Nick

It’s not often that half the team descends on Chester Green’s at once, but we’re doing it in spectacular fashion tonight. We’re taking up the entire back wall of the bar between the team, girlfriends, and wives. Zeus has claimed Frey’s baby and is telling everyone that she gets her good looks from her mother’s side of the family. You wouldn’t think a baby would turn half a hockey team into sappy dorks, but we’re all making funny faces at her and fighting over who makes her smile the biggest.

“I can’t wait until you and Joey have babies,” Gracie, Frey’s wife and Zeus’s sister-in-law, tells Zeus. “It’ll be good for your ego.”

She grins while she says it, and everyone laughs.

Everyone except Ares, who’s shaking his head like nothing will ever cure Zeus of his ego.

We’re on our second round of drinks when the door flings open and a familiar brunette hustles inside, head bent over her phone. She pauses just long enough to talk to the hostess and point to the bar, then ducks her head again and charges for an open seat.

I track her movements, sliding a glance at Felicity, who’s whispering and laughing with Gracie.

Felicity’s back’s to the door.

Kami hasn’t spotted us.

So unless the two of them are texting—which isn’t likely, seeing as Felicity’s not making any move to grab her phone—then I’m the only one who realizes we’re all in the same building.

And I don’t like that Kami’s all dressed up, or that she’s frowning, or that she just threw back a shot.

I stand up so fast my chair tips and clatters, which makes everyone look at me.

“Gotta piss,” I announce.

Felicity rolls her eyes.

Zeus stands. “Yeah, me too,” he says.

My lips part and my eyes bulge, because we don’t go to the fucking bathroom together like a flock of women.

The entire table busts up into laughter, and he lowers himself carefully back into the seat, still holding the baby. “Just shitting you, Murphy. Should see the look on your face.”

Fucker’s going down.

But everyone goes back to talking, and nobody pays any attention to me walking off toward the john. Or any attention to me switching paths and sliding onto the stool next to Kami.

“Don’t tell me some fucker stood you up,” I say.

She jumps, hand to her throat, and her eyes fly to me.

And then they go even wider than they already were.

She moves to hide her phone, but not before I get a quick look at her text messages. Every cell in my body freezes, and my muscles tense like I’m getting ready for a fight.

“Why the fuck are you texting someone about Felicity’s ex-dick?”

“Mind your own business,” she snaps.

She shoves her phone in her coat pocket and grimaces like she’s in pain. When she pulls her hand out again, I realize her knuckles are red and swelling.

“Kami?” Fury is washing through me, because I don’t know what happened, but something did. And whatever the fuck happened, I’m going to make sure it never happens again.

“Just a mistake,” she mutters. “I handled it.”

She flinches when I touch her hand, but she doesn’t pull it back while I lift her knuckles for closer inspection.

“This is how you handled it?” I growl.

She tosses her hair back and straightens her shoulders. “Maybe.”

I feel somebody watching me, so I glance back at the team table. Jaeger’s staring. He pokes Lavoie, who looks at me too.

“Come here,” I grunt, and before she can object, I’m pulling her into the back hall. I stop outside the women’s restroom.

“I handled it, Nick,” she repeats, but she’s cradling her injured hand, and I’m seeing red.

“Where is he?” I demand.

“Probably nursing his ego and getting his nose realigned. It was a blind date, okay? Neither one of us knew, we both agreed it was a mistake, and I handled it.”

“Did your cousin set that up?”

“My dating life is none of your business.”

“The fuck it isn’t.”

There’s nothing sweet in her brown eyes now. It’s all lightning and suppressed fury. “Do you want kids, Nick? I want three. And I want a little house in the country where I can have chickens and goats and cows if I want to, and I want to go to PTA meetings and soccer games and buy matching outfits for our annual Christmas picture. And I want to fall into bed every night with a man who worships me, not someone who settled for me because I’m convenient. And that man, Nick Murphy, is not you.”

I’ve never wanted to settle down in my life, but there’s no fucking way I’m letting Kami go. I can’t explain it. Not to her. Not to myself.

But I want her.

I grab her at the waist before I realize I’ve moved, and I capture her mouth with mine. I’m devouring her lips, gripping her ass in one hand, her hair in the other, tasting the tequila still lingering on her tongue. She whimpers, but she’s kissing me back and gripping my shirt like she’ll drown if she doesn’t.

Kissing Kami is like having an ice cream sundae for dessert. Like watching the sun rise in paradise. Like holding the cup after winning the championship.

Glory. Beauty. Perfection.

Her skin is silky soft. Her tongue so eager. Those little moans and gasps when I rake my fingers over her ass utterly enthralling.

The idea that she might’ve let someone else kiss her like this tonight is enough to make my blood boil.

The idea that it was Felicity’s stalking asshole ex makes something else entirely hammer through my chest.

But Kami’s safe.

She’s with me.

She’s—“Oof.”

The sucker punch to the gut takes me by surprise.

But it’s nothing compared to the disgust curling her lip as she backs away, rubbing her hand again. “Do. Not. Kiss. Me.”

“I—” I stammer.

But I stop.

Because her chin is wobbling, her eyes are going shiny, and the disgust is giving way to pain.

Something sears my chest and leaves a hollow ache behind as she turns on her heel and marches back down the hallway. I trail after her in a daze, and even watching her march up to Ares, tap him on the shoulder, and whisper something doesn’t immediately snap me out of it.

Ares leaps to his feet. Felicity whips her head around until she finds me, her eyes going first round, then narrowing into such narrow slits that half the guys at the table squirm.

I’m pretty much a dead man.

And I don’t care.