Chapter 17 Henry #2
I took a bite and fought the grimace that wanted to cross my face. Damn, that was sour. Instead, I swallowed. “It’s good. I like sour things.”
“You’re such a shit liar.” Her laugh was so airy and bubbly, it made my heart flutter.
I frowned. “No, I’m not.”
She extended her hand, making a grabbing motion. “Give it back. It isn’t fair for you to be stuck with the shitty flavor.”
“Oh, and it’s fair for you to be stuck with something you don’t want?” I retorted.
“Yeah, because it was my choice.” She stared at me like I was an idiot.
“My God, Kenny,” I huffed a breath, exasperated. “You don’t know when to accept nice things from people, do you?”
Her shoulders became visibly tense. “I do, too,” she mumbled. It was cute when she challenged me and knew she had no leg to stand on.
“Okay, then be a good girl and eat your ice cream, and I’ll eat this one.” I wiggled my cup in the air before taking another bite. It wasn’t as bad this time around, thank God.
Her eyes widened in shock, her lips softly parting at my words. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she was feeling pretty flustered.
Excitement sparked through my body. I knew a praise kink when I saw one, so I kept that piece of information close to my chest. The knowledge was giving me many ideas.
My dick ached at the thought of Kennedy splayed on my bed.
Playing with her body until I figured out what drove her to the brink of insanity.
Rewarding her with mind-numbingly intense orgasms and praises until she begged me to stop.
I slammed the brakes on that thought, because now was so not the time to have a boner when I was trying to get to know more about her. But, fuck, I was dying to take her in any way I could.
Self-control, Henry. Ever heard of that word? my brain mocked.
“You’re so annoying.” A small huff escaped her lips, but she still grabbed the ice cream cup and started eating it. “Don’t go blaming me later.”
“I assure you that will not be happening,” I replied confidently.
We finished our ice creams quickly but stayed seated as we talked and asked each other all kinds of questions.
The sour aftertaste still lingered in my mouth, but it was every bit worth it. The look on Kennedy’s face while she ate hers gave me intense satisfaction.
She was happy because of me.
I got to see her smile because of me.
Now that was a special kind of drug. Since the last time I’d made her smile, I’d been trying to figure out a way to see it again. Because, as the man who mostly got glares from her, admiring her face light up for a change was like hitting a jackpot.
Kennedy’s smiles were rare, but when they happened, all my instincts told me to do was get on my knees and do whatever she desired. It was a dangerous, delicious weapon. Alluring in every way imaginable, and well on its way to becoming my fucking downfall.
“How is it having a twin sister?”
“Annoying,” I deadpanned.
“Sure, so annoying you go around punching her exes and getting ejected from games,” she said dryly.
“Exactly.” I smirked. “That is why.”
“You ever gonna tell me what Holt said?”
“Nope.” I grinned. “What about you? Do you have any siblings?”
She shook her head. “I’m the Jones’s miracle baby.”
“Was it hard?” I asked, letting curiosity get the best of me.
She gave me a small shrug. “When I was little, sure. You know how kids are, they always want things they can’t have, and I wanted a sister I could play with.”
Why did the thought of Kennedy having a lonely childhood tug so deeply at my chest?
And why did I wish I could have gone back in time and done something about it?
The thought was stupid, but the need to fix whatever made her sad was unavoidable. I was aware Kennedy was capable of being fun and playful, and I wanted to pull every laugh and smile she was willing to give me.
Her laugh was a blanket of warmth, and her smile was like the brightest sun after a rainy day.
And I had a lot of those, to be honest. I was always inside my head, working myself to the bones in hopes that one day I would be enough for someone, but always falling short. My mind was used to being a jumbled mess, and I did everything in my power to stay away from it—women. Fighting.
Nothing worked…until her.
To many, she was a woman with an impressive career, but cold and calculating. She was serious and closed off, and it was difficult getting a read on her.
I was one of those people once, too. Until one day, I wasn’t.
It was becoming impossible to dwell in the darkness around a woman like Kennedy Jones because, to me, she was sunshine itself.
It was scary, you know? Like jumping into deep waters and not knowing where I would end up. But still, I was ready to jump into the unknown.
And wasn’t that pathetic?
“Enough about me.” She waved her hand in the air dismissively. “Tell me, why hockey?”
I almost asked why she was trying to deflect, but I thought better of it. Getting on her bad side twice in one day wasn’t something I wanted. Not anymore. I craved more of these little moments when she let her walls down low enough, even if it was for a fraction of a second.
Her question threw me for a loop. “What do you mean?”
“There are so many sports you could have chosen, so why hockey?”
The question made me pause and think, which was rarely a good thing. Being too inside my head was a recipe for disaster.
My parents bought me my first pair of skates before I could even walk.
That was the Anderson household way.
My father wanted me to follow in his footsteps, and I was a child who craved his approval.
I didn’t know better then. When you’re a kid, you…
miss things. Become blind to what the other side of the curtain holds.
But the older I got and the more I witnessed, the more I realized how different I wanted to be from him.
Yet, the thought of not playing hockey never crossed my mind, despite knowing this had been something my father instilled in me.
The game became my only salvation, and I poured my heart and soul into it for myself.
If you were to ask my deadbeat of a father, he would say I did it for him.
But the truth was, I liked the exhaustion and extreme discipline hockey asked of me because it was better than what waited for me at home.
His hockey schedule was demanding until the very end, and the day he got his career-ending injury, he became the monster people warned kids about.
And I needed the escape, for my goddamn sanity.
Instead of trauma dumping on our first—technically second?—fake date, I said, “I’m Canadian, baby. It’s in my blood.”
Her brown eyes settled on my face with a scrutinizing expression. “Why are you lying?”
I forced a laugh. “I’m not.”
“You do that a lot, you know?”
“What?”
“Deflect.”
“When did this become a therapy session?” I joked.
“When you decided to start lying to me,” she replied bluntly, leaning back in her chair.
I didn’t like this. The way she saw me so openly. It was embarrassing for me, but more than anything? Terrifying. Like I was teetering along the lines of something I wasn’t ready to face. But as I would come to find out later, Kennedy always pushed me to be my very best and to stay true to myself.
“Okay, if you must know the truth, hockey became sort of an escape.” I cleared my throat at the unexpected feeling that wanted to settle in the pit of my stomach. “What about you? Why public relations in sports?”
“You’re deflecting again, but I’ll let it go.
” She smirked knowingly then sighed. “I’ve always loved hockey,” she whispered, lost in thought.
“But honestly? Ever since I was a little girl, I admired women who weren’t afraid to enter a male-dominated field to leave their imprint.
It takes a lot of courage. We’re often criticized and judged for the same things our male colleagues do, simply because society believes women belong at home.
” She blew a short breath, shaking her head.
“But I want to make a difference and show young girls they can do and be anything they want to be when they grow up.”
I nodded, holding on to every word she spoke. This didn’t help tame the infatuation I had for her. If anything, it fueled it. The fierce determination in her eyes and the way she shared this information so wholeheartedly, it was attractive.
“Has anyone ever told you how fierce you are?” I asked softly.
She gave me a small smile, avoiding my gaze. “I’ve been called a lot of things over the years. High-maintenance. Too eager. Too forward. Too loud. But no. Never fierce.”
My body all but roared in outrage, but I kept myself in check as I stood from my chair and crouched in front of her. My hands found the warmth of her face, and I caressed her jaw back and forth with my thumb gently. Electricity ran up my arm, like touching her rewired something deep in my bones.
“Then let me be the first,” I rasped. It was difficult to breathe with the way my heart stabbed my ribs so painfully.
“You’re a force to be reckoned with, Kennedy Jones.
” I smiled when she took a sharp inhale and dropped her gaze.
“Talented, fierce, and fearless. Don’t let anyone ever make you believe otherwise.
” My hands found the nape of her neck, and I tilted her face, forcing her to meet my stare.
“And if you, for some reason, ever forget, I’ll be here to remind you. Every fucking day if I have to. Okay?”
Her brown eyes swam with an unspoken emotion.
Like I somehow managed to tear down the ironclad walls she kept up to keep people out.
People had this perception of Kennedy because it’s what she allowed them to see.
A mask she kept so close to her face it made it impossible to break through.
But it had finally cracked, just the tiniest bit, at my words.
I was a determined man on a mission. However long this fake relationship would last, I would make my damndest sure to help her see she didn’t have to be like this. She didn’t have to hide from me. Never me.
I wanted to be her safe space.
It wasn’t lost on me I was also living under a lie and keeping people at arm’s length. But there was a key difference between us.
It was already too late to save myself. But a woman as wonderful and strong as she was didn’t deserve that kind of fate. I had become accustomed to the loneliness life had given me. The suffocating feeling that wrapped its hands around my throat with a vise grip.
Solitude was a dear old friend of mine.
But the emptiness, the anger, the desolation it offered wasn’t something I wanted for her.