Chapter 6 #2
These motherfuckers. All around me, they’re in love because of me.
Rubbing it in my goddamn face while I’m over here living a fucking nightmare of blue balls and semi-hard-ons with no relief.
Not to mention, a live-in assistant who I can’t fuck.
A girl so fucking hot, so fucking perfect for me that the night I met her, I wept myself to sleep from not being able to bury myself between her legs.
How is this fair?
“Oh, here is your protein shake, Mr. Posey,” Wylie says as she hands me my shake.
“You make her call you Mr. Posey?” Halsey asks with a disgusted look.
“No,” I say and then glance down at Wylie, who now has a coat of mascara on her lashes, making her light gray eyes stand out even more. “We went over this. You can call me Levi.”
“Ooo, Levi, that seems so personal,” Blakely says while her arm is still wrapped around Halsey.
“She didn’t want to call me Posey. I didn’t want her to call me Mr. Posey. So we settled on Levi.”
“I don’t know anyone who calls you that,” Blakely says.
“Only when he’s in trouble,” Halsey says.
When it comes to Wylie Wood, I’m in a whole lot of trouble.
“I didn’t want to seem disrespectful at work,” Wylie says.
“Call me Levi at all times. There’s no need to be fancy around these guys.”
“What does that mean?” Blakely asks. “Are we not upper crust enough for you?”
“Not even a little.” I take my protein shake from Wylie. “Thanks for this.”
“Do you really have her fetching you drinks, Posey?” Halsey asks. “You’re better than that, dude.”
Yeah, I fucking know!
If it were up to me, Wylie would be sitting pretty in my guest room, playing around with her art while casually making social media posts for me.
But thanks to her dictator father, I have no choice but to have her fetch me things.
If the way her dad pulled me into the office today isn’t an indication of the tightrope he has me on, I don’t know what is.
“I don’t mind,” Wylie says. “I’m here to help Levi with whatever he needs. Which, by the way, when you get a chance, will you send me access to all the team photos and video clips?” she asks Blakely.
“Yes, I’ll talk to the team and get you a login this morning.”
“That’s amazing. Thank you.”
“Not a problem,” Blakely says. “There are some clips of Posey I’ve never used, but they’re solid gold. Have fun.”
“Just don’t embarrass me,” I say, wanting to clarify that.
“You embarrass yourself on your own terms,” Halsey says. Look at this motherfucker, coming out of his shell now that he’s found happiness. He wouldn’t have even said two words to Wylie a year ago, but now he’s making jokes at my expense.
See what I’m talking about? Ungrateful friends.
“And with that, I’m taking off. You coming, Wylie? Lord knows these two want to share a donut Lady and the Tramp style.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” Blakely says as she leans into Halsey.
Rolling my eyes, I leave the office with Wylie trailing. Once we’re down the hallway, she says, “They’re really cute together. They got married this past summer, right? I think I remember seeing a picture from their wedding.”
“Yeah. This summer. It was an intimate wedding in Banff.”
Halsey and Blakely kept the guest list to a minimum and celebrated the wedding at Silas’s cabin in the Canadian Rockies, where they said their vows in the backyard. Silas’s private chef catered the event.
I offered up the great idea to have bologna sliders as an appetizer, but they didn’t take the suggestion, nor did they listen to me about bringing Sherman—their bonsai tree—to the wedding, which I thought was flat-out irreverent.
That tree was one of the main reasons—besides me—that they got together.
Because of those two huge misses in their event planning, I knocked their wedding score a full point. They didn’t care when I told them.
Fucking rude.
“So you’re close with Halsey, right? And from what I can tell, Eli Hornsby. And perhaps Silas Taters?”
“Yeah. And Pacey Lawes. Oden O’Connor is in the mix now too, as well as Ian Rivers, but with his injury that still has him out, I’m not sure he’s going to return. He seems to keep having complications.”
“And Oden is new to the team from last season?”
I nod and press the elevator button. “Yes. Surprised you even have to ask, given who your father is.”
“Shockingly, we don’t talk hockey, like ever. Anything I know is from what I’ve seen. He’s sort of closed off when it comes to the job. When he’s home, he asks me how school is going and talks to me about the future. That’s about it.”
Sounds pretty sad.
“But he’s never really been a talker,” she adds, probably to make him seem like less of an ass.
She doesn’t need to pretend. I know the type of man he is. One sneer will make any private part shrivel up.
“Not much of a talker? You don’t say,” I joke, which makes her smile.
“Yeah, he’s always kept to himself.” The elevator doors open, and we head down the hallway, but I stop right before the locker room to keep talking to her.
“Was he like that when you were growing up too?”
“Yes,” she answers. “He never talks about my mom, ever. He acts like she doesn’t even exist. He doesn’t talk about his feelings.
Doesn’t talk about the wins or the losses.
After you guys won everything last year and I congratulated him, he just nodded and kissed the top of my head.
That night, we had dinner in front of the TV and watched Miracle .
It’s the one movie we’ve both loved over time.
I tried to get him into The Mighty Ducks franchise, but he wasn’t having any of it. ”
“What?” I ask, shocked. “Not a fan of Gordon Bombay?”
“Not even a little. Nor was he a fan of the flying V.”
“Oh bullshit,” I say. “We have a very similar play to the flying V. Maybe he’s a secret fan, and you don’t know it.
He doesn’t want to tell you out of fear of people thinking he’s copying Gordon.
” I take a sip of my protein smoothie, enjoying the chocolate peanut butter flavor that floats over my tongue. So fucking good.
“Ooo, you know, I never thought about that,” she says. “What if he’s a secret fan? Perhaps he has an homage to him in his closet, behind some coats. After blessing his underwear, he says a prayer to the great Bombay before taking off.”
I let out a loud laugh. “Fuck, that would be amazing.” I take another sip of my smoothie. “Thanks for this, by the way. I know you were out late last night and the last thing you wanted to do was grab me something else for breakfast. I really appreciate it.”
“Of course.” She smiles that beautiful smile up at me. “That’s why I’m here.”
And then she leans against the wall, staring up at me, those stunning eyes sucking me in, making me want to reach out and touch her face, stroke her cheek, pull her in close.
If things were different and she met me in my kitchen, I would have scooped her up and carried her to the couch.
I would have held her and played with her hair while I talked to her about the day ahead.
She would have laughed at some joke I said.
I would have kissed the tip of her nose.
And then, when I slid my hand under her shirt, she would have?—
“Posey!” Coach Wood yells from down the hallway, puckering my balls into a sunflower seed.
Jesus Christ.
I turn just in time to catch the fury in his eyes. “Yes, hey, hello. Howdy, uh . . . what’s up, Coach?” I try to act as casual as possible despite just daydreaming about his daughter.
“What the hell are you doing? Get in the locker room.”
“Right, yup, just finishing up some tasks over here.” I turn back to Wylie. “So get that stain out. Thanks.”
“Not a problem.” She smirks. “Good luck tonight. I’ll be watching.”
“Uh-huh. Sure.” I swallow hard, feeling Coach Wood staring me down. “Okay. Bye.”
I move away from her and head into the locker room where Coach Wood stands, staring me down. I offer him a nervous smile and scoot past him, clenching my ass the entire time.
Yup, having a great fucking time.
“Heard you made your new assistant fetch you a smoothie this morning,” Pacey says as he pulls his socks up. “You really going to be that boss?”
I look over at Halsey, who’s happily in his own little world, texting Blakely, I assume. So now he’s just going to tell everyone my business, then not participate in the discussion?
He’s changed, and I’m not sure I like it.
“It’s called helping your employee fulfill their job responsibilities.”
“It’s called being a douche,” Silas says. “Get your own damn smoothie, man.”
“She wants stuff to do.” I will defend myself here. “There’s nothing wrong with giving her tasks so she feels like she’s aiding in the success of my life.”
“Is that how you’re really going to put it?” Eli says. “The success of your life?”
“I think it has a nice ring,” OC says.
All the boys turn toward OC, who sheepishly picks up his socks and puts them on.
“Dude, just tell us what the hell is going on with Grace so we don’t have to watch you pathetically suck up to Posey all the time,” Silas says. “You’re starting to lose our respect.”
“Don’t listen to them,” I say to OC. “You just write up that synopsis for me, and we’ll figure out what to do. Trust me when I say these morons have no idea how to handle a budding relationship.”
“Not this again,” Eli says with a groan. “If you’re so good, then why the fuck aren’t you with someone?”
“Great point,” Pacey says. “Explain to us why you aren’t the master of your own heart.”
Silas presses his palm to his chest. “That’s a nice way to put it, man.”
Pacey nods. “Thanks, it felt like it had a nice ring to it. Something in one of Halsey’s books.”
Halsey doesn’t even look up from his phone, where he’s smiling largely now.
I can see that the honeymoon phase hasn’t passed yet.
“I don’t even think he’s been with anyone in a while,” Silas adds. “I haven’t seen Posey with a girl in, I don’t know . . . a few months.”
“Unless he’s been hooking up at home,” Eli says.