Chapter 12 #3
“But that isn’t what he said,” Jackson reminds me. “He said he ‘couldn’t do this,’ not that he didn’t want to. Did you ever ask him what he meant?”
“No. I met Josh, and he just kind of swept me off my feet. Made it easy to forget about Jameson, like I thought he forgot about me.”
“Did he, though?” Morgan asks again. “Because the way he told you that you were making a mistake marrying Josh sounds like he was all kinds of crazy jealous.”
“That—” I take in a deep breath. “—never actually crossed my mind. I thought that was just Jameson being an asshole, like usual.”
But now that they’re bringing it up, I’m having all kinds of second thoughts about what actually happened five years ago.
“I don’t know what he was like back then,” Jackson says, reaching over and squeezing my knee, “but he certainly doesn’t sound like he’s an asshole now.”
I roll my head back so it’s resting in the crook of Petra’s elbow. “Yeah, it doesn’t seem that way, does it?”
And then I have the eerie feeling of being watched. When I lift my head and look around, Jameson is one section over, and looking straight at me with the self-satisfied smirk of a man who knows he’s rattled me. He knows I’m talking to my friends about him, and he’s enjoying it.
“You’re allowed to cheer for your husband when he scores,” I tell Petra when she sits back down with a smug, yet sympathetic look.
There are definitely some hometown fans around us who were not too happy with her jumping up and down and yelling as Aleksandr reached his stick back while falling forward past the goal, sliding the puck between Colt’s legs, directly through the five-hole.
Lucky shots like that don’t happen often.
They also don’t happen without intense focus and skill, which Aleksandr is known for demonstrating on the ice.
The buzzer sounds to end the period, and the players retreat to their locker rooms. Around us, people are headed to the lounge or the bathroom, and I’m about to do the same now that I’ve finished my entire soda, but then I see AJ headed right toward us.
I introduce her to my friends, and half listen as she and Petra chat about hockey and the media and Petra’s show.
But mostly my bladder is yelling at me that I’d better go get in line or it’s going to get serious, so I excuse myself and head to the bathrooms. By the time I make it through the line and am headed back out toward our seats, I can hear the music indicating that the players are taking the ice.
My phone vibrates in my hand, so I glance down at it as I rush forward, not wanting to miss the beginning of the next period, and run right into what feels like a brick wall.
But of course, as I look up, it’s not a wall at all, just two hundred pounds of solid muscle, by the feel of him.
“I’m starting to wonder if you’re following me,” I say as I look up at Jameson.
“Maybe I’m just getting lucky running into you so frequently tonight.”
“Or maybe you’re intentionally running into me.”
“Would you be mad if I was?” Jameson asks.
I break eye contact and glance around, noticing that the last few people here are headed back to their seats. I look back at him. “Depends . . . on why you’re here every time I’m alone.”
He takes a step closer. “Why do you think I’m here, Lauren?”
I swallow. “Jameson.” I shake my head slightly, trying to clear up the confusion that always seems to creep in when he’s around. “I haven’t done this in a while. I could easily be misreading these signs. So I need you to be very clear with me . . . what are you thinking right now?”
“I’m thinking a week is too fucking long to go without seeing you.
” He reaches over and tucks a piece of hair behind my ear, and his hand slips beneath my locks, resting on the back of my neck.
I like the feel of his skin against mine maybe more than I should.
“And I’m feeling like we started a conversation the other night on the phone that we still need to finish. ”
Somehow, his answer tells me everything and nothing all at once. I’m about to clarify and ask him how he feels about me, when he adds, “How are you feeling?”
“Really confused. Jules and Audrey told me yesterday that you are to thank for my perfectly designed upstairs.”
He swallows, but doesn’t look away or say anything in response.
“How did you design something that’s so perfectly me?”
“Do you really think I don’t know you at all?” His voice is softer, more seductive than it normally is.
But how do you know me better than my husband ever did? That’s the question I want to ask, but I don’t know if I want to show all my cards like that.
“I think maybe you know me better than I realized,” I admit. “And maybe I don’t really know you that well at all.”
“So maybe it’s time to change that,” he says, and he pulls me closer, dipping his head so his mouth is next to my ear.
Heat flames through my body at his proximity, and I want to step closer, press myself up against him.
“But first”—his breath trails along my ear and into my hair—“go enjoy the game with your friends. We’ll talk later. ”