Mackenzie
As soon as I woke up I knew something was different. The sun was out and it had stopped snowing. I was also alone.
Jake was gone.
I sat up and looked around. The cabin was empty, although there was a fresh log on the fire. I shivered and realized I was naked. That’s when the previous night’s lovemaking came tumbling back to me. Me shaving Jake and then grinding against the bulge of his erection until I came on his lap. Jake lifting me up and carrying me to the bed where he lay me down. Him ripping open the condom wrapper with his teeth and rolling the thin film of latex over the head of his cock and down the thick shaft. His fierce kissing. His magnificent, naked body. His talented hands and tongue . . . his glorious cock and what he did to me with it.
My body throbbed at the memory. The way his naked body slid across mine. The rhythm of his hips as he pushed into me. The warmth of his abs against mine. The curl of his fingers as they entwined with mine above my head. The gentle whisper of his breath on my throat as he moaned desperately in my ear. Warmth spread through me and I began to pulse with the need to revisit all those things. And I couldn’t help but smile. Even if I had crossed the line separating client and lover I wouldn’t change one thing about last night.
Because in the glow of what we had done I simply didn’t care.
Heat swirled through me as the previous night continued to unfurl. The way he moved into me, slow and controlled, his deep, tortured moan warming the soft curve of my neck. The lingering scent of shaving cream on his skin. The taste of him on my tongue. The sheer strength of him as he filled me. Him tangling his fingers through my hair and the sensation of him gripping the base of my skull. The sound of his moan, deep and urgent as he came.
Grabbing my discarded shirt from the end of the bed, and other pieces of clothing littered across the floor, I dressed quickly and went to the window over the little sink in the kitchen. I wasn’t going to think about the consequences of what I had done. Not today. Not when I felt so . . . unbroken.
Parting the curtains, I looked out onto the bright wintery day. A pristine layer of snow had fallen overnight and blanketed as far as the eye could see but the sun was trying to break througfh the gossamer sky and cast a warm glow across the snowscape.
In the distance, something caught my attention out on the pond. I squinted my eyes. It was Jake.
And he was in skates.
I will never skate again.
The awareness zipped across my brain like a firecracker, and hope and promise curled in my heart. Jake was on the ice. Jake was skating. Jake had changed his mind.
I picked up my phone from the table and shrugged on my coat and gloves.
I will never play hockey again.
He had said that. He had really said that. Yet there he was on the ice.
I rushed from the cabin and frosty air slapped my cheeks so I pulled my coat around me tighter and headed out into the winter wonderland. Snow crunched beneath my boots as I passed by the tall pines flanking the pond. Smaller than Moose Lake, the pond sat on the other side of an alpine grove and was no bigger than a hockey rink
As I got closer I could see Jake more clearly on the ice. He was skating without effort, his hockey stick playing with the puck as he tore across the frozen pond with effortless speed.
When I made it to the top of a small rise just short of the pond, I stopped to watch. Without thinking I took out my phone and started to record Jake’s impressive moves. He was as fast as the wind, his feet fluid as he changed direction, stepping and turning with ease. It was like he was dancing with the puck across the ice, toying with it with his hockey stick, gliding freely across the glittering ice. He was so mesmerizing, I let my phone drop to my hip so I could take it all in. The gliding. The chattering. The hop stepping. The harsh turns that ripped up the ice and sprayed powder in a cloud across the frozen pond.
“Look at you . . .” I whispered.
Jake hadn’t lost it.
Suddenly the idea that Jake would carry the Galveston Fury to the playoffs wasn’t such a crazy idea after all.
Excited, I ran down the hill to the edge of the pond and when he saw me he skated over to me. Emotion burst in my chest when I looked up into his freshly shaven face. I hadn’t seen him in the daylight without his beard. He wasn’t just beautiful. He was devastating.
“You look like you were having fun,” I said.
He grinned and it shot desire right through me. And I wondered if it would be too forward of me to drag him back to the log cabin and revisit all the things we had done the night before.
“Maybe.” He winked and then cast his eye around him as if he was taking in the beauty of the weather. “I couldn’t sleep.”
“Oh, yeah?”
His eyes glittered down at me. “Yeah. You were snoring so I—”
I gave him a friendly punch to the chest. “I don’t snore!”
He chuckled. “I am so going to record it.”
I couldn’t help but grin. “You’ll do no such thing, you weirdo!”
We smiled at each other and something shimmered between us. Something magical, something so amazing it made my stomach turn and twist with excitement. It was a strange feeling, one that was completely alien and it spiraled through to the very core of me. I grabbed my lower lip with my teeth and sucked in a deep breath as the air around us crackled with whatever was happening between us.
“So what inspired you to try them on for size?” I asked, gesturing toward his skates because I was so desperate to break the spellbinding gaze holding us. “I thought you didn’t skate anymore?” I teased, squinting up at him.
That irresistible grin of his deepened his dimples. “Z, you showed me your rack. Serenaded me with Olivia Newton-John. And then threw yourself in the pond—”
“It wasn’t so much as a throw . . . more like a plummet to my death, kinda thing.”
“Whatever. Throw. Plummet. The point is, I owe you a skate, so here I am.” On skates he towered over me and when he looked down at me his face was full of affection. “You also kissed me,” he said softly. “So it’s the least I can do.”
The way he said it made my cheeks burn.
Flustered, I bit the inside of my mouth and managed a mumble, “You kinda kissed me.”
He grinned again. But this time there was something more to it. Heat filled his gaze and as he leaned in closer so I could feel the warmth of his breath on my cheek. “Uh-uh. You kissed me. And then you got off on my lap.”
Now my cheeks really burned and I figured a second plummet into the icy waters wouldn’t be quite so bad about then. “We both got off with me on your lap.”
He grinned but his eyes were dark and his voice was low and husky. “And it was incredible. Watching you come as you rubbed yourself against me. Making me want you. Making me hard.” He leaned even closer. “Then making me come.”
Oh, boy.
Remembering the orgasms, my body fluttered with a thousand tiny pulses. Remembering what he did to my body as he made love to me gave me goosebumps over every inch of my skin. Muscles clenched and I felt an overwhelming need to feel him inside me again. I closed my eyes against my desire, afraid Jake would see—afraid they would betray me and reveal just how much I wanted him.
“You saved my life. So it seemed kind of appropriate,” I whispered.
His eyes glittered down at me in the early morning light. And when he smiled his teeth were white and perfectly straight as they sat on his bottom lip.
He literally took my breath away.
“Tell me, do I get to kiss you again?” he asked and I heard the hiss of air as he inhaled deeply, like the thought did things to him. “Because I really want to.”
My mouth parted, willing it to happen. “You do?”
I didn’t know why I was being so coy. But Jake Pennington did things to me that no other man had ever done. He made me nervous because he was just so damn beautiful.
“Hell, yeah, I want to kiss you…” He cocked a brow as he looked down at me, inching closer so I could feel his warmth against me. “. . . and all the rest.”
Suddenly I was a slave to the heat throbbing between my thighs, and I couldn’t move. All I wanted was for him to touch me. And more. So much more. I wanted him to take me back to that cabin and do all the things he’d done to me the night before. I was desperate to feel it. The heat. The soft warmth of his abs as he pushed into me. The feeling of fullness when he was inside of me.
But I didn’t get to respond because five kids appeared from the pocket of trees beside the pond and skated up to us, the fifth one slamming his small body into Jake’s legs. They excitedly began to tease Jake, asking him who I was, would I play hockey with them and was I his girlfriend?
Jake did quick introductions. They were five of the eight Redwing children. The twins, Samara and Luka, were about eight or nine, and they were holding onto the youngest of the group, Locky, who Samara announced was four. Next was ten-year-old Emma, and then the oldest of the group was twelve-year-old Nathaniel.
They were masters on skates. Except Locky, who, despite being confident for his age, still looked like a newborn foal learning to walk.
“Will you play with us, Jake?” Nathaniel asked keenly.
“We could have a team of three,” Emma said.
Jake looked at me with a face that said how can I refuse?
But before they could start playing, Billy appeared, and again, I was taken back by how huge he was.
“I could hardly hold them back when they saw you were out here,” he said to Jake, gesturing to his children who were now pushing a puck around the pond.
Jake nodded toward Nathaniel who had control of it. “Looks like you’ve got a Gretsky on your hands.”
“Here’s hoping.” Billy turned to me smiled, his eyes crinkling at the sides and his face bright with warmth and kindness. “Nice to see you again.”
“You, too.”
He turned back to Jake. “I need a favor.”
“Sure, anything.”
“Overnight, one of the grey pines fell down on the wood nook and it’s caved in. I was hoping you’d help me break it up and patch the roof.”
My heart dipped a little. Damn. I was hoping to get Jake back to the cabin and naked, stat. But what they were talking about sounded like it might take them a while.
Jake didn’t hesitate. “I’ll bring the chainsaw. It will make light work of it.”
“Alice said there’s a dinner and some maple syrup pie in it for you.” Again, Billy turned to look at me. “My wife’s a good cook and Sasquatch here is a fool for her maple syrup pie. We’d both love it if you’d join us.”
I looked at Jake who was waiting for my response.
“Sure. I’d love to come to dinner.” I smiled brightly.
“Looks like you’ve got yourself a deal,” Jake said.
When Billy left, Jake glided across the small patch of ice between us.
“You’re going to love Alice’s maple syrup pie,” he said.
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.” His smile faded. “There’s just one thing. . .”
“What?”
“It’ll be dark when we get back,” he said.
“Meaning?” I couldn’t hide the hope from my voice.
“Meaning you’re going to have to stay another night.” The way he was looking at me and the tone in his voice told me so much more than what his words did. They told me that last night was only a hint of what was to come.
The tension in my stomach instantly vanished and was replaced by a swooping excitement.
I got one more night.
One more night with Jake.
* * *