Friendzone Hockey (Heartbreak Hockey #4)

Chapter 10

Chapter

Ten

THEN

Off-Season One - August

Stacey

I t’s rare that I get the house to myself, but today I have it and man do I need to release some of this fucking unresolved sexual tension. Who do I really want? Fucking Dash. But I can’t have Dash. I can’t even honestly look for someone. It’s just been me and my hand since he came along. But masturbation isn’t doing it. If I don’t do something, I might do the unthinkable.

I’m only bringing a man to the house because I’m desperate. The whole “one-and-done” thing feels so irresponsible to me. Like a dirty secret. I don’t want anyone to know I opted for a quick fuck in the middle of the afternoon. I’m going to fuck him, and then I’m going to kick him out. That’s what Benduovr is for. It’s not where you find true love.

The front door opens. I’ve got my lips on another man’s lips, him straddling my thighs. I toss him off me so damn fast like a cheating husband.

“Dash, you’re home. I thought you were working?”

He’s staring, blinking at me, speechless. He licks his lips. “It was beyond slow. Dad told me I could take the rest of the afternoon off.”

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Um, don’t let me interrupt. I’m just gonna go to my room.”

Yeah, so, he pretty much runs there.

The man on top of me attempts to start in again, but my dick’s lost its mojo. “Sorry, man. You gotta go.”

He raises his brows. “Boyfriend?”

“No,” I say perhaps a little too forcefully. If I could take out an ad in a newspaper to let everyone know that Dash and I aren’t dating, I would. I have the bizarre need to prove that we aren’t boyfriends to every person we’re in contact with. Most especially because a lot of people assume we are dating.

“Then … why?”

“We have roommate rules,” I say, inventing the lie on the spot. “I thought I had the house to myself, but I don’t. You gotta go.”

He climbs off me, smirking. Don’t think he believes me. “When will I see?—”

“You won’t.”

The man rolls his eyes, but he slides into his flip-flops. He can’t be gone soon enough. Once he is, I head to Dash’s room.

“Dashie, can I come in?”

“Kinda busy.”

Kinda pissed at me more like it.

“He’s gone,” I try.

There’s shuffling, then nothing, then more shuffling, and finally footsteps. The door swings open. Dash’s face is red, and I detect the faint smell of restaurant on him—he hasn’t showered yet.

“You didn’t have to get rid of him, Stace.”

“It made you uncomfortable. Did something remind you of Robin?”

“Gah! No, god. Not everything reminds me of Robin.”

“A lot of things do,” I point out. He doesn’t like it, but they do. I might hate it more than he does at this point. If I ever see Robin, I’m gonna do something that’ll land me in jail, and I don’t give a fuck.

“Not this,” he says, his brown eyes darkening with frustrated anger. He exhales, heavily, one arm resting on the doorframe. He pulls in another breath and with his arm stretched like that, the hem of his shirt lifts enough to reveal his creamy skin. Great. Now my dick decides to show signs of life. I’m paralyzed—any sudden movement could cause a full-on boner versus the half-chub threatening to ruin my life currently.

I want him. I want him so bad. God. I’d nibble on that fucking lower lip of his that’s always tempting me. So plump, juicy, begging for my teeth. What would he taste like? How would he look with a hickey on his neck? One I put there?

Dash’s hand reaches out. Slowly, he grips my hand—it’s larger than his—and he traces the knuckles. His damn Bambi eyes look into my soul, lashes fluttering.

“I don’t like seeing you with people, I guess. I feel weirdly possessive of you. You’ll find someone to be with, and I’ll get less of your time. That’s so wrong. Ugh. I’m terrible. Ignore me.”

“It won’t happen again,” I promise.

“No. Don’t do that. I don’t know why I feel this way. I’ll get over it. Especially when I can’t even think about being with anyone, Stace.” The “but you” hangs in the air. That’s normally cause for me to take a step back, create distance between us. But how can I when it looks like he might fall apart? “I meant what I said before. It just … gives me the ick to think of you with someone.”

Taking a bit of a risk, I snatch his wrist and suction him to me. I inhale a deep breath of him, starved of him after being polluted by … what was his name with the flip-flops? Don’t remember. Already erased from my browser history.

“If there’s anyone who gets it, it’s me, okay?” At least my brain does. My heart might never fucking understand. My dick? We’re not gonna talk about that damn troll. It would be sunk so far into Dash at the smallest flash of a green light.

“Do you think I’ll get better someday? Better enough to have a someone?” he asks.

“Of course, I do.” Even if that someone will never be me.

I made a promise to his dad. He trusts me to look after Dash. I won’t betray that trust, I won’t betray Dash, even if my body has other ideas. It’s just lust. Isn’t that a sin? Not sure, I’m not particularly religious, but I could use that as my deterrent.

Unless there’s a religion based around Dash. I might have to start attending church.

H unter Boulder, Dirk’s older brother, is an interesting guy. He’s always wearing gray, sleeveless shirts that have his bulging biceps on display, his jaw has to have been cut from steel, and while he has hair, it’s shaved pretty close to the scalp, like he’s in the army or something. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the man in anything other than jeans, and the steel-toed boots he seems to wear for every occasion. According to Dirk, he never leaves the construction site, even when he’s left work for the day.

I’ve come home to him, sweating under the hot August sun, doing repairs around my house—um, our house, I guess. But it’s shit I feel like I should do, and it’s weird having him carrying two-by-fours toward my steps—over his boulder-sized shoulders—and go to town with his fucking nail gun and portable table saw. He works like a horse too, only stopping to sip whatever he’s got in that large sports bottle of his. He makes Dirk help him.

And it’s fine. Our landlord’s an older guy who appreciates us keeping the place in shape for him. He’ll even knock a little off the monthly when we do something like this.

But fucking Dash watches Hunter like he hung the moon. His bare toes skim the grass as his feet kick with delight from where he watches, perched on the old bench that’s an accessory in our yard. A breeze kicks up, blowing summer air through his thick hair.

He should have shoes on with all the nails Hunter’s got carelessly—in my opinion—scattered at the bottom of the steps. Our backyard is not a construction site.

“What’s going on here?” I ask.

Hunter gives a tight smile. “Few steps were loose. Didn’t want this one fallin’ and breaking his neck.”

His gaze lands on Dash, not Dirk. My body seizes with annoyed tension. “I was planning on fixing those,” I say, even though my plans would have probably seen the steps fixed once we returned for the off-season. This house is my responsibility.

Dash is my responsibility.

“Take a load off, brother. We had extra wood and nails at work, and I wanted to show Dirk how to do this anyway. These are important life skills,” Hunter says.

Dirk shrugs.

If I’m not careful, I’m going to embarrass myself. “You want a beer?” I force myself to offer. Mom taught us good manners.

“Love another one after I finish up with the saw. Dash was kind enough to bring one out for me.”

He was, was he? “Guess you’re all set. I’ll just …” I gesture toward the house.

I turn to begin my journey to the front of the house since that’s where I’ll have to enter with Hunter’s shit everywhere.

“Stacey, wait! I’ll come with?—”

I spin in time to see Dash’s toe catch the ground, and because I haven’t gotten too far, it’s a matter of a few of my long hockey strides and a reach. He falls into my arms, but he’s quick to use them for balance so he can grab his stubbed toe.

“Fuck. Fuck I hope it’s not broken. Ow!”

That’s one way to ruin the start of your first hockey season. Bending and slinging him across my shoulders in a fireman’s carry is innate.

“Stace, what the…”

I’m around the front of the house and up the stairs with him so fast. I set him on the porch swing and crouch to take a look while his face scrunches with pain. It’s red but doesn’t appear to be swelling. Keeping hold of his heel, I sit next to him, maneuvering him so that his bare foot can sit in my lap, and I can watch it.

Slowly, he can work the toes through full flexion and extension. That means not broken.

“Oops,” he says, knowing a scolding is coming his way.

“Shoes, Dash. Especially near Hunter’s construction zone.”

“Is that tone I detect?” he says.

Probably. I might have said “Hunter” with a little too much disdain. “The shoes, Dash.”

“Yeah, yeah. Shoes,” he huffs. “Now, what did Hunter do to you?”

My nose wrinkles. I think. I don’t know. I didn’t wrinkle it on purpose. “Nothin’. He just … I don’t like him fixin’ my stairs.”

Dash crosses his arms over his chest, smirking. I’m so busted. His heel’s still in my lap, so I gently massage the sole.

“I get it. Two alpha men in one house doesn’t work so well.”

That’s not it. That can work, but not when one of those men’s people is up for grabs … who he also secretly wants … but is working on not wanting. “Something like that.”

“Okay, so, for real? Yeah, I’ve had a massive crush on Hunter since my teenage hormones kicked in, but that’s as far as it goes. He’s a little like the big brother I never had, but Dirk came first for Hunter. Above anything. Even me.”

“He cares about you,” I say.

“He does. I’m just saying, I never made it past that invisible barrier to his heart—the deeper part of his heart. I’m not mad about it. Hunter and Dirk went through hell growing up. Hunter took the worst of it, so Dirk didn’t have to, but it jaded him. Kinda like you do for Casey, um, not that you’re jaded. But you feel harder on the inside like he does.”

“Figured that out, did you?”

“It doesn’t take long if you’re paying attention,” he says.

“And if you had made it past Hunter’s barriers?” I say, getting back to that topic. I can’t help myself. It shouldn’t matter, but it fucking does.

He laughs. “I woulda hit that, Stace. C’mon. Can you blame me?”

I’m sorry I asked. White hot flames lick my insides. Jealous flames. Goddammit. Can I ban Hunter from coming to the house?

“If it makes you feel better and wipes the murder off your face, that was past me. Sure, I find him attractive, but I’m not attracted to him anymore. He’s my best friend’s brother. That would be so weird. It would be like … like Dirk dating my dad. Ew!”

“Oh, god, no. Now I can’t unthink it. There are over twenty years between them.”

He looks around. “Yeah, but wanna know something crazy?”

Anything to get us away from this mortifying topic. It’s too dangerously close to admitting—out loud—that I can’t stand the fucking thought of Dash with anyone. Maybe he’s not attracted to him anymore, but Dash saying he would have fucked with Hunter at some point in their lives is all I’m gonna see when I look at the man.

“Always.”

“They’re so close since what happened with me that I can’t help seeing it sometimes, and I refuse to be alone about it. You’re with me now.”

“Thanks a-fucking-lot.”

He laughs.

“Casey and I are kinda close with your dad, too,” I point out, hoping to dispel a theory like that. I’m all for the age gap and love is love, but Dirk and Travis? That would be hard to swallow.

“Dirk and Dad have inside jokes inside their inside jokes.”

Fuck. Now I can’t stop thinking about it. “I hate you for this.”

“And now it’s our inside joke, which will hopefully remain just a joke.”

I shake my head. He’s a brat. Sometimes a conniving brat. I’m onto him. “But back to shoes. These feet better be in them next time Hunter stops by to remodel the house, or else.”

“Or else you’ll what? Spank me?”

A bolt of lightning fries my nerves. Holy shit. He can’t say things like that to me. “Let’s not find out.”

“Aye, aye, Captain Alderchuck,” he chirps, giving me that damn navy salute.

A t the end of August and after too long of a wait, if you ask me, the trial happens. By the last day of it, everyone’s a fucking mess, which means I can’t be. I have to hold it together for Dash, Travis, and Dirk. Also Casey and Jack—because they’re involved now that Dash is considered family.

Jack’s pacing the damn living room, fussing with the brim of his hat more than usual. Casey hasn’t touched food in twelve hours. That’s practically starvation mode for him. Travis isn’t at the house, but he’s been texting me non-stop, or well, what’s considered non-stop for him. He’s not a big texter, so the amount he has texted me is a lot for him. I also spoke with him over the phone earlier this morning. I’m a little surprised he hasn’t shown up at the house yet, but we’re supposed to meet him at the courthouse in forty minutes. He’s probably finding his composure.

Dirk is shockingly calm, but I suspect it’s a “calm before the storm” kind of calm. Dash curled up in his lap after breakfast—if you can call coffee breakfast—wrinkling the suit I had dry-cleaned for him.

I give a loud whistle. Firm, decisive, and militant brings its own source of comfort. That I can do in my sleep. “C’mon, Dash, let’s go. Dirk, you comin’?”

That pulls a scowl from Dirk because of course he is.

“Then get moving.” If they have me to be mad at, they’ll forget about the verdict for a minute. Long enough to get them to the courthouse. Jack and Casey’ll hold the fort here. My hand remains planted on the back of Dash’s neck till we get to the car. He sits in the passenger seat, and my hand rests on his thigh.

I loved it when Mama would pull me in her arms, and sing the Gilligan’s Island theme song, Dash said. One day she stopped.

After he told me that, I like to keep a hand on him somewhere when I can. I abandoned all my “hands off Dash” rules. I wouldn’t let him suffer because of my weakness for him. It requires all my strength and the occasional reprieve from him, but I’ve been doing it. Especially these past few weeks. He hasn’t left my side for long.

His muscles let go as much as they can, and he closes his eyes. I glance in the mirror, checking on Dirk in the backseat. He’s planning his revenge mission, and I don’t blame him. The things I want to do to Robin for what he did to Dash.

Travis has cleaned up nice for court, ditching his plaid for a suit. Dash falls into his open arms. Being involved in a trial sucks all around, but it’s brought them closer together, something Dash needed.

Robin gets the maximum number of years for grooming a minor, ten years, with the possibility of parole. It doesn’t seem long enough, but it’s enough to shake the anxiety from Dash’s eyes. I know what he’s thinking—this gives him time. He’s got ten years to rebuild himself before he’s out.

We all convene at The Wicklow to celebrate the good news. Travis closed it for the day. We crack beers and pour shots of tequila. Some of the extended members of our posse filter in—Jack’s dads, friends from the team who live in town—and we drown our sorrows in whiskey-laced good times.

Stacey’s Second Season With The Wildcats

I ’m not prepared for Dash on the ice with a stick in his hand. Sure, we all played a bunch of street hockey during the off-season like we always do, and we’d hang at one of the many ice rinks in the city, but it wasn’t like this.

He moves with the agility of a high-performance hockey player alright, but also with the grace of a dancer. His stick skims and waves over the ice. And I see it. The power, the pure jubilation. All the reasons Dash loves hockey skate with him down the ice.

Wham!

Some big hockey-playing asshole with the cross-check.

Okay, so it’s not even close to the worst cross-check I’ve seen. Still illegal. Casey’s right, Boston is a dirty-ass team.

Dash pings off the boards like a billiard ball, landing on the ice with a monumental slam. If you’re not used to watching hockey, a wipeout like that will have you calling the local authorities, demanding they ban any kind of aggression in hockey immediately. But shit like that happens every game. We have competitions in the locker room—who has the largest bruise of the night.

I’m saying, I’m used to it, but I’m not used to Dash getting hit like that.

Dash is up quickly, already back in play. Of course, the ref didn’t see shit. Casey claims it’s rigged when we play Boston. Maybe it is. I look from Dash to number twenty-one, otherwise known as the asshole that won’t get off Dash’s ass and click my mouthguard into place.

Don’t know that I consciously made the decision. I’m running on bloodthirsty instinct, and it just fucking happens off the face-off. Next I know, twenty-one’s jersey is twisted in my fist, my bare fist because my gloves are already on the ice, stick gone. My knuckles pound a satisfying crack across this asshole’s cheekbone and, huh, he’s not wearing a mouthguard.

Good.

I break his teeth. A snaggle-tooth chicklet lands on the ice, my fists soak up blood on the next punch, and I’m gonna have a nice bruise on my knuckles. Worth it. A tooth is the exact fucking price you pay for fucking with Dash.

The refs pull me off the guy, and it’s do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars, straight to the penalty box for me. I get five minutes to stew, but then it’s over. Buddy catches my drift and while he doesn’t stay away from Dash, there are no more illegal hits or hits to Dash’s body period.

Later, in the locker room, Dash has his shirt off. Casey’s down to a towel around his waist ready to head to the showers.

“Check it out,” Case says. “Nice bruise to start the season off with.” He shows off the deep oval of indigo coloring on his hip. “Fucking Sutter. But I got him way worse than he got me.”

“What about me? Look,” Dash says, eyes bright, chest lifted. Molted purple splotches stain his upper chest, from number twenty-one’s stick I’ll bet. “My first bruises of the season.”

“And the last if I can help it,” I mutter under my breath. It’s unrealistic to think I can prevent everyone from beating on Dash, but I can minimize it. It’s not uncommon for certain players to have enforcers on the ice. I’m gonna be Dash’s, and I’m sure Casey and Dirk will have no problem helping me with that one.

Dash must miss my uttered promise. “What about you, Stace? Anything?”

“Your knuckles must be bruised to shit,” Casey says. “Didn’t you see him take out Howell? He’ll be eating through a straw for a few days that’s for damn sure.”

“I saw him in the box, but I missed what happened. Coach was giving me a few pointers,” Dash says.

Maybe that’s for the best.

Dash grips one of my bear-paw hands in both of his. “Holy shit, Stace. This is bad. There’s a toothmark.” He runs a thumb over my swollen skin, fascinated. Tingles erupt over my hand. My face heats. I do my best to remain perfectly still until he lets it go. I count every heartbeat, pounding in my ears while the heat of his touch sets me afire. The world spins differently when I’m in Dash’s orbit.

“I’ll get some ice on it, and it’ll be fine. How about you?”

“This is nothin’. It’s great. Don’t judge me, but I like a few bruises.” He winks, and it means exactly what I think it means.

“Don’t be a fucking brat,” I warn him. I try to keep as much lightness in my voice as possible when I say that like I usually would, but picturing him with someone, doing that to him … I don’t think I could fucking handle it, and I’d better never see any damn love bites on him.

If there’s any violence on my face, he misses it.

He shrugs, smiling, chin held high, daring me to do something about it.

“Get in the shower, Nolan,” I say with a tight jaw.

“Yeah, yeah. You comin’, Case?” He doesn’t wait for my brother, yanking his towel from his hips, twisting it into a whip, and snapping it across Casey’s torso.

Casey yips, wincing as Dash high-tails it far, far away. “That fucking bitch. Sorry, Stace. I’m gonna get another towel and his ass is gonna feel it. You gonna punch my teeth in?”

Am I surprised he’s figured me out? That what I did to Howell was pure revenge on Dash’s behalf? No. I’m also not gonna punch his teeth in for having a towel-snap war with Dash.

“He asked for it.”

“Alright! You’re gonna get it, Nolan,” Casey shouts, chasing after him in the buck.

I wish I could have that kind of fun with Dash, but I can’t. Instead, I strip down, grabbing a towel for myself, and listen. I listen for the inevitable snap. Dash’s high-pitched yelp.

But then there’s laughter. His unfettered laughter. It’s got the same ring of purity it did the day I tackled him and tickled him.

It’s him. He’s really here. He’s not just coming out of his shell, he’s busting out of it, leaving the shell in ruins.