Bruiser

by Whiskey, Samantha

  I shrugged. Sure, he had soft brown eyes, dark well-kept hair, and a kind smile. I had noticed he was nice to look at, but that was it.

  No desire churned in my core.

  Nothing begged me to be bold and reach out and connect.

  Because nothing and no one had been enough to melt the wall of ice I had around my heart. Not in the way Grace implied—waggling her eyebrows across the table. Fear had been a cold, tangible thing in my life since I gave birth to Elliott. And I couldn’t risk placing her in harm’s way again because I might, on occasion, crave more physical contact from the opposite sex.

  It wasn’t worth it.

  “It wouldn’t kill you, you know,” she said, a sadness in her eyes. We’d been friends long enough for her to know why I didn’t date or pursue or even really notice when men hit on me. “It could be good for you. More stress relief than these things,” she said, lifting her near-empty margarita.

  I chuckled softly, taking another drink of mine.

  She wasn’t wrong. It could be fun to get wild and be with a man. Let him take care of me in that sense rather than me using my trusty vibrator. But my vibrator wasn’t going to turn the tables on me—wouldn’t shout and punch holes in walls and put the fear of God in me. Wouldn’t ignore me when I said stop. Wouldn’t back me into a corner until I transformed into a vicious, raging mama bear.

  “One day,” Grace said, eyeing me. “One day you’re going to meet someone who you can’t resist, and then all this pent-up-energy is going to consume you when he’s around.”

  The warning rang clear and hot in my mind.

  Porter’s face flashed behind my eyes, his bulging chest and biceps. The way he’d been soft and kind to Elliott. How he’d made her laugh. Such a contrast. But the only reason I’d felt a flicker of anything when I saw him when he brought me my favorite drink was because I was surprised to see him there. That was all.

  “That’ll never happen,” I said to Grace. “The man I need doesn’t exist.” I laughed, raising my drink as we emptied them.

  “What do you mean?” she asked. “There are good men out there, Shea.”

  “I know,” I said. I wasn’t dumb enough to believe all men were assholes. I’d just had enough experience with one that I hadn’t wanted to find out for sure. “But,” I continued. “I’d need someone who is strong enough to protect us, but also understanding enough to put up with my”—I glanced at Elliott, who was still engrossed in her game—“darkness, and be gentle enough to know when and how to react to a ten-year-old’s demands.”

  Grace pressed her lips together, nodding. “Plus,” she whispered, “he needs to be a god in the sack.”

  I laughed so hard my sides hurt.

  “What?” Grace said, shrugging. “For how long it’s been for you?” She practically gaped at me like I should be a side-show act. “You need someone who is beyond the norm in that department.”

  The laugh left my lips, something else spinning in my blood. I had been the only one I allowed myself to get intimate with—God knows Elliott’s father hadn’t been generous or skilled. But the idea of a man taking me there…it was terrifying and exciting at the same time.

  “It’s a tall order,” I said, coming back to earth. One I knew had a slim chance of being filled. It would be hard enough finding a man who would put up with my past, let alone sign up to be an instant dad. And that role is where I’d be the most strict when it came to judgment. There was nothing more important to me than Elliott. I knew she needed that father-type figure in her life though, which is why I’d enrolled her at the—

  “Who’s tall?” Elliott asked, drawing into our conversation so quickly I jumped.

  “No one,” I said, a slight flush on my cheeks as I grinned at Grace.

  “Mr. Porter is tall,” she said, flashing those puppy eyes at me.

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. We’d already had this discussion yesterday and the day before.

  “Please, Mom,” she said. “He’s so cool. And he could teach me how to play hockey.”

  I eyed her.

  Grace tilted her head, and I quickly filled her in on the events a few days ago.

  She pursed her lips. “He’s friends with Connor, right?” she asked. “The case you had recently?”

  I nodded, trying not to remember how easily Porter had scooped me off my feet when the paparazzi surrounding Connor’s house had nearly trampled me. The massive bear of a man hadn’t even asked. He’d simply acted. Sure, his instincts may have led him to protect me first and ask questions later, but I knew all too well what reacting before thinking got you.

  “Easy street or hard street, Shea?” His voice echoed through the mental cage I’d locked him in.

  “Easy,” I cried. “Easy.”

  A harsh crack across my cheek.

  Thumbprint bruises on my forearms.

  Purple and red on my skin.

  Broken glass on the stained carpet.

  I blinked away the images, looking down at Elliott, who had that determined look in her eye.

  Stubborn girl.

  “Mom,” she said, her tone so much older than her ten years. “Why did you even bother to let me into the Club then?”

  I raised my brows.

  “You wanted me to get assigned someone. You wanted me to have this…experience,” she said, laying her hand flat on the table.

  God, she was already a teenager.

  “So why not with him?” she asked. “He plays for the NHL,” she said, her eyes wide. “He’s athletic and could help me up any of my games. Plus, he’s huge. He’ll scare off bad guys.”

  My eyes immediately switched from stern to wary. “What bad guys?”

  Elliott was too young to remember her father. To remember the seedy motels he’d kept us in the first year of her life. But my years of protecting her, being cautious of who I let into her life…that had made her cautious by default.

  “You know, them.” She shrugged. “The universal them that is out to get us. No one would come around if Porter was my Big.”

  I smoothed some hair back that had fallen out of her ponytail. “Are you scared, baby?”

  She rolled her eyes. “No, Mom,” she groaned. “I’m just listing the perks of Porter, and there are tons.”

  Something cracked in my chest. Something that screamed I should let go. Screamed that Porter really was the perfect match for her because they both loved sports and competition and pushing themselves to earn the win.

  But…he was…God, what was he? What had I wanted from this program? A CEO? Or a minister or a sales manager? What had I wanted?

  For Elliott to experience what it was like to have another parental figure—someone separate from me. For her to have space and independence.

  And now she was asking me, no begging me for this one.

  I sighed, my shoulders dropping a fraction.

  “Yes!” Elliott clapped her hands together before squeezing me in a side hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

  Grace stared at the two of us. “What just happened?”

  I chuckled. “I just gave in to my daughter.”

  “You’re the best!” Elliott continued, releasing me. “When do I start? When do I get to hang out with him?”

  “I’ll call him tomorrow and check the official Club schedule.”

  She clapped again, fist-bumping the air. “Yes,” she said. “I’m so going to be unstoppable.”

  She didn’t specify a sport, and she didn’t need to. The girl could play anything she put her mind to, do anything. I admired her determination and her natural ability when it came to all things sports. And that was the one department where I was lacking. Because while I could show up to games and cheer her on and Google everything about each new sport she took up, I couldn’t play with her. Not really. Not in a way that challenged her. Not in the way she needed.

  Hudson Porter was definitely not lacking in that ability.

  And I had to wonder if the giant could be what she neede
d, or if I was making a huge mistake.

  Chapter 3

  Hudson

  “Don’t make me regret this,” Shea said under her breath as we walked out of her office.

  “There’s nothing to worry about,” I promised her. I was still shocked that she’d given in and let me mentor Elliott.

  “We’re going to be fine, Mom!” Elliott declared as she spun on the sidewalk, her arms outstretched like she could capture the August sunshine in her hands.

  “You have my number,” I reminded Shea, who looked like she might be sick.

  “And you have my daughter,” she responded.

  I hit the unlock button on my key fob, and my G-Wagon lights flashed. “Climb on in, Elliott,” I said without looking away from Shea.

  “In the backseat!” Shea exclaimed. “You can’t let her ride in the front seat. Airbags deploy at like 200 miles an hour, and she could end up with a fractured face.”

  I would have thrown back some snarky comment since I knew all of that, and I would never have let Elliott ride in the front seat, but the stark fear in her gray eyes made me think twice, and err on the side of kind.

  “I was never going to let her ride in the front seat,” I promised Shea. “I’m an excellent driver, I promise. Great hand-eye coordination and all that,” I finished with a small smile.

  “I know. I checked your driving record.”

  “Of course you did. Check my registration, too?” I teased, trying to lighten the mood.

  She shielded her eyes with her hand and stared at my car as if she had X-ray vision. As if she could see if Elliott was putting on her seatbelt or not.

  “I did, actually.” She looked up at me. “I was both relieved to see that you’re entirely legal, and genuinely concerned for your sanity.”

  “Why is that?” I asked.

  “Because no one in their right mind spends a quarter million dollars on a car.” She quirked an eyebrow up.

  “Hey, that thing is a tank,” I told her as I motioned toward my G-Wagon. “Seriously, I would have thought you’d be over the moon about the safety ratings.”

  She shook her head at me. “I’ll never understand rich people.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed with her. “I won’t either.” I threw her a grin and walked backward toward the car. “I’ll have her back in an hour and a half. That should give you time to finish up your day, right?”

  “That sounds right.” She bit her lower lip, which then led me to thinking about biting her it for her. “Just… Just be careful with her, Porter.”

  “I’ll defend her with my life,” I promised, putting a hand over my heart.

  “Don’t put her life where you have to defend it!”

  I didn’t bother answering her, just gave her a wave and climbed into the driver’s seat, quickly closing the door.

  “You buckled in, kid?” I asked, checking my rearview mirror.

  “Yep!” Elliott answered. “So where are we going?”

  “My favorite place in the world,” I told her as we pulled into traffic.

  Fifteen minutes later, she sat on the players’ bench as the Zamboni finished its run over the arena ice.

  “How does that feel?” I asked her as I tied on the third pair of skates I’d brought for her. The first had been too small, the second too wide, but these were Goldilocks style—just right by my estimation.

  “Great!” She wiggled her toes in the boot, and I nodded.

  “I figured. Okay, let’s get your second skate on and get you out on the ice.” I quickly tied her second skate, remembering to keep it a shade looser than I liked mine. Not everyone liked their skates tied so tightly that they bordered on cutting off circulation.

  “What’s this for?” she asked as I handed her a helmet.

  “So your mother doesn’t kill me,” I told her in all seriousness, sitting next to her to put my skates on. I laced them up with the quick efficiency of someone who had practically been born in skates.

  “How did you have all these extra pairs?” she asked, pointing to the small lineup of black hockey skates.

  “Because I had the sales rep bring me all those pairs around the size your mom told me so we wouldn’t need to have skates fitted to your feet.”

  “What will you do with them? The extra ones?” she asked, tilting her head just like her mother.

  “Donate them to the Dorsal Club so other kids can use them,” I answered with a shrug. “Unless you had a better idea?”

  “Nope,” she said with a grin. “I think that’s perfect.”

  I snapped her chin strap, and then her cage.

  “Why don’t you need your helmet?”

  “Because I’m not going to fall.”

  She gave me a look that said she was unimpressed with my answer, which made me laugh.

  “Okay, if we get to puck work, I’ll put mine on. You need yours because you’ve never skated before, right?”

  “Not that I can remember,” she answered.

  “Right. So I need to protect you from you. Once we get to sticks and pucks, then I’ll get my helmet, because then I’ll need protection from you, too.”

  “Ha, ha,” she teased as the Zamboni finished.

  “Okay, kiddo. The ice is ours for fifty-five minutes. Any longer than that and I’ll be late returning you, and you might turn into a pumpkin or something.”

  She nodded and stood, her knees wobbling for a moment before she steadied. A perplexed look crossed her face.

  “You okay?”

  She nodded, pulling a slim, black device from the front pocket of her jeans. “Just in case I fall,” she told me as she placed the device in the back pocket of her ever-present backpack.

  “What is that?”

  “My tracker,” she answered with a shrug.

  “Your what?” There was no way she’d said what I thought I’d heard.

  “My GPS tracker. It tells my mom where I’m at and lets her listen in if she’s worried.” She looked up at me with unflinching eyes.

  Holy shit. Shea was so worried about Elliott that she’d put a tracker on her? For fuck’s sake, I wasn’t that bad of a guy. Had I gotten into fights? Yes. Had they all been justified? Maybe. Kind of. But did I scare her so much that she’d gone and bought a damn tracker?

  “So she’s been able to hear every word we say?”

  “If she wants to.”

  Oh, this was rich. I put my finger to my lips and motioned for her to hand me the tracker.

  She grinned, showing even, white teeth that were missing a couple a few rows back, and handed me the device.

  It had a few buttons and a small speaker. I turned it over in my hands and then lifted it to my mouth. “Okay, Elliott, where should we start? Teaching you how to drive the Zamboni? Maybe bottle rockets at center ice? Oh yeah, explosives sound like the way to go.”

  She smothered her laugh with her hand.

  “And after we’re done with that, I thought we’d head to the bar. Maybe get you some bartending lessons? Then we’d cross the street without looking both ways—really live dangerously. What do you say?”

  She snorted through the gaps in her fingers, scrunching her nose. “Sounds good to me!” she managed.

  “Me, too!” I tossed the device into the small pocket of her backpack and headed onto the ice. “Step out carefully,” I told her in all seriousness.

  She bit her lip and came out onto the slick surface.

  “No biting your lip. You fall, and your teeth will go straight through it,” I warned her.

  She nodded and then concentrated as I taught her the motions which were second nature to me.

  The ice was my home. Out here, nothing could touch me. I was invincible in my element. Hell, I was more comfortable in skates than I was shoes.

  “There you go,” I told her as she stopped trying to walk in the skates and began to glide, trusting her balance.

  As odd as it was, I’d never taught anyone to skate before. I figured one day I’d teach my own kids, but since
that train wasn’t leaving the station any time soon, I was glad I had someone as athletic as Elliott to teach.

  It would be harder to fuck her up.

  “What are you doing, Hudson? Not like that. Why can’t you get it right? You’d better skate faster boy, or I’ll catch you once you’re off that ice.”

  I shut his voice out of my head with a quickness. He’d poisoned so many years, and he wasn’t getting any of them now.

  “How do you feel?” I asked Elliott.

  “Good! I think…” She pushed off the boards, gliding with sure, strong strokes. “I think I can let go!” she called back before quickly looking forward again.

  I caught up to her with a few quick motions and smiled. “I think you can!”

  My phone buzzed in my back pocket, and I slipped the device free from my warm-up pants. A text message from Shea flashed across the screen, and I thumbed the screen to open it.

  Shea: No driving the Zamboni. No bars. Use the crosswalk.

  A smile tugged at my lips, and I shook my head as Elliott skated ahead.

  Hudson: You gotta learn to trust me. Also, your daughter is a natural.

  I skated to center ice and then took a quick video as Elliott made her way around the rink. “There you go. Slow down for the turn. I’ll teach you to stop next,” I promised as the video rolled. “You should be proud of her,” I said quietly enough so only the video would catch it. “Seriously, a natural.”

  I quit filming and texted it to Shea.

  Then I started teaching Elliott the art of stopping.

  Shea: She’s amazing.

  Hudson: You should see her in person.

  Shea: You mean it?

  My stomach clenched. Hell yes, I meant it. I’d take whatever time Shea wanted to give me, but I wasn’t using Elliott to get it. I glanced over where Elliott was practicing shifting her weight so she could stop.

  I also didn’t want Shea coming just because she didn’t trust me.

  But maybe if she saw how well Elliott and I got along, she’d loosen the reins a little.

  “Hey,” I called out to Elliott. “You care if your mom comes down and sees you skate?”

  “Yeah!” she answered, throwing her arms up. “Then she’ll see how awesome I am and maybe let me go out for hockey!” She lost her balance and fell smack on her butt.