Elite Player (Winning Love #2)

Chapter 1

NICO

My dick’s gotten me in trouble before—but never called-to-the-principal’s-office kind of trouble. Yet as I sit here under the narrowed glares of the Philadelphia Iron’s general manager, my agent, and apparent babysitter, I have to answer for it.

“Why can’t you keep your dick in your pants, son?”

I open my mouth and then close it. Because I’m not sure if it’s a rhetorical question or not.

Why can’t I keep it in my pants?

Well, for starters, it feels good when I take it out, and I’ve never had a shortage of volunteers willing to become its playmate.

I am but a lowly man. With the self-control of a gorilla.

Once, at the San Diego Zoo, I saw a male gorilla wanking it in front of a huge crowd of people. Totally nonchalant. Simply trying to have some fun in his godforsaken cage.

Some visitors gasped. Parents covered their children’s eyes. But I didn’t see the problem. He was doing what he was meant to do.

And I’m doing what I was meant to do.

“We haven’t even finished preseason, and already, we’re dealing with your fucking bullshit,” the GM says, crossing his arms over his chest. Tom Fitzgerald, with his thick Minnesota accent and benign features, seems like he should be passing the plates in church on Sundays.

But his church is the ice, and I’ve blasphemed in his house.

I lift my hands to plead my case. “You can’t blame what happened on me. I didn’t know she was going to do that.”

“Break in to the training facility in order to find you,” Malcolm supplies unhelpfully. As if we don’t all know the story.

A few nights ago, I hooked up with this random woman. I know I’m good at sex, but I think it’s seriously impressive that I’m good enough to track down while at practice and beg me to fuck her.

It was a whole thing.

Clearly.

Since I’m being called on the carpet for it.

“I don’t know what the fuck goes through your head sometimes,” Fitzgerald growls. “Honest to Christ, I could kill you. And I just might if I weren’t already being pressured from the top to get rid of you.”

I jerk upright in my seat. “What?”

My agent finally pipes up. “You think I flew here from Chicago to tell you what a wonderful job you’ve been doing?”

I shrug. “Might be nice.”

He rolls his eyes. Jameson Probst has been with me for nearly a decade, since I was in the Juniors.

While I’m not his star client, I think he has a soft spot for me underneath the blank face and even blanker eyes.

Before this little meeting today, he’d given me a stern warning, informing me that if I wanted to stay out of trouble, I should simply nod along to anything they told me.

“You know the standards we have here,” Fitzgerald says. “We’re trying to change the culture of hockey, and you’ve earned your last strike.”

I blink at him and then at my agent. “You’re kidding.”

They both shake their heads.

“But that’s why we called this meeting of the minds,” Jameson says then points to Malcolm, the man they’d introduced me to when I walked in the room.

The guy sent from the public relations firm Rosenstein & Hill to keep me in line.

I was ready to accept my punishment, but not if I’m being fucking traded.

I thought I was making a home here—fitting in. I’ve learned all the systems and get along with my teammates. But they want to trade me?

“We made that play-off run last year because of you,” Fitzgerald explains. “You came in with a fire lit under your ass, and I like it. Love it. But I’m not the only one making the decisions.”

“So I stepped in with an offer to try to smooth the waters,” Jameson continues. “You have the next few months to shape up, or you’re shipped out.”

I heave a sigh and comb my fingers through my hair. “Shape up or ship out? This isn’t the military.”

“You’re right. It’s hockey, and you’re fucking it up,” Fitzgerald says then gestures to Malcolm, who begins to count off my offenses on his fingers.

“The girl coming in here—”

“Was not my fault. I have no idea how that happened.”

“The STI story.”

I wave it off. “An untrue rumor. Ask the team doctors. I’m tested regularly. Whoever she got that infection from, it’s not me.”

Although at this point, it doesn’t matter. I met some girl at a party at the beginning of June, and by the Fourth of July, my name was all over every hockey Reddit thread for spreading the clap.

“You have fans throwing their panties at you on the ice.”

I try to hide my laugh at that one. “I mean… They might be a little overzealous, but…”

“You were traded here because you slept with Jared Craft’s wife.”

I deny it, offering them the same excuse Florida gave me. “It was about the salary cap.”

“It was because you slept with his wife,” all three of them say in surround sound.

In my defense, I didn’t know she was the wife of one of the owners of the Seadevils.

She was a hot twentysomething, and he has to be mid-seventies.

I probably gave her the ride of her life.

I only found out who she was when Jameson called to tell me Jared Craft personally requested I be traded.

If I were first or second line, I’d probably be safe.

Craft could always find a new young wife, but he couldn’t find a star winger.

Lucky for him, since I was third line. I’m disposable.

“None of this changes your reputation,” Malcolm says, and the leather of my chair creaks when I sink back down, deflated.

“So, what now?”

“Now you do what I say.”

I raise my brows in silent question, so he goes on. “I will be working closely with you to rehab your image. Not only do you need to prove to the entire front office that you are a reformed playboy, you need to quiet the whispers about you.”

“This organization is serious about conduct,” Fitzgerald adds. “You knew that when you arrived here.”

Yeah, the Philadelphia Iron are all about building community and disproving hockey stereotypes.

When we put on the jersey, we not only represent ourselves, but the team and all of Philadelphia.

We’re the City of Brotherly Love, blah-blah-blah.

I received the lectures and sat through the slide-deck presentation.

But I’m not hurting anyone. If anything, I’m spreading the love.

Shit, one of the guys I used to play with on the Seadevils was arrested for hitting his wife, and he barely got a slap on the wrist from the team and league, when he should have been blacklisted from ever playing again.

There have been so many instances of players doing things I’d never dream of, yet it’s no big deal.

But I give a few ladies some orgasms, and I’m the one who needs to be made an example of? Fucking ridiculous.

“I haven’t broken any laws,” I say. “Of all the scandals and bullshit behavior other players and teams have caused, my stuff is on the bottom of the list.”

Fitzgerald huffs. “The only list I care about is the lineup, and I’d prefer not to lose you because you can’t fucking keep it in your pants.”

“Yeah, all right. I get it.” I sigh, rolling my eyes up to the ceiling. “Shape up or ship out.”

“You think you can do that?” Jameson asks, and I slowly drag my attention back to his wary gaze.

“Sure.”

Malcolm tugs on his tie. He’s wearing pressed slacks and a white sweater over a collared shirt like a nerd on a boat. “I’ll make sure he toes the line.”

“May I be excused?” I say with all the attitude of a surly thirteen-year-old and stand without waiting for an answer. Malcolm follows me.

In the hall, I take big steps to lose him, but he keeps up with my pace. “So, what? We gonna hang out together? Go to the movies? You going to take the place of my dates?”

He readjusts the bag he’s carrying. “I wouldn’t call what you’re doing dating, but to take the temptation away, I’d like your phone.”

I freeze, wrenching back. “What?”

“Your cell phone,” he repeats, holding out his palm.

“For what?”

“I want to make sure you’re not slipping into any DMs.”

“I’m not giving you my phone.”

He arches one dark brow.

“I’m not,” I say again, crossing my arms over my chest. Though young and fit, Malcolm’s a few inches short of six feet and probably a buck fifty. No match against my six-foot-two and two-hundred-pound stature.

“Shall we return to the office? Do you want me to go tell Mr. Fitzgerald you’re already being uncooperative?”

“What is this? Grade school? You gonna tattle on me?”

“I’m being paid to make sure you stay out of trouble. I’m not being paid to be your friend. Now, I’d like your phone. I am not going to change any passwords or shut anything off.”

“Then why do you need it?” I ask, reluctantly handing it over.

“I’ll be monitoring your account.”

“This is some Big-Brother shit right here,” I grumble, looking over his shoulder as he follows through with his promise.

“Yes, well, when you can demonstrate you don’t need it anymore, you’ll be free to do whatever you want again. Also, while we’re chatting, I’ve already put you on the list of players who will be volunteering with the Skate Away kids, and I have you scheduled to be part of the Speak Out campaign.”

“What’s that?” I already know that Skate Away is the Iron’s community outreach, raising funds for and directly working with inner-city kids who want to learn how to skate.

A couple times a year, these kids come to games, and there is always a skate around, where some of the team’s players do a meet-and-greet.

But I have no idea what this other campaign is.

“A nonprofit in the greater Philadelphia area working to shed light on sexual violence. They wanted some local stars to be the faces of the campaign, and I thought, who better than you?”

Who better than me?

For a moment, I think he’s somehow stumbled into my memory. Found the worst parts of me, but as he ticks his head to the side, impatiently waiting on my answer, I know he hasn’t. He’s only doing his job—coincidentally holding a mirror up for me to view the darkness.

Ignoring all that, I slap on a smile. “Whatever you say, boss.”

I accept my cell phone and offer him a salute. He’s not amused. “You’ll be hearing from me in a few days.”

“Can’t wait.”

“I can,” he mumbles and pivots on his heel. For a moment, I watch him walk away, head held high like he didn’t just put me in the corner.

“See you, bestie!”

He doesn’t acknowledge me, and I lose my good humor the instant he’s out of sight. I try to stay optimistic, not take anything too seriously, but this feels like overkill. Hockey is about winning and money, and I hate to be the not all men guy, but fuck. It’s not me.

I treat all my hookups with respect, and I always make sure I have consent. Hell, they’re the ones asking me to fuck them.

So management is pointing the finger at the wrong guy.

My actions are getting picked apart, while there are so many other players who are doing legitimately bad shit.

Beating up people in the world, assaulting and abusing women, saying horrific things.

Yet I make one—okay, a few—mistakes, and I’m raked over the coals.

And I’m still steaming by the time I glide onto the ice to warm up with my teammates.

We have another week of preseason training, and we’re still working out the kinks and lines.

It’s a time when players can still be cut or traded, and from the way I feel eyes on me from the owners’ box, I know I’m on the chopping block.

Reassurance from my new babysitter or not.

Sheffy glides over to where I’m double-checking my skates. “What’s up? What happened?”

Alex Sheffield has been my friend since I was sixteen.

His family was my billet when I played in Calgary in the WHL.

I’m closer to Pam, Sheffy’s mom, than my own, and since my dad died when I was twelve, it was Dane who gave me the sex talk.

Although at that point, I’d already had all the education I needed.

I spent some of my best years with the Sheffields, and if anybody knows me, it’s Sheffy.

“They want to trade me,” I say behind my glove, pretending like I’m fixing it, but really using it to provide us some cover.

Sheffy frowns. “No shit.”

“Apparently, I’ve fucked one too many girls for their puritanical morality.”

My best friend raises his brow in surprise, although it quickly melts as he tilts his head as if he understands. And what the fuck?

“You think so too?”

“No, no. Not that you deserve to be traded. You’re our grinder. But, yeah, I mean… Lay off the pussy, man.”

“You’re just jealous you’re stuck with the same one for the rest of your life.”

As usual, whenever the subject of his wife comes up, a dreamy look overtakes his face, and he smiles. “Love her pussy.” When I knock him off-balance, he laughs. “Okay, so what’s going on? Is Fitz really going to trade you?”

“Not if I change my ways. So he and Jameson assigned me a babysitter to make sure I’m being a good little boy.”

“Mm. Sounds kinky.”

“You wouldn’t be saying that if it were you.”

He taps my shoulder pad with the end of his stick. “Do what you gotta do, eh? We’re finally back to playing together again, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

I heave a sigh and put on my helmet, following him out to the blue line, where a bucket of pucks had been tossed out so we can take a few shots on goal before we start drills.

Playing hockey has always been my outlet, and it’s no different now. I slide one of the pucks closer to me and wind up, taking out my aggression on it, sending it flying into the air. But instead of hitting the back of the net, it ricochets off the bar, hurtling sideways.

Right into the head of a woman.

Fuck me. I’m in trouble again.