Bottles & Blades (Eagles Hockey: Oak Ridge Vineyards #1)

Chapter 10

Ten

Jean-Michel

In a single heartbeat, the negotiation has shifted.

From me in control to her.

Normally, I would fucking hate that.

Normally, I would wrench control right back.

But there’s something about the light that’s weaved its way through her expression that has me biting back my urge to take over again.

She’s never been kissed—well, had never been kissed.

She’s a virgin.

She spent most of her life in a fucking hospital.

She lives in a tiny apartment, is worried about a couple of dishes and some clutter and is studying languages.

She deserves a little bit of light, a little bit of control.

So, I lean back against the couch cushion, mirroring her position, cramming my legs beneath me when all I want to do is lay them straight on the small ass sofa and draw her against my chest, wrap my arms around her, bury my face in her hair.

This is dumb as fuck.

Being here like this, with a woman like her.

Too young. Too sweet. Too fucking tempting.

And yet…my ass is glued to the goddamned cushion.

She opens her mouth, and I can already see that the light dancing across her face is fading, insecurity creeping back in.

A pang in my chest.

The words just flow out of me.

“Sometimes I hate my life.”

Her eyes go wide, but I’m still talking.

“I know that makes me sound like an asshole. I have a life most people would dream of. I get to spend my time working on the things I love.”

“What are those?” she asks softly.

“Hockey. I own the Eagles,” I add when her brow furrows. “And wine.” I nod to bottle, take in the beauty of her expression gentling, that lush mouth tipping up at the corners.

“Well,” she says, and fuck, the humor that slides back into her eyes has my heart squeezing, “I’m more of a Gold fan, but your wine is good.”

I chuckle. “Brutal, buttercup.”

“Why do you call me that?”

“Because you smell like one.” I tilt my head, studying her when she frowns. “What?”

“Well,” she says slowly, “buttercups don’t really have a scent.”

I take her hand. “They do.” I tap my nose. “It’s my job to know these things.”

“With your wine?”

I nod. “You smell like buttercups, baby. Well, like one particularly special variety. It’s a soft scent, like most of those types of flowers, a gentle mix of citrus and rose, but it’s one of my favorites.”

“What’s its name?”

“Of the flower?”

“Yeah,” she whispers.

“It’s called the Ranunculus Persian Buttercup.”

“Fancy name for a buttercup.”

My mouth tips up. “Sometimes it’s the simplest things that are the most valuable.”

Her chest inflates and our eyes hold for a long, long moment.

Then she asks, so quietly I can barely hear it, “Did you learn that in your business dealings?”

“No,” I admit, telling her something else I’ve never told anyone. “I learned it when my wife left my daughter and I.”

Her face gentles. “You have a daughter?”

“Yeah,” I murmur.

“How old?”

“Would it bother you if I told you she’s about your age?”

She tilts her head to the side. “Why would it bother me?”

“I’m too old for you.”

Silence falls. Then she sighs softly. “I learned a lot while I was in the hospital, and far too much of it was about life being unfair. There are rules we’re supposed to follow, and some of them make sense, but a lot of them don’t—like why little kids get cancer, and why they sometimes die, and why health care in this country means taking out a predatory second mortgage on a house.”

I make a mental look to check into that.

And not just for Tiff.

“And so,” she says, “I learned that sometimes it’s okay to ignore the rules.”

“My buttercup is a rulebreaker?”

Her cheeks go pink. “In some things,” she whispers.

Christ.

I can’t resist it.

I give in to the urge to reach forward, to wrap my arms around her middle, and recline back against the armrest on my side of the couch, gathering her against my chest.

She doesn’t fight the change in position.

Instead, she exhales, then relaxes against me.

As though she trusts me.

As though she’d been wanting this too.

Fuck, that sits deep…and fuck I like it there.

“What about your life do you hate?” she asks into the quiet that falls between us.

“Forget it,” I say softly, stroking a hand down her spine. “It doesn’t matter.”

She pushes on my chest, lifting up enough to meet my stare. “Why do you think your feelings don’t matter?”

It doesn’t escape me that this is an insane conversation to be having.

I don’t know her.

And yet, I can’t shut it down, can’t get up from the couch, can’t walk out that door.

“Tell me more about school,” I say softly, tucking a strand of dark, brown hair behind her ear.

Her eyes sharpen, those plump lips parting, but before she can call me on my obvious attempt at changing the subject there’s a knock at the door.

No.

A pounding .

Loud enough that it shatters any of the mellowness that’s descended between us over the last hour.

Hard enough that it vibrates through the wood, through the walls.

The lock rattles, and I narrow my eyes at it. What a piece of shit . But that thought is here and gone in a second.

Because it seems like it might give way.

I stiffen, start to sit up.

Then a voice echoes through the wood.

A male voice.

I’m not starting to sit up.

I’m on my fucking feet, Tiff beside me.

I steady her than move toward the door.

“Wait,” Tiff says, snagging my hand before I get more than a couple of paces away. “Just ignore him.” Her fingers tighten. “If you ignore him, he’ll go away.”

Right.

I’ve now gone from annoyed to worried to fucking pissed to?—

Ready to commit murder.

“Who’s he? ” I grit out.

“Dave lives three apartments down,” she says. “Most of the times he leaves me alone…”

“And the other times?”

Her throat works.

“Baby,” I warn.

“He does this.” A nod to the door, her words so soft they’re barely audible over the man yelling in the hallway. “Knocks and yells and eventually stumbles his drunk behind into his apartment.”

“Right,” I mutter.

“Right what?”

I gently untangle our hands, nudge her back. “Stay here.”

“Jean-Michel?—”

But I’m already moving to the door, undoing the lock, and throwing it open.

The dickhead on the other side is exactly what I fucking expect him to look like. Bloodshot eyes, wrinkled clothes, hair that’s oily and standing on end, and—Christ—the smell of liquor coming off him hits me like a ton of bricks.

He wavers on his feet, staggers back a step. “Who the fuck are you?” he slurs.

“Right,” I say again.

And then I move.