Present Day
A quiet tension had fallen across the table, but I hadn’t noticed it at first. Typically, I was good at that sort of thing. Feeling out the dynamic, seeing a play before it happens, tuning in to the opponent’s line and realizing the weak link and taking advantage, but I was too busy trying to hear above the pounding of my own pulse, too drawn into her eyes to realize I might’ve made a huge fucking mistake approaching her.
“Wow.” Her smile faltered as the guy sitting next to her draped his arm possessively behind her chair. “I never thought—”
“I’d see you again.” I finished the sentence for her, hiding the nervous candor of my voice behind my grin. I kept my focus though and rested my hand on the high-top table. “You look good.”
Stevie’s lips lifted at the corners as her gaze lingered, at first on my face, my mouth, and then lazily down my body as if she couldn’t believe I was standing here. The feeling was mutual.
“Who’s your friend?” the guy sitting next to her asked, regarding me in a way that if we’d been on the ice I would’ve thought about punching his teeth in. All condescension and bravado.
One of the other suits almost spit his beer all over the table at the question. Fuck, he recognized me. “You have to be kidding. Ben, you’re not that out of the loop, are you?”
Ben.
Shit.
That possessiveness made sense, and I felt a twinge of guilt. She’d only said his name a few times the night I’d met her, but I’d never forgotten it. He was the reason I hadn’t taken what I wanted. The reason that drum in my heart stopped beating and that familiar feeling of loss, the feeling I got when I was sure I had the win but shot too wide. She was his.
Stevie’s eyes fell to her friends across the table. Confusion cinching her brows together. “What are you talking about, Alec? Out of the loop?”
I clenched my jaw waiting for the hammer to drop, or maybe my heart. I hated the fucker who was about to unveil me, show me off, and ruin everything. The third guy, not Alec, not the whistleblower, kept his head down avoiding my stare as his friend plowed along. Alec’s excitement, his inner fan, started to unravel. Most people tried to pretend not to be affected by the “stardom” of a celebrity or an athlete. It wasn’t arrogance, it was a fact. Eventually, the cool exterior people held onto cracked and faded and exposed their intentions.
“You guys…” Alec sent a glare around the table before giving me an apologetic smile. “Mark Carmelo…” Stevie’s eyes widened when he said my name.
Her face blanched. I could almost hear the question in her eyes. Why did her friend know my name? Several emotions played across her features. Anxiety, confusion, and finally as he said, “He’s a starting forward for Tampa Bay.” Something akin to mortification settled inside her eyes.
“And I’m supposed to know what—”
She cut Ben off with a whispered, “Hockey?”
Her face—that fear and wonder swirling in her stormy eyes—was precisely why I’d never wanted Stevie to know when I’d first met her who I was. I’d wanted our moment to be pure of that infectious expectation. I’d been just a guy in a bar, hitting on a beautiful woman, and it had been hands down one of the most bittersweet nights of my life. I couldn’t lie and say I hadn’t thought about her, about the what-ifs, over the past year. It was like the whole thing had been some sort of dream. Like I’d conjured her from my winning-night high.
Stevie sitting at that table—she was the most stunning woman I’d ever seen.
Her husband’s shrewd eyes judged me as he asked her, “Since when do you watch hockey?” He took stock of my six-foot-one, two-hundred-plus-pound frame, my lean muscle, my easy-going smile, my ink. I was his polar opposite with his clean cut, starched shirt. If everything Stevie had told me was true about him, he wouldn’t know I was more her type than he was. Then again, Ben had known her for almost half of their lives, and I was just some punk jock who’d stolen a moment, and it would appear he was a lot smarter than she gave him credit for. I’d jumped the gun. I should’ve never stepped foot at this table.
She shook her head. Her eyes on mine. Her mouth opening and then closing, unable to give him an answer.
I jumped in and saved her. “No, if I remember correctly you didn’t even know Tampa had a hockey team,” I said with a smirk and my blood thrummed as she blushed.
Her friends laughed, but it was Alec who chimed in, his star-struck eyes fully exposed. “Now that you’ve moved back, we’ll have to catch a game.”
“You moved back?” I asked without tamping down my enthusiasm. Unfortunately, her husband keyed into that, too.
Ben’s voice pitched an octave higher as he asked, “How do you guys know each other?”
“Last year, when I came to visit.” She spoke softly only for him and that quiet tension became a loud thunder.
“I hit on her friend, shit, what was her name?” The lie felt wrong, but I had the urge to protect our short amount of time together. It was ours and nothing had happened. No point in putting her in front of the firing squad.
“Reagan?” Ben smiled and his shoulders relaxed.
“Yeah, her. She blew me off,” I joked, but Stevie’s stare held the truth of that night and it nearly knocked me on my ass. All that desire, it was still there in her eyes.
“This is surreal. I’m a huge fan.” Alec’s friend finally spoke up.
I held out my hand trying to regain some footing and my manners. “If I have everyone’s names correct, it’s Ben, Alec, and—”
“Oh, sorry.” Stevie’s confidence thrilled me as she straightened her spine and commanded the table’s attention. “This is my new boss, Trenton—”
“Just Trent.” He held out his hand and I shook it. “Trenton sounds—”
“Pompous,” Alec’s jab made Trent chuckle.
I offered my hand to Alec next and he took his turn.
“I have to admit, I’m not a huge hockey fan, but it’s cool as hell to meet you.” Alec’s grip was firmer than I figured it to be. “Grab a seat, you should join us, have a beer—”
“I was actually about to take off, early morning practice, but I wanted to say hi to Stevie.”
She glanced up at me from under her lashes. We were stuck inside that bubble from a year ago. The electricity she fed me through that one look was enough to tell me if we had our chance, I’d never get her out of my fucking system. Her husband’s arm no longer lingered across the back of her chair. His attention not as pin-point after my little fib. I didn’t miss that he never offered me his hand, though. Maybe he wasn’t that gullible after all.
“You have to leave?” she asked, and I internally cheered at her disappointment.
I rubbed the back of my neck. “I do. It was good to see you, though.” I wasn’t sure if that was true. My temptation, in the same city, and fucking married.
“It really was.” Her smile felt private, and God, I needed to touch her face, her cheeks were burning and I wanted to see if they felt warm. My fingers twitched so I slid them into my pockets. She took the last sip of her wine and pushed back from the table, her chair grating against the floor. “I’m going to grab another glass.”
“I can—”
“I got it, Ben.” Her tone lost the soft edge it’d held for me. “Walk with me?”
I shrugged despite my rising surprise. “Sure.”
I gave the guys a wave and a nice to meet you, ignoring the way Ben ignored me.
Stevie led me to the front of the bar and I followed behind, loving the way her hips swayed in her form-fitting skirt. My fantasy of her behind a desk played loud and clear in my head. I had to snap the hell out of it. This chick was married. Unavailable. Unobtainable.
She stopped abruptly and turned to face me once we were no longer in the line of sight of her table. She was breathing fast and the flush in her cheeks bled into her lips. “You’re a professional hockey player?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes!” Her tone was petulant and kind of cute.
“Why?” My lips broke into a playful grin as I toyed with a few stray pieces of her hair. It was stupid, but I had to touch her, it might be the only time I’d ever have the chance to again. “You don’t even like hockey.” She bit her lip, and I let the strands of her hair slide from between my thumb and forefinger. I expelled a long breath, a wakeup call, and slipped my hands back into my pockets.
“I dumped my life in your lap, Mark.” My name sounded way too good on her tongue. “I feel stupid that I didn’t—”
“You needed to vent and it was nice not having to deal with the whole—”
“I’m a famous person thing.”
I chuckled. “Yeah. It can be a pain in the ass.”
She puffed out a nervous laugh. “I guess it could be.”
My smile fell as the laughter from her table drifted over to where we were standing, reminding me we were not alone. “You guys worked things out? Moved back?”
“No.” Her eyes were filled with something I couldn’t read. The blue burst was alive when she said, “We got divorced.” Divorced. The word was that first drop of water after an hour on the treadmill. Relief. And I felt terrible for thinking that way. “We’ve literally been in town for four days, he’s only here because I needed help moving. He convinced Trenton to hire me on temporarily until I can find another firm to work for, or prove I know what I’m doing.”
“How long?”
“Have we been separated?” She dropped her eyes to the floor. “About a month after I met you, actually. Divorce was finalized three months ago.”
My body gravitated toward hers. “Are you okay with everything?”
“It’s been a long year.” Her smile was sad, but as she raised her head, her eyes shimmered. “I’m happier than I was, that’s a good thing. I’m finding my way. Stevie West rises again.” Her laugh was sweet and I wanted to taste it.
Stevie West.
She was finding new ground, and I should let her be, but I took another step closer. “Nothing to hold you back?” I handed her the same words from a year ago and she laughed.
“I guess not.”
“I want to call you.”
“You do?” She sucked in an anxious breath.
I nodded, keeping my cool when all I wanted to do was say, fuck yeah. “I’m leaving in a couple days. We have three road games but I’ll be back next Friday and I want to see you.”
I’d only met her once, spent one night getting to know her, and now she was free to get to know me. Hell if I didn’t want that more than the win we’d lost tonight. It could’ve been that my bed had been cold more often than not these days. The start of the season made it difficult to have a personal life. It also made it hard to avoid my ex, and generally put me in a fuck-off kind of mood. My apartment, my bed, was an inhospitable environment. But Stevie, with those lips I wanted to touch, and hips I wanted to lose myself in… yeah, for her, I’d make an exception.
She hesitated, and I waited as the beat of her pulse became visible in the slight crook of her neck. She stepped back an inch giving herself room to breathe. The physical pull we shared was something I hadn’t encountered with anyone else, and I was glad that it hadn’t been there only because she’d been off limits. Stevie wet her lips, and the sexy curve of her mouth sent a jolt of anticipation down my spine as she smiled and said, “I think I’d really like to see you, too.”