I can only see his eyes and the brim of his hat. “Delivery for Violet Hall.”
“Oh. Wow. Thanks.”
I’m surprised flower shops deliver this early in the morning. The flowers are heavier than I expect, and I almost drop them when he passes me the bouquet. After the flower guy leaves, I set them on the table and check out the card while Charlene hovers behind me.
I’m glad your beaver made a full recovery.
~Alex
“Beaver?” Charlene asks.
“He’s referring to my girl parts.”
“He’s a bit of an odd duck, isn’t he?”
“He’s Canadian,” I reply as if this explains everything.
Charlene plans my wedding on our drive to work. I remain mostly silent as I’m reeling from the phone call last night and the flowers. The trek to my cubicle is telling—I get a lot of looks from the guys in the office. The kind that tell me they no longer regard me as the nerdy girl in accounting. Now I’m the nerdy girl who makes out with hockey players. Someone made a collage of the Internet pictures and taped it to my computer screen.
I rip it off and survey the office for the culprit. Fortunately, Charlene and I have a pre-team-meeting meeting with two of the other junior accountants this morning, so I can evade most of my colleagues until lunch. I gather my things and avoid eye contact on the way to the conference room.
As I flip open the laptop, Dean arrives. Only Jimmy is missing now. Logging onto the system, an alert shows several new emails. Four stand apart from the rest; they’re from Alex. I don’t remember telling him where I worked. I supposed if he searched my name, it wouldn’t be hard to find my email address on the company website.
“Oh my God,” Charlene squeals. “First the phone call, then the flowers, now he’s emailing you?”
“Who’s emailing you?” Dean asks.
I pull the laptop toward me, hiding the screen. “No one.”
“Alex Waters,” Charlene says.
I shoot her a glare. “You’re suspended as my best friend. I’m not talking to you for the rest of the day.”
“I heard there are pictures of you two getting it on,” Dean replies.
“We were just kissing.”
Charlene cuts in. “Didn’t you call it ‘mouth fucking’?”
“Ooooh, ‘mouth fucking.’ That sounds dirty.” Dean taps his fingers on his chin. “So we have his account now?”
“What? No!” I’m appalled Dean would think I could stoop to such low, unprofessional tactics to secure a client for the company.
“Why not? Waters is one of the top earners in the league. He cleared almost eight mil—”
I hold up my hand. Buck makes an obscene amount of money. I don’t want to know what Alex is worth, even if it is as easy as looking it up on the Internet. “Stop! I didn’t sleep with him to get his account!”
“You slept with him?” Dean’s jaw drops, his shock is understandable.
“Shut up!” I stalk across the room and shut the door. “Why don’t you announce it to the whole building since it’s not humiliating enough to have pictures of us kissing taped to my computer?”
“For real?” Dean leans forward. “You slept with Waters? Is the rumor true?”
“I’m not answering that.”
“So it’s true.”
“Enough. We have a presentation to prepare for. Unless we’re changing the topic to the size of Alex’s dick, we need to get going.”
“It would be way more interesting than this.” Dean gestures to the PowerPoint presentation on the screen.
Of course, Jimmy, the last member of our team, arrives, and we have to go through the entire thing again, including the mouth fucking explanation, which Jimmy loves as much as Dean. It’s going to be another long day.
I check my phone when I excuse myself to use the restroom. I have three voice mails and several texts. The first voice mail is from my mom. She found the flowers. Obviously she’s been in my place without asking again. The next one is a telemarketer advertising a free trip and the last one is from Alex. It goes something like this:
“Hi. This is Alex. I wanted to call and see if anything came for you this morning. I have a game tonight, but . . . um . . . maybe I’ll talk to you later.”
I listen to it five times and save it as I did with the first one.
I move on to the text message.
Okay, so two messages checking to see if I got the flowers. Odd.
I move on to the emails.
The first one is blank.
The second one reads:
The third one reads:
The fourth one reads:
The email is completely ridiculous. As much as his persistence irritates me, I’m beginning to like the awkward tone and his inappropriate comments. Especially coming from a man who seems so self-assured on the ice—and in bed. I curb the warm fuzzies. He’s still a player.
I hold off on responding until I’m home from work. I type and retype a message fifty times before I settle on this:
I debate adding a smiley emoticon and decide against it. After I press send I have regret. It’s not the friendliest text, but I’m torn. Beyond being great in bed and possessing the ability to read above a fifth-grade level, his media persona isn’t one I like. Especially with the plethora of photos I’ve seen of him with various women.
I don’t want to put out positive vibes because in reality, I kind of like him. If he hadn’t called or texted or sent flowers or emailed, I would write him off as another asshole because it’s exactly what I expected. Except he’s done all these things that contradict my assumptions. How did a one-night stand get so complicated?
I should finish Tom Jones since my book club meets tomorrow. The Hawks are playing tonight, though, so reading isn’t my first priority. Bringing my book with me, I snuggle into the corner of the couch. I’d watch it with the ’rents on their seventy-inch HD flat screen, but my mom keeps asking Alex-related questions I’m not interested in answering. Sometimes she forgets she’s my mother, and it gets weird.
By the end of the first period the Hawks are losing by one goal. No one scores in the second period and the players are getting chippy. Alex ends up with a two-minute penalty at the beginning of the third for interference. The camera zooms in on him. He’s tight-jawed and livid as he sulks in the time-out box. His knee is bouncing a mile a minute as if he’s barely managing to contain his frustration. I bet sex with him when he’s this riled up is amazing. I can imagine him being intense, dominating, and possessing.
When Alex returns to the ice, he finally pulls it together and scores a goal, tying the game. Aggressive and focused, he’s clearly determined not to let his team down because he lost his temper. The Hawks score another goal in the final minutes of the game and win by one. According to the sportscasters, it’s an important game that gives the Hawks the advantage moving forward, so the team’s excitement is understandable.
Alex is edgy during his interview with the sportscaster; maybe because the final score is too close. He rubs the side of his neck, his chagrin over his penalty obvious. I notice the dark pinkish-purple hickey, which matches several of mine. He angles away from the camera as if trying to hide it. I remember giving him one on his shoulder, but after what I’ve discovered in my research, I can’t be certain this one’s from me.
I climb into bed with the hickey on my mind. It’s all I can focus on as I toss and turn, trying desperately to get my brain to shut off and let me sleep already. As the cusp of dreamland makes my eyes droop, my phone buzzes, signaling a text. I sigh and grab the device from my nightstand, highly aware I don’t want it to be Charlene.
My stomach does a weird flip thing when it turns out to be from Alex, in response to my earlier text thanking him for the flowers.
I wait exactly four minutes to respond, so as not to appear too eager.
It buzzes less than a minute later.
I smile. He’s fishing for compliments.
I’m graced with
a winky emoticon and another message.
While my lower half gets all excited, I don’t fail to recognize he could easily pick up any puck bunny and celebrate his brains out. I must not reply fast enough because another message arrives.
I send one final text in response, my uncertainty as pervasive as my excitement. If he keeps this up, I’m going to start to like him more than I already do.
The week follows with daily deliveries from Alex. I receive a complete set of Tom Fielding’s works with a note suggesting that he read them to me so I’m not bored to tears. I laugh and send him a text in return. He calls again during my book club meeting; I let it go to voice mail rather than answer. The butterflies in my stomach unnerve me.
The next day he sends a USB stick with a compilation of albums for a band I’ve never heard of called The Tragically Hip—they’re Canadian, like Alex. It’s accompanied by another note in his messy scrawl, citing all his favorite songs. Next is a box of truffles from Godiva and then a gift certificate from Victoria’s Secret for an unknown amount. It’s made out to my boobs, which Alex officially asks on a date.
He sends an email the same night, apologizing for the content of the card and asking the rest of me out on a date, as well. He’s beginning to wear me down with the cuteness. It takes me a good hour to compose a response. I remain evasive by saying I’ll check my schedule.
The next day I receive a giant tin of coffee from a Canadian diner called Tim Horton’s. It’s named after a famous hockey player. Sidney tells me it’s like Starbucks, except cheaper, and if I won’t drink it, he sure as hell will.
The gifts aren’t the only thing I receive from Alex. Daily texts and emails follow, checking to make sure my packages have been delivered. They’re always thoughtful, often explaining the nature of the gift he’s sent. At the end of each email, he offers to take me out for dinner when he returns to Chicago. I don’t give a definitive answer.
The day before Buck is scheduled to come home, I open a box to find a stuffed beaver wearing a Blackhawks jersey with the number eleven and WATERS embroidered on it. It was accidentally delivered to the main house, so my mom stands beside me as I open my newest gift. She giggles like a teenager over how cute it is. She thinks he sent it because the beaver is Canada’s national animal. I don’t correct her.
I miss Alex’s call that night because I’m watching the game highlights at Charlene’s, and her basement apartment is like a cellular signal black hole. Solace comes with knowing Alex will be in Chicago tomorrow. My excitement is a problem.
I arrive home from work the following evening to find Buck on my couch, drinking my beer and eating my leftovers. I should’ve anticipated this; he does it almost every time he comes home from an away game. It’s his way of scamming a meal while he waits for a truckload of food to be delivered to his house since he doesn’t do his own shopping.
“Where’s your car?”
“A friend dropped me off.”
I drop my purse on the kitchen table and head straight for the fridge. If Buck is home, Alex is, too. His voice mail from the previous night is the last I heard from him. It’s disappointing to have Buck taking up space in my living room yet hear nothing from my sometimes-stalker.
“Wow. You sure don’t waste any time.” By friend, I’m assuming Buck means one of his puck bunnies. Buck doesn’t “date” in the traditional sense of the word. He does, however, have a rotation of women he sleeps with in Chicago. He calls them his “regulars.” One of these days he’s going to contract an STD and put his parts out of commission.
“What can I say? My ladies miss me when I’m away.” Buck sets up the Xbox with a lecherous smile.
“You’re disgusting.”
“I have needs.”
He regales me with the finer details of the last four games while we play NHL hockey. Buck plays himself, and I have my own awesome avatar which I created. His phone keeps dinging with endless messages while we play, so it’s easier to kick his ass.
“You’re popular tonight,” I say after the eight-millionth text comes through.
“Some of the guys are picking me up in twenty.”
“Didn’t you spend the last two weeks on the road with them? How aren’t you all sick of each other?”
Buck shrugs. “I’m new to the team. We need to talk strategy for the next game since we’re facing our biggest competitor in the league.”
“Oh. Right.” I try not to perk up, curious who might be coming to get him and if Alex is among his buddies now.
Ten minutes later, he gets a call from some girl named Honey. All the puck bunnies who call him are named Honey. Probably easier than remembering their real names. He pauses the game while he sets up round two of puck bunny lovin’ for later in the evening, inviting Honey to the bar. He even goes so far as to suggest she bring some friends. This is where my beliefs about the habits of hockey players originate from. Once he hangs up, Buck makes another call, this time to a teammate. He kindly informs whoever it is that he has bunnies lined up and primed for action. He really is a dog.
Buck pockets his phone. “The guys’ll be here in two—you cool if we rematch later?”
“You would’ve lost anyway.” I turn off the Xbox and flip through the channels, looking for some crappy reality television show to watch. Might as well turn my brain into sawdust seeing as I don’t have any other plans, because I’m sure as hell not waiting for Alex to call.
“Don’t forget to bathe in bleach later,” I say, just to get a dig in.
“Not all the chicks I hang out with are dirty.”
I drop the remote and slow clap. “Congratulations. You said it with a straight face.”
He flips me the bird on his way out the door.
After five minutes of reality television, I want to poke my eyes out. I surf through the music channels and stumble on a station dedicated to The Tragically Hip. I’ll have to tell Alex about this station since he seems to love the band. When he texts me. If he texts me.
Annoyed I’m being such a girl, I decide it’s time to change into jammies and prep for my meetings tomorrow. I give the Waters beaver a rub under the chin as I pass him on the way to my dresser. Of all the gifts I’ve received from Alex, the beaver is the most bizarre. It’s found a special home on my bed, between my pillows. I regret to admit I snuggled with it last night. The stupid thing is cuddly.
Once I’ve changed into boxers and a V-neck tee, I grab a stack of client portfolios and the box of Godiva and settle on the couch again. Two paragraphs into the report, I’m interrupted by a knock at the door. Buck probably forgot something, such as an industrial-sized bottle of hand sanitizer. He’ll need it after he sleeps with whatever puck bunny he’s called upon this evening. I shove my pen in my hair and push my ill-fitting spare glasses up my nose, ready to yell at him for making me get up.
I wrench open the door, scathing comment ready to fly. Except it’s not Buck.
It’s Alex. He looks like shit. Hot shit, but shit nonetheless.
VIOLET
Alex has a nasty gash over his right eye with one of those tiny fly bandages holding the skin together. He looks like he hasn’t shaved since the last time I saw him. My mind immediately wanders to how his scruff would feel between my thighs. Combined with the slight slump of his shoulders, he looks cashed. I want to hug him and kiss his eyebrow better. I manage to control myself.
“Um, hi. What happened to your face?”
“Hey.” He touches the wound, looking uncomfortable. “It’s nothing. A little on-ice argument.”
“You didn’t get into a fight during the last game.”
A tiny grin appears. “So you watched it?”
Dammit. Now he’ll think I’m watching for him. I nod and shrug. “Yeah. I watch most of the games. That looks pretty bad.”
“It looks worse than it is.” His eyes dart below my neck.
I cross my arms over my chest. It’s cold, and I’m not wearing a bra. “Buck left a few minutes ago.”
“I saw Kirk pick him up. We’re supposed to discuss strategy tonight. I thought now would be a good time to return your glasses. I called last night after the game—did you get my message?”
I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say. Yeah, you sexy stalker freak, I must be some sort of rock star in bed and it turns me on that you seem a wee bit obsessed doesn’t seem appropriate. I go with the truth instead.
“I was out with a friend. I didn’t get the message until I got home, and it was late.”
His brows knit together. “A friend?”
“My bestie, Charlene. We watched the game at her place.”
“Oh. That’s good.” He ducks his head and peeks up. “Can I come in?”
It’s hard to believe he’s such a player with how sweet he’s being. “Yeah, unless you’re planning on binding and gagging me so you can take me to your lair. If that’s what you had in mind, I’d prefer you stay outside while I call the police and possibly a mental health facility.” And there goes my mouth, spewing crap again.
“Uh . . .” Alex stares for a few long seconds.
His eyes drop to my chest again even though I’m covering the girls. “Not very reassuring, Alex.”
“What?” He shakes his head, his eyes lift, then drop again. “Oh, oh right, no. I’m not planning on gagging you and taking you to my lair. I don’t even have a lair.”
“Good to know.” I half smile and motion him inside. “Come in before I get frostbite on my nipples.”
He looks momentarily ashamed. I can’t fault him since I’m braless again. At this rate, he’s going to think I never wear one. A gust of frosty air follows him inside, making me shiver. He might look as if he’s been sleeping in his car for the past few days, but he smells fantastic.
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