Chapter Fifty-One
Carlos
My alarm went off and I moved to silence it. Only there was something on my chest. A naked redhead to be exact. A guy with brown hair was also sprawled across my legs. Hale always slept at such weird angles.
Right. I’d come home from morning skate, got in a light workout, had lunch, and then they’d taken a nap with me, in my bed.
We actually had done some sleeping… after. Still, I felt amazing.
Wait… was that why my mated teammates always seemed to arrive at the arena practically whistling? They had a little something something with their naps?
Mmmm, I think I liked this part of being mated. The alarm continued to beep, and I extracted myself from under Fiona to turn it off.
“Five more minutes,” Fiona muttered.
“Take all the time you need, Mi Reina. You have hours until you need to be at the arena.” I gave her a kiss and drank the water I’d left for myself on my nightstand.
Turning on some music, I shaved, took a long, hot shower, singing along. After I did my skincare routine, I threw on my robe, and went back into my room.
“Hi, Pumpkin.” Fiona watched me as I rummaged through my drawer for some PJ pants. I probably shouldn’t make a snack in my underwear.
Or should I?
I was still figuring out this whole living-with-people thing.
“Hi.” I gave her a kiss. “I’m going to get a snack and make a smoothie.”
“I’ll come down with you. Maybe Saoirse’s back. I got a lot of emotion from her and just an, I’m fine text. It’s probably her family being assholes again,” she replied.
Hale sat up. “That does make you feel emotions. Hey, are we messing up your pregame routine, Lalo?”
“I’ve never had a really rigid before I get to the arena routine. Now that I’m in the PHL it’s more developed. Back in high school and college, I was balancing acting, classes, two teams, and family stuff. I was always coming from somewhere, so I kept it simple,” I explained.
“Oh, okay. That makes sense. I’d hate to disrupt your routine,” Hale replied.
I sat down on the bed and held him to me. “You’re not. Even now it’s more like eat, nap, sing a little, snack, hydrate.”
“I like hearing you sing in the shower.” Fiona rolled over so she could cuddle with us.
Hale’s head tilted and he sniffed the air. “Is someone roasting a chicken?”
I grabbed my phone and looked at it.
“I don’t know. But my mom is coming to the game. She wants to bring you purse enchiladas because she needs someone to feed. Um, she always brought Gwen enchiladas in her purse, because she’s always hungry,” I explained
“Really? If she’s offering, I’ll take them,” Hale replied. “I will gladly be the student she feeds with Gwen being gone. I’d always get jealous when I’d go to games with Verity and see Gwen with them in the stands, because they smelled so good.”
“I’ll let her know.” I texted her.
“We get to meet your mom?” Fiona beamed.
“Yes, along with Anita, Beatriz, Dulce, and various children and mates. I got them passes to watch warmups with you all and they’re in the family section. Though my brother-in-law is a Sharks fan.” I made a silly face.
Hale laughed. “My little brother likes the Sharks, too.”
“While we’ll go over for Sunday dinner soon, this is just a low-key way to meet them.
” I thought that might be better. Dusty’s dinner with his moms and siblings for a first meeting had been a little overwhelming for the ladies.
Meeting them casually at the game had actually been Mamá’s idea.
I was by the other day to get some stuff, visit her, and give everyone their dolls.
I went downstairs. The aroma of chicken and spices made my nose twitch. Who was cooking?
Dusty was in the kitchen, wearing an apron as he stirred a large pot, loudly singing a silly and annoying kid’s song.
“Stop. Please.” Saoirse laughed as she sat at the breakfast bar with a mug of something.
“Oooh, more soup?” I asked. It smelled delicious.
“I saved a piece of chicken for you, if you want chicken and rice instead of soup?” he offered. “Soup is almost done.”
“A bowl of soup sounds great. I might add the chicken to it,” I replied, looking for my smoothie stuff.
While Dusty cooked, I made a smoothie to take with me.
Fiona came out dressed, and went over to Saoirse. “Is everything okay?”
“Nothing I can’t handle,” Saoirse said softly.
“Okay. It’s okay if you can’t. I’m here.” Fiona gave her a huge hug.
“I know.” She hugged her back.
“Does everyone want soup?” Dusty asked. “If so, we should sit around the table.”
“Sounds good to me,” Hale replied, joining us.
They went into the dining room and sat around the table. Dusty brought Saoirse some soup and buttered toast.
I chopped up the extra chicken and added it to my soup. I joined them at the table as Dusty brought some soup for Fiona and Hale.
Finally, he plopped down with his own bowl. “I have news. I’m playing Feral Ratville.”
“You are?” I looked up at him, excited. That had been the dream.
“Yes! Isn’t that incredible? I got the call from my agent when we were at the grocery store getting stuff for soup.” Dusty beamed. “Of course, you can all come. It’s at the end of June, on an island in Greece. We can probably work our mating party and vacation around that.”
“That sounds perfect,” Fiona replied. “There are so many nice places in Europe we could visit.”
“Feral Ratville. Mercy will be so jealous.” Hale took another bite of soup.
“We’re proud of you,” Saoirse praised.
“We are,” I added. Wow. That was incredible. But after Winter-Fest I had a feeling it would happen.
“We're living the dream, man, and we’re doing it together,” Dusty replied.
That we were.
“Are you taking your new car to the game?” Hale grinned. “How’d it drive to practice?”
“It drove great. Yeah, I think I’ll take it.” I had the day off yesterday and I bought a small, fast, orange sports car. It was a tight squeeze in the garage, but it fit.
It was a reckless purchase considering I’d just bought a townhouse. And rings.
I’d also taken Hale and Fiona to get their New York driver’s licenses, because that was one of the big items on the checklist to establish residency. We needed to do that, so that we could begin the six month residency requirement for our pack application.
“Did your agent mention that possible guest role for the both of us?” I added. It would be during the All-Star break.
Dusty shook his head. “No. I’ll text him for an update. If we don’t get the role, should we go on a little pack trip during the break?”
“What about a nice staycation?” I suggested. “It might be fun to just hole up and watch movies and play games. Especially because Hale might have classes.”
Hale nodded. “I like that idea.”
After I finished eating, I went upstairs and got out one of my suits, along with a clean shirt and one of the ties that Fiona had gotten me for Christmas, along with my pumpkin tie tack.
“I wasn’t sure if it would be overstepping to choose an outfit for you and put it on your bed, you know, so you don’t get sad because your mom isn’t there to do it for you,” Fiona teased as she came into the bathroom as I fixed my hair.
“I don’t mind doing it myself. But feel free to pick out my tie if this isn’t the one you want me to wear.” I turned to face her.
She straightened my tie and smoothed my jacket. “It looks great. Even without your mom ironing for you.”
“I usually just pick them up from the dry cleaner. Oh shit, I need to find a new dry cleaner. I guess I can just ask Dimitri,” I replied. One more thing to add to the endless list.
“A good dry cleaner is a necessity,” Fiona agreed.
I gave her a kiss and went to the kitchen to grab my smoothie. Hale was loading the dishwasher. Giving him a kiss, I went down to the garage.
Wow. I was going to drive my car to the game.
I texted one of the social media interns. She’d seen me bring my car to practice today and asked if she could do a video of me pulling into the garage. It was something she often did with different players.
How was all this going to go? Usually, I drank my smoothies and listened to music, and reviewed a couple of videos on the subway, on my way to the arena. I couldn’t really review videos while driving, but I could still listen to music and drink my smoothie.
I took off for the arena and blared one of my playlists that I used to get into the right headspace for games.
As I pulled into the garage, I saw the intern taking a video of me. I left my car and gave the camera a big smile.
“That was great, people are going to love it. That car is incredible,” she said.
“You get packed up and then buy a sports car? Aren’t you a little young for a midlife crisis?” Kylee appeared next to the intern.
“I needed a car that Hale could also race.” I shrugged. Oooh, could that car brand be my sponsor? I texted my agent. An energy drink brand was interested, but more sponsors would be a good thing.
Her hand went to her face. “I didn’t need to know that.”
“Um, Fiona got us a family car, but we needed another?” I blinked. Then I turned to the intern. “It’s a pink SUV. It might be fun to do a series on MASO cars? Verity has a pink sports car. Muriel has that purple buggy with the flowers on it.”
“I like how you think.” She nodded.
“Fiona and Saoirse also have motorcycles,” I added.
Her face lit up. “Oooh, also good.”
A motorcycle came through the parking garage. Had Clark gotten a new one? His motorcycle had gotten wrecked in an accident back in October, when the asshole brothers of Gwen’s ex decided it would be fun to smash into them on purpose.
“Why is Clark riding a pink motorcycle?” Kylee sighed.
“I love it! I’ll get that for the next game,” the intern nodded.
I sucked in a breath. “Pink motorcycle. Right. I forgot. Gwen got a pink motorcycle in the MASO holiday gift exchange, but she’s in Mexico and she doesn’t have a driver’s license. Makes sense he’d ride it.”
Clark parked next to me and took off his blue helmet. “How do I look?”
“Does she know you have her motorcycle?” I took a photo and sent it to her.
“It was her idea. We finally picked it up from Tegan’s. It’s a nice little bike,” he replied.
“It is.” I looked around. “No Bucket backpack?”
“I wish. Tenzin is very much against it. He doesn’t even like Gwen and I riding motorcycles. I have armor on under my suit.” He sighed, slightly annoyed.
“Considering you were in a motorcycle accident, I kind of understand that. But still, Bucket would look so cute on the back of your pink motorcycle.” I grinned at the thought.
“He’s not going to fit on the back of that. I barely fit on it.” He laughed. “I’ll get a new one of my own eventually.”
When Gwen returned and got her license, she and Fiona would have a great time going all over the city together. Saoirse and Clark could tail them for safety.
We still stood there and I wondered what we were waiting for. Tenzin’s truck pulled in and parked next to Clark’s motorcycle.
“Sunshine, did everything go okay?” Tenzin gave Clark a kiss.
“Everything was fine. Come on, let's go upstairs.” Clark took his hand and the three of us went up the elevator.
My phone buzzed.
Fiona
Love you. See you soon.
Me
Love you, too.
The idea that I’d have my family and my pack watching me play made me giddy.
Yep, it was game time.