“It’s okay,” she says. “Neither of us did, I’m sure. I just came here to meet you, and I got to do that…in a way I definitely wasn’t expecting.”
“Well you’re definitely the first to ever meet me that way…the first and last. I meant what I said about you being mine,” I say.
She’s stands there frozen, not sure what to say or do.
“But we’ll talk about that next time,” I say double re-assuring her right now that there damn sure will be a next time. I don’t want her to think for a second I’m taking this lightly or playing around. Professional athletes have reputations, but not me…and for a reason.
I never knew exactly why before. I told myself because it had worked in the past. I told myself that most of the girls I met didn’t really deserve me. I told myself a lot of things, but now I know the real reason why.
Because I was waiting all this time for her.
I open the door sticking my head out and staring at the line of guys waiting to get in. And then I stare some more. I’m giving them a death stare to let them know that I’m not fucking playing around.
And then I take my woman’s hand and escort her from the room like a gentleman as we move down the corridor together.
And nobody says a fucking word to us, because they knew if they did they’d be insulting my woman and that’s even worse than insulting me.
And the world knows I can defend pucks all day and all night long, but no one would be able to defend the hell storm I would rain on them if they disrespected my woman.
CHAPTER 5
Hazel
“Hey, did you hear there was an autograph signing at The Garden tonight?” My way too tall and way too beautiful roommate Adriana says the second I walk into our tiny two bedroom apartment way out on Staten Island that was the cheapest thing I could find when I got to the city.
But I blow right past her and towards my room. “I was going to call you and let you know, but I figured it was already too…” she continues.
I close my door and face plant onto the bed.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
“Hazel? Are you okay?”
“Uh huh,” I say after a solid five seconds of contemplating that question myself.
“Are you sure?”
“Uh huh,” I repeat.
“Okay, I’m making mac and cheese if you want some.”
“Uh huh.”
“Uh huh you want some or uh huh you heard me?”
“Uh huh.”
And then I hear her exhale hard through her lips and the sound of her feet as she walks the seven or eight feet from my door to the kitchen. We basically each have an eight by eight room to ourselves and one eight by sixteen room that serves as the kitchen, living room and do everything room.
Yeah, two hundred and fifty-six square feet split between two twenty-two year old young women.
So it’s not like I’m going to be able to hide anything from her…for long.
And strangely enough I do feel like hiding it from her, and from everyone.
Partly because I’m in shock still.
Partly because I know that’s the easiest way to cause whatever it is that we “have” to crash and burn real quick. I know how celebrities never reveal their relationships until some time has passed to make sure it’s real and so it doesn’t upset their fan base...and does Henrik ever have a huge fan base of women whose hearts would be broken. So if I go blabbing my mouth it could be over before it ever really gets going. I don’t want to jinx it by talking about it.
And partly because it makes it feel more real…and like some sort of secret.
But he didn’t seem like he wanted it to be a secret at all. He was talking about rings and claiming me and all kinds of possessive stuff.
Is it April first? No, so this isn’t some April Fool’s joke.
Is it my birthday? No, so this isn’t some elaborate scheme by my friends, not that I really have any since I just moved here to New York after finishing my physiotherapy degree at Louisiana State University. Plus nobody I know has the kind of money I’m guessing it would take to pull off a joke like this.
There’s no way to explain it other than…real.
I mean it sure felt real to me and it’s everything I’ve ever wanted, I just never in a million years thought it was actually a possibility. I mean what superstar celebrity do you ever hear of dating one of their fans?
It just doesn’t happen.
So history is not on my side, but maybe my age is seeing that I’m twenty-two going on forty. I just don’t really get along as well with people my age as I do with older people. Can someone like Henrik sense that?
Plus he’s European and from what I hear age doesn’t matter much over there when it comes to dating and relationships. People seem more interested in what they’re doing versus here in the States. We sure have a celebrity culture here, but that’s more out in Los Angeles to the best of my knowledge. People in New York are just too busy and sarcastic to really care about what someone they don’t know is doing.
But not people from the small town where I’m from.
Too often small towns equals boredom and boredom equals paying attention to celebrity news, or more realistically just paparazzi pics of what people are doing on a day to day basis.
And I’m not into that stuff…except if I’m being honest about myself then I am when it comes to Henrik.
I follow his Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and have my alerts set for his name and any Gotham Guardians news.
So yeah, I definitely qualify as a fan girl.
And every fan girl’s ultimate dream is to meet and have something real with the guy they’re a fan of.
And everything inside me is telling me that’s exactly what happened.
And if it did, and continues to, then I won’t be a fan girl anymore. I’ll be something a whole lot more important to him.
Wouldn’t that be incredible?
And how amazing would it be if he was not only my man but the guy I got to apply my physio techniques on? I could probably learn a ton from the team trainers and pick up the rest from him based on how his body responds.
And was his body ever responding today. And did it ever make my body respond in kind.
That erection I felt against my backside when he spun me around and looked at the back of my jersey, or should I say his jersey.
The way his lips came crashing down on mine.
And then the passion in the way he kissed my neck.
And how could I forget the way he felt my breast, making my already pebbled nipple perk out even more.
Good lord! Just thinking about it has me wet again already.
I swear I thought I was going to finish before he even got his cock inside me.
How absurd does that sound? Henrik Magnusson saw me, immediately decided I was to be his, and then took me to the training room to make me just that.
This sounds more like a story I’d pay to download to my Kindle before bed than something that could ever really happen in real life.
And speaking of bed there’s no way I’m falling asleep anytime soon.
After he walked me out of the building he took my number and told me to “expect a call later.”
And by the intensity of his words and the seriousness of everything I’ve seen about him so far, including the way he carries himself, speaks, and takes exactly what he wants…and what I want too, I’d say “later” to mean tonight.
I have to get ready.
“Mac and cheese is getting cold,” I hear through my paper-thin door.
Food is the last thing on my mind right now, especially when all I can think about is how close he was to devouring me.
Not to mention my stomach is completely full of butterflies.
Then again some carbs might be good. He’s a professional athlete and I’m guessing the next time we’re together he’s going to put me through a workout like none I’ve ever experienced.
CHAPTER 6
He
nrik
“Is that all ya got?” I yell as I beat on my chest and stare Ryan down.
“Whistle blew, Henrik. Practice is already over. Pack it up.”
“Whistle? What whistle?” I say as the other guys skate off the ice.
I didn’t hear a thing for the last hour. Nothing that is except the sound of pucks slamming into my stick, pads, and glove.
Nothing got by me. Absolutely nothing.
Just like her. There was no way I was going to let her slip through my grasp today, or ever for that matter.
She’s mine.
“You okay, man?” Joffrey asks as he skates off the ice and I just stand in the goal looking like I’m lost. I feel like there’s still so much blood rushing to my head and my muscles still. There’s no way I can be stopped right now. I could goal tend all night, but then I remember I’ve got something else much more important to do than to stand out here on a man-made sheet of ice.
Her.
I promised I’d call her later and it’s already a good two hours later already.
That’s how long it took to get dressed and go through practice. Heck, I didn’t even go back to the autograph signing after her. How could I? And who else would I ever want to meet.
We’ve got great fans and all, but I already met my number one…and not just fan.
My partner for life.
I’ve heard stories of guys trying to date girls from Instagram or from fan events and sometimes they turn out to be the equivalent of ax-wielding psychos. It’s super rare but no one’s ever gotten hurt. More often than not the girl just takes some pictures that the guy doesn’t know about and then posts them to social media.
Not a good look at all in so many ways.
But she’s not some fan, and I know she’s not a psycho.
She looks young, sure. But she carries herself in a much more mature way. If I told someone that they’d think I’m crazy. I could tell how she carries herself just by the way she was standing in the corner?
Yes.
It’s my job to read people and I get paid based on that.
Will this guy go right or left? Will he try and shoot high or low? Will he dump the puck off to a teammate at the last second? Are they trying to draw me out of the goal so they can slide the puck in behind me?
All of this and more. And I have to read this off of body language alone, and not really even body language. I have to study small movements from guys wearing masks on skates skating around at a multitude of speeds. Not to mention there are six of them. And five guys besides me on our team who are on the ice during a game, assuming no penalties of course.
So you give me the most beautiful girl in the world in a corner where I can read her body language, her facial expression, and a whole list of other human characteristics and there’s absolutely no way I’m wrong.
She’s shy. I could tell. And she’s a lady. I know that too.
And what we almost did wasn’t exactly ladylike, and certainly not gentlemanly on my part, but I know it’s something I’ve never done before nor her.
All the rules go out the window when your body and your emotions override your brain and your whole insides are just moving you into position to mate.
At least that’s what those shows on Animal Planet say. And no matter how much people try and put on a fancy show and have elaborate mating rituals at the end of the day we are animals. And when that perfect female specimen appears in our life our instincts take over and we do what we’ve done throughout history...ensure our genes survive by mating with that one and only woman we can’t resist even if we wanted to.
And damn if I would have had another minute I would have had her jeans off and been inside her, feeling her warmth wrap around me as I filled her with my juices so deep they would have been dripping out of her until a week from Tuesday.
“Never better,” I reply to Joffrey before I realize he’s already skated off.
And I quickly high tail it to the sidelines as well.
I’ve never practiced better than today, let alone played better in all my years as a professional, but practice is over.
And now it’s time to go do something that requires no practice at all.
Follow my calling and make her mine.
CHAPTER 7
Hazel
“Hey, there’s a guy here to see you,” Adriana says through the bathroom door startling me that I literally bump my forehead on the bathroom mirror as I apply my makeup.
She’s here trying to become the next big fashion model to make it from Brazil, but so far her financial situation is about as dire as mine.
But her dating life is quite the opposite.
Her phonebook is filled with the names of guys who are tripping over themselves to take her to the fanciest restaurants in town. She’s a great girl, but sometimes after days on end of mac and cheese, hot pockets, and cans of tuna she gives in and goes for a night on the town.
Without spending a dime of course.
I’m truly happy for her, but if I’m being completely honest with myself maybe I am a tad bit jealous.
Guys see me more as “one of the guys.” They think I’m like them because I like hockey so much, but somewhat ironically being one of the guys doesn’t get you invited to any hockey games while being a foreign face with a perfect figure and enchanting eyes gets you any seat in the house.
And I already know she has tickets for tomorrow’s home opener even though she’s been kind enough not to mention it to me. We share this chicken coop and last week I mistook her planner for mine, quickly realizing the mistake when the first page I looked at had “Hockey match at The Garden w/ Justin” on the page for tomorrow.
Yeah…definitely not my plans for tomorrow…at least at the time.
Now I have all kinds of ideas going through my head, including the box seats Henrik mentioned, and one of the nicest things about it all is that it will give Adriana and I a chance to do something fancy together…but just as quickly as I get the idea I shelve it.
Because while I may be slightly jealous of how easily she navigates the VIP lifestyle on a ninety-nine cent store budget, I would be extremely jealous to have her, or any woman, around Henrik.
Plus we just met and it doesn’t make sense.
And of course most importantly I want him all for myself.
The bathroom door opens slightly. “He’s hot,” she says and gives me a wink.
“He’s mine,” I say.
“Okay. Okay. Rarw,” she says imitating a cat sound.
But I don’t apologize. I want it known immediately who he’s here to see and who he’s not here to see.
I quickly pat down my forehead removing the smudge the mirror put on it and remind myself it’s time to clean said mirror sooner rather than later.
And later is what I think about the moment I see Henrik sitting on our beat up old couch, as in “I want a piece of that later.”
Or more accurately freakin’ all of it!
Good lord he looks amazing.
I’ve seen paparazzi pics of him and other photographs of him at charity events and such, but there’s nothing like seeing the man you want more than any other sitting in your tiny living room…because he’s here to see you.
“You look incredible,” he says as he stands.
“You look very handsome,” I say.
“Comparing my looks to yours is a battle I will lose every single time. I’ve got guys slapping pucks at my face all day and you’ve got…well…perfection,” he says holding both arms out as if to say, “look at all this beauty.”
I feel the heat in my cheeks.
“Thank you. That’s the nicest thing someone’s said about my appearance in a long time.”
“Well I hope you don’t blush easily because I plan on complimenting your exquisite beauty a lot.”
Did he just refer to me with the words exquisite beauty? Maybe my mom was right…I do clean up all right when I actually try.
But my heart was never into it
. I never saw the need when I spent most of my days in hospitals trying to help people recover from what ails them. Plus I needed the money and the half hour to full hour that I would have spent each morning applying makeup to me meant one more hour I could be working and helping. It may have been only minimum wage back in my hometown, and I wasn’t certified to do anything too spectacular, but the feeling I got from watching people come in broken and leaving healed was worth more than any amount of money in the world.
Hockey Obsession: An Older Man Younger Woman Romance (A Man Who Knows What He Wants Book 76) Page 3