Head Coach EPB
Page 15
She jumped into his arms and he spun her around. The smell of roses washed over her and she knew that forever after, that scent would bring her back here, to this second. The velvet softness of his tongue. The feel of his arm clamping her lower back and hauling her to meet his hungry mouth. She wasn’t all bushy eyebrows and a strong jaw. She wasn’t a tough-as-nails reporter. She wasn’t even the new kick-ass head of PR for an NHL team. She was just a girl, kissing the man she loved, a man who had just declared his love for her to the world.
“I love you,” she said, pulling back.
“I already knew that.” His brows rose. “I could tell.”
She shook her head. “You really are insufferable, you know that?”
“And you love it.” His gaze was hot on her face.
She hugged him close, pausing before the next kiss. “God help me, I do.”
Epilogue
Four months later . . . Valentine’s Day
The audience cheered before the curtains opened. Neve gripped the handle of her red-feathered fan. Her palms were so sweaty it was amazing it didn’t clatter onto the floor. She nodded at the backstage tech and the music started. Michael Bublé. The curtains opened and there she was. In the spotlight. Wearing nothing but a top hat, garter belt, fishnet thigh highs, high-waist panties and a corset. Her stilettos might as well be stilts.
This was recital night for The Twirling Tassels. The culmination of the weekly lessons. Each student performed a five-minute routine.
Four months ago, she’d been stuck in traffic. Stuck in a rut. Stuck in life, period. She’d been afraid of what it meant to blossom. To let loose. Be pretty and practical. She could be feminine and strong. Sexy and powerful. One word didn’t negate the other. With the lockout over and games resuming this weekend, she’d now often be making that same commute beside her boyfriend—no, wait. . . . Her gaze fell on the square blue sapphire ring winking from her finger. Fiancé. He’d proposed in bed before the show.
Their bed.
She’d moved in last weekend and never intended to leave.
I wish I could give you everything, he had whispered as he slid the platinum band onto her finger as they lay stomach to stomach. But for now, I hope this is enough.
She lowered her fan and peered out into the sea of expectant faces. It didn’t take her long to find him. His bold features stood out in the crowd. He lifted his fingers to his mouth and let out a hog whistle, pride and liquid-hot possession showing from his eyes.
That’s my girl, his gaze said.
She sashayed forward. She was doing this. Owning the moment. Embracing her power to be whoever the heck she wanted to be.
After blowing Tor Gunnar a kiss, she shook her shoulders in a shimmy, threw back her head and began to dance.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to the wonderfully perceptive Elle Keck who whips every book into its best version of itself, and to Emily Sylvan Kim, who isn’t just an agent, but also the wind beneath my wings. Shout outs to my writing sisterhood: Jennifer Ryan (thank you for the blurb too!), Jules Barnard, A.J Pine, Chanel Cleeton (extra penguin props), Jennifer Blackwood, Megan Erickson and Natalie Blitt—you guys may all live far (too far) away, but every day it feels as if you are RIGHT THERE IN MY LIVING ROOM. To my family: Nick and the PB and J, much like Bryan Adams, I do everything for you—so much love.
An Announcement for Virgin Territory
Want more of Lia Riley’s Hellions? Don’t miss Patrick “Patch” Donnelly finding his match in
VIRGIN TERRITORY
On Sale March 2018
Click here to pre-order!
An Announcement for Mister Hockey
And keep reading for a look at how Breezy and Jed fell in love in
MISTER HOCKEY
Her biggest fantasy is about to become a reality . . .
Jed West is Mr. Hockey. The captain of the NHL’s latest winning team, the Denver Hellions—and the hottest player on the ice—at least according to every magazine . . . and Breezy Angel. Breezy has been drooling over Jed at games for years, and he plays a starring role in her most toe-curling fantasies. But dirty dreams don’t come true, right?
Then Jed saunters through the doors of her library, a last minute special guest for a summer reading event, and not only is he drop dead gorgeous up close, his personality is straight up swoon-worthy. He even comes to the rescue when she has an R-rated “Super Book Worm” costume malfunction. But when he mistakenly assumes she’s more into books than pucks, she’s too flustered to correct his mistake. And then comes a big kiss, followed by a teensy-tiny problem. Jed’s dating policy is simple: Never date a fan.
So what’s a fangirl going to have to do to convince her ultimate crush that he’s become less of a perfect fantasy, and more like the perfect man . . . for her?
An Excerpt from Mister Hockey
“Let’s try it again. From the top.” Breezy Angel sucked in, straining for the costume zipper, putting herself at risk of serious rib crackage. Who was she kidding; these loosey-goosey abs hadn’t seen a decent crunch in years. They could barely flex, let alone possess the strength to break bone. Sweat prickled the nape of her neck while stars skimmed the edge of her vision. “Oof. Come on, come on,” she huffed, grimacing.
She reached and almost . . . almost . . . almost . . . her fingers grazed the zipper.
Success.
She gripped the millimeter of metal and tugged. Stubborn little sucker refused to budge. Frowning, she tried again.
Same result.
At fifteen years old, the library’s Super Reader costume had seen better days. But last summer it fit fine.
“Ugh.” The bathroom scale had been an asshole since the Rory breakup. During last week’s move to her new—and first—home of her very own, she’d exiled the spiteful hunk of metal to the garage as punishment, but it hadn’t lied. Fifteen extra pounds padded her hips and butt, a result of an ongoing ménage a trois with Ben and Jerry.
Zzzzzzzerp! The zipper gave way.
“Sweet Sugar Babies!” Her voice echoed off the women’s room tile as she clutched her pancaked breasts. Her nipples inverted and her naval squashed her spine, but hey, she’d stuffed herself inside—victorious, more or less.
Now to survive the next hour without laughing, sitting or breathing.
Not that she’d ever been a slender, willowy sort of gal. Her body tended to softness and a good cheese plate was better than size six jeans. She owned her juicy ass and had an allergy to any talk about how a “real” woman had a) curves b) no curves or c) hard-won muscles.
Nope. Sorry. All a so-called real woman needed to own the title was a heartbeat.
Boom. Done. End of story.
But even still, she wanted to feel good in her skin . . . and right now, she didn’t. She hadn’t in too long.
Picking up the Jed West coffee mug from the edge of the sink—a recent twenty-ninth birthday gift from her big sister—she drained the bitter dark roast before glancing at his photo printed on the side.
Sigh.
Westy was the carrots to her peas. The cheese to her macaroni. The gin to her tonic. The . . . the . . . corned beef to her cabbage.
Those irises were a tug of war between June grass green and hickory bark brown. How many hours had she spent trying to bestow his perfect hazel eye color with the right poetic descriptors?
Spoiler: a lot.
No regrets, because that face was a gift to humanity; as if no matter what the nightly news indicated, the world couldn’t be going to hell in a handbasket if it had conspired to produce such a perfect male jaw. And those freckles. Yeah. Wow. Those freckles just weren’t fair.
She checked her reflection with a half-hearted shrug, nothing much to cheer or sneer there. On a positive note, yay for a good hair day. The half beehive paired well with a low side ponytail. Straight sixties glam. She leaned closer, wiping a lipstick smudge from her lower lip. Her usual cat-eye makeup was on point too. The black liquid liner gave her wings, even as t
he low hum from the crowd in the community room threatened to send her heart into an Icarus death spiral.
Everyone twiddling their thumbs in the folding chairs was expecting to meet the Hellion’s popular coach, Tor Gunnar, fresh from his second straight NHL championship victory, who was sidelined due to bad weather. Ugh. Bad news on a good day, a disaster when the Library Board of Trustees kept making ominous rumblings about pending cuts.
Municipal appropriations had plunged and to add insult to injury the library system had lost several hundred thousand dollars in federal funding. It wasn’t a question of if there would be branch closures or department belt-tightening, but when. Her department better shine if it hoped to survive the dark days ahead.
Breezy nibbled the inside of her cheek, wincing as one bite too hard flooded her mouth with a faintly metallic taste. No way would she get flushed down the professional tubes without a fight. Her department transformed the children’s zone for each holiday, made it a place where young patrons could come after school and get homework help from senior volunteers, reluctant readers were paired with the perfect book, or took part in a Lego or chess club, participated in drop-in Robotics or Minecraft, and where local parents could form connections with one another at toddler story hours or in a parenting class.
Anyone who wanted to dismiss librarians as boring bookworms had never heard Breezy rap out “I Like Big Books and I Cannot Lie” after one Jack and Diet Coke too many—bonus points for her twerking skills.
And if she ever daydreamed about opening an independent children’s bookshop, well it was nothing but another of her fantasies, like the one where she met Jed West and he fell madly in love.
Here! The phone buzzed with her sister’s text. Speaking of someone who lived their dreams, Neve had the perfect job for a card-carrying member of the Hellions Angels, the nickname of their family’s hockey fan club. From October to April (and the playoffs, God willing), Angel women spent Hellion game nights crammed into Aunt Lo’s creaky Victorian in Five Points behaving like unashamed dorks: Mom, Granny Dee, Aunt Joanie, Aunt Shell and her best friend, Margot, who was basically an honorary member of the family.
Those were the evenings when her stepdad and the uncles retreated to the man cave above the garage to shoot pool, play foosball and pout over their loss of the living room’s sixty-inch flat-screen. The men were Bronco diehards to a one, obsessed with fantasy football leagues.
But the Angel women?
They were all about the puck, a tradition started with Granny Dee and proudly passed through three generations.
Some folks were obsessed with Marvel Comics or Doctor Who or Harry Potter. She self-identified as Ravenclaw, but the rest of her family didn’t know the word cosplay or that Comic-Con existed. And yet they donned red devil horns, smeared their faces with crimson-and-white paint and brandished plastic pitchforks without a shred of embarrassment.
“Good, you’re here!” Neve burst in wearing black dress pants and a gray collared shirt. Breezy loved vibrant patterns, the bolder and funkier the better while her big sister had an allergic reaction to wearing anything that wasn’t a neutral color or cotton. “Your assistant thought you’d still be changing.”
“Thanks for bailing me out on no notice.” Breezy rinsed the Westy mug and tossed it in her “Reading is Sexy” tote bag before reaching for the door. “We’re running late so here’s how it’s going to go up there. I’ll introduce you and . . .”
“Breezy—wait!”
The nerves connecting her feet to her brain snapped midstep into the hall. She froze, her gaze raking a pair of vintage Adidas sneakers, and climbed up gray sweatpants hanging off a trim, narrow waist. Shadows played on the cotton, highlighting the merest suggestion of a bulge. Then up to a broad chest and even broader shoulders. The distinctive chin. The scruffy jaw. Those eyes that were . . . that were . . . what were colors?
What was life?
Every muscle in her body flexed tight, her heart unable to squeeze anything approaching a full beat.
Holy guacamole with a side of chips.
Jed.
West.
Captain of the Hellions.
Jed West.
Her ultimate celebrity crush—Jed freaking West was in her library. Leaning against a cinder block wall four feet away.
Her heart paid a visit to her throat. Small hairs prickled at the nape of her neck.
No way. No freaking way. But yes. Oh yes. Oh God yes.
His black raincoat offset the rich, espresso-brown gloss to his thick hair. Tiny rain beads clung to each perfect strand, bright as carat diamonds. The Fates swooned. Nope, wait. That particularly breathless mewl came from her own parted lips.
“Told you I was bringing a surprise.” Neve spoke in a slow, even cadence while her piercing gray eyes silently ordered, Get a grip, dude. Do not lose your shit.
“Nice cape. Do I get one?” Jed’s famously lazy smile twisted an invisible screw at the apex of Breezy’s thighs, a sharp twinge that settled into an acute ache. Of course he didn’t know about the starring role he played in her biweekly Hitachi wand sessions. Or the imaginary dirty talk he groaned in her ear while she writhed in the dark.
I taste you on my lips, sweetheart. Tell me who owns you.
He couldn’t have the first clue about her dirty overactive imagination, but Jesus H. Christopher Christ riding a unicycle, she knew. Whenever she fantasized about a guy putting ranch dressing in her Hidden Valley, he was the one wielding the big, big bottle.
Her cheeks turned a subtle shade of rose-blooming-in-hell as she forced a gasping chuckle. “Uh, hang tight. I forgot . . . a . . . thing.”
Beating a quick retreat into the bathroom, she did what any non-freaking-out, red-blooded gal would do when encased in ancient threadbare red Lycra and confronted by their ultimate dream man.
She let the door smack his beautiful face.
Click here to buy!
Also by Lia Riley
Hellions Angels series
Mister Hockey
Coming Soon
Virgin Territory
Brightwater series
Last First Kiss
Right Wrong Guy
Best Worst Mistake
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpt from Mister Hockey copyright © 2017 by Lia Riley.
head coach. Copyright © 2017 by Lia Riley. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers. For information, address HarperCollins Publishers, 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007.
Digital Edition NOVEMBER 2017 ISBN: 978–0–06-266248-4
Print Edition ISBN: 978–0–06-266249-1
Cover design by Nadine Badalaty
Cover photograph © PeopleImages / Getty Images
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