Seb

Perched as close to the edge of the bed as possible without falling on the floor, I yanked my shirt over my head and bent to shove my feet into my boots. The rustle of sheets behind me made me tense and I dropped my head into my hands, and propped my elbows on my knees. I knew what came next and for the millionth time wondered why I kept doing this to myself. There were a dozen other women, ready and willing, waiting for my call, yet I ended up at Amanda’s. Again. I'd made progress. I came around way less often than I used to, but still. Each time I did it I swore it would be the last. Until that damn familiar swell of fury blinded me and the knot of rage tightened in my chest. Then I would blink and discover my car in Amanda’s driveway.

Every damn time.

Wasn't there a saying about insanity? Something about doing the same thing over and over or something like that? Except, when my mood plummeted into darkness, when I needed a release as desperately as I did after last week’s debacle with Calloway, there was nothing sane about me. When I ended up in a place so black I couldn’t see a thing, Amanda was the only one I knew who could withstand—and enjoy—whatever I dished out.

A hand slid under my T-shirt and up my sweaty back. It took an extreme amount of self-restraint to stay still when I wanted to flinch, or worse, spin around, grab her hand, and squeeze. That wouldn't be good as I could quite easily break Amanda’s tiny bones. I'm the first one to admit I'm a bastard, and an even bigger one in bed, but I refuse to be a monster. The last thing I’d ever let happen was for the anger overtake me to the point I’d beat up on a woman. I would die before I sank to my father’s level. Besides, the incredible pounding I gave Amanda’s tight pussy less than five minutes ago satisfied my darker urges.

Until the rage came back. Which it always did.

“Leaving already, baby?”

Baby?

A second hand joined the first and this time, I couldn't help it. My muscles tensed and I jerked away, my back ramrod straight. The hands on my skin stilled, then slender fingers moved higher to grip my shoulders with a little more pressure than necessary.

“Jesus Christ, Seb. Again with this?”

I blew out a long breath and pushed to my feet. In hopes of putting off the inevitable, I cracked my neck and studiously ignored the rude scoffing sound Amanda made by digging my blunt fingernails into my palms.

Twitch, twitch, twitch.

She was skating awful damn close to the no-go zone. The knee-jerk, raw fury I had barely been able to contain over the last few days while on the road with the team might have been gone, temporarily subdued by a couple of hours of highly athletic and savage fucking, but that didn't mean it wouldn't, or couldn’t, immediately return.

It ticked me right the fuck off that Amanda was ruining my buzz. And being pissed, in turn, brought on a fresh round of eye spasms. Twitching away, I spun to face the stunning brunette who sat amongst a twisted pile of white sheets. Her green eyes narrowed and chaffed red lips pulled into a deep frown. I dropped my gaze to Amanda's wrists. She subtly massaged one of the raw circles of flesh. Lower, I noted finger-shaped bruises on the pale flesh of her hips.

Visual evidence of just how fucked in the head I am. The sight did nothing to help my current state of mind.

“Don't start with me, Mandy.” Frustrated, and furious that I was frustrated instead of relaxed like I was a minute ago, I ran a hand through my messy dark hair, then zipped my fly. “You know how this works. I'm not yours. You're not mine. Were not exclusive in any way.” I gestured back and forth between us as I searched for the rest of my things.

“Yeah, I know.”

Her morose tone caught my attention and I froze.

When did Mandy get so fucking whiny and clingy?

When you stopped acting like a human being and started treating her like a hole to stick your dick in, idiot.

I really was a bastard, and though I wouldn’t excuse my shitty behavior, Mandy knew the deal. We'd been non-exclusive fuck buddies going on two years, and agreed from the get-go that it would never be anything more.

Always on the lookout for new…outlets for my fits of anger, when Amanda Brooker came to work for the Comets as a corporate sales manager, all polished and professional and sexy as hell, she caught my eye. The second I spotted her I recognized the darkness we had in common, hidden by her smoking hot exterior and a brilliant mind. Instinctively, I knew I found a partner. One with similar demons. Someone damaged. Ruined. Fucked up in the head, like me. I asked her if she wanted to get a drink and the rest was history.

Until recently.

The changes began subtly. Amanda began to mention she had to get up super early and I might as well stay the night so we could squeeze in one more fuck in the morning. Me arriving for a quick screw only to find dinner laid out on the dining room table. Her acting like she wanted yet another round even when I, a professional athlete in peak physical condition, was so tapped out I could barely walk. “Please? Just lay down with me a little while and we can go again,” she'd say.

Merde. It was bullshit.

Everything she said was bullshit to manipulate me.

More recently, she'd dropped all pretenses and would flat out get angry when, like every single other time without fail, I got dressed before the jizz cooled. Nothing changed for me, but clearly something had changed for Amanda.

I started to speak, then hesitated. What if it really was me who changed, and not Amanda?

When we first started screwing, I responded to Amanda’s infrequent, but flirty texts. I chatted her up when I walked through the front door instead of immediately silencing her by crushing my mouth on top of hers in order to get straight to the sex. I remember I used to talk to her like she was a person, not an inanimate object or fuck toy. I'd also noticed—while pretending I hadn’t—that over the last few months, I wasn’t getting the same amount of satisfaction from fucking Amanda.

Not like I used to.

Maybe all of those reasons were why, over time, I'd withdrawn. Pushed her away and started to call some of the other women I had lined up, just so I wouldn't have to deal with her shit. Apparently the writing had been on the wall for a while, and as humiliating as it sounded, I was too chickenshit to cut Amanda loose. Plus, if I did, I'd still see her from time to time at the arena. We’d never have a clean break and I knew it.

So I wouldn't have to deal with the stress of an ex at work, I maintained just enough contact to keep Amanda invested, yet whittled our relationship down to the most basic of activities. No frills. No extras. Insert cock in hole, bust a nut, get dressed, leave. And obviously she had had enough.

I didn't blame her.

“I’m sorry.” I stared at my feet. Apologizing for doing nothing wrong made me angry. We had an arrangement. I kept my head down because if I had to look at Amanda's face while apologizing, when she was the one who broke her end of the deal, it would set me off. What infuriated me the most was that I just finished fucking the mountain of issues out of my system, and here she was riling me all up again. It was imperative I remained calm.

“Fuck off, Seb. Just go.”

“Mandy —”

“Go!”

Her voice cracked and, though I knew it made me the king of all pricks, I found my jacket, snatched my phone and keys off the nightstand, and left, not once meeting Amanda’s eyes or sparing a glance back. I tried to persuade myself not to worry. She was just an outlet, a piece of pussy.

Yeah, I failed spectacularly.

Seated in my truck I began the five mile, traffic riddled, road rage inducing drive across Atlanta to the W.

Fury, fighting, and fucking.

Those were the only three things I took pleasure in, and after dealing with Amanda, I had to admit even those were beginning to lose their shine. Naïve as I had been at the time, I honestly believed the day my father was gone, permanently, would be the day my life became normal. I barked out a humorless laugh. Right. The bastard might be gone but the scars he inflicted remained, and they went bone-fucking deep.

There would never be more to life for me than a hollow empty feeling. One that swung the pendulum between rage and nothing. I was damaged goods.

Damaged. Fucking. Goods.

And always would be.

At least I had something to look forward to. After failing to administer Calloway’s well deserved beat down, and breaking things off with Amanda, in less than twenty-four hours, I'd once again come face-to-face with Rocco “Sasquatch” Calloway. A glittering diamond on the pile of dogshit of my life. Tomorrow night I got another chance to break Calloway’s ribs.

Despite the inherent glee from the image of busting up Sasquatch, the stress from the sequence of events caused the black cloud to return. The gaping emptiness I screwed out of my system filled back up as the twisted darkness took root and grew.

Twitch, twitch, twitch.

I swatted at my stupid eye while dodging an idiot in an overloaded pickup truck, thoughts of the Beverly Hillbillies popping into my head. Naturally, the constant eye spasms brought back a barrage of negative memories and my mood plummeted further. By the time I pulled into the W Hotel's parking garage, the atmosphere in the cab of my truck was so fucking cold I wouldn't have been surprised to find icicles on the ceiling. The ache in my chest flared and I scratched at it as if I could make it stop. I fucked away my issues with Amanda and already felt like I was going to explode. The cycle was exhausting.

While waiting for the elevator, I thought about my pathetic excuse for a life and realized, if I didn't have Rémy, hockey, and my teammates, I wouldn't have anything.

* * *

“You really are a bastard, you know that?”

I slouched further down in my seat on the private jet the Comets used to fly us around the country and kicked Evvy in the shin. I should have kept my damn mouth shut about breaking it off with Amanda, but I guess I needed to tell someone. Being an island only got me so far and Ev was the only one who knew enough about my demons to understand.

“You're supposed to be on my side, Evvy.”

Calvin Everette got called up the same year as me. As rookies, they paired us up to room together on road trips. I despised Ev on sight and didn't hesitate to tell him exactly what I thought. Evvy responded by popping me in the mouth, giving me a fat lip. I reciprocated. After wiping off the blood, we exchanged begrudging respect for one another and have been best friends ever since. Maybe it wasn't the normal start of a friendship, but it had lasted seven years and counting. With the exception of my brother, Ev was my longest relationship.

That was pretty fucking sad, and it said a lot about me.

Evvy chuckled and thumped me in the bicep. “If you want someone to suck up to your inflated ego and agree with everything you say, you're barking up the wrong tree.” He lowered his voice and shifted closer. “You know you're going to run into Amanda every now and then, dude. I'm just sayin’, you could have been nicer going about dumping her.”

“I didn't dump her,” I hissed. “We were fuck buddies, that's it.”

Ev snorted. “Yeah. If you consider the shit you’re into to be fucking.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” I leaned toward him, offended by his choice of words. Evvy was the only person in the world who knew about me. Everything about me. Rémy knew a lot, but there were certain things I never wanted my brother to find out. With Ev, I didn't have to edit things out. He knew my past, my childhood, and my screwed up way of dealing with things. While I knew Evvy didn't judge what I did in bed as long as it was with a consenting adult, it stung to hear what he really thought.

Evvy shrugged. “Don't get all bent out of shape. You know I don't care if you have massive orgies and use your dick to swing from the chandelier, as long as you show up and play hockey. Just…” The drawn out pause made my hackles rise.

“Just what?”

“I dunno, man. You gotta wonder about a chick who likes that shit.”

My jaw dropped. “Who are you and what have you done with my friend?”

Seriously. Ev isn't a deep thoughts kind of guy. That's why I like him. He's fun, easy to be around, and rolls with the punches. The fact that he put any thought whatsoever into the mindset of my sexual partners was disturbing to say the least. Evvy turned and stared at me, his hazel eyes so somber, my stomach dropped.

“Dude, you can't tell me you've never been curious why the women you screw her into… You know.” He made a rolling motion with his hand.

“Into what, Evvy? If you're trying to make a point, have the balls to say it out loud.”

Evvy’s gaze darted around then he tilted his head closer to me. "Shhh. Lower your voice, Sebby.”

I grimaced, but knew he was right. I definitely didn't want any of our teammates eavesdropping on our conversation. A conversation I couldn't believe I was having.

“Women who are into being tied down and hurt during sex, that's what you mean, right?”

Evvy’s cheeks reddened. “Well, yeah. What's going on up here for them to want that?” He tapped the side of his head.

I sat back and sighed. “No. To be honest, I've never given any thought. It’s difficult enough to find someone who's not only willing and able, but knows how to keep her mouth shut afterward. So no, I don't care why they like it, just that they let me do it.” I left unspoken the part where I figured my partners were probably just as screwed up as me. Which said a lot.

Evvy laughed. “Back to what I said before. You're a real bastard.”

That comment earned him another sharp kick to the shin.

“They don't call me The Sinner for nothing, Evvy.”

My tone was joking, but I knew damn well there was nothing funny about any of it. The darkness that lived inside me, the crushing guilt, the cold, detached manner in which I treated Amanda and any other woman who temporarily warmed my sheets. What did it say about me that I didn't know most of their names, and not only that, I didn't give a flying fuck? Ev was right. Why would any sane female put up with my shit?

But like I told Evvy, I had enough of my own problems. I couldn’t worry about the baggage someone else carried around. What I had with my sexual partners was always mutual. I got relief from the intense, aching pressure in my chest, and they got their kicks from being held down and hurt a little. End of story. The day I gave it any more thought was the day I jumped off a cliff. The careful juggling of the various aspects of my life would get all disturbed, and then the whole thing would come crashing down on my head.

No. I was better off doing things my way. Besides, without my coping methods, my carefully chosen “outlets,” considering the violent way I reacted to stress, I'd end up fighting everyone I met instead of fucking them out with a hot chick. And if I did that, my career would be over. Then I wouldn't be able to watch out for Rémy. I'd been down that road once before and more than ten years later I still struggled with guilt over leaving my brother alone.

Never again.

Mindless fucks it is.