Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
EMMETT
Curtis Freeman—the Scorpions forward and general asshole—comes barreling toward me on a breakaway, but it’ll be a cold day in hell when I let this arrogant prick get the better of me.
The Kronwall I give him is hard enough to send him crashing into the boards, but soft enough to keep him conscious.
“That’s for putting our key defenseman in the hospital last season, you fucking piece of shit.” I deliver my sentence with a smile as he slowly climbs to his feet, adjusting his helmet.
He squares up to me, knocking his visor against mine. “Schneider had it coming, and he knew it.”
“Williams,” I bite out. “His name is Tommy Williams now.”
“Okay, okay. Either one of you needs to drop your gloves or we restart the play.” The ref plants a palm on each of our chests, putting some distance between us.
Freeman’s eyes burn with a desire to fight, even if his smaller frame doesn’t stand a chance against me. I’ve been fighting my whole hockey career; he’s barely out of diapers.
“Rein it in, Curtis.” Scorpions forward, Jessie Callaghan, slides toward us.
After tipping his chin at me in acknowledgment, he turns his attention to Freeman, voice dropping low as he tells his center to get a fucking grip on himself.
“Are you trying to put yourself in the emergency room? Show a little goddamn respect for what happened last season. Williams nearly died!”
“Come on now, Curtis.” Tommy pulls up next to me, chewing on the corner of his mouthguard.
“That’s no way to make friends when you’re already two to one, down in the third.
Besides”—he knocks his glove against Freeman’s helmet, a patronizing move designed to taunt him—“Richards here would destroy you with his first punch.”
“Why are you still here, Schneider?” Freeman accentuates Tommy’s former last name, hoping to get a rise out of my teammate.
If there’s one guy on this team you don’t want to piss off, it’s one thousand percent Tommy. However, luckily for Freeman, Tommy only fights when he needs to these days, frequently opting to take the moral high ground.
“I save my punches for people who are worth the effort,” Tommy retorts.
“Are we going to fight or play?” The ref intervenes again, raising his voice so we can hear it over the crowd.
It’s wild in here tonight, and this exchange with Freeman has only fueled the fire. After the incident between Freeman and Tommy last season, there’s been a ton of speculation leading up to tonight’s game, including whether Tommy would slip back into his former ways and crush Freeman in a fight.
“We’re going to play,” I reply, eyes tracking to the Jumbotron.
The chances of Billie showing on-screen are slim to almost zero, but I keep my eyes locked on it for a moment longer, letting her know that even when I’m mid-game, she’s always on my mind.
“That was some goddamn performance out there tonight!” Coach Morgan moves around the locker room, bumping fists with each of his players in his usual postgame routine, whether we win or lose.
He stops in front of me, pressing his lips together in thought. “Of all the guys I’d want in that position tonight with Freeman, you would’ve been my first pick. Good work killing the breakaway, even better work putting Freeman back in his box.”
“Where he fucking belongs,” Archer adds right as he bumps fists with Coach and dumps himself down beside me on the bench. “Top of the league, bro. I can feel another Cup coming on.”
“Don’t fucking jinx it,” I jest, pulling my jersey overhead before getting to work on unlacing my skates.
“Are you gracing us with your presence at Lloyd’s tonight?” he asks, an unmistakable twinkle in his eye. He knows that Billie and Scott are here tonight since Darcy was the one who met them at the arena entrance. “Or are you entertaining at home instead?”
Pulling off my second skate, I sit down beside him. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re the world’s most annoying teammate?”
He makes a face akin to pride. “From time to time. But my question was a serious one. Are you coming out to Lloyd’s?” He leans closer, dropping his voice to barely a whisper. “And are you bringing Billie?”
My eyes grow wide at the memory of when she not only caught sight of my dick, but witnessed her name tumble from my lips as I brought myself to the edge with thoughts of how she’d suck me so well.
“No one can hear what we’re saying,” Archer declares, casting his hand around the room, the rest of the team either heading for the showers or deep in their own conversations.
I shake my head at him. It’s been nearly a week since I dropped Billie and Blake back home that fateful morning, and not a single word has been exchanged between us since.
I’m pretty sure that she wants to die of embarrassment, and I’ve been thinking about turning Catholic, mainly for the benefit of a confession.
I jerked off to thoughts of my best friend’s only daughter.
And I fucking loved every goddamn second of it.
“I’m not even sure she’ll stick around for the players’ lounge.”
Archer frowns at me. “Did something bad happen?”
Clearing my throat, I wait for Coach Morgan to move past us. When I’m confident we have adequate privacy, my head drops into my hands.
“Oh shit a fucking brick. You fucked her, didn’t you?!”
“Nope,” I mumble. “It’s arguably worse than that.”
When Archer doesn’t reply, I slowly turn my face toward him.
He just sits there, jaw popped open, staring back at me in horror.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I scold.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re judging me. We all know that you did some questionable shit in your time.”
His wince is an agreeable one. “True.”
“She walked in on me taking a shower.”
“Oh.”
“And I was jerking off to thoughts of her.”
“Fuck.”
When Archer doesn’t add anything else, I pinch the bridge of my nose, images of her tight body in tiny sleep shorts flashing through my mind.
“Say something,” I beg.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know …” I blow out. “Tell me the first thing that entered your head when I told you what happened.”
Archer rests his elbows on his knees, brows pinched together in thought. “Does she know that you were jerking to thoughts of her?”
I nod once. “If she was standing there for at least ten seconds, then she heard me speak her name.”
“This is bad.”
“Thanks for the observation, Captain Obvious.”
Archer rolls his eyes at me. “What are you going to do about it?”
I chew on my bottom lip as a wave of sadness washes over me. I’ve missed Billie and Blake so fucking much this past week, all because I couldn’t think of what to say each time I picked up my phone to message her.
“If she shows up tonight, then I’m going to engineer a way to get her alone. We need to talk, and it has to be face-to-face.”
A cunning smile grows on Archer’s face, and suddenly, it’s like I’m talking his language. “I can distract Scott with conversation while you bang his daughter’s brains out.”
“You’re a sick man. You know that, don’t you, Moore?”
His shoulders shake with laughter. “No more twisted than you.”
I fall silent, unable to argue with that logic.
“But in all seriousness, if you want to spend some time with Billie later, I can double as a decent wingman.”
When he holds out his fist for me, I bump it straight back. “Thanks, man. This past week has been a fucking nightmare.”
Leaning back against the wall, Archer clicks his tongue. “Last time we spoke, you told me you didn’t have any kind of feelings for her. That isn’t strictly true, is it?”
The next couple of seconds feel like an eternity as I chew over my response.
I can’t keep denying how I feel—to myself or to Archer.
It’s been a long time since I fell for a woman, but I know my heart is heading that way with Billie.
The thought of claiming that what we have is purely physical makes me feel sick.
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve tried to avoid catching feelings, yet here I am, sitting on this bench, trying to fight the fact that I’m falling.
So, if anything is a testament to how strong I feel or how inevitable we are, then this moment right here is exactly that.
Acceptance should make this whole situation straightforward. Instead, all it does is complicate things further because we can’t be together. Not in a relationship or even for a single night. I’m failing at keeping a lid on my emotions, and that’s not something I’ve struggled with before.
“I’m so confused,” I sigh. “All I know is, my poker face is cracking, and I’m in so much fucking trouble. Despite all the dangers, I keep wading into deeper waters with her.”
Archer already knew what was going on in my mind before I voiced the words, his head nodding along as I speak.
“Are you too far gone to pull back?”
I shrug my shoulders, frustration creeping into my bones. “I don’t even know anymore.”
He looks at me then, no sign of humor in his features. “You need to act and do something before it’s too late and I’m attending my defenseman’s funeral rather than lifting this year’s Cup with him.”
I try to answer, but he carries on, apprehension and understanding laced in his voice.
“If you’re too far gone to pull back, then you need to approach Scott and talk to him about where your head’s at with his daughter.
” He slaps his thigh. “But if you can still put a stop to this … well then, you need to have a serious conversation with Billie and set clear boundaries between you.” He knocks his knee against mine.
“I’m all for my friends falling in love, but not if it means picking up the pieces of their lives when everything ultimately blows up in their faces.
I’m telling you now, Emmett, if you keep going down this road and you two end up falling into bed together, you need to be prepared to kiss your friendship goodbye, possibly along with whatever you have with Billie.
This could fuck up her relationship with her parents, too, and you already told me that she’s been through a lot. ”
All I can do is stare ahead at the wall, gut contorting while my head and heart face off with each other—a war sparked by the logic in my goalie’s warning.
“I’m falling hard.”
From my peripheral vision, I see Archer’s subtle nod of acknowledgment. “I know, buddy.”
It feels like I’m ingesting razor blades when I breathe my next breath.
“You asked me if I’m too far gone, and the answer is yes, but that doesn’t mean that I’m too selfish to resist pulling back.
” On the next swallow, the razor blades rise into my throat.
“You were right when you said that the best things happen when you least expect them because Billie and Blake are everything to me.” My voice wobbles, no matter how hard I try to keep it steady.
A warm palm rests on my shoulder. “Fuck, Emmett, I’m so sorry that you’re going through this.”
Closing my eyes, I pray that the darkness will make my next sentence slightly easier to admit. “And the fact that she means so much to me is precisely why I have to let my girl go.”