Centered (Gold Hockey Book 9)

by Elise Faber

  They slipped their jerseys over their heads at almost the same moment, Brit grinning as she fixed her long blonde ponytail. “You’re kind of fast, Williamson.”

  “Um, thanks?” he said. “You, too?”

  A beatific smile. “Yeah. And you know what that means?”

  “Oh no,” Max mumbled, but Brit was still talking, and Liam was focused on her words.

  “It means, you’re officially invited to run with us.”

  “Oh no,” Max moaned. “Abort. Abort!”

  Brit punched him. “Stop,” she said. “Coop promised me earlier that he was coming, too. Plus, it’s fun!”

  “It’s something,” Blane muttered, standing and heading out the door. Still, he paused and looked back. “Straight after practice?”

  Brit nodded. “Yup. Gear off. Stairs on.”

  Max groaned. “Oh God.”

  “I’ll be there,” Blane said before he disappeared into the hall.

  “Max?” she asked.

  “Heaven help me for peer pressure, but yes.”

  She fist-pumped, turned her bright blue eyes on him. “Liam?”

  He shoved his hands into his gloves, wondered for a moment what he was getting himself into and if it was possible that he’d screw up whatever Brit wanted from him. But . . . no. He was sticking with it. Fuck it. This was nice. The teasing. The poking fun. The insult-trading.

  Maybe that gave an insight to how fucked up he was inside, that he liked the insults and wanted more. But again . . . fuck it.

  If these were his last months, then he was going to do what he wanted.

  He was curious. They’d invited him. He was going to stop worrying and start putting some words to action. “Okay,” he said, nodding, excited rather than dreading . . . and if he’d known the fate he’d just ensured himself, then Liam definitely would have been dreading.

  “Yes!” Another fist-pump. “Lose the gear, trade skates for sneakers, and meet at the PT Suite after practice.” She walked to the door.

  Max clapped him on the shoulder as he made his way out. “Man.” A shake of his head. “You just signed your death warrant.”

  “What?” Liam asked.

  “Of course, it’ll be worth it in the end,” Max said, “but still. Death. Warrant.”

  “What—”

  Before he could finish the question, Max disappeared.

  He chalked it up to more joking, but yeah, if Liam had known what was awaiting him on those stairs, he definitely would have taken Max’s words much more seriously. As it was, he spent practice loose and relaxed and looking forward to something hockey-teammate-related for the first time in a long while.

  And he found that looking forward to something took his mind off his game.

  That morning, he played like he once had.

  Creative. Strong. Self-assured.

  He played like himself. Before his love of the game had been shrunk down to nothing, before his confidence had been eaten away by coaching, by teammates, by his own brain, before family responsibility had trumped enjoyment.

  But . . . if only he’d know what was coming his way after practice.

  A couple of hours later, he collapsed to the floor alongside Max, Coop, and Blane, chest heaving, legs shaking. “I don’t . . . know what . . . was more . . . torturous,” he said, gasping in air, “Brit’s pace . . . or the music.”

  “The music, dude,” Max said, lying back, his arms extending over his head, trying to suck in more air.

  “Why are you guys always so tired?” Brit asked, barely out of breath even though she’d led them on an intense sprint through the bleachers that surrounded the practice rink. Up, down, over. Up, down, over. Again and again between each set.

  And then around a second time because apparently these bleachers were smaller than the other place they usually ran, the team’s home arena, the Gold Mine, and they’d needed to be “balanced.”

  “You should be getting in better shape,” she said, taking a dainty sip of water.

  Liam was the first to recover, and he pushed to his feet, stretching out his trembling legs.

  “We are in better shape,” Blane said with a groan then mirrored Max by sprawling out on the ground, arms overhead.

  “The problem is that you are, too,” Coop added.

  Liam could see that. Brit had moved like liquid lightning over the stairs. The pace had been brutal, she’d sprinted past them and hadn’t let up the entire time they’d run. Yet, here she was calmly stretching out her quads, her forehead lightly glistening with sweat, her cheeks flushed pink from exertion but having already caught her breath. She looked like a freaking angel.

  Meanwhile, he felt like he’d been pulled backward through a hedge.

  She’d thoroughly kicked his ass, and done it effortlessly.

  He thought of another woman who’d already kicked his ass effortlessly. Only this one had long black hair and careful brown eyes. A mouth that had tasted like heaven and temptation all at once—

  “Mia would like you,” he said, lost in his brain, not realizing he’d spoken the words out loud until Brit’s head whipped toward him, eyes calculating.

  “Who’s Mia?”

  Alarm bells blared through Liam’s brain.

  He turned to see Max, Coop, and Blane sit up, equally calculating.

  Uh-oh.

  It was late on the East Coast. Too late for his dad to be calling, but his father was a force of nature. He didn’t respect boundaries or silly things like time zones.

  Liam let the call go to voicemail, knew at some point he’d need to talk to his family, but he couldn’t deny that the distance between New York and California had actually turned out to be a good thing. It had given him space, allowed him a chance to regroup.

  His phone began buzzing again almost immediately, but Liam still didn’t answer the call.

  The reason why came precisely two seconds after the second call.

  Buzz-buzz.

  Good last game. Keep your head up and your elbows out, it’ll give you more space on the entry.

  The advice was fine. It was good. It would probably help.

  The trouble was that the advice didn’t stop there.

  The messages kept buzzing through. Two. Four. Seven texts in all.

  Six too many, especially considering the first text didn’t end after Good last game.

  Liam sighed, knew he’d need to figure out to handle his dad—perhaps, he’d get his mom to run interference? Sometimes that garnered him a few weeks’ break. But either way, he needed a break from thinking about the Williamsons and their legacy of hockey, of all the ways he needed to improve, about everything he was doing wrong.

  He needed to forget hockey for the moment.

  Especially since there was a certain black-eyed beauty he was desperate to talk to.

  Eight

  Mia

  She was just reaching for the light switch, readying to flick it off and head up to her apartment to cook dinner for herself, when her cell phone rang.

  Her heart skipped a beat.

  Silly, it was probably just a telemarketer, but she couldn’t stop herself from hoping that it would be Liam.

  He’d texted her a couple of times yesterday, but he’d had practice today, and other than a quick good morning, she hadn’t heard from him. She shouldn’t have heard from him, not when they hardly knew each—

  “Isn’t that argument getting old?” she muttered to herself, tugging out her phone.

  It was.

  Because . . . as much as it didn’t make sense, Mia felt connected to Liam in a way she’d never felt tied to another person.

  So, steeling herself for the disappointment that was sure to come—because no one actually called her aside from telemarketers—she glanced at the screen.

  And then felt that little tendril of hope plant itself firmly in her heart.

  Liam’s name was on the screen.

  She swiped a finger across it to answer the call, brought it up to her ear. “He
llo?”

  “Hi, J.B.”

  Heat arrowing between her thighs, but she was made of sterner stuff. “When are you going to tell me what that means?”

  “How are you?” he asked, neatly avoiding the question. There was noise in the background, the sounds of a restaurant with multiple voices overlapping, the tinkle of silverware against plates.

  “I’m good,” she said. “Classes are done.”

  “I know.”

  She found herself leaning against the wall, loving the way his slightly rasping voice trailed over her skin. “You know?”

  “Your last class finished at eight-thirty,” he said.

  Yes, it had.

  “Then you had to clean up,” he went on.

  Yes, she had.

  “Sorry, I didn’t finish here in time to come see you like I’d planned.”

  Mia froze. There was a lot to decipher in that statement. “What?”

  “I’m at a charity thing. Brit roped me in because Blane had to flake. His daughter spiked a fever—” He broke off on a chuckle. “Not a hundred percent sure what that means,” he admitted, “but I know enough to understand that fevers aren’t good.”

  “Yes,” she agreed.

  “Anyway.” He sighed. “I’m here. You’re there.”

  “Terrible,” she said, going for a joke.

  A soft, husky laugh. “It is,” he said. “I was going to tempt you into another kiss.”

  Her breath caught, a curl of desire sliding through her stomach. She knew she would have let him kiss her. There was no tempting necessary. Still, circling back to strong, to steel. “You could try.”

  A pause then, voice deeper now, with a trace of heat, “What would tempt you?”

  Every single thing about this man.

  She bit her tongue, stifling admitting that, and instead said, “Cleaning.”

  Another pause, longer this time. “Cleaning?”

  “Yup,” Mia said. “Cleaning shows responsibility. Initiative. Follow-through. Those are all tempting characteristics.”

  “Hmm.” A heated rumble. “And did you . . . clean tonight?”

  She stopped, considered her answer. He’d somehow made that sound dirty, but her mind wasn’t working fast enough for her to come up with a witty response. Instead what came out was, “You know I did. The pads were dirty.”

  “Yes. They were dirty.” His voice dropped further, sliding right down her spine and into her panties. “And if I’d been there, would you have let me help?”

  How did the man make a conversation about cleaning sound sexy?

  Well, come on, Mia, her mind snapped, pulling her back into herself. You practically gave him that one with the whole ‘dirty’ thing.

  True.

  She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and made a face. “Well, since I’m not stupid enough to refuse help for the dreaded task of mat cleaning, yes, I would have allowed you to assist.” Ice had drifted into her words, but he didn’t seem to mind. In fact, she could almost feel him smiling through the speaker.

  “Hmm,” he said again, still hot, still sending prickles of heat through her, “and did I do a good job of assisting you the other night?”

  She sniffed. “It was adequate.”

  He laughed outright. “I missed talking to you today, J.B.”

  “I don’t think I like that nickname.”

  “I think I like you.”

  “Ugh.”

  More smiles through the airwaves. She didn’t know how she knew that, just felt it in her gut. “Why ugh?”

  “You’re being charming.”

  “Not sure that’s a bad thing,” he said, “especially when the more important question is . . . is the charming working?”

  She yawned, the lack of sleep from two nights before still catching up to her, and flicked off the light, heading into her office, then upstairs to her apartment. “Some would say I’m uncharmable.”

  “Guess I’d better up my game.”

  “I guess you’d better.” Mia locked the door at the top of the stairs then crossed through the short hall that led to the apartment’s back entrance. “Tell me about this fundraiser.” She let herself in, threw the dead bolt behind her, then headed to her bedroom, toeing off her shoes before shoving down her sweats.

  “Are you—?” For the first time he sounded shocked. His voice dropped to a hiss. “Are you undressing?”

  She went ramrod still. “What?”

  “I heard rustling.”

  “I—” Her pants were around her ankles, but she didn’t know what to do. She’d been on autopilot, going through her normal routine of exchanging her clothes for her pajamas. “Yes,” she said. Fuck it, she wasn’t going to hide what she was doing. Not from this man, not anymore.

  “How much begging do I need to do to get you to switch to FaceTime?”

  “Too much.”

  “Damn. If I can’t get a visual, then at least tell me where you’re changing. Your office, so I can get sexy office porn vibes? Or in front of those mirrors? They’re very 1990s gym class sexy.”

  Her mouth fell open, and she stood with her sweats draped over her feet, totally thrown for a loop. “Are you serious right now?”

  “No.” He laughed. “Though, let it be stated that I’m not opposed to seeing you naked.”

  She snorted and shook her head then stepped out of her pants. “You’re incorrigible.”

  “That’s my middle name,” he quipped.

  “I’m in my apartment.”

  “Oh,” he said. “I thought you were still in the studio.”

  “Don’t you have to get back to that fundraiser?”

  “No,” he told her. “I did my part. I’m just waiting for Brit to finish her conversation so we can go.” The noise behind his voice went a little quieter. “Now tell me, you live close by the studio? Since you’re already getting naked?”

  A huff. “I’m not naked!”

  “Let a man have his fantasies.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I’m standing by my incorrigible statement.” A sigh when he didn’t reply other than a soft chuckle. “Yes, you could say I live close,” she told him. “I live above the studio.”

  “Oh.”

  Mia waited for him to say more. “Just oh?”

  “You said I’m incorrigible.” She waited, and the troublesome man stayed right on course with his next reply. “So, I’m not going to tell you all the fantasies that just went through my mind.”

  Except, even that was enough to make her want. “Liam.”

  She heard the voices rise in the background. “Fuck, Brit’s coming,” he muttered. “And I didn’t even get to the point of me calling.”

  “Why did you call?”

  “I wanted to make sure you didn’t chicken out on Friday.”

  She huffed in outrage. “I don’t chicken out.”

  “The slide?” was his only response.

  She growled, yanked open her pajama drawer and stepped into the plain blue cotton bottoms. “I don’t chicken out on things that are legal.”

  A beat then, “Okay, that’s fair.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I also wanted—” The rest of his sentence was lost as the voices grew in volume again.

  “Also wanted what?” she asked, raising his voice. “Liam?”

  “Sorry,” he said, “I had to hide in the closet.”

  “Hiding in the closet? Why?”

  He cursed softly. “Because my teammates are nosy as fuck and want to know if I’m talking to the Mia.”

  The Mia?

  Her throat went tight. What the hell did that mean?

  “Come to the game tomorrow.”

  She was still reeling from the Mia. “I—”

  “The game doesn’t start until seven-thirty. Your classes end at six-thirty. I can send a car, get you a ticket in the lower bowl—"

  “Liam—”

  “Please, say you’ll come.”

  “Why?”

  “Why?” h
e asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “Why?”

  Quiet stretched between them.

  “Promise you won’t panic if I tell you?”

  “No,” she said, her heart threatening to pound its way out of her chest. What was he going to tell her? That he loved her and wanted her forever? It was way too soon for such sentiments, and also that was . . . terrifying—although probably not as terrifying as it reasonably should have been. More likely, he was going to tell her he needed to imagine her hard-ass head on the puck in order to hit it really hard. Centered by the last thought, she said, “I absolutely will not promise to not panic.”

  He laughed, and it coated her skin like honey. “Fuck,” he said, “but I like you, Mia.”

  “Why, Liam?” she pressed.

  A sigh then his voice dropped. “Because I want to look in the crowd and know someone is there for me. Just for me.”

  Her breath caught because . . . well, it wasn’t what she expected. But also, it was so much more than she’d anticipated hearing. “I like you, too,” she whispered.

  “I’m glad, J.B.” A beat. “So, will you come?”

  “I don’t need a car,” she said.

  “Okay.”

  “And I’ll buy my own ticket.”

  “The game’s sold out.”

  “Fine,” she said. “I’ll reimburse you for the cost.”

  “No.”

  “Liam,” she warned.

  A sigh. “Fine,” he said, giving in easier than she would have expected. He didn’t seem like the kind of man who’d let a woman pay for something he wanted. But then again, she hardly knew him, maybe she’d misread that particular facet of his personality.

  “Okay, I’ll come.”

  “Really?” he asked, and it was hard to ignore the way her heart swelled with something soft, something tender in the same spot that the tendril of hope had made itself at home earlier.

  “Really,” she said.

  “Thanks, sweetheart.”

  She didn’t know if she liked that endearment or J.B. better. Both make her breathing hitch, filled her with warmth. Both made that spot in her heart expand. “You’re welcome,” Mia said, matter of fact now, pushing the feelings aside to ponder later. “Now, how much is the ticket?”