Chapter 13 #3
I interrupted, “Sounds like a plan my father would cook up, only instead of a hot, sexy, Daddy type he’d find the hottest twenty-year-old blonde-haired, blue-eyed puck bunny, yes girl for me to date and then propose at the end of my rookie contract.
One willing to pop out the next generation of the Malachek hockey dynasty before she’s twenty-five. ”
“Well, according to you that’s not your type.”
“No. Not to say I haven’t partaken when it’s been offered, and yes, I know how shitty that sounds now that I’ve said it out loud, but I’m not interested in bedding a svelte empty-headed model for the rest of my life to make a bunch of homophobes happy.”
“Glad to hear it, kid.”
I laughed at the assholish comment, and I vowed to find a way to make him stop calling me kid.
But first… “So what’s your criteria for a sub other than someone who isn’t looking for something better—that’s the stupidest shit I’ve ever heard, you’re fucking gorgeous and nice—and who understands you’re possessive and don’t share your playthings? ”
“First, they have to like Dominant men, and you just said you don’t.”
“Okay, pops. First, you need to hit rewind on the relic of a tape deck in your noggin. I said it’s proof you’re hot as fuck. I don’t give a fuck that you’re Dominant. I actually fucking like it. My dick twitches every time I think about you getting bossy in bed and manhandling me.”
“That, right there? That’s what’s called brat behavior, kiddo.”
“Good to know. Thank you for the vocabulary lesson. Did you give it so you had time to find the remote to rewind the conversation?”
“You little fuck!” he yelled, his shocked face fighting off the smile and laughter.
His hands moved, but I clocked it too late.
His fingers dug into my ribs, tickling me until I writhed in his lap and fell to the floor between the sofa and coffee table, pulling him with me.
We wrestled, pushing the coffee table further and further away as we rolled around, switching who was on top, both of us doing our best to keep the other from terrorizing our ribs while laughing like a pair of hyenas.
“Stop. Fuck. I’ve not pissed this morning!” I yelled.
He laughed in my face. “Poor baby.”
“Slone, I mean it. I’m gonna fucking piss on you.”
He didn’t tickle me again, but he smiled down at me as he rubbed my nose with his. “Maybe I like golden showers.”
“Ew. Gross.”
Tears sprang to my eyes with relief when he sat back on his haunches and removed his massive frame from my bladder.
I scrambled to my feet, bent and kissed his still-smiling face before racing for the bathroom.
The morning raced through my head while I relieved myself and washed my hands.
Then I glimpsed two things that stabbed at me.
One, the lounge clothes laid out on the counter with a new toothbrush and deodorant sitting next to them. I pushed the way those borrowed items made me feel because the other thing didn’t just stab at me; it twisted the knife before plunging it in a second time.
The weapon: the smile on my face. I never smiled like that. Or not never, but fucking close. The wide-mouthed grin that stretched my face and crinkled my eyes once belonged to someone else, like everything that made me me.
I may be just another Donald Malachek, but I didn’t look like them.
I looked like another champion. Another Olympian.
Another hockey player. I remembered him somewhat.
He loved skating and the game the way I loved skating and the game.
He was good. Excellent, but unlike the Malacheks, Victor Petrov was larger than life and always happy.
A big, beautiful man whose face was rarely without a smile.
Tears burned trails down my face, and memories rolled through my head.
I missed him. He made all the training fun.
He never made it feel like a chore. We laughed at our mistakes until we got them right.
But all that went away when he died. He suffered an aneurysm while skating.
The doctors said he was dead before he hit the ice.
The funeral took place during my first week of Junior hockey, and my father refused to let me miss the start of training camp.
Unable to walk out of the bathroom, I turned on the shower so the water could warm.
Hopefully, the ragged mess look I sported would disappear after a scalding hot shower.
I needed it to anyway. No way could the hot as fuck kinky bastard I wanted to throw me down and rail me into next week see me like this.
The shower rained over me, beating the hangover soreness from my muscles. Palms pressed against the tiles, head hung between my arms, I stood there, letting the water cascade over me while also letting the emotions warring inside me have free rein.
When continuing to hold the position became uncomfortable, I finished my shower, toweled off, and wrapped the towel around my waist, ignoring the clothes Slone laid out on the counter for me while actively avoiding the mirror.
Knowing my face showed signs of my crying fit and seeing the evidence left behind were two things.
One deep breath turned into two, then three, then another three before I got up the nerve to open the door.