Chapter 6
6
“ F our more,” Mac barked, and Jude swallowed a groan and obeyed.
“Good, good,” Mac said over the clank of the weights coming to rest. “Nice extension on those.”
Jude grunted. “Fuck, my arms feel dead.”
“They should. I upped the weight.”
“Bastard.”
Mac started shifting weights from the bar to the rack. “That’s my job.”
“Goddammit, Mac,” Jude said, scowling. “How the hell am I supposed to hold a stick in two hours with arms like noodles?”
“Careful,” Mac cautioned with a jerk of his chin. “Your girl will hear you whining.”
“She’s not my girl,” Jude muttered, his scowl deepening, and deliberately didn’t look at the corner of the weight room where Brynn had set up her camera.
She’d kept her distance during the workout, as promised, but he’d known she was there. Every squat, every lunge, every curl and press and pull, he’d felt her eyes on him. And every time he’d seen her looking at him, it hadn’t felt like she was evaluating how she could use the moment for social media.
It had felt like she was fucking him with her eyes.
It wasn’t the first time he’d had to work out with half a chub, and it was just as uncomfortable as he’d remembered. Mac hadn’t helped, his knowing gaze laughing at him the whole time and taking every opportunity to chat with Brynn, making her laugh, and if there was a man who could concentrate on deadlifts while listening to that laugh, well, it wasn’t Jude Bessonette.
“No?” Mac paused, turning to eye Brynn with a gleam in his eye that had the hair on the back of Jude’s neck standing up. “Why not?”
“Because she’s my assistant,” Jude said and chugged water to keep from snarling like a dog guarding his bone.
“Don’t see what that has to do with anything,” Mac mused, weights clattering as he went back to moving them. “She’s cute. Nice smile. Great ass. You saying you don’t want to hit that?”
Jude turned his head far enough to scowl at his trainer. “Watch it.”
Mac’s beetle brows rose. “It’s just an observation.”
“Observe something else,” Jude said and stalked over to the mats to stretch.
Brynn sipped from her water bottle and checked the view on her phone’s camera to make sure she was sufficiently zoomed in. Jude had moved away from the weights and was stretching, and if she’d thought the weights were bad, the stretching was ten times worse.
He was on his belly on the floor, a foam roller under one hip, and was rolling back and forth in what she assumed was some kind of stretch designed to aid in hip or quad flexibility. She’d ask him—or maybe just Google it, because there was no way she’d be able to ask without blushing hard enough to set her hair on fire.
Because it looked like he was fucking the foam roller, and dear God, she wished it was her.
Her phone’s camera was high quality, the image crisp and clear. She could see the sweat beading on his skin, the definition in his leg muscles as he rolled back and forth, back and forth. His T-shirt was red—team colors—and had ridden up a little, baring the small of his back. Sweat pooled there, shining in the bright overhead lights, and she was so deep in a let-me-wash-your-sweaty-back shower fantasy that when she came out of it, he wasn’t on the mat anymore.
A quick, panicked look around revealed he’d moved to a treadmill on the other side of the room—and by the deep V of sweat soaking the front, had been there for a while. Mentally kicking her own ass, she repositioned the tripod and went to refill her water bottle.
By the time Jude was lacing up his skates in the locker room, he was a mess. His muscles were like gelatin and his dick was like granite, an uncomfortable state in which to play hockey, even if it was just an informal scrimmage. He was trying to think of some way to get out of it when someone sat on the bench beside him.
“You look like your dog died,” Tommy said, bumping his shoulder into Jude’s. “What’s up?”
“Nothing,” Jude muttered.
“Come on, tell Uncle Tommy what’s wrong.”
Jude glanced up, surprised to find the locker room empty. “Where’d everyone go?”
“Already out there. I came to find out what was taking you so long. So? You gonna tell me, or am I gonna have to beat it out of you on the ice?”
Jude frowned. “I thought today was no contact.”
“Figure of speech. Come on, spill.”
With a sigh, Jude leaned back against the locker. “I almost kissed Brynn.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” Tommy leaned in. “When, where, how? Gimme all the dish.”
Despite his inner turmoil, Jude smiled. It was hard not to around Tommy. “Yesterday, walking the dog. We were standing close, and it felt like we had, I don’t know…a moment.”
Tommy nodded. “Nice. And?”
“And then the dog yanked the leash, which I was holding, and I hit her in the ear, and, well, the moment was over.”
Tommy stared. “The fuck?”
“I know.” Frustrated, Jude dragged his hand through his hair. “She was with me, until the ear thing.”
“Well, that’s something.” Thoughtful, Tommy pursed his lips. “Okay. Well, you need another moment.”
“Great. Any ideas how to make that happen?”
“You can’t force it,” Tommy decided. “It has to be organic.”
“How am I supposed to make an organic moment happen?”
Tommy scratched his head. “Yeah, that’s a puzzler. Maybe take the dog for another walk?”
“That’s all you’ve got? Take the dog for another walk?”
Tommy shrugged. “You got anything better?”
“No.” Disgusted, Jude picked up his helmet. “This is hopeless.”
“Nah, man. Not hopeless. Just…”
“Just what?” Jude asked when he trailed off.
“Problematic,” Tommy concluded.
“Thanks,” Jude said drily and slapped his helmet on his head. “That’s much better.”
Tommy grinned. “I like you like this.”
“What?” Jude groused and stood. “Pissed off? Horny? Confused?”
“Lovesick,” Tommy said, his grin widening when Jude scowled. “It looks good on you.”
“You’re an asshole.”
“I know,” Tommy said cheerfully, and rising to his feet, clapped Jude on the back. “Come on, let’s go play hockey.”
“I’m shooting at your dick,” Jude muttered as they headed out to the hall and made the turn for the tunnel that led to the ice.
Tommy just laughed. “Head’s up. Your girl’s watching.”
Jude looked up. Brynn stood at the edge of the boards at the end of the tunnel. She’d donned a thick hoodie over the t-shirt and leggings she’d worn in the weight room, likely in deference to the chill coming off the ice, and the phone in her hand was aimed at him.
“Smile, asshole,” Tommy muttered.
“What?”
“You look like a constipated goat. Smile.”
He didn’t feel like smiling. He felt like chucking his gear, snatching her up, and fucking her into the boards until they both passed out. He didn’t even care that he’d be risking frost bite to his balls to do it.
Tommy snorted out a laugh. “I said smile, not eye-fuck her.”
Fuck that. She wanted juice for social media? He’d give her some juice.
He walked up the tunnel, his eyes on her face. She was watching her phone screen, but then her gaze flicked up to meet his.
Sometimes, before a game, it was like something was building inside him, an engine revving before a race, energy coiled and waiting to be set free. That’s what he felt like now, seeing awareness dawn in her eyes and color bloom in her cheeks. This close to the ice he could see her breath, coming in short, rapid little puffs, hitching as he drew closer. He slowed down, so many things he wanted to say leaping to mind. You’re beautiful. I want you. Please sit on my face. But she was filming, and none of those things were appropriate.
So he sent her a slow smile, knowing his dimples would pop, and closed one eye in a wink when he passed her. He skated onto the ice with Tommy right behind him, still laughing, and shouted, “Okay boys, let’s do this!”
Brynn made her way up into the stands, trying to stop hyperventilating before she got to her seat. Tommy’s wife was here with her sister, along with his assistant Angela, and she was afraid if she didn’t calm down they’d ask questions, probably something like, are you going through early menopause? because she sure felt like she was having a hot flash.
She’d set up her tripod a few rows back from the glass, hoping to get as much of the ice in frame as possible while still staying close to the action, and busied herself setting up her phone. There were about a dozen players out there, skating in circles and talking shit, Jude in the middle of them. He was laughing at something Tommy said, which wasn’t helping her hot flash situation, so she set the phone to record and took the stairs into the stands at a run so it would look like she was breathless and sweaty because she was out of shape instead of horny.
Kara, Tommy’s very pregnant wife, was dressed in a pair of leggings and her husband’s jersey and had her red hair up in a high ponytail that set off her excellent bone structure. Her skin, almost as white as Brynn’s, was unfairly freckle-free, something that would’ve annoyed Brynn if Kara hadn’t already confessed that the red was chemically assisted. She was bickering with her sister when Brynn arrived and was surrounded by an impressive array of snacks. There was a two-liter bottle of Faygo Red Pop on the floor, a jar of garlic pickles next to it, and a Meijer grocery bag filled with what looked like every kind of box candy they carried perched on Kara’s knees.
“It’s ridiculous,” Kara’s sister was saying. Seated on Kara’s other side, she was a pretty, forty-something white brunette with a short, stylish bob, snapping blue eyes and the kind of skin that screamed I work indoors and make enough money to see my dermatologist more often than my dentist.
“It’s not,” Kara insisted with a toss of her ponytail, her own blue eyes firing. “And anyway, I didn’t ask. She volunteered.”
The sister—Layla, Brynn recalled—rolled her eyes. “She volunteered because you whined.”
“I did not whine,” Kara whined.
“You’re pathetic,” Layla declared and snatched the bag of candy off Kara’s lap.
“Hey!”
“I’m taking the Lemonheads. That’s your punishment for being a spoiled brat.”
“Bitch,” Kara muttered, then turned to smile at Brynn. “Hey, Brynn. Want some candy?”
“No, thanks.” Unfazed by the sisterly bickering and grateful for the distraction from her lustful thoughts, Brynn took the seat next to Kara. “How’re you feeling?”
“Okay,” Kara said, patting the bump rising from her middle like Mount Doom. “Tired, and hungry all the time?—”
Layla snorted around a mouth full of Lemonheads.
“Bite me,” Kara snapped, then continued without missing a beat. “But all in all, feeling pretty good.”
“That’s great.”
“I’m so glad they’re doing this.” Wiggling in her seat, Kara nodded at the ice, where the shit-talking had stopped and they seemed to be getting organized. “I can get some heckling in before I’m sidelined with Tommy Junior, here.”
“You’re going to heckle your husband?” Brynn asked, amused.
“Hell, yes.” Leaning forward, Kara cupped her hands around her mouth to yell, “Hey Jakes, you candy-ass! You gonna play some hockey, or stand around gabbing like an old lady all day?”
Layla just shook her head and sighed, but out on the ice, Tommy laughed.
“I see the heckling has started,” someone said, and Brynn looked up to see Angela standing at the end of the row. A tall Black woman with a short crop of tight curls, she wore a crisp white shirt dress that made her dark skin glow and showed off legs that would’ve been welcomed on any high fashion runway. Her earrings were gold hoops Brynn could’ve put a fist through, her three-inch pumps a bold yellow that matched the enormous leather tote slung over her shoulder, and in her hands was a bucket of popcorn from a local movie theatre chain.
“Ooh, popcorn!” Kara squealed, heckling momentarily forgotten. “Angela, you’re a goddess.”
“I know,” Angela said and handed over the bucket.
“Hey, Ang!” Tommy shouted from the ice. “Did you go to the movie theatre just to buy my baby popcorn?”
“She whined,” Layla yelled, and Kara kicked her in the shin. “Ow!”
“You deserved it,” Kara said and shoved in a handful of popcorn.
“I did,” Angela called back, her boldly red lips curling in a smile. She sat, neatly crossed her excellent legs, and plopped the giant tote in the seat next to her. “The good theatre with the real butter. I had them layer it through the bucket. I’ll let you know how you can show me your appreciation.”
“How about an extra week of paid vacation?”
“That’ll do,” Angela said promptly.
“This is so good,” Kara mumbled. Butter was dripping down her chin. “Babe, you have to try this!”
“I’ll try it later, honey. Trying to play some hockey, here.”
“Oh, right. Sorry!” Kara waved a hand. “Kick some ass, baby!”
“Always, honey,” Tommy called, and blowing her a kiss, turned back and said, “You heard her, boys. I gotta kick some ass, so let’s get rollin’.”
“Good to see you,” Angela said to Brynn as the clatter of sticks and skates rang in the air.
“You, too,” Brynn said with genuine pleasure. “How’s your summer been?”
“Pretty mellow, actually—trips to the movie theatre for popcorn notwithstanding,” Angela said, lips twisting with amusement. “Tommy hasn’t wanted to be far from home, just in case, so he hasn’t been doing much. Charity golf tournaments, a few local appearances. Easy stuff. You?”
“Jude just got back into town this week, so also mellow,” she replied, deliberately leaving out her financial and housing woes. The world of professional hockey was a small one, and she had no doubt that the news of the embezzlement would get out—Grant wasn’t just Jude’s agent, after all, and who knew how many other of his clients had been affected—but she didn’t want her personal business on everyone’s tongues.
“That yours?” Angela asked.
Brynn followed her gaze to the tripod. “Yeah. I told Jude I needed some new juice for his Instagram, since he barely posted anything over the summer. You’d have thought I asked him to drink battery acid or something.”
“He’s not a fan of the ‘gram?”
“Not really. He’s private,” Brynn explained, tracking him on the ice. He was at the near blue line with Tommy, passing the puck back and forth, looking for a shooting lane. “He understands it’s important, he just doesn’t want to think about it, you know?”
“Come on, Jakes, you pussy! Shoot it!” Kara hollered, spilling popcorn.
“Which is where you come in,” Angela pointed out. On the ice, Tommy shot and missed, eliciting hisses and boos from his loving wife and jeering laughter from his teammates.
“I don’t mind, really,” Brynn said. “At least I don’t have to worry he’s going to put something inappropriate out there.”
“That’s a blessing, trust me. Tommy would post toilet selfies if I didn’t lay down the law.”
“Ew.”
“Exactly. How’s it going otherwise?” Angela asked.
“What do you mean?” Brynn hedged.
“I mean, new job, new city. You’ve been here almost a year now, right? You’re settled in, making new friends?”
“Oh. Um, not really,” She admitted. “I’ve had some personal stuff going on the last few months. It’s kind of sucked up all my time and energy.”
Curiosity warred with sympathy in Angela’s dark brown eyes. “Anything I can do to help?”
“It’s all good now,” Brynn explained hurriedly. “Finally. So I’m hoping to get out and explore the city more in the next month or two.”
Though the curiosity in her gaze remained, all Angela said was, “Good. Let me know when you’re ready, and I’ll take you out, show you around.” She winked. “Introduce you to some guys.”
“Oh. Um. I’d love to go out, but…”
“Not interested in guys?” Angela asked.
“No, it’s not that.”
“You’ve already got a guy?”
Oh, god. “Not exactly?”
Angela’s lips twitched, and one elegantly arched eyebrow went up. “You’re not sure?”
“It’s complicated,” Brynn hedged.
“I’ll bet,” Angela murmured with a knowing look, and Brynn felt her stomach give a warning jitter.
“Jakes, you clown, how’d you miss that pass?” Kara shouted next to her. “My grandma’s cross-eyed cat could’ve handled that!”
“Is she always like this?” Brynn asked.
“Pretty much,” Angela said, and to Brynn’s relief, went with the change of subject. “Until someone else joins in, then she tries to fight them for talking smack about her baby.”
Brynn grinned, appreciating the image. “That sounds like fun.”
Angela rolled her eyes. “I just thank God it’s not in my job description to babysit her.”
“For Christ’s sake, try skating with your eyes open next time, you—oh!”
Brynn swung around to look at Kara in concern. That ‘oh!’ had sounded pained. “Kara? You okay?”
“Um. No.” Both hands braced on the armrests of her seat, Kara swallowed hard. Her eyes were wide, and she’d gone dead pale. “My water just broke.”
“Shit. Shit.” The box of Lemonheads hit the floor, candy scattering as Layla surged to her feet. She wiped her hands on her jeans. “Okay, we’re okay. You’re not having contractions, are you?”
“I don’t think so. That means we have time, right? If I’m not having contractions? The baby’s not coming right now if I’m not having contractions. What are you doing?” she demanded when Layla fumbled out her phone.
“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m Googling it.”
“Googling it? Googling it?”
“Yes, Googling it! What else do you want me to do, Kara? I’m not a doctor! I can’t—” She twirled one hand in the air like she was screwing in a lightbulb “—check your cervix, or whatever the fuck!”
A hand clamped on Brynn’s arm, and she turned to Angela. “Go get your phone.”
“What?”
“Go get your phone. I need mine, so you have to record all this. Go.”
“I—okay.” Grateful to get out of the fray, Brynn hurried down the steps. Behind her Angela said, “Okay, let’s calm down.”
“I don’t want to calm down,” Kara replied, her voice carrying. “My water just broke, and she’s Googling—oh! Oh, shit whoa!”
Fumbling the phone out of the tripod, Brynn glanced back. Kara was bent over, clutching her belly.
“Oh, God, what’s happening?” Layla reached down like she was going to pat Kara on the back, then seemed to think better of it. “Kara?”
“My guess is she’s having a contraction,” Angela said as Kara began to breathe like…well, like a woman having contractions. At least, like women having contractions on TV always breathed—Brynn had never actually seen anyone having contractions in real life.
Kara nodded frantically, huffing and puffing like a steam engine, her ponytail bobbing wildly. “This…really…hurts.”
“Shit,” Angela muttered as Brynn trotted up. “You filming?”
“Never stopped,” Brynn confirmed.
“Don’t,” Angela told her, then crouched to lay a hand on Kara’s knee. “How you doing, Kara?”
Her face the color of a tomato, Kara just shook her head.
“You gotta breathe through it,” Layla said and demonstrated, sucking in air through her nose, blowing it out through her mouth.
“I am…breathing,” Kara said through gritted teeth.
“Well, are you doing it right?”
“Fuck you,” Kara managed, and sucking in a big breath, bellowed out, “Jaaaaaaaaaakes!”
Tommy, who’d been skating hard for the net at the other end, put on the breaks, treating the goalie to a snow shower, and turned to squint at them. “Kara?”
“We need you, Tommy,” Angela called, waving a hand in the air, but the guys on the ice were chattering again, and Tommy was too far away to hear clearly.
“What?” he yelled, skating to the near blue line.
“We need you,” Angela yelled again, Layla adding her voice this time, and he glided to the center line, a confused frown on his face.
“What?” he asked again, and Kara, her breath back finally, opened her mouth and with enough volume to shake the banners in the rafters, bellowed, “ I’m in labor, you fucking asshole! ”
Anticipating him, Brynn panned the camera away from Kara and zoomed in just in time to catch the moment of slack-jawed shock, then she was scrambling to keep him in frame as he moved like lightning across the ice. By the time he got to the bench he’d shed his stick, gloves and helmet, then he was over the boards into the bench, then climbing up out of the bench and into the stands.
“Your skates!” someone shouted from behind him, but he either didn’t hear or didn’t care, and Brynn winced at the sound of steel on concrete. He clambered up the stairs, dark hair flying, and fell at Kara’s feet.
“Baby.” He fumbled for her hand, and Brynn saw him fight off a wince when her nails dug into his skin. “You okay?”
“No,” she sobbed. “It hurts, and it’s happening so fast. I’m scared.”
“I’m right here,” he promised, bringing their joined hands to his lips. “I’m not leaving you. I’ll never leave you.”
She offered him a wobbly smile. “I’m sorry I called you an asshole.”
“It’s okay. I love you.”
“I love you, too—oh, God, here comes another one.”
“Okay, all right, you’re okay. Breathe, baby. Just breathe.” Over her bowed head, his wild eyes searched out Angela’s. “What do we do?”
“I’ve got a car waiting, and I called the hospital so they know we’re coming in. They said not to wait.”
“Okay. Okay. Kara? Baby? We have to go.”
She nodded, huffing and puffing her way through the contraction.
“We need to get your skates off, Tommy,” Angela said, and he started to shift to unlace them.
“No, don’t let me go,” Kara said, clinging tighter to his hand.
“Just for a minute,” he told her, but she shook her head fiercely, and Brynn’s heart ached at the helpless look on his face.
“I’ve got it,” Layla said, climbing down into the next row of seats and getting behind him. He lifted one foot, holding it up so she could get at the laces, and she worked swiftly to undo them.
“Be careful of the blade,” he warned when it was loose, and she grabbed the boot by the back of the heel and tugged it off. By the time the other one was off Kara was through the worst of the contraction, so Tommy got to his feet and scooped her up into his arms.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” Kara sobbed, burying her face in his neck.
“Baby, I wouldn’t be anywhere else,” he vowed, and with his teammates cheering and banging their sticks on the ice, followed Angela up the stairs and out of the arena in his stocking feet, Layla close behind, her phone in one hand and the bag of candy in the other.
Brynn kept the camera trained on them until they disappeared, then panned back to the ice, where Jude stood hooting and cheering along with his teammates. And when his gaze met hers and he winked again, she was grateful he was too far away to see her thighs tremble.