Page 31 of Worth the Shot

Inside, the arena hums. Music thunders through the speakers, lights flickering across the ice as players start to filter out from the tunnel for warm ups.

We find our seats, which are first row, right behind the glass tonight, a rare occurrence that I have gotten to experience twice so far this season. Usually we only use these seats if Luca is with us, but Mom insisted on being able to bang the glass herself tonight.

Shayne’s already on the ice, chirping Miles, the two of them whacking each other’s sticks like overgrown children. Emma watches, smile on her face, like she just realized that she’s married to the world’s most overgrown child and she’s proud of it.

My eyes quickly move around the ice and abruptly stop at Brennan. He’s near center ice, stretching. Dropping down low on both knees, leaning into it and doing some sort of up and down motion that feels like torture to my…never mind. My brain short-circuits. God help me, the way his back flexes beneath his jersey should be a crime.

For a split second, I’m not imagining the ice beneath him. I’m imagining me. The slow, calculated thrusts, the intent stare that makes concentration look dangerously sexy…

I blink hard.

Nope.

Nope, nope, nope.

As if he can feel my eyes, he looks up and smirks. And then, because apparently subtlety isn’t in his vocabulary, he pulls his glove off and runs a hand through his hair and down the back of his neck, slow and deliberate. He knows exactly what he’s doing and he’s daring me to look away.

I don’t.

I can’t.

“Sweet mother of—” Jo whispers beside me. “Is he stretching or auditioning for a romance novel cover?”

“Shut up,” I hiss, though my voice cracks.

Just then, the little girl next to me squeals, her mom banging the glass in front of her. She’s tiny, no more than eight years old and the sign she’s holding is almost as big as she is. It reads:

It’s my birthday! #22 is my favorite, can I have a puck?

Brennan sees her immediately and skates over, tapping his stick against the boards before he tosses over a puck. The crowd near us cheers when she catches it, and her face lights up like it’s Christmas morning. He nods at her, smiling, and I watch her melt into the seat, eyes bulging out of her head with a permanent smile plastered to her face.

I get it, girl. I really do.

Just when I think he’s done, he skates away, only to turn right back around.

With another puck.

He glances up, eyes locking on me, and grins. I look around, trying not to lock in, but then he points at me and flips the puck over the glass.

It lands right in my lap perfectly on his first try, and the little girl gasps. The crowd around us “oohs” and Jo elbows me so hard I nearly drop it. I play it off, waving my hand like it wasn’t a big deal.

“He’s such an idiot,” I say, trying to hide the nerves and…whatever else I’m feeling right now.

“Uh-huh,” Emma says. “Sure. An idiot who just publicly flirted with you in front of fifteen thousand people.”

Mom leans forward, eyes wide. “Was that Brennan?”

Jo and Emma both answer in perfect unison. “Yup.”

I can feel the blush climbing up my neck. “It was friendly. He was just being nice to the kid.”

Jo smirks. “And her hot seat mate.”

I glare at her but can’t stop smiling. Because the truth is, the minute that puck landed in my lap, my heart did too.

The game starts, and from the second the puck drops, it’s pure adrenaline. We’re up against our rivals, the Tampa Bay Cyclones, and they’re not going down without a fight. Their forecheck is relentless, and every direction I look, one of our guys is getting thrown against the boards.

Miles lines up a perfect hip check on their star, Dmitry Ivanov, but Ivanov retaliates with a nasty cross-check, hard, right across the numbers on Miles’s back. It knocks the six-foot-four wall of muscle flat like he’s made of paper.