2. Adler
TWO
Adler
“Ace! Ace! Ace!” My teammates cheer, pulling me up onto their shoulders to parade me down the beach. “Ace!”
Hearing people chant my last name will never get old. I raise the beer in my hand, sloshing some over the sides, relishing the crowd’s heckles before I’m lowered to the ground like a king stepping off his throne.
“We’re gonna go all the way!” Corbin—my best friend on the team—wraps his arm around my neck and ruffles my hair. “This is our year. I can feel it, man.”
Olly, another of my teammates, slaps me on the back. “You’ll make them bawl like babies at our next game, if you play like you did today.”
This sets off another round of, “Ace, Ace, Ace!”
Their cheering vibrates through my entire body like a thumping heartbeat. Fuck, today is a good day. Adrenaline from our win is still coursing through me as I bounce on the balls of my feet. I’m on top of the fucking world. Nothing beats the high of obliterating the competition.
“Great game, Ace!” Cindy, leader of the SVU Foxes ice skating cheer squad, saunters over.
Stopping in front of me, she trails her long nail down the front of my chest. She’s still wearing fox ears clipped to her blonde hair, and I’ve seen dental floss that’s thicker than the strings of her tiny bikini.
Half the team is practically drooling. “Maybe we’ll celebrate together…
” She leans in, assaulting me with her layers of overpoweringly sweet scent blocker, almost making me sneeze. “Like we did last time.”
Hooking up with her once when I got wasted was a big mistake, and worse? She now expects it to happen every time I see her.
“You’re in, dawg!” Olly winks, obviously checking out Cindy’s perky ass as she dramatically swings her hips while she walks away. “Imagine helping her through a heat.”
I can’t think of anything worse. During our night together, I had the misfortune of discovering that Cindy’s scent blockers masked a sour milk odor mid-way through screwing her. But I’m not an asshole, so I keep my opinions to myself and smile politely, looking for an escape.
“You’re welcome to her,” I tell him. “Good luck.”
I scan the beach. It sucks that Luca couldn’t come.
He’s working with the team physical therapist as part of his training, so he knows practically everyone here.
But he decided to take off on one of his solo camping expeditions tonight.
What’s more interesting about the outdoors that could possibly beat this?
I’m standing in the middle of what would be most college guys’ idea of paradise with beer and chicks on tap.
I take a photo of the party and send it to our pack group chat.
ME
Look what you’re missing, @Luca.
He sends back a photo of his muddy hiking boots and him holding a sad-looking marshmallow over a fire.
LUCA
I’m good here. See you in the morning!
Orin responds almost immediately too.
ORIN
Got a night shift. Keep it down.
ME
All right, grandpa…
Typical Orin. He’s the oldest member of our pack.
We met in high school when he was a senior, and Luca and I were freshmen.
He became our informal mentor on the ice.
Without him, I wouldn’t be the player I am today.
He joined the military straight after his high school graduation, so we didn’t see him again until he returned to our hometown four years later.
By that time, Luca and I had learned our designations—both alphas—so we formed a pack.
The three of us have been playing hockey since little league.
Throughout high school, Luca and I have always had our hearts set on playing for the SVU Foxes.
When we both got in, Orin got a job as SVU’s head of security, which suits him perfectly.
He’s cautious, calculating, and will do anything to keep people safe.
Sometimes, his protectiveness can be a major pain in the ass—especially when he breaks up some of my wild antics—but he helps keep me grounded.
He jokes that I’d be a runaway train without him, and he’s probably right.
Corbin joins me to talk through a play-by-play of his moves during the game. He likes to see if there’s anywhere he can improve by unpicking every move. I’m the opposite; I live for the moment. When it’s gone, it’s gone.
“And then when you pulled that hat trick!” Corbin punches the air as I fill our red cups with beer from the keg. “You should have seen their coach’s face. I saw tears, man! Literal tears.”
“We better bring our A-game to the next one,” I remind him. “That’s the big one.”
If we win, we’ll be in the championship finals.
“Yeah, and…” Corbin’s voice trails off, patting down his afro when a pretty girl strolls past without looking in our direction.
“You should just talk to her.” I roll my eyes as he snaps his jaw closed before he starts drooling. “How long have you had a crush on Nia now?”
Nia is SVU’s Feminist Society president, and she captured Corbin’s heart the moment he first saw her in one of their shared classes. Unfortunately for him, he’s too scared to pluck up the courage to ask her out.
“You say that like talking to her is simple,” he groans, taking a swig from his cup. “I’m a hockey player, remember? She sees the orange shirt and thinks I’m just like…” He gestures at our teammates who are having a burping competition between chugging a giant beer pitcher. “Them.”
Although we’re a team, I don’t necessarily like all of my teammates’ company. Some of them have more muscles than brain cells.
“Then show her you’re not,” I tell him. Since Kyro and Shea Cockburn—two asshole football players—were expelled from campus, all SVU sports teams have been required to comply with stricter codes of ethics. “If Nia got to know you—”
“Got to know me?” Corbin’s eyes bulge like I’ve suggested he can fly.
“Dude, have you ever spoken to her? She’s, like, the smartest person on campus.
Plus, when I saw her in Bouncing Bunna last week, I couldn’t even get a word out.
” He gazes at her longingly, watching her black locs sway in the breeze as she sits next to a redhead on a picnic blanket, away from the crowd.
Who is that? My eyes focus on Nia’s new companion.
She’s fucking gorgeous. Her tanned legs stretch out endlessly in front of her, her deep copper hair pulled up into a high ponytail that swishes around her waist when she laughs.
She talks animatedly to Nia, her body language confident and sure of herself, leaning back on her palms with her back straight.
“Who is Nia with?” I can’t take my eyes off the fiery-haired woman. My inner alpha seems to snap to attention, drinking in her features. She’s covered in cute as shit freckles and has full, pouty lips that would look perfect wrapped around my… “I haven’t seen her before.”
She’s not one of the usual puck bunnies who follow us around or come to these post-game parties.
Corbin follows my gaze. “That’s Sabrina Maverick. She’s captain of the volleyball team. I’m surprised you haven’t seen her before.” He smirks. “Apparently, she can punch a hole straight through the net with her serve. Don’t you read The Valley Voice?”
Admittedly, I don’t spend a lot of time keeping up with campus gossip.
I’m too busy at the gym, training, studying, and chilling with my pack.
The only time I tend to see anything from The Valley Voice blog is when Luca is laughing over some bullshit they’ve written about me.
Last week, they posted about how I allegedly spend hours bleaching my hair before a game for good luck, which he and Orin found particularly amusing.
Corbin keeps talking, but I don’t pay him any attention. My eyes don’t leave Sabrina. She isn’t in swimwear, but seeing how the fabric of her tight T-shirt stretches around her full breasts makes me wonder what she’s hiding underneath.
“Ace!” Corbin waves a hand in front of my face. “Earth to Ace!”
“Huh?” I’m rudely brought back to the present again, clearing my throat to compose myself. I drain what’s left in my red cup before crumpling the plastic. “Let’s go talk to them.”
“What?” Corbin tenses. He’s not typically shy, yet Nia seems to have put the fear of God in him. “We can’t!”
“Sure, we can.” I punch his shoulder. “I’ll be right with you. It’ll be fun.”
“Ace…” He looks like he wants to run in the opposite direction, face scrunched. “I don’t know if I can.”
“You’re Corbin fucking Hollis!” I deepen my voice, the same way I do before we head onto the ice.
It’s not quite an alpha bark—using an alpha bark in any sport is illegal, but there’s a tone of voice that can help to inspire confidence that Orin taught me.
A trick he learned from his military days. “You can talk to her.”
Corbin still doesn’t look convinced, but before he can protest further, I wrap my arm around his shoulder and steer him over to the two girls chatting on the sand. As we approach, their conversation halts, and they look up at us expectantly.
The moment Sabrina’s amber-gold gaze locks on mine, the music fades into a muffled hum, and I completely forget why I’m even standing there.
I open my mouth, but no words come out, entranced by her eyes, which are the exact color of golden honey.
Corbin doesn’t seem to be faring much better. The two of us look like gawping morons.
Sabrina crosses her arms and blows a strand of fiery hair off of her face before her lips tick up. “Do you want to join us?” She pats the spot next to her.
Now that we’re standing over them, I have to refrain from inhaling deeply.
I can tell she’s wearing scent blockers, recognizing the familiar neutral fresh tones.
However, unlike Cindy who smells like a toxic floral fume, I catch a slight hint of something fruity too.
Something juicy and delicious that makes me desperate to know her true scent.
“Uh…” is all I manage to get out.