Chapter 13
MILA
Mila wakes up to hot breath in her face.
And not the sexy, whiskey-scented kind from last night. No, this one is damp and slightly fishy, accompanied by a snort and a full-body sneeze that sprinkles her cheek like morning dew.
“Gordie,” she groans, pushing the squat little bulldog away from her pillow.
Gordie Howl pants happily and plops his considerable weight directly on her stomach, clearly thrilled she’s alive.
Her skull pulses with a dull, wine-soaked throb. Her mouth has a sour taste, like she’d licked a penny.
As she blinks fully awake, pieces of the night before start clicking back into place, soft and disjointed at first, like flickers of a dream she’s not sure she actually had. The hush of the night air. The press of a body against hers. The glint of firelight on a black mask.
His voice.
His hands.
And, oh God, what she let him do with those hands.
She groans into the pillow covering her face.
What was I thinking?
Flirting with a stranger was one thing—that was manageable. But letting him touch her? Kiss her? Grind her against the wall like she was a damn sorority girl in a costume and not a grown woman with a condo and a mortgage?
She should be ashamed. Deeply. Profoundly.
Not to mention, she has no idea who that man was. Because she still doesn’t know his name.
He could be anyone. A trainer. A staffer. Hell, he could be on the team.
And if she scores this contract, if she ends up working directly with the Whalers, then she might have accidentally kicked off a business relationship by dry-humping a client. Which would officially be strike two on the “don’t hook up with people you work with” scoreboard.
Her stomach knots. Stupid. So, so stupid.
But then her brain—traitorous, unbothered—hands her a flash of him.
The press of his body. His breath at her ear. That voice, all rough edges and dark promises, murmuring “Say yes, sir.”
Heat curls between her thighs like a match dropped on dry leaves.
Mila groans and fans herself with the duvet, cursing her body for being so dramatic.
Okay. So maybe shame and propriety are overrated.
Because that orgasm? That wasn’t just sex. That was a spiritual experience. Like he’d hacked into her nervous system with nothing but his voice and the weight of his hands and flipped some hidden switch she didn’t know existed.
Which is now officially a problem.
Because Mila Anderson is many things—brand whisperer, breakfast cereal aficionado, high-functioning over-thinker—but a woman who can hook up with a masked stranger and then go about her life like nothing happened?
Not a chance.
She tosses off the duvet and winces when her bare feet hit cool hardwood. Gordie waddles after her as she grabs her phone from the nightstand. No new messages.
Downstairs, the kitchen smells like bacon and coffee. Natalie slumps over the island in Jake’s hoodie, a pair of sunglasses on despite the gray, overcast morning, with a thin wash of light filtering through the windows.
Jake, on the other hand, is chipper and irritatingly well-hydrated, flipping pancakes like a man who’s never known pain.
“Morning, sunshine,” he says, grinning. “Sleep okay?”
“Like the dead,” Mila mutters, heading straight for the coffee pot.
“God,” Natalie groans, her face mashed into her folded arms on the kitchen island. “I feel like I was run over by the team bus. Twice. And the second time, it backed up just to be sure.”
Jake doesn’t look up from the stove. “Probably because you split a bottle of wine with Mila before the party and then drank Jesse’s radioactive jungle punch all night.”
Natalie lifts her head to glare at him from behind her crooked sunglasses. “I had one glass.”
“You had three, and then lectured Jesse about the dangers of binge drinking while pouring your fourth.”
Natalie groans louder, sinking deeper into her arms. “Oh my god, you’re right. I am a bad guardian.”
Mila, perched on a barstool with her mug of coffee hugged to her chest, smiles into her cup.
“Nat, you’re not a bad guardian. You’re making up for lost time. You didn’t get your wild twenties, remember? You were too busy raising Jesse and keeping him from lighting household appliances on fire.”
Jake raises an eyebrow. “That happened?”
Natalie lifts one limp hand and waves it dismissively. “It was a small fire. Burrito. Microwave. He didn’t read the instructions.”
“That sounds like our Jesse,” Jake replies dryly.
“I remember that,” Mila says, sipping her coffee. “You didn’t let him use the microwave for a month.”
Natalie groans again. “I should’ve said no to the punch.”
“But then we wouldn’t have that beautiful moment where you tried to confiscate Jesse’s beer while slurring something about being a role model,” Jake adds. “Truly inspirational.”
“I hate you,” Natalie mutters into the counter.
Jake leans down to kiss the top of her head. “You love me.”
Mila watches them, her chest tugging a little. Their easy affection. The bickering. The well-worn comfort that comes from loving someone through all their worst hangovers. It makes her ache in places she usually keeps locked up.
She shakes her head and turns to Jake, who’s somehow matching Gordie Howl’s energy as the puppy tears through the kitchen, with a crumpled paper towel clenched triumphantly in his crooked little jaws.
“How are you this fine?” she asks, squinting at him.
Jake flips a pancake with flair and grins. “Because I’m built different. Also, I had two beers and a Gatorade. My body is a temple.”
Mila snorts. “You’re the most annoying temple I’ve ever met.”
“Yet she keeps coming back to worship,” Jake says, winking at Natalie.
They both groan as Jake slides plates in front of them, piled high with pancakes, scrambled eggs and bacon.
Natalie lifts her head, eyes bleary and face creased from the countertop. “Wait, where did you go last night? One second you were with us, the next—poof. Gone.”
Mila freezes, mug halfway to her mouth. Her spine goes ramrod straight and she blinks hard, needing a second to reset her expression. The mug finally makes it to her lips, but she doesn’t drink—just hides behind the rim, staring into the dark liquid.
“I needed some air.”
Which isn’t a lie. She did need air.
She just happened to get it while making out with a masked stranger in the shadows of a gazebo, letting him wreck her with his mouth and his hands and his voice, like some kind of sexed-up fever dream.
But she still doesn’t know who he is.
And until she does, she’s not telling Natalie. Or Jake. They wouldn’t understand.
“I didn’t realize I had to file a missing persons report,” she says lightly, glancing at Natalie over her coffee mug.
Natalie doesn’t even blink. “You’re acting weird.”
Mila shrugs, aiming for casual. “I’m fine.”
She’s not. Her heart is still pounding like it knows something her brain hasn’t caught up to yet. Her skin feels too tight, like her nerves are wearing it from the inside out.
Time to pivot.
“Hey, who was at the party last night?” she asks, turning to Jake, keeping her voice even.
Jake doesn’t look up as he digs into his plate of eggs. “Half the team, plus some of the training staff. Why?”
“Just curious,” she says, taking another sip of her coffee. “I saw a lot of people I didn’t recognize.”
Jake hums noncommittally.
Time to go fishing.
“What about that guy in the LED suit?”
Jake grins. “Tall. Our goalie. We introduced you, remember?”
“Oh, right. I forgot. Dry sense of humor.”
“Yeah, he’s a goalie,” Jake says, like that explains everything. “They’re weird. Comes with the job.”
She nods and pokes at her pancakes. Then, as casually as she can manage, “And what about the guy in the suit and black mask?”
Natalie looks up, puzzled. “There was a guy in a suit?”
“Dark hair. Tall,” Mila presses, pretending to care more about slicing her pancakes than about the answer. “Hanging out in the backyard. Looked like some kind of Phantom of the Opera situation.”
Natalie frowns. “I didn’t see anyone like that.”
“But dark hair and tall? That could have been Theo,” Jake says.
Mila’s fork stalls halfway to her mouth.
Sweet baby Jesus. Jake has a point.
Last night had been dark, hazy, soaked in adrenaline and wine. She hadn’t stopped to think. She’d just let herself surrender to the gravelly voice, the irresistible rush of letting someone taking control. Her whole body had gone pliant for him, her brain reduced to a puddle of shameless hormones.
Now her stomach somersaults, nerves and logic wrestling in a dizzy rush. No way. Theo’s quiet. Careful. Sweet, even. The man in the mask had been bold, filthy-mouthed, the kind of commanding that still has her shifting uncomfortably in her chair.
“Could’ve been a friend of a player,” Natalie chimes in. “Jesse told a bunch of people to invite whoever.”
Mila needs to know.
She wipes her mouth with her napkin and sets down her fork. “Hey Nat, I think I left my phone at Jesse’s. Mind if I borrow your car after breakfast?”
Natalie groans, already slumping into her chair. “Take it. I have a date with the couch, and we’re getting serious.”
Mila smiles sweetly, but her mind is already elsewhere.
Time for Plan B.