From Chapter One...

©Mira Lyn Kelly

Quinn

Last Season

That’s it. No more bunnies.

One time I end up handcuffed to a bed with a missing key and, months later, I still haven’t lived it down.

Trashing the latest gif—this one courtesy of the GM’s wife—I glare at the hospital vending machine and the precariously balanced paper cup filled with coffee. This is gonna hurt.

Bending to retrieve the cup is bad enough but coming back up has me breaking out in a cold sweat. Everything aches. My knuckles are swollen and split. My shoulder feels like someone tried to yank my arm out of the socket. And my knees—damn, guys, sorry.

What a shit show.

We knew going in this game would be rough. Even without a team grudge like the one we were up against tonight with the Epics, hockey is a physical sport. You don’t get on the ice without understanding there are risks inherent to the game. But Christ, it isn’t Thunderdome.

Now we’ve got two of our best players in the hospital, and the fuck-face who started it from the other team getting stitched up across town. It’s the kind of night that makes me envy the players who have someone to go home to. Someone real. Someone they trust to listen to how messed up things got.

Yeah, having a someone would be nice right about now.

But still… no bunnies.

I heave a breath and round the corner to the semi-private waiting room where Greg Baxter, my team captain, texted that his little sister is currently freaking out. What he didn’t mention is she’s not alone.

Holy shit.

Coffee hot enough to melt the skin off my fingers sloshes over the rolled paper lip as I forget how to walk, every cell in my body tuning in to the redhead with a gentle hand on Nat’s arm.

Her hair is this short spill of fiery waves around her face. And that face. I swear my heart just threw in an extra beat. My feet are moving double time. It’s like I can’t see the rest of her fast enough.

She’s not as tall as Nat, but I’d bet my left nut she’s an athlete. There’s something about the stance, confident and alert. She’s got a Foo Fighters T-shirt on that fits just right, and her cargo pants hint at strong legs and a phenomenal ass beneath.

Her arms and face are covered in pale freckles, and her lips are full and wide. I can’t see her eyes yet, but with every step closer I know I’m about to. I want to. I need to.

Time fucking slows and I feel each heavy pump of my heart. A smile I can’t quite explain starts pulling at my lips.

And then I have it—eye contact.

Those honey-browns meet mine, and something that feels a lot like recognition slams into me with the force of a two-hundred-pound defenseman. Only I’ve never seen this girl before. The way her eyes flare tells me that hinky sense of something isn’t one-sided.

Her lips part, and I wait for the smile that answers my own.

This is the moment we’ll tell our grandkids about. One look and I knew—

Whoa.

That’s not a smile. In fact, that lush little playground has firmed into a flat line as unwelcoming as anything I’ve seen before. And those heart-and-soul eyes are suddenly hard as stone, narrowing fast.

Natalie notices me then and I nod, handing over the coffee as I get my shit together and try not to gawk at the girl whose pissy stare is practically daring me to engage.

Hospital, dipshit.

I’m here for Nat.

Only this girl is so intense, I can’t be chill. I offer my hand. “Hi, I’m Quinn O’Brian. Don’t think we’ve met before.”

She doesn’t take it, instead raising a brow as she asks, “Sure you’d remember if we had?” Her voice is husky and low, stroking softly against the back of my brain, like she’s somehow managed to scratch at the fringe edge of some hard-to-reach itch. But then her words register, and I get it.

Shit. She already knows who I am. And not just the hockey stuff.

“Reputation’s that bad, huh?” I ask, rubbing my neck with a sheepish grin.

I know it is. I’ve seen the posts. The polls. The bunnies running at the mouth about every Chicago Slayers player they’ve scored and the frequency with which my name comes up. It’s never bothered me before.

Now?

I want to tell her whatever she’s heard isn’t true. That it’s exaggerated… but I’d be lying. And before I can come up with a joke or even think to ask her name, she tells Nat she’s got a call to make so her family doesn’t worry.

She’s that kind of girl.

It makes me smile because I like it, even if knowing she’s that kind of girl means she’s even further out of my league than she was ten seconds ago.

I watch her take off and then turn back to Natalie who’s the reason I’m standing here. I won’t ask her about her friend tonight. Hell, with the way that girl looked at me, all pissy indignation, I shouldn’t ask about her at all.

But damn, I know I will.

***

George

Unfreakingbelievable.

Ducking around a corner, I press my back to the wall and suck one shaky breath after another until the spots behind my eyes finally clear, along with any wayward thoughts about a third Slayers hockey player needing a bed in the ER.

I can’t believe it. After all these years.

Quinn O’Brian.

Two feet in front of me. Giving me that same smile. The one that put my belly into free fall the first time I saw it. Left me breathless. And then less than a day later, left me humiliated. Devastated. Working up fantasies about the wrath I’d rain down on him if I ever saw him again.

So much for that badassery. My knees barely held me when I looked up to find those stupid sea-green eyes twinkling back at me like some Disney hero come to life.

Stupid eyes.

Stupid shoulders and muscles-everywhere body.

Stupid sandy blond hair standing up like some foolish girl had just had her hands in it for the last hour.

And that introduction.

Blowing out a breath, I shake my head.

He didn’t even recognize me. Though why I ever thought he might is beyond me. Six years later and I’m still reading more into that night than there ever was. More into those soul-deep stares and slow touches. More into those tender words that turned out to be total lies....