Chapter 27
Twenty-Seven
By the timewe returned to his opulent home, all the lights were turned off. Asking to sleep in separate rooms was a fight I didn’t have the energy to take on tonight. Not that it mattered. Xander would find a way inside any room I stayed in. Instead of fighting about it, I made him promise to use discretion for Jasper’s sake.
Someone had already organized my things in his room. It was a bold statement that we were to share this bedroom moving forward, even though this place seemed large enough to accommodate six.
As I headed toward the closet in my torn leggings and flannel shirt, he stepped forward to block my path.
“Take everything off and put this on,” he said, tossing his jersey at me before sitting on the bed.
I barely caught the fabric. My fingers burned against the soft material.
“I want to fuck you in my jersey at least once tonight.”
Having sex again seemed like the irresponsible thing to do based on the catastrophe from tonight. But if he were to go down in flames tomorrow for indiscretions with his stepmother, the least I owed him was a distraction. And I could no longer deny there was something magical between us. I lost my mind every damn time he touched me and was starting to crave him like an addict.
I took a step back, heart pounding. Turning my back to him, I stripped as fast as I could, yanking the jersey over my head before he could get a look. Not that it mattered—he’d already seen all of me.
With nimble feet, I moved toward the bed. His eyes flared when he took me in. Otherwise, he was quiet, observing me.
I wasn’t sure what made me do it, except that I wanted to take away all the stress he had experienced today. He sat at the foot of the bed, and I knelt between his legs. My trembling fingers moved to his sweatpants, grazing the bristly line of hair that arrowed from his navel. He didn’t help me as I dragged his sweatpants down slightly and pulled out his cock.
Curving toward the tight drum of his abdomen, his heavy cock twitched under my gaze. It was thick and roseate, and lightly veined, with a flushed crimson head already glistening with pre-cum. I had never been with someone so athletic, and the image of his prowess was mouthwatering. The sight made my heart race. Before I could talk myself out of doing what I was about to do, I leaned over and took him in my mouth.
Xander’s groan echoed through the room, and I hoped it didn’t travel any farther. His hands tangled in my hair as I worked him relentlessly with my mouth, intent on using my tongue to tease his sensitive head, tracing the frenulum until he lost all reason.
“Fuck, stop,” he cursed, pulling me off him. “I’m not coming in your mouth. Get up.”
I stood on shaky legs and straddled him, struggling a little with his size as usual. He had me ride him at the edge of the bed until my thighs burned with the effort, and my pussy felt stretched and full. “You’re so fucking amazing,” he told me, keeping one hand beneath my ass to control the pace. “Did I ever tell you that, jailbird?”
I shook my head, tightening my grip on his shoulders for balance.
“You could have everything handed to you on a silver platter.” He nudged me with his large hand, fingers brushing the sensitive skin where we were joined. “If you let me, I’ll take care of you.”
I yelped as he rolled us over, still inside me, the movement pushing him so deeply that I felt a sharp pain as he whispered the filthiest things into my ear, that I was a good girl, and he knew I could take it, and didn’t I enjoy being bred? I couldn’t remember the last time I’d blushed in front of a man, but the things he was said—I didn’t have words to respond.
He came with a roar, slamming his arm beside my face for leverage as I felt the heated shudder of his cum inside me. Every warning I’d ever heard about unprotected sex flooded through my mind as I felt his cum trickle down my thighs. I had lost count of how many times he had fucked me without protection.
“You feel so good.” He brushed a lock of hair out of my face with a gentleness that was at odds with the way he fucked. “I can’t control myself when I’m with you.” He tugged playfully at my hair.
The way Xander spoke about me always left me breathless, bringing back the three little words he had uttered earlier tonight.
“I love you.”
No one had said those words to me in years. I didn’t have the chance to process them when the paparazzi interrupted us, and now, it was a can of worms I didn’t want to reopen.
“I’m tired,” I said instead of tackling the elephant in the room. “Can we go to sleep?”
“Yeah.” He reached over me with one solid arm to turn the lights off. The dark hair on his chest was coarse against my bare arm, eliciting goosebumps I was glad he couldn’t see.
We didn’t sleep, though. That night, in the dark shadows of his room, he took me again and again until we couldn’t move from exhaustion. Finally, he draped his arm against my waist, pulling me up against him until I could feel his hips against my ass, my heavy eyes drooping without permission.
I didn’t remember falling asleep, but when I opened my eyes, the sun filtered through the floaty curtains, and I felt Xander’s breath puffing against my ear. His breathing grew shallow as he stirred against me. He was smiling faintly in his sleep, and if I had any disillusionments about what those dreams might entail, the hard evidence was riding up between my thighs.
I squirmed out of his grip and got my phone. Hundreds of notifications stared up at me—all of which had been steadily building since I started working again—but I ignored them for now.
I needed to see if that photo of Xander and I had been posted.
I typed our names into the search engine and saw the usual puff pieces about our family and Henry’s “charity” work, so I switched the time of posting to this week to see if any small blogs or articles had picked it up.
Then I saw the article: NHL STAR—PUNCH DRUNK?
“That’s the other article,” I muttered under my breath, my publicity instincts already kicking in as I began to dig. Was this the article Xander had mentioned? I could tell from the preview that it wasn’t going to be good news, but the article was even worse than I imagined.
The article claimed they spoke to guests from the party, spinning the events in the worst possible light. “An older man with heart issues.” Henry came off as a frail old man, and Xander was the aggressor. There was no mention of beating me. Instead, I’d been referred to as the troubled wife. As far as the author of this article was concerned, Xander might as well have stolen me from a mental asylum.
This had Henry’s fingerprints all over it. He must have gone to one of his telecom buddies and paid them a generous sum to run this piece. What were the terms of their bargain? I wondered. Free ad space on his new app? A hefty payout? Golfing with the boys on some distant island paradise?
I didn’t recognize the publication, and it was hardly front-page news, but if a bigger periodical caught wind of this and ran with it, or the wrong “tea channel” went viral with it, things could be very, very bad.
Xander sat up in bed, the sheets dropping to his chiseled hips, revealing the deep, curving lines of his Adonis belt. The golden light made his olive skin glow. He rubbed his eyes in a gesture that might have been disarmingly boyish if it weren’t for the way it made his arms and stomach flex. He tilted his head toward me, and I felt my stomach drop.
“You’re up early,” he remarked, his voice hoarse from sleep.
I held my phone out to him. He blinked at it with an expression that said he thought he was humoring me.
“I told you about the article. Why are you showing it to me?”
“This is so much worse than you made it out to be.”
He grazed a thumb over the fading bruise on my cheek. “Because you deserved a few days to recover before the shit hit the fan.”
Xander pushed my phone away and slid out of bed, revealing an erection that hung heavily between his thighs. I could feel my cheeks heating like a schoolgirl when he bent over uncaringly, stepping into the boxers he’d discarded last night.
After he’d made me strip.
“You still should’ve told me sooner. We need to decide what to do about this. I mean… I’m your publicist, which reminds me, I need your agent’s number.”
“Number is in my phone under Ross.” He tossed his phone on my lap and gave me the password.
I couldn’t help noticing that Xander never had anything to hide, openly sharing every part of his life with me. Meanwhile, Henry used to sneak his phone into the bathroom to answer texts. In hindsight, it now made sense.
I heaved a sigh. “Let’s set up a meeting with Ross and get this under wraps while we can still control the narrative.”
Before I could make the call, his phone chimed, and I returned it to him. Xander arched an eyebrow at the screen.
“What?” When he didn’t respond right away, I asked, “Henry?”
“No. I was tagged in an Instagram post.” He tilted the phone, but I already knew what I was going to see.
It was the picture of me straddling Xander in an abandoned parking lot.
The room smelled like lemon cleaner. After the Instagram photo went live, Xander called his agent and his coach. Both of them agreed to a meeting, and we were now sitting in one of the administrative offices of the rink, where they kept track of all the player files and tax information for the building. The file cabinets were at my back and looked like relics from the 70s. Possibly they were. Bureaucracies tended to move at a slow pace.
Unlike social media.
I tucked my sunglasses into the collar of my blouse, straightening my clothes self-consciously as I studied the other two men in the room.His agent was a dark-haired man named Carl Ross—who went by Ross—and I knew his coach as Coach Foley.
“So, I think we all know why we’re here.” Ross looked at us. His glance seemed to home in on me and then linger for a few moments longer than necessary.
“Ross!” Xander snapped. “Your eyes seem to have a problem with wandering onto things not meant for them.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to—” Carl shook his head, and Xander stared between us. “Sorry,” he mumbled, glancing down at the table.
Already, I could tell Xander was on edge. I didn’t understand him. Everything had been fine between us, sans his father trying to ruin his life. The unexpected shift in his mood was once more giving me whiplash. There was never an explanation for it, he would simply go from tranquil to beastly for no reason.
I focused on the other two less complicated men in the room. I looked into their social media profiles this morning to learn more about them. From the looks Coach Foley was giving me, he had done the same. I’d seen that expression on Xander’s teammate, Kai, and knew what it meant. He was aware of my relationship with Xander and wasn’t happy about it. In fact, he was pissed.
Coach Foley cleared his throat. “How are we going to handle it?” He spoke in a drawn-out way that was probably supposed to sound paternal but came off condescending.
“Let’s start with the lost sponsorship, eh?” Ross suggested.
I frowned. “Wait. What lost sponsorship?”
“Oh, you didn’t know? One of the team’s sponsors was a sports outfitter in New York. Family-owned chain, lots of hockey gear, big on family values. Not so big on whatever this is,” Coach said, gesturing between Xander and me. “When the photo went live, they sent me a Dear John and bowed out, costing the team thousands of dollars a year, not to mention the free gear.”
Fuck.
I ran my hands over my face and stiffened when I felt Xander put his hand on my thigh beneath the table.
“Okay. This can be fixed,” I started. “Let’s find another shop without as much of a social media presence. We can do some pro bono modeling with the players and have them share the pictures on their socials as part of a collaboration. I’m sure they’d be grateful for the boost.”
“What do you think this is?” Coach Foley broke in. “America’s Next Top Model? My boys are busy gearing up for the game. They don’t have time to prance around a runway for free.” His coach shot a black look at Xander. “The whole team shouldn’t suffer because of one person’s mistake.”
“Well, I’m open to suggestions,” I said pleasantly, trying to ignore Xander’s tightening squeeze on my knee. He seemed seconds away from exploding, which would only deteriorate the situation.
“Yeah, I got one,” Coach said. “Drop the puck bunny act. You two are related, and what’s happening here is disgusting?—”
My heart started beating erratically at the accusation, and at the same time, Xander growled, “She’s not a fucking puck bunny. I’m not going to sit in this room if you’re going to talk about her like I scraped her up from the gutters.”
His coach’s eyes flashed as if no one had dared to speak up against him, and they probably hadn’t. Players didn’t talk back to their coaches.
I had a feeling if Xander didn’t respect his coach so much, he would’ve pounced on him and was holding himself back with great effort. I patted his shoulder in hopes of calming him, which seemed to unwind the tense muscles of his neck marginally.
He took his hand away from my leg and folded both on the table in front of him. “If you want to talk solutions, I’m here for it,” he added, sounding less angry. “Otherwise, we’re leaving.”
“Maybe we can spin this,” Carl mused, desperate to break the tension. “Hockey is big with the female demo right now. Perhaps we can use Jordan to our advantage.”
“I can do whatever you need me to,” I said, equally eager to play diplomat. “But before we talk strategy, one thing you need to know about the article and the photo is that they’re filled with lies. It was my soon-to-be ex-husband’s doing, who was angry at my stepson for stepping in after he hit me.”
As I spoke, I rooted through my purse for one of my makeup wipes. The men gasped when I cleaned off my heavy-duty foundation, revealing the bruise splotching my cheekbone.
No matter how many times he saw it, Xander looked as if the sight pained him. I ran my fingers over it as if it cemented my truth.
“That photo was a fake. There is nothing unseemly going on between Xander and me,” I insisted even as I felt Xander tense next to me.
His words from last night blared in my ears. You act like you’ll die of embarrassment if someone finds out about us.
But this wasn’t about shame. You couldn’t retain endorsements—nor would anyone keep you on as the center of an NHL team—while actively screwing one of your family members. It was too big of a scandal.
Something had shifted in me after seeing Xander on the ice. Sharing that moment with me was everything to him because hockey was his passion, his one true love. I couldn’t let Henry take that away from him.
“Henry doesn’t like to be thwarted,” I continued without looking his way. “He’s done some terrible things in an attempt to control both of our lives and now that we’ve gotten away from him, he’s probably going to do worse.”
And he will.
“Henry’s going to come at Xander with everything he’s got,” I said grimly.
My throat tightened as I realized Henry had waged this ridiculous PR war because of me. His target was Xander’s career because that was what his son loved the most.
I thought of the malicious glee Henry exhibited whenever he took down one of his competitors. To him, people were just obstacles to overcome in his quest to get what he wanted. The destruction of another soul was just a pyrrhic victory. I had no doubt he had hired someone to take that photo of us and leaked it online.
My confession seemed to move the meeting in the right direction. Carl and Coach were suspicious of what was brewing between Xander and me, but they were less angry when faced with the sight of my bruise. It was difficult to dismiss a battered woman’s sad story, and in the end, their empathy won out.
They decided to help Xander fight his father and attest to his character to defuse the situation.
Xander, for his part, reluctantly agreed to one of my ideas—some conspicuous volunteer work on weekends and after practice, teaching kids to skate. Kids were cute, and a big man like him providing gentle guidance while eight-year-olds tugged at his clothes and tried to please their hero was bound to melt countless hearts.
I nodded through the rest of the meeting with a smile plastered on my face, aware of the looks his agent and coach kept flicking in my direction. They liked the skating idea, but I knew that they didn’t trust me. They saw me as the reason for all of this.
And they weren’t wrong.
“All right.” Carl clapped his hands. “I think we’ve made good progress here. Let’s take a breather and circle back to see where this lands.”
“So, we’re done here?” Xander asked, and when his agent gave a tight nod, he looked at me and said, “Let’s go.”
He nodded at his coach with a promise to see him tonight. They were flying out in a few hours for a game tomorrow morning in New Jersey.
Despite his insistence to never be more than five miles away from me, he hadn’t demanded that I join him for the away game. At first, I thought it was because I didn’t have my passport; I had no idea how he’d snuck me across the border in the first place. But something about Xander’s lackadaisical attitude about my attendance didn’t sit right with me.
Since I got to Canada, Xander had stuck to me like moss on a damp wall. If he was finally allowing me some breathing room, it was because he was up to something, and whatever he was planning couldn’t be good.
He suggested having lunch before leaving for his flight, and it appeased him when I immediately agreed. As soon as our main course came, he slipped away to go to the bathroom, and I picked up my phone, holding my glass of water loosely in my other hand.
Henry’s previous messages glared at me like a taunt.
The one he’d sent by not speaking was even louder. Regardless of what else Xander had said, this wasn’ta warning shot. The war had started, and Henry would consider it a victory only after accomplishing his goal—destroying Xander’s career. Henry must’ve realized by now that I wouldn”t return to him and blamed Xander for it. Hockey was what Xander loved the most in this world, and Henry wanted to take that from him as revenge.
I didn’t want to be the reason for him losing everything, not while he made me feel like I could regain a part of myself just by being around him. Being responsible for his fall from grace made me feel like a selfish person.
I squeezed my eyes tightly shut and braced myself before clicking on the text field.
What do I need to do to make this stop?