EIGHT
Luca
I should be used to it by now. Watching women flirt with Max and him flirt right back. It’s the soul-crushing consequence of having a thing for a straight guy.
I’m tempted to tell my boss to inform Coach Beck he should give this assignment to another agent on the security team. But I can’t say why. My name, my background information is fake. GM Reid and Bronwin can’t know I used to work for Belova.
And I can’t tell anyone I’m obsessed with Max.
He’ll love me backing off, though. He doesn’t want a bodyguard. No other player on the team has protection like this.
Max got it right, saying it’s antithetical for a six-foot mountain of a hockey player to have a bodyguard. Hockey is just different. They’re working-class players making decent, but not obscene salaries like football or baseball stars.
Most guys on the team are married and live quietly with their families in the suburbs. The single ones, like Max, live in high rises with doormen and locked parking garages.
A penthouse I’m apparently moving into. While I wrap my head around that one, Coach Beck shows up with the team doctor, and when he approves Max’s release, we’re on the move.
Walking to the elevator, I keep pace behind everyone, taking up my position in the rear watching for trouble. Knowing the bratva wants to hurt Max, my gaze sharpens for trouble. They won’t come at him head-on again. They won’t send another woman to tempt him. The next attack will be one of stealth.
A guy on a bicycle racing by with a shiv when he’s jogging, or a car running him off the road.
A suspicious package mailed to him.
People need to see he has a bodyguard. But I can’t have Ivan Belova recognize me.
Catching my reflection in the polished elevator car, I wonder if the beard and longer hair is enough of a change to my appearance. This new assignment makes it more important than ever that I grew out the military flat top. Now my dark shaggy curls cover my ears and flop in my eyes while wearing shades. I need to keep Ivan from suspecting it’s me.
He’d never guess on his own that I’d go from his number three enforcer, doing brutal hits, to working security for a professional hockey team.
Yet, here I am.
Outside, Coach Beck instructs everyone where to go and what to do. He drives Max home to his apartment where, according to Beck, his closest teammates, Willis and Madison, are waiting for him. They’ll stay with Max while I drive back to my houseboat in Norwalk and pack up to live with the object of my obsession.
Two hours later, I arrive at the snazzy penthouse, and only Beck is still with Max. But after shaking my hand and silently wishing me luck, he takes off.
Max eyes my two suitcases and several garment bags, the color draining from his face. “How long do you plan to live here?”
“For the rest of the season, I assume.” I should probably get some kind of idea from Bronwin.
Max shakes his head. “How many suits do you have?”
“In case you didn’t notice, we wear suits to every game, like you guys,” I answer in the same brusque tone. “For each suit, I need dress shirts, ties, and shoes. The days off I wear jeans, T-shirts, or casual sweaters, but different shoes. Oh, and PJ bottoms for midnight security checks.”
Christ, I have to shut the fuck up.
Max raises one dark eyebrow at me. “Bottoms?”
“I’m not a matching top and bottom kind of guy.” I gasp, realizing the dirty pun that just fell out of my mouth. “When I wear something to bed at all.”
Most guys sleep in the nude, just rarely do straight guys talk about it to other guys.
“I’ll show you where you can stay.” Max struts by my pile, not lifting anything up to help me, but I don’t want his help.
Plus, he’s injured.
“The bedrooms are back that way, but there’s a—”
“The bedrooms are that way?” I stop him from turning a corner. “Where are you taking me?”
To bed , I’d love to hear him say.
“There’s a guest room for the housekeeper if she needs to stay over.”
Despite the updated appliances, this building is old, with classic molding and finishes. I bet it has maids’ quarters he’s talking about.
“And what if she does?” I fold my arms. “Do I sleep on the floor, or share a bed with her?”
Max tightens his fists for some reason, then shakes them loose, wincing in pain.
“Where’s your bedroom, Max?” I ask sharply.
“You’re not sleeping in my—”
“Show me.” I invade his space, my face in his to exercise my authority.
As I wait to be pushed, shoved, or punched, I breathe him in. It’s a mixture of day-old, faded cologne and male power. His eyes hit my mouth and my cock throbs.
Jesus H. Christ. Is it remotely possible my obsession isn’t one hundred percent straight? Bi-curious was too much to hope for.
After stalling, Max turns and struts toward another hallway. My mouth twists in disappointment.
What the hell am I doing?
I’m really a murderer who will eventually live in the shadows again. Being in a relationship with a fucking star hockey player isn’t in the cards for me.
After Belova tried to have me killed, I disappeared and faked my younger sister’s death. Samara is twenty-nine, but I’m eight years older and always felt responsible for her. That was until she started freelancing as a cleaner for other mob families. No one who hires her wants to know her name, let alone her background. Or who’s after her.
And she’s damn good, based on the reports I get from her.
I shake away thoughts of my sister and follow Max down a hallway painted gray with crisp white chair rail molding and industrial chic overhead lights.
Max stops in front of a door. “This is my bedroom. Unless I’m screaming for help, you don’t step one foot in here, do you understand?”
Years on the enforcer team for Belova, protecting princesses or mistresses, I’ve heard this before. And always brushed it off. Hearing Max specifically tell me he doesn’t want me in his bedroom stings.
“Let’s get one thing straight.” My insides coil when his brows furrow at the word straight, like it’s a taunt. “My job is to protect you. If I think I need to be in that room, I’m coming in.”
“If the door is locked?”
“I’ll kick it down. ”
Max flushes, his jaw trembling, his eyes right on my mouth again.
Try me, bad boy. Please....
“Take that bedroom.” He points to a closed door further down the hall.
I notice a door directly across from his and open it. It’s as if I’ve stepped into a hotel room at the Four Seasons. It has a king size bed, light blue painted walls with bright white wainscotting below. There’s fancy gunmetal gray lacquered furniture. While breathing in a scent of citrus and lavender, I see a bathroom in the far corner.
“I’ll stay in here, if you don’t mind.”
“I do mind,” Max belts out. “That’s too close.”
“Too bad.” I toss in the one suitcase I carried with me and then brush past him to get the rest.
His bedroom door slams, and I shake my head, walking away. If he only knew what I do to men who throw tantrums.
After hauling all my shit into the bedroom, I meet Max in the massive kitchen.
His head is down and for a moment, I think he’s in pain. It guts me, even though he’s being an asshole.
I get it. A stranger has moved into his sanctuary, and I’m going to be up his ass for the foreseeable future.
God, I wish. Him on his back, me fucking him while I kiss the shit out of him.
I clear my throat as well as that useless fantasy from my mind. Nothing good will come from these thoughts messing with my balance.
Max looks up, wearing a T-shirt from a top pub in Norwalk. Looking closer, I see he’s making a list, and not hanging his head from pain.
“You’ve been to O’Malley’s?” I ask, rounding the high counter that divides the working kitchen from the open dining and massive living room areas.
“Sure, all the time.” He glances down at his T-shirt like he didn’t even realize what he threw on. “A few guys from the team go.”
I’m guessing O’Malley’s is where he picks up women and brings them back here to fuck in that bed.
Jealousy fires through me.
But I can’t take my eyes off him. His hair is wet and slicked back. Massive sculpted biceps challenge the T-shirt sleeves. I can’t stop looking at his veins and golden skin. That O’Malley’s Pub merch barely covers his waist, and the low-riding gray sweatpants cling to his hips.
Not seeing a waistband for briefs or boxers, I assume he’s going commando.
All I have to do is reach inside...
“Why are you asking about O’Malley’s?” Max comes close to catching me checking him out.
“I live in Norwalk. At the docks. Houseboat.”
Max blinks a few times. “Those old, ragged things bouncing around in the water?”
“I’m sure the worst one you’ve seen is mine.” Part of my cover.
“I doubt it’s the worst one.” He sounds friendlier for some reason. “Hey, what do you drink? I’ll put it on my shopping list.”
I get closer, glancing at the list. “I don’t drink.”
He clears his throat. “Problem?”
“That’s an awfully personal question.”
“I’d like to know if my bodyguard is an alcoholic.”
“I’ve never had a problem,” I scoff. “My job is to protect a multi-million-dollar franchise, it’s best I stay sober during the season.”
He blushes again. “Sorry. Just checking. You’re living with me, and I don’t know anything about you.”
“I know everything about you. That’s all that matters.”
He tenses, the vein in his neck throbbing. “Everything?”
“Enough,” I say to relieve him.
Clearly, Max Ryan has some secrets.