Fake Shot (Boston Rebels Book 2)

I wake up exhausted, having tossed and turned half the night. I’ve never had to think twice about sleeping with someone so obviously willing, and having to exercise this kind of restraint is killing me. But she’s Jameson’s sister. She’s off limits, and always has been. And I promised him I wouldn’t touch her—something that’s proving way harder than I expected.

As soon as I got upstairs last night and started undressing, I realized that I’d left my phone in my car. So I headed downstairs to get it, being as quiet as possible in case Jules was already in bed trying to fall asleep. On my way back in, I checked my messages to find another text from Gabriel, this time confirming the B&B reservation and telling me how much Mom and Dad are looking forward to meeting Jules.

With Game 7 on Friday night in Boston, there’s really no excuse for why we can’t drive up there on Saturday in time for the party, spend the night, and come back on Sunday. Especially since, if we win the series, the next one will start in Boston, so I don’t even have travel plans as an excuse.

Plus, if I’m being honest with myself, I’m actually looking forward to a road trip with Jules. If I have to go back to my hometown and see my brother and sister-in-law for the first time in fifteen years, there is no one else I’d want by my side. Mostly because I’ll be so focused on her that it’ll be easy to ignore them, but also because she’s fiercely protective, and I feel like she’ll be the perfect buffer.

I feel safe with her. Not physically, because my body feels entirely out of my control every time she’s around. But emotionally, she’s one of the only people I can let my guard down around. I have a few close friends who I feel that way about, but she is the first woman who feels like she’s giving more than she’s taking. She’d go to bat for me, even while giving me sass about, if that’s what it came down to. Just like I’d do for her.

I was so lost in thought about spending the whole weekend with her that I almost didn’t notice the low moan coming from her bedroom door as I passed by, but the second time, the sound finally registered in my brain, and I fucking froze in that hallway. That low, slow groan of satisfaction turned hurried, coming out faster with a higher pitch, and I knew exactly what was happening on the other side of that door. I could picture it so clearly—the way her back would arch, her tits bouncing with each thrust, her lips parted and panting as she chased that orgasm.

It was enough to send all the blood in my body rushing toward my cock, and as if someone had injected it with concrete, it expanded and hardened so fast it ached—for her touch, for those sounds she was making to be for me, for the feel of her skin against mine and the taste of her on my tongue. I ached for her with an intensity I’d never felt before, and the sound of her hissing out a low Yessss had me turning and heading up the stairs before I blew my load in my pants right there outside her door.

I had barely shut the door to my apartment before I turned, one hand already in my pants as I rested the other against the front door, hearing her sounds in my head as I quickly jerked myself off to the visions I’d had in the hallways.

And now, even after finally getting some sleep, I still can’t get those images out of my head. I want to know what every inch of her body looks like. I want to know what her skin feels like sliding along mine. I want to taste her, to know what she sounds like when she comes on my tongue. I want to push inside her and see what her face looks like when I’m filling her completely—so full that there’s not a centimeter of her that’s not taken up by me.

But I can’t. I can’t do any of those things, because despite my reputation and my past, one thing I will not do is go back on my word. Not when it was given to my best friend, who has stood beside me through some shit, who has made sure my career and my future weren’t affected every time I made a dumb, impulsive decision. He trusts me to take care of her, and I couldn’t do that to him just because I’m fantasizing about her.

I am not my brother.

It takes me longer than it should to pack up my shit for our pre-game skate, so I’m running late as I take the stairs two at a time on my way out. Jules said she had her therapy appointment this morning, so I’m hoping she’s tied up with that and I won’t run into her on my way out. I need to get her out of my thoughts, and getting on the ice is the only sure-fire way I know of to clear my head like that.

But when I come down the second flight of stairs, I catch sight of her on the far side of the kitchen. She’s bent over at the waist, taking something out of the under-counter microwave, and her short workout shorts are doing nothing to cover the bottom half of her ass cheeks, which has me wondering what type of underwear she’s wearing—which has my mind going to the exact place I don’t want it going.

She must hear me, because she straightens up and spins around, two hands clutching a steaming coffee mug. “Oh, hey,” she says, like she’s surprised it’s me. There’s a split second where I wonder if the sounds I heard last night were actually her in there with someone else, and that thought makes me even more ashamed of getting myself off to visions of her.

“Who else would be coming down the stairs in your house?” I ask.

She lets out a small laugh. “No one. I just . . . sometimes I forget you live here too.”

I grab my baseball hat off the counter and slip it on my head backward. “I love being so forgettable.”

Her eyes crinkle in the corners as she looks at me, trying to assess my meaning. “Trust me . . . you’re not forgettable.” She mutters something under her breath as she brings the coffee cup to her lips and takes a sip. Then she’s clenching her teeth and lips together in pain, before swallowing and saying, “Shit, that was too hot.”

“Why were you heating your coffee in the microwave?” I ask. Everyone knows that things heat unevenly in a microwave. She’s lucky she didn’t burn her lips or tongue.

“I always reheat it. I never seem to be able to drink a cup before it gets cold.”

I set my bag on the floor next to me. “You should get one of those mugs that just keeps it at a constant temperature for you.”

“I didn’t know there were mugs that did that. I’ll have to look into it.” She nods at my bag. “Are you headed to the rink?”

“Yeah, pre-game skate. I’ll be back in the early afternoon, and I, uh . . . I always take a nap before the game. I don’t know if you have any plans that would be loud⁠—”

“No.” She shakes her head. “I know that’s part of any hockey player’s routine on a game day. I’m actually going shopping with Morgan this afternoon—I need something to wear to the anniversary party this weekend—so I’ll stay out of your way.”

I want to tell her she’s never in my way, but in this case, it really is better if she’s out of the house. Maybe then I’ll be able to sleep without thinking about her? “You mean to tell me that within that expansive closet of yours, you don’t have anything you can wear to that party?”

“I don’t have anything I want to wear to the party, which is pretty much the same thing. What are you wearing?” she asks. “Just so I know how dressed up to get.”

“I’ll probably wear a tie. That’s about as much as I’ve thought about it. Everyone will get dressed up, but it’s like ‘small-town dressed up,’ not ‘big-city dressed up,’ you know?”

She smiles, laughter shaking her shoulders. “Yeah, I think I know what you mean. So how small is this small town? I thought you grew up in Montreal?”

“No, a small town about forty-five minutes outside of the city called Pinevale.”

“I thought all the town and city names in Quebec were French?”

“They are. But you don’t speak French, so I’m just going to use the English names, for your sake.”

“Damn Latin never comes in handy,” she says, as she raises her cup and blows on the surface of the coffee before taking a small, tentative sip. “Not that I ever travel . . .”

“Wait, you’ve been out of the country before, right?”

Lifting her eyebrows, she shakes her head.

“But you do have a passport, right?” Holy crap, how did I not think to ask this before?

“Yeah, I’ve just never used it.”

I exhale a sigh of relief, because if she wasn’t able to come, there’s no way I’d be going. That thought has me realizing how dependent I’ve become on having her in my life, and I have to remind myself that we can be friends, but nothing more.

“Alright, I’ve got to go. I’m already cutting it close.” It takes so long to get all my goalie gear on, I arrive earlier than most of the other players. “Will I see you after the game?”

“I don’t think I can stay for the whole game. I have to be up at five tomorrow because we’re getting a big shipment of lumber at six.” She lets out a small groan as she sags back against the countertop. “The neighbors at this new house we’re starting on this week are going to freaking love me tomorrow morning.”

“You should get some gift cards for a local coffee shop and drop them in everyone’s mailboxes with a Sorry for the early morning note,” I suggest.

“That’s actually kind of genius.”

“So, will I not see you before I get on our plane after the game tonight?” I ask.

“Ahhhh . . . ” She gives me a fake sad face. “Are you going to miss me?”

You have no idea.

“No,” I huff out a laugh. “But I have a little going away present for you before I leave.”

Her eyes widen. “I know we’re supposed to be engaged and all, but this better not be like the gifts Drew sends Audrey when he’s traveling.”

“Why? What does Drew send Audrey?”

Those blue eyes widen even more and then she slow blinks. “Oh my god, pretend I didn’t just say that. Please.”

“Why, what’s he send her?”

“Nothing. And don’t you dare ask him, either. That would be a total violation of my sister’s privacy.”

“Ahhh, so something sexy, then?” I’m teasing her just to see if I can get her to blush. As the pink creeps into her cheeks, I step around the kitchen table so I’m directly in front of her. “Why, is that the kind of goodbye gift you’d like?” She’s full-on blushing now, which only makes me want to push this a bit further. “Because that could easily be arranged.”

“Don’t make promises you don’t plan to deliver on, Colt. Per your choice, we’re keeping this platonic, remember?”

Wait a minute. “That’s not what I said. I said I couldn’t do anything about it, and you said you wanted me to respect our agreement and the promise I made to your brother.” My voice drops lower. “Are you telling me that now you don’t want to keep this platonic?”

“Let’s not have this conversation again,” she says breezily, but I can tell she’s more affected than she’s pretending to be, and not just because of the way she’s holding that coffee mug between us, her forearms pressed right over her nipples like she doesn’t want me to see what my being this close does to her.

“As you wish,” I say, stepping back. “So, this is goodbye? For the next few days, at least?”

“What time are you leaving here tonight for your game? I can make sure I’m home in time to say goodbye.”

She didn’t make it home in time to say goodbye, but she sent me an apology text detailing how crappy her afternoon had been, and as we stand in the hallway waiting to take the ice for our second home game of this series, I’m trying not to let it bother me.

It’s not that I expect her to drop her own plans—I wouldn’t have even expected that if this was a real engagement. But standing there in the kitchen this morning, I’d known the perfect gift to get her, and I didn’t want to wait for some special occasion to give it to her. I’d gone to three stores after our pre-game skate before I found exactly what I was looking for, and I stopped by one of those fancy card stores to get a pretty gift bag that was big enough for it. I’d just wanted to see her face when she opened it. Instead, I left it sitting on the kitchen table with a sticky note that said, “Open me tonight.”

“Why are you in such a fuck-off mood?” Zach asks. But he looks like he knows the answer. “Not trouble in paradise, I hope?”

How do I even answer questions like that? Am I supposed to pretend to be a lovesick fool over her? Or should I be acting like everything is perfect?

“Just gearing up mentally,” I say.

“Dude, don’t take this the wrong way, but you play like shit when you’re pissed. I know Hartmann’s starting the game tonight, but you better get your head on right before you take the ice.”

“I’m sorry, Zen Master.” I taunt him in a way that has a few of the players closest to us looking over. Zach is our resident Aikido black belt, so-calm-you-can’t-shake-him guru, but at this moment, his advice is not wanted. “Am I not chill enough for you tonight?”

Zach just looks at me like I’m pathetic and snorts out a laugh. “Your funeral, man. I’m just trying to keep you alive.”

And then the music is blasting and the fans are cheering, and we take turns slapping our hands against the giant Rebels symbol on the wall as we head down the hallway and onto the ice. And when I skate past our bench, I glance up six rows where I know Jules will be sitting.

Holding up her phone, I can barely make out a picture of her rechargeable mug—the travel kind so she can take it to work with her, too—as she mouths, “Thank you!”

But that’s not the thing that has the smile splitting my face in half. No, that’s because, despite saying “only this once” before Friday night’s game, she’s wearing my jersey again.

Hartmann goaltends for the first two periods, and when I go in for the third, it’s because he gave up two goals in the last five minutes. Our 4-1 lead going into the second period is now a narrow 4-3 lead.

“Nothing gets by you.” Those are the instructions Wilcott gave me in the locker room between periods, and they hang heavy on me. Winning the game will be up to our other five players on the ice. Losing it will be up to me.

Florida’s getting sloppy and if we can just keep it together and play smart, we can prevent them from tying it up before the period ends.

With three minutes left in the period, Drew narrowly misses a goal. That’s when it gets ugly.

We’re exhausted. They’re exhausted. Tempers are high and so it shouldn’t be a surprise when the next face-off turns into a brawl that sends Drew to the sin bin for two minutes. With the power play advantage, Florida pulls their goalie so they have six players on the ice ready to score. They’re taking a risk to get the tie because they want that additional overtime period to give them a chance at winning.

I block four shots before the fifth goes wide, and I leave the crease to stop it with my stick. But there’s no one to pass it up to because Florida’s covering all our players, so I send it to the boards near the center line, hoping that if the puck advances into their neutral zone maybe one of our players can get to it on some sort of a breakaway. With an empty net on the other side of the rink and about twenty seconds left on the penalty clock, it’s our best shot at scoring.

But the puck ricochets off the boards at the perfect angle, and heads straight toward the wide-open goal. I hold my breath, even as I know how unlikely it is for a goalie to score. Somehow, though, even as two of Florida’s defensemen skate back toward it as fast as they can, the puck goes into the net. The sound of the buzzer fills the arena, and can barely be heard over the deafening roar of the home crowd.

It’s the first goal of my entire professional career. Our fans scream the Rebel Chant at the top of their lungs while they swing the white towels with the dark and light blue Rebels logo above their heads.

I take the moment to skate to the bench, high-fiving my teammates who are also losing their fucking minds. And then I continue on, stopping at the glass right past our bench. Jules is already in the aisle, running down the stairs toward me when I stop and point at her. She comes to a stop before me, blowing me a kiss before I yell, “That one was for you!”

Her eyes widen and she shakes her head at me like I’m crazy, so I wink at her before turning and skating back to our goal so we can finish the last few seconds of this game. And long after the game and the never-ending interviews with the press, I find her waiting for me in the Family Room even though she said she wasn’t staying until the end.

It’s close to midnight, and she’s clearly tired, but I’m thankful she’s waited. The team is headed to the airport in a few minutes, and we’ll be gone until Thursday unless we win our first game and close out the series. I’m having strangely mixed emotions about not seeing her for that long.

I stop short, leaving a few feet between us as I hold my arms out for her, because I need her to come to me. And she does, wrapping herself in my arms, saying, “I couldn’t let you leave for Florida without congratulating you.”

When her lips meet mine, it occurs to me that this is the first time she’s kissed me, and not the other way around. And I’m starting to wonder if the line between what’s fake and what’s real is getting as blurry for her as it already is for me.