After she finished speaking, the head of personnel said, “You’ll both get a chance to tell your side of the story. That won’t happen tonight; it may not even happen this week with this bug that’s been going around. The only action I can take is to suspend you both from coaching until this is settled.”
Gabi managed to look crestfallen and murderous.
Coach Dickhead kept a smug smile. He didn’t care about getting suspended, but Gabi assisted with two other age groups. This was a huge blow to her and her players.
“If you’re suspending both coaches, who’s gonna coach our kids?”
Murmurs sounded in response.
“Again, that is a matter for personnel to handle. But we’re short staffed, so it might be a few weeks until a replacement coach can be arranged.”
“What if a parent from this group could coach in the interim?” Lucy asked, shocking the crap out of me.
“I imagine you have someone in mind?”
“Stonewall would make an excellent coach,” Gabi blurted out. “I’ve been watching him working with his daughter on her skill set, and I don’t need to list his accomplishments to prove he’s qualified.”
Lucy squeezed my arm when I started opening and closing my fists.
There were a chorus of yeahs from the other parents.
Coach Olin’s expectant eyes zoomed to me. “You on board with this, Lund?”
Blood rushed to my head, and I had to swallow twice before I could eke the words out. “I’ll already be here, so yeah, I’ll do it. Both the skills class and game coaching.”
“Happy now?” Coach D said to Gabi. “You got what you wanted—your precious hockey pro working here.”
Gabi’s face bloomed pink.
Next to me, Nolan muttered, “Shit.”
Coach Olin said, “Enough, Dennis. My office. Both of you. Now.”
Margene said, “You’ll have to fill out all the applications to coach in USA Hockey before you leave tonight, so we can get them faxed in ASAP and don’t miss the registration cutoff deadline.”
“Some of the paperwork should already be on file with them, since I helped out at training camps and skills events the last year I played in the NHL.”
“Excellent, Jax. After you get done here, meet me in my office.”
Through the excitement buzzing around us, Lucy stood on her tiptoes and whispered, “You got rid of him and you didn’t even have to throw a punch.”
I caught her lips with mine and kissed her, not giving a damn who watched.
The pleased little hum vibrating from her let me know she didn’t care either.
“Daddy?”
No reason to break away guiltily. We said we’d deal with this as it happened, and Mimi just happened to return when I was kissing her mother.
“Hey, squirt. Are you all right?”
How would she react? Happily? With confusion?
Her gaze moved from me, to her mom, to Nolan, to the coaches on the bench removing their skates and back to me. “Did Coach Welk get in trouble?”
Or option C, choosing to ignore it entirely.
“She and Coach D have to sort through some issues with their bosses, so in the meantime, I’ll be coaching your team.”
“You will? Like coaching everyone?”
“That’s what team means.”
She scowled.
A niggling sense that she wasn’t happy about this development surfaced. “What’s wrong?”
“But you’ll still coach me alone sometimes, right?”
“Wouldn’t dream of missing our ice time together, Meems.”
She smiled widely, showcasing the gap in her gumline. “Yay! Can we go out for ice cream now?”
“I bought ice cream at the store today,” Lucy said. “We can make sundaes at home.”
“But I wanna go out for ice cream with Daddy.”
“Then it’s a lucky thing that I already asked him to come over.”
But belligerent Mimi had settled in. Lucy noticed it and she tried to hustle Mimi out. “Come on. You’ll ride with me. Daddy will be right behind us after he’s done with his paperwork.”
“No. I’ll wait for Daddy. You can go home and get stuff ready.”
Lucy’s patience thinned. “Watch your tone or the only thing that I’ll be getting ready is you for bed without any ice cream.”
“That’s mean.”
After everything that had happened in the last hour, I wasn’t about to ignore Mimi’s attitude. I leaned across the railing. “Go with your mother now, Milora Michelle. And no back talking.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “I don’t want any stupid ice cream. And I don’t want you to come over if you’re both gonna be mean to me.”
Nolan muttered under his breath.
I looked at Lucy and she mirrored my WTF? expression.
But she rallied first. “Have it your way, Mimi. We’ll skip the ice cream tonight. Say good-bye to your dad.”
“Bye,” she said sullenly, not coming closer for a hug.
Lucy said, “I’ll call you,” and followed Mimi as she stomped off.
“Man, it’s like an alien inhabited her body,” Nolan said. “Haven’t you told her you’re back together yet?”
“Nope. If she reacts that way when she sees us kiss I don’t know how she’ll take it when I’m at her place in the morning after I’ve spent the night. Or if Lucy is at my place.”
“Isn’t that the dream of most kids whose parents have broken up? That they get back together and life will be unicorns and sunshiny rainbows once again?”
“It’s different for us, because there’s never been an ‘us’ as a family.” I didn’t have time to brood about Lucy having to deal with Mimi’s bratty attitude alone, because the parents who’d been milling around finally descended.
“Your questions will be answered as soon as I have answers,” I said. “Assuming I’m approved to coach, let’s keep the same schedule for now for skills and practices. Margene will update you with changes.”
Nolan accompanied me to Margene’s office, which I hadn’t expected.
Margene didn’t chatter with me or my brother, which allowed me to get the paperwork done faster. But I was curious about one thing.
“What can you tell me about the woman who owns this place?”
“Eccentric is frequently used to describe her. She bought the land—or if you believe the rumor, she won it in a poker tournament—intending to build a paintball gun recreation area. Something happened with the zoning that didn’t allow it. Someone advised her to build an ice rink. So she did. She initially wanted the space to be strictly for figure skating—guess she had a crush on Dick Button back in the day, that’s how old she is—but hockey has grown so rapidly she banked on that instead. She did insist on having an hour blocked out on Saturdays and Sundays for ice rental for kids’ birthday parties.” Margene shook her head. “She’s great to work for, but there are a few things, like hiring Dennis, that make no sense.”
“Is she ever here?”
“She drops in. She likes to catch us unaware. But she hasn’t been in for ages, and all my correspondence with her is either through her property manager on the phone, or via email. Why do you ask?”
I shrugged. “Just wondering if I oughta be on the lookout for a granny type coming after me with a cane or a walker for insulting her nephew.”
Margene and Nolan both laughed.
Then I said, “It’d probably be best if I went on the offensive and asked to meet up with her first.”
“She’d like you all right. Big, handsome athlete who’s a master on the ice.”
Nolan coughed, “Suck-up.”
She merely grinned at him. “Telling it like it is. I’ll see what I can do about hooking you up with her.”
I cringed. “Jesus. D
on’t say it like that.”
“Dirty mind,” she chided. “Now get outta here so Gabi can sneak in and blister my ear.”
In the parking lot, Nolan said, “Thanks for the interesting evening, bro.”
Then it occurred to me that it was Saturday night, his sacred “hang and bang” club night. “What’s going on with you? Why aren’t you out trolling like the tomcat you are?”
“I told you. It’s gotten old. Or maybe I’ve gotten old.” He brushed a speck of lint from his navy wool coat. “Or maybe I just like hanging out with you. We’ve never gotten to do that on a regular basis before.”
What a sweet little shit. I shocked the crap out of him when I said, “Aww. I’m touched, and prepare yourself, bro; I’m coming at ya for a hug.”
During the backslapping, tight-squeezing, laughing hug, that sneaky sucker managed a quick shot to my kidney. I’d forgotten we used to do that, and I laughed, even when it stung. “Nolan, you dirty-fighting fucker. Good thing I love you, bro, or I’d be rubbing that GQ face on the concrete.”
“You’d have to catch me first, and the only time you’re faster than me is when you’re on skates.” He adjusted his wool scarf. “And back atcha, showing the love tonight. Speaking of . . . are you going home? Or over to Lucy’s?”
“What do you think?”
* * *
• • •
I texted Lucy that I was on my way over.
She answered the door before my second soft knock. “Hey. You didn’t have to come over. Mimi is already asleep.”
“Did she . . . ?”
“Get mouthy? No. She didn’t bring up that she saw us kissing either.”
I kicked off my shoes and hung up my coat. “You’re sure she saw us?”
“Jax, baby. Everyone saw us.”
My arms circled her and I tugged her against my body. “Did that bother you?”
“Only in that we haven’t given Mimi a heads-up that we’re . . . God, if I can’t come up with the right words for us, how are we supposed to explain it to her? Boyfriend and girlfriend sounds juvenile. We’re not lovers.”
Lucy paused, waiting for me to tack on yet, and I wanted to, but the thought of telling her the reason I’d been holding back with her made my heart race, and I had the urge to flee.
“Jax?”
I looked into her eyes, seeing confusion. “We tell her that we’re replacing yelling with kissing.” Then I kissed her. And she melted into me like she always did. When I broke the kiss and lifted my head, pain shot down the side of my neck, and I winced.
“What’s wrong?”
“Wrong angle for my neck. No worries, though. That kiss was worth it. Your kisses are worth everything.”
Lucy stepped back and propped her hands on her hips.
Never a good sign.
“Even if we can’t define what we are to our daughter, we both know this is an intimate relationship. Intimate means more than sex—it also means we tell each other things.”
My heart picked up speed.
“Is there something important you forgot to tell me, Jax?”
There’s no way that she knows. Don’t act paranoid. “Such as?”
“Such as you replaced Flint and Lund as your general contractors on the remodel.”
I exhaled, silently thanking the universe for a reprieve, even when I knew it was temporary.
“I had to hear it from Simone.”
“To be honest, I don’t know how to be a normal couple, Luce. I haven’t been part of a couple since we were together, which for me has meant I had no one to talk to about the daily life stuff. There’s been no ‘How was your day, dear?’ with anyone else. I talked hockey with my teammates, I talked about addiction issues with my counselors, I talked health concerns with my doctors, I talked bar business with Simone, I talked property management issues with Chris, I talked career issues with Peter, I talked to you about Mimi and I talked to my family. That’s it.”
“So neatly compartmentalized,” she murmured.
“It works for me.”
Lucy moved in and smoothed her hands over my pecs. “Well, it doesn’t work for me. If I’m part of your life, I want to know about all of that because that’s what makes up your life. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“And you can start by telling me who the hell this Chris ‘property management’ person is, because that’s the first time you’ve ever mentioned that name.”
I gave her a quick peck on her frowning mouth. “This building isn’t the only property I own.”
“Shocking.”
Such a smartass. “Stonewall Enterprises is the company I started for property investments. Chris is a former college teammate who manages everything and advises me on potential purchases. My cousin Brady is such a numbers geek that he runs my financials for fun. As of right now, Stonewall Enterprises owns the entire block that the bar is on, an office building in Wayzata and one in Burnsville. Last year I acquired an abandoned strip mall and several parcels of land adjacent to it. I’ve looked at a dozen options to turn it into something besides a big money suck, but nothing has been decided.”
She stared at me.
“What?”
“This is what you deal with all day?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“How did you ever think you could do all that and run LI?”
“Hey, I came to the conclusion that I couldn’t sooner rather than later, remember? That counts for something.”
Then she got right in my face. “No wonder your neck hurts. So here’s what’s going to happen. You will strip down to just your socks and underwear. Stretch out on my bed and let me massage your neck and back.”
Half-naked with Lucy touching me . . . I’d jacked off to that thought more times than was healthy. How could her bossiness piss me off and turn me on?
Because this is your Lucy, the one you fell in love with because she’s always had that special ability.
A firm tug on my hair brought my attention back to her.
“Let me take care of you, Jax. While I’m massaging away the aches and pains of the day, you can fill me in on what happened with Walker, and we can both use the time to remember the intimacies of being a couple.”
I was too choked up to say anything; she’d known what I needed before I did.
I kissed her forehead, took her hand and led her into her bedroom.
* * *
• • •
Talk about surreal, stretching out on Lucy’s bed—happily she still slept in a king—like a starfish, with Lucy sitting on my ass and her hands working magic on my stiff muscles.
The crisp cotton sheets didn’t have her scent, meaning she’d probably just changed her sheets. In anticipation of me coming over tonight?
A sharp slap landed on my shoulder blade. “Don’t tense up.”
“Sorry.” I’d kept the tension from my body as I told her about Walker. I’d voiced my concerns that I hadn’t heard from Brady or Jensen, so I assumed they were pissed off at me too. Annika wasn’t mad; she hadn’t understood the delays either.
We talked about my potential new gig as a hockey coach.
We talked about her taking on more management responsibilities when Lennox went on maternity leave.
We talked about the furniture delivery schedule for my apartment.
We talked about taking a baking class with Mimi.
We talked like a normal couple reliving the week’s events, which was a milestone for us.
While we talked and Lucy had her hands all over my back, shoulders and arms, I’d kept my dick from going fully hard by imagining an ice bath.
But as soon as we stopped talking, the sensuality in her touch overwhelmed all of my senses.
When she leaned forward her hair trailed against the underside of my arms, making the skin
there tingle. She pressed her fingers into my flesh so deeply that I felt the bite of her nails, which spun me into the past and all the times she’d dug her fingers into my ass, my shoulders, my spine, the nape of my neck as I moved inside her.
I thought I could keep it together by imagining walking naked through a snowstorm, but that’s when she went in for the kill. She scooted down so she could lay her upper body on top of mine.
Her naked upper body.
Her breasts pressed into the lower curve of my back. Her fingers circled my wrists. Her breath fanned over the damp spots she’d created as she kissed and licked the slope of my shoulders.
And her scent. Christ. That lemony sweetness eddied around me when we were skin to skin, and I wanted to rub every inch of her all over every inch of me.
At least a dozen times.
“This body of yours, sport.” She sighed dreamily. “It’s beyond fucktacular. Muscles, muscles everywhere I touch.” She licked the back of my neck, and I shuddered beneath her when she sank her teeth into that spot. “Everywhere I taste.”
Another delicate lick near my hairline sent goose bumps down my arms, and my erection jumped as if she’d tongued me there.
“I want you,” she whispered in my ear. “I want you so much I can’t think straight.”
Yes. Finally.
Her left hand moved up and down my left arm in a constant caress as she dragged her mouth across the slope of my shoulder, alternating kisses with the tender scrape of her teeth. She nuzzled my neck and breathed me in, and when she exhaled, that sexy hum of pleasure vibrated throughout my entire body, like a tuning fork that had hit the right note.
Then she started to rock her groin into my ass, and my body remembered what to do, how she needed me to move. As soon as my hips left the bed, Lucy snaked her hand between my body and the mattress, grabbing hold of my hard-on through my boxers.
Reality crashed down as if I’d been doused in an ice bath and then shoved outside into a subzero Minnesota winter night.
Panicked, I rolled away from her, dumping her back on the mattress. At first glance she still wore that naughty smile, believing that she was about to get lucky.
I Want You Back Page 27