by Avery Flynn
He glanced at the clock on the microwave as he wound his way through the kitchen on his fourth lap around the house. Her shift had ended forty minutes ago, according to the info he’d gleaned from Lucy, who had greeted him with a hug and a don’t-fuck-with-my-girl talking-to outside the locker room.
Stopping in front of the island, he stared at his phone sitting right in the middle of it. He hadn’t talked to Fallon beyond a few hurried texts since they’d had sex in the bathroom at the clinic—right before she’d left the fundraiser early for a shift at the hospital. The urge to call her had only grown in the past two days, to the point where he’d left his phone on the island so he wouldn’t start texting. If she wanted to talk, she’d reach out to him. That was how it usually worked. Someone wanted something from him, they called or texted or waited outside a locker room to flush his day down the toilet.
Yeah, thinking of his parents was definitely not what he wanted to do at the moment. What he wanted was Fallon, but he had no idea what he was doing. She wasn’t a booty call, she wasn’t a puck bunny, and she wasn’t the single girl from college that had been his last actual relationship. Not that he wanted a relationship. He just wanted to hang out with her—but naked, and then they’d talk after, argue hockey greats, and order in food.
Christ. He made himself sound more pathetic the longer he thought about it.
Locate your balls and call her, Blackburn.
He tossed the empty pint carton in the trash, put the spoon in the dishwasher, and grabbed his phone—which he stared at in confusion for way longer than someone who used the damn thing eight billion times a day should.
Your balls. They’re currently in deep storage. How about taking them out?
Hip-checking the annoying, mocking voice in his head, he opened up his contacts. There she was under LL, which just seemed stupid. She was more than Lady Luck; he and his missing balls could both agree on that.
He tapped the edit button and added an FA in front of the LL and then an ON after. Then, a quick Google images search later, he uploaded a contact pic of her screaming bloody murder from the stands while he and Johansson traded haymakers on the ice. Like an asshole, he grinned at that shot for way too long.
Fuck this. Your gonads have been ball-napped. You’re on your own.
Ignoring the douchebag in his head, Zach hit call.
“Hey,” she said, her voice groggy and sleep-roughened.
He winced. “Sorry, I thought you’d just gotten off work a little bit ago.”
“I did,” she said. “Came home and collapsed in my bed.”
And he was the jerk keeping her up. “You shouldn’t have picked up. Go get your sleep.”
“If I didn’t want to talk to you, I wouldn’t have,” she said. “Great game tonight, I got to see a couple of minutes of highlights during my break.”
If that’s how she wanted to play it, he wasn’t about to argue. Instead, he started back toward his room, shutting off lights on his way. “Wish you’d have been there.”
“I think you did fine with the stand-in.” The muffled sound of covers being tugged into place carried over the line. “That guy was a good sport to wear that sash thing.”
“Yeah.” It was true, but that dude was also the last person he wanted to talk about when he had Fallon on the phone. “So, are you working Thursday?”
“There’s no game that night.”
“I know.” He walked into his room, flipped the phone audio to speaker, and tossed it on his bed before he started to undress. “I was hoping we could go out to dinner, maybe catch a movie.”
There was a pause long enough for him to shuck all his clothes off and crawl into bed—which was really damn long.
“You still there?” he asked.
She let out a soft chuckle. “Are you asking me out on a date?”
Yes. Absolutely. “Maybe.”
“Considering what happens when there’s not plexiglass between us, I’m not sure if it’s a good idea.”
“You’d rather just come over here?” Okay, he was completely down with that. “Or I can come over there.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
He took her off speaker and put the phone to his ear again, the activity giving him an outlet for the sudden onset of nervous jitters making him not just want but need to move. “What do you mean?”
“That despite my better judgment, I’m starting to like you.”
His pulse sped up, even though he was lying propped up on a pair of pillows instead of skating his ass off to stop a breakaway, which was what this felt like. She liked him. Liked. Him. Not a coy tease or an implied maybe, but just the facts, straight out and without adornment. That was his girl.
“You make it sound like a bad thing.”
She let out a half giggle, half sigh. “More like a dangerous thing.”
“I’m completely harmless.” Yeah, he didn’t even believe himself.
“Not even when I’m so tired I can barely keep my eyes open will I ever agree with that one.”
“I’m gonna convince you to go out with me.” As soon as he said it, everything clicked into place. It was like seeing a play form on the ice seconds before the players moved and knowing where the puck was going to go.
This was going to happen. They were going to happen. All he had to do was get her to agree.
“Good luck to you,” she said. “I’m a stubborn woman.”
“I’ll have to play dirty then.” And he most definitely wasn’t above that—especially not when inspiration hit out of thin air in the form of an already planned Ice Knights players and family event. “How about a group thing? No pressure. No chance for us to get naked. Plus, you can shoot me with paint pellets.”
“You’re a glutton for punishment, aren’t you?” she asked with a laugh. “What time?”
He raised his fist in triumph. “Be ready at eleven. We’ll swing by and pick you up.”
“We?”
“What fun would it be if I told you everything?” Especially since, as a total Ice Knights fan, she’d freak out knowing she was going to be hanging out with the entire team.
“You can’t just hang up now without more details,” she said, excitement making her voice higher and the words come out quicker than usual. “It doesn’t work that way.”
“Now you know how I felt when you sent that selfie before my plane took off.” Curious. Needy. Wanting more. “Sweet dreams, Fallon.”
…
Fallon had no idea how she’d ended up squatting behind a haystack as paint pellets flew overhead. Scratch that. She knew exactly how she’d ended up there, and it was all because of the guy with the fabulous ass sneaking around a tower of old tires a few yards away.
When he said the other night that she’d get to hit him with paint, she was thinking more along the lines of a color run or a messy Paint and Sip. Instead, they were in a field littered with obstacles along with half the Ice Knights and their significant others playing paintball. There were only five of them left in play in this round, with all the others shooting off wisecracks from behind a ten-foot-high chain-link fence where everyone went once they’d gotten splattered with a bright yellow paint pellet.
“Hey, Blackburn,” she yelled as she stood and took aim.
He turned and must have realized halfway through his pivot that he’d made a rookie mistake because he tried to dive behind the tire tower—but it was too late. She fired off the last two rounds in her air gun, hitting him right in the middle of his camouflage vest.
“Nice shot.”
Fallon whipped around. Marti stood a few feet away, her own vest free of any paint, with a friendly grin on her face and her finger on the trigger. “Sorry, Fallon.”
The paint pellet hit her in the shoulder, leaving a yellow splotch and a dull ache like getting nailed by a hard-packed snowball.
“Don’t let the sweet smile fool you. Marti is a bloodthirsty competitor,” Zach said as they did the walk of shame together off the field.
>
“You know her pretty well?” Not that she was jealous. She was just curious, and the uptick in her blood pressure was the result of the paintball, that was all.
“Coach Peppers coached my travel team in high school. Marti was always around.”
Don’t ask. Don’t ask. Don’t ask. “And did you ever…”
He nodded and held open the gate to where everyone else had gathered. “Like rabbits.”
And that’s what she got for asking. Her stomach sank. She liked Marti, but she did manage to make wearing a dorky camo vest and goggles look cute. And Fallon? She didn’t need a mirror to know that the minute she took off the goggles she was going to have a red imprint across her forehead and under her eyes. Super attractive.
“I’m kidding,” Zach said, pivoting so that he was directly in her path. “We’ve never and I would never.”
“Why?” Not that she was digging for more, but she was totally digging for more.
He snaked an arm around her waist, pulling her close as they walked toward the rest of the team at the covered picnic area. “She’s too nice for me.” He dipped his head down so his lips were millimeters from her ear. “I like ’em more bitchy.”
The warmth of his breath against her sensitive skin sent a shiver of anticipation down her spine. The man was trouble to her personal pledge not to end up naked with him again.
“Is that supposed to flatter me?” she asked, quickening her step toward the group of players, wives, and girlfriends sitting around the picnic tables, watching the action and drinking hot chocolate and steaming apple cider.
“Does it?” he asked, looking at her as if he already knew the answer as he easily kept pace with her fast steps.
“A little.” Or a lot, judging by the way her heart was going a million miles an hour and the fact that she had to shove her hands in her pockets to keep from touching him.
“Then, yes. I’m known all across Harbor City for my flattery skills.” Even he couldn’t keep a straight face.
“You’re so smooth.” She rolled her eyes and sat down at the end of the picnic table, close enough to everyone else to still be a part of the group but not so close that they were right next to them. “Of course, we did meet when you were puking your guts up, so there really was nowhere for you to go but higher.”
He sat down beside her, his gaze locking on hers, and the world tilted just for a second. “That wasn’t when we met.”
It wasn’t his words that got her right in the solar plexus, but the way he said it. The way his voice lowered, his eyes darkened, and his entire focus zeroed in on her as if how they’d first set eyes on each other was important. They were on the edge of something here, and she wasn’t sure if she was ready.
Taking in a steadying breath, she tried to pull back and create some mental distance with that old familiar snarky teasing. “Oh, you’re finally ready to admit that you knew exactly who I was when I showed up at your house?”
“You knew I was full of shit, huh?” he asked.
Chuckling, she nodded. “You got all three of my sisters’ names right while you were forgetting mine. Yeah, I knew.”
“And you didn’t make me pay for it?”
She shrugged. “Figured you puking your guts up was punishment enough.”
He leaned in close, his smell enveloping her as his fingers strummed along the length of her inner thigh. “Such a softie.”
When it came to him? It had started to feel like that. There was just a sense of ease that came from being around him. Not that she was relaxed; she was way too turned on for that. But being with Zach just felt right—they felt right together.
“Oh my God,” Cole said, flopping down on the opposite side of the picnic table from them and letting out a huff of annoyance. “Would you two just get a room, already, or go behind a tree or something? Some of us are not in the mood for all the lovey-dovey.”
“Phillips, did Marti come to her senses again?” Caleb Stuckey asked, scooting down to their end of the table.
Cole glowered at his teammate. “She’s impossible.”
“Really? It’s her, huh?” Zach asked. “The woman who has a doctorate, can kick your ass in pool, and is currently wiping the field in this paintball battle?”
“Don’t forget she’s hot,” the team’s center said.
“Shut it, Petrov,” Cole said while flipping off the other guy.
Brain trying to catch up on this kind of conversational whiplash, Fallon turned to Zach. “Do I even want to know?”
“This is a constant cycle for them,” he said, shaking his head. “This time they made it six months, though. That’s a record.”
Cole shrugged and looked down at the spread of three yellow globs of paint across his chest.
“Did she do that?” Fallon asked, wincing because unless she was mistaken, Marti had triple tapped the forward with direct hits to the heart.
Cole nodded, stood up, and turned around to show off his back with an additional two splatters right between his shoulder blades. The rest of them let out a collective groan. Someone had sent a message, and not a particularly subtle one.
“Look, you like her?” Zach asked as the other players looked at him like the team leader he was. “Then find your balls and figure out a way to make it happen.”
And as he finished, his heated gaze fell on Fallon. The air crackled around them as the rest of the team and their significant others fell away and realization jolted through her clear and loud like a lightning bolt in a summer storm. She wouldn’t just fall for Zach if she wasn’t careful. She already had.
So what in the hell did she do now?
Her brain was trying to work through the possibilities when a text buzzed through on her phone, making her ass vibrate. She pulled it out of her back pocket, still in a kind of haze, but one look at the group message changed everything.
Mom: Emergency family meeting ASAP. Battery dying. Can’t give you details yet. Not bad. See you soon.
Lungs squeezed tight, she jolted up and away from the picnic table. Sure, her mom had said not bad, but when it came to their family, there was a lot of space between good and bad when it came to injuries sustained in a fire or a shooting.
“Something happened,” she said, barely able to get the words out. “I gotta get home.”
In a heartbeat, Zach was up with an arm around her, grounding her to the here and now instead of the million horrible possibilities.
“Take my car.” Caleb, who’d given them a ride to the paintball field in his truck, tossed his keys to Zach.
“Don’t worry,” Zach said as he guided her to the truck. “I’ve got you.”
Three words she held onto as they sped down the highway toward whatever was waiting at her parents’ house.
Chapter Nineteen
The Hartigan house was total chaos. The entire family was packed into the living room when they arrived, everyone talking over each other at a volume probably audible from space. Then, just to add to the general insanity, there was a French bulldog chasing an orange tabby cat with one eye and a chunk missing from its ear from one end of the house to the other.
It had been like that since he and Fallon had burst through the doors a minute ago, and it had Zach on edge, but Fallon seemed take it all in stride. As soon as she gave the room a once-over that seemed to assure her that both parents and all six of her siblings—along with their significant others—were alive and apparently unharmed, her vice-like grip on his hand relaxed, but she didn’t let go. Instead, they stood in the doorway to the kitchen and watched the chaos.
Fallon relaxed against him, laying her head on his arm and letting out a soft huff of amused annoyance. “She did it again.”
Surveying the room, he tried to pick up on what and who she was talking about, but this whole family thing was not his game. “What do you mean?”
“Last time my dad got promoted, Mom sent out a similar get-your-butts-here-right-now message.” She shook her head and looked at him with a can-you-ev
en-believe-it expression. “Everyone rushed over, and we found them two glasses into the bottle of celebratory champagne.”
The whole explanation made little to no sense to him because, glancing around the room, it looked like everyone was pissed off. Well, except for Lucy and Frankie, who were both standing in the corner laughing their asses off. What in the hell was going on?
“Really, we should know better,” Fallon said. “I love my mom, but she always thinks it’s gotta be done her way and now.”
The laugh burst out of him before he could think better of it. The irony was just too sweet. “Sounds like someone I know.”
Fallon looked up at him, her eyes big with mock innocence. “I’d never cause this much chaos—and anyway, I am always right.”
Before he could call her on that bullshittery, an ear-splitting whistle from the family matriarch cut through all the noise, and everyone—except for the dog and cat—fell silent. They all turned to Kate Hartigan, who smiled at the crowd as if she hadn’t just caused all the drama and given them a heart attack in order to get them in the family home ASAP.
“Frankie and Lucy have an announcement,” she said, turning to the couple in question.
“We’re getting married,” Lucy and Frankie said at the same time as she lifted her left hand and showed off a gleaming ruby engagement ring.
There was half a beat of silence, and then it was like the Hartigans had won the Stanley Cup, the Norris Trophy, and been inducted into the Hall of Fame all at the same moment. Everyone was screaming and hugging. Kate hustled over to Fallon and him, drawing them both into a quick squeeze strong enough to have broken a rib or two.
“I know you’re about to kill me, Fallon, but they wanted to wait until everyone was together at family Saturday lunch to make the announcement, and I had no chance of keeping something as good as this to myself for forty-eight hours.” The words came out fast and with a hint of guilt clinging to them, “But I did tell you all that it wasn’t anything bad.”