Chapter 67 Melody
Melody
If anyone had asked her, Melody could swear her heart stopped when Ben went down. And that was nothing compared to how she’d felt when she saw blood splatter across the ice.
As she raced through the stadium underground, waving her VIP badge at anyone who looked inclined to stop her, she couldn’t help but ruminate on what an idiot she’d been.
Had she really been thinking of tossing aside an exceptional relationship just because of something as silly as the possibility of periodic media involvement?
When she looked at all the potential issues that could affect a relationship—physical violence, substance abuse, actual infidelity—finding herself splashed across the gossip rags didn’t seem quite so bad.
Did she like it? Absolutely not, but the real tragedy would have been allowing other people’s idle tongues—and keyboards—to torpedo her relationship.
Melody had felt reassured when Ben had been able to get up and skate himself off the ice under his own steam, but that didn’t necessarily speak to the severity of his injuries.
Adrenaline was a powerful thing and hockey players were used to playing through pain.
Many of them would practically have to be hit by a Mack truck to be kept down.
Melody was just this side of frantic by the time she reached the dressing room. The guard recognized her, so he just held the door open and waved her in.
Melody took an educated guess and sped toward the medical treatment rooms. She skidded to a halt when she saw Ben sitting on an exam table, shirtless, with his head tipped down and a cloth to his nose. A few drops of blood peppered his chest.
She took a step forward, wanting to leap into his arms and assure herself he was okay, but quickly stopped herself. She didn’t know what injuries he had. Until she did, it would be better if she kept her distance.
The squeak of her sneakers must have caught his attention because he lifted his head and turned to look at her.
“Melody?” he inquired, blinking in surprise.
Oh, God. Did he have a head injury? Was he unsure who she was?
She felt the blood drain from her face when he pulled the cloth away from his nose. It was saturated with blood. She stumbled back in surprise.
Ben glanced at her no-doubt ashen complexion and then at the blood-soaked cloth.
“It’s okay,” he reassured as he slowly got up off the table, threw the dirty cloth in a garbage can, and grabbed a fresh one. He held it up to his nose for a few seconds before pulling it away and studying it.
Melody let out a relieved breath when she saw the cloth had come away clean. Thank God. That had to be a good sign, right?
Ben tossed the still-white cloth on the exam table and took a few steps toward her. “It’s okay,” he repeated. “It was just a nosebleed.”
Melody blinked. “What?” she asked, confused. “But you went down.”
Ben’s lips pulled to the side in a minor grimace, but he kept his gaze reassuring. “I was distracted by the blood and didn’t shift my weight properly when I was hit,” he explained. “The force of which caused me to lose my balance.”
“So, you’re okay?” she sought to confirm, her tone no doubt conveying the extent of her worry.
A warm smile lit his face. He seemed to like knowing she’d been concerned about him.
“I’m really okay, sweetheart,” he consoled, the honeyed tones of his voice helping to soothe the rest of her fears away.
He took a few more steps forward, until he was just in front of her. “It’s all the dry air from the airplanes and hockey rinks,” Ben explained. “It doesn’t usually happen during a game, but the chronic low humidity results in a nosebleed or two a season.”
The force of her relief was so acute she could practically feel herself deflating. She lifted her eyes to meet Ben’s and saw all the warmth she could ever hope for reflected in their gorgeous hazel depths. She hadn’t realized just how much she’d missed him until this very moment.
When Ben opened his arms to her, she didn’t hesitate to rush into them. Tears stung her eyes as she realized even more forcibly what she’d very nearly thrown away.
Seeming to read her as well as he always did, Ben cradled the back of her head and pulled her into his chest. Melody settled into his embrace and hugged him close.
“I’m so sorry,” she apologized, tears straining her voice.
“For what, sweetheart?” he asked as he stroked her unbound hair soothingly.
She leaned back and lifted her eyes up. She liked how she didn’t have to leave the supportive circle of his arms to do so.
“I’m sorry for getting spooked and pulling away from you,” Melody explained, feeling embarrassed by her behavior.
“The shock hit me hard . . . and I let my insecurities get the best of me.” She added in apology, “I shouldn’t have done that.
I should have been better at talking to you and trying to work through things together. ”
Ben smiled that beautiful smile that never failed to light her up from the inside out.
He lifted one of his hands to her cheek and used his thumb to gently caress her jawline.
“But you’re here now, aren’t you, sweetheart?
” he said as he paused to tuck her hair behind her ear.
“You’ve worked through what you needed to, and you came back. ”
“I have. And I did,” she promised with a conviction that comforted her.
“That’s good,” Ben said, looking deeply into her eyes. “Because I love you and I can’t imagine another day without you.”
Melody suddenly understood what it meant to be choked up with emotion because that was exactly how she felt. “I love you, too,” she managed to articulate through the happy tears that had started to fall down her cheeks.
The force of her feelings for Ben had shone with crystal clarity when she’d seen him go down on the ice. She’d known she was falling for him for a long time, but in that instant, she’d known she had fully fallen.
Had she thought his smile was beautiful moments before?
Well, that smile had nothing on this one.
The smile currently gracing his heart-meltingly handsome face was the smile of a man who had just been granted everything he’d ever wanted in life.
It was humbling to know she’d contributed to putting it there.
Ben used the underside of his thumbs to gently brush away her tears. “You don’t know how happy I am to hear that,” Ben said as his eyes smiled lovingly into hers. “This may still be fairly new, but I don’t need time to tell me what my gut knew from the very first: You’re it for me, sweetheart.”
His eyes twinkled into hers before he added with just the tiniest hint of the devil. “If I didn’t think it would freak you out, I’d ask you to marry me right here and now,” he confessed. “But seriously this time.”
Melody imagined she must resemble an exotic fish, slack-jawed and saucer-eyed. Was he serious?
Ben just chuckled, the rich baritone of his voice practically singing her a love song, before placing a gentle kiss along the hairline above her temple.
“I love you,” he repeated, quietly and with feeling.
“I love you, too,” she returned, suspecting he needed the assurance of hearing her reaffirm the depth of her affections.
Ben didn’t waste any more time before lowering his head and brushing his lips against hers. She relaxed into his kiss, loving the way his lips took their time exploring her mouth. There was something both playful and possessive about his touch. Goodness, but she’d missed him.
She moaned when he slipped his tongue into her mouth. It was a primitive reminder of just how strongly he affected her.
Melody was sliding her leg up the side of his body when a throat cleared.
She sprang back reflexively, a gasp escaping her lips.
She was grateful for the way Ben grabbed her hips to steady her.
She’d like to think she would have been able to recover her balance on her own, but she was glad not to have had to put it to the test.
“Don’t mind me,” Dr. Simmons, the team physician, said as he walked into the room, eyes averted and a heavy dose of humor lacing his tone. “I just wanted to give you your test results,” he said after a beat, his eyes now landing on Ben.
Ben shifted their positions so that Melody’s side was pressed into his. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close.
“You’re welcome to speak freely, Doctor,” Ben stated, “I’m comfortable with Melody hearing whatever you have to tell me.”
Dr. Simmons nodded his assent as he glanced down at the sheaf of papers he held in his hands.
“As predicted,” he disclosed, “all your tests came back clear. No sign of a head injury or anything else of concern. You’re clear to play.
Clear to ‘play’ whatever games you wish.
” Dr. Simmons laughed softly at his own innuendo.
Melody blushed and hid her face in Ben’s chest but couldn’t really fault the good doctor for his comment when he’d walked in on her and Ben the way he had.
“Maybe just don’t let her father catch you canoodling, all right?” he warned Ben as he walked toward the door. “Second period is almost over and the team will be back in the locker room shortly.”
Melody felt her eyebrows rise in surprise when she heard the telltale click of the door closing behind Dr. Simmons.
“What do you think that’s all about?” Melody asked as she turned to look at Ben, her expression perplexed.
“He more or less just warned us to keep our distance from each other only to then go and close us in a private room together?”
Ben chuckled. “I think Dr. Simmons knows a man in love when he sees one,” Ben observed. “Or maybe he was trying to remind us that there’s such a thing as proper time and place—in case we’d forgotten.” Ben waggled his eyebrows.
Melody felt herself blush, remembering how she’d been the one to deepen the passion level of their embrace before Dr. Simmons walked in.
“No, no, no,” Ben tsked. “None of that now.” He crooked his index finger and used it to lift her chin up toward his face. “Please don’t ever feel embarrassed. I like that you’re demonstrative with your affections.”
He dropped a playful kiss on her nose. “And, if need be, I will happily serve as your body shield,” he promised, “as I meet your passions every step of the way.”
“That is a very generous offer,” Melody acknowledged, smiling fondly at the memory of a similar promise made the night they’d spent together at the greenhouse over Thanksgiving, “but maybe let’s just try to avoid all public displays of indecency?”
“It’s a deal, sweetheart,” Ben vowed. “PDA, though?” he asked as he stroked her face with the back of his fingers. “I don’t think that can be avoided.”
“No?” Melody teased, not objecting in the least.
“Nope,” Ben confirmed, popping the “p” sound. Somehow, he managed to be charming even when he was being ridiculous.
Ben was just leaning in to seal his promise with a kiss when there was a gentle rap on the door. “Logan, I hear you’ve been cleared—”
“Hi, Dad,” Melody greeted when the door started to open. She couldn’t help but feel relieved Dr. Simmons and her dad hadn’t exchanged their order of entry. Now that would have been embarrassing.
Despite Ben’s reassurance that he enjoyed her physical overtures, she certainly wasn’t comfortable with her father witnessing them.
“Melody?” her dad said with a note of confusion in his tone. “What are you doing down here, honey?”
Her dad appeared to answer his own question as he took in the scene before him. Melody might not have her leg up around Ben’s thigh—this time—but they were intimately positioned with one of her hands on his still naked chest and one of his spanning her hip and lower back.
Her dad’s eyebrows lifted toward the ceiling before his eyes settled on Ben’s.
“Logan,” he said, his tone as professional as he could likely make it under the circumstances. “We want you back on the ice for third period. Can you be ready?”
“Yes, Coach,” Ben replied affably, somehow striking that perfect balance between a player and a man dating his coach’s daughter.
“I’ll just . . .” her dad said awkwardly, rotating his wrist and pointing his thumb at the door.
“I’ll be right out,” Ben said, likely trying to save her dad from the need to finish his sentence.
“Very good,” he responded with a mite less awkwardness.
Her dad gave them both a crooked smile before turning to her and saying, “See you later.”
Melody laughed softly when she noticed that, unlike Dr. Simmons, her dad didn’t fully close the door. Instead, he left it cracked open a few inches. It was like high school all over again. Or what she imagined high school would have been like had she had a boyfriend at the time.
“I’m beginning to wonder whether or not he likes me after all,” Ben joked as he nodded toward the open door with shared good humor.
Shaking his head, Ben took both of her hands in his and lifted them to his lips.
She felt his warm breath on the back of her hands before his lips brushed over her sensitized skin.
“I’d better get out there,” Ben said, nodding toward the door, “but you definitely helped me feel a million times better.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” Melody stated, so happy with the way her life had righted itself that she could barely contain her delight. “Now you go out there and kick some Penguin butt,” she laughed.
Ben shook his head again, a soft smile playing at his lips. “Why am I now picturing peach and shoe emojis?” he teased with obvious affection.
“How should I know?” she teased right back.
Ben smiled that sweet and sexy smile of his. He squeezed her hands gently before letting them fall. “You’ll be here after the game?” he asked, seemingly more eager than worried.
Melody smiled and nodded. “Absolutely,” she confirmed. At this point, it would take more than wild coyotes—or steely penguins—to keep her away.