jesus, even my balls draw up at the thought, sight, and memory of her.

But I stop mid-sentence, mid-lift of my beer to my mouth, mid-everything when I catch sight of her sitting at the bar, talking to Callum. Sure, her back is to me, but I would know that curve of her shoulders in a heartbeat.

“There a problem?” Frankie asks.

I shake my head and turn back toward him, trying to remember what the hell I was saying but find myself at a loss.

Damn Dekker.

She always did have a way of owning my thoughts when I’m not a guy to be owned by much of anything other than hockey . . . and family.

But my eyes slide back to where she’s sitting. I hate the way Callum’s hand rests on the back of her chair and how he throws his head back and gives that cheesedick laugh that’s too loud and not real.

Yeah, he’s her client, but it’s not a hard jump to assume he’d fuck her if given the chance.

Hell, every damn guy in this place would.

I know. I’m one of the lucky bastards who have.

Lucky? Is that the right word, because I’ve seen her for a whole five minutes and the shit that the sight of her has stirred up is insane.

Over-the-top sex. Hours on end of never being able to get enough. An intensity as she stared at me from the hotel doorway and told me our . . . friends with benefits had run its course.

I convinced myself it was because she had found someone new.

I pretended I didn’t care.

But fuck if seeing her sitting there right now doesn’t tell me otherwise. It’s been almost three years since . . . since the end of whatever we were, but seeing her now, I remember every sigh, every moan, every goddamn thing.