SWNOVELS Pucking Sweet: Chapter 2
Well, hot goddamn. I am on fire. Training camp is going exceptionally well for me. Thanks to my grueling summer cardio routine, I’m as fast as I’ve ever been out on the ice. Strong too. At twenty-six, I’m seven years into my NHL career, and I’m in the best shape of my life. I feel like a bull only just hitting my prime.
As if I need the affirmation, the next words out of the physical therapy intern’s mouth are: “You’ve been looking great out there, man.”
“Thanks.”
“Seriously, you’re really fun to watch.” Teddy O’Connor stands at the end of the massage table, my feet cupped in his hands as he gently jiggles my legs. It always helps me to get some of the lactic acid moving before I hit the ice.
I groan, tipping my head back as his strong fingers massage my left calf muscles. “God, you’re good at that.” I feel my body go slack. “What will it take to convince you to come to my house and do this every night?”
Teddy stills.
“Novy, stop propositioning my interns,” Doc Avery calls from the next table over. He’s busy working on Langley, one of the flashy young wingers. I don’t know why, but Avery always makes me grit my teeth. The guy is a fucking asshole.
“Don’t listen to him, Teddy Bear,” I tease. “You know I’m totally loaded, right? I’ll make it more than worth your while.” I flash him an obnoxious wink that Langley and Avery can both see.
Teddy laughs. “Sure, Nov. Why don’t I just move in for the season? I can kip on your couch and make you oatmeal in the morning too.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
He grins. “Cool. My going rate is a thousand dollars a night.”
I huff a laugh that comes out part grunt as he digs his thumb into my soleus muscle.
“Hey, you just said you’re loaded, right?”
“Don’t even tempt me, bud. You’re that good. You’ve got way better technique than old Hotdogs-for-Hands Avery over there.”
Avery grumbles something under his breath while Teddy puffs out his chest a little, pleased with my compliment. “Okay, man. That’s about all I can do,” he says, lowering my leg. “Hit the bike for fifteen to twenty minutes when you get off the ice. Keep it loose and casual.”
“Loose and casual? Did you memorize my Tinder bio?”
“I can help you stretch after if you need me,” he offers.
“Hey, there are twenty-two other guys on this team,” Avery calls over to him. “Time to crawl out of Novy’s ass, kid.”
Sitting up, I swing my legs off the side of the table.
“Good luck out there today,” Teddy says, his voice lower now, his smile falling.
I hop off the table and flash him my most confident grin. “Like I need it.”
He’s right to wish me luck though. On a regular team, training camp is typically used to decide which farm team guys will fill out the twenty-three-man roster. But this is year one for the Jacksonville Rays. No player’s position is guaranteed, not even mine. All the rookies are hungry for a chance to shine, and the older guys are desperate to stay relevant. Hopefully, Coach Johnson is about to announce that I’ll be the starting left defenseman this season.
I think the only holdup at this point is deciding who will skate at my right. There are a few good prospects. Jean-Luc Gerard is a legend. Jake Compton is definitely solid. We’ve been chasing each other in the League rankings for years.
But I’ve got my hopes set on Cole Morrow. Methodical and confident, he’s like a cannonball on the ice. He’s knocked me on my ass more times than I can count over the years. And we already have a shorthand we can dust off from the time we played together back in the Western Hockey League. It was only for one season, but when we started together on the Seattle Thunderbirds, we were a well-oiled, two-man machine.
Langley hops off the other table. He’s only an inch or two shorter than my six-foot-two frame, but he’s a forward and I’m a defenseman. He’s lean and fast, while I’m built like a tree. “You ready for another exhibition game?”
“I was born ready.”
“You’re from Thunder Bay, right? And you played in the WHL?” I eye him carefully. “Did you google me, Langers?”
“Might have done.”
I press a hand to my chest. “Aww, I’m touched. You wanna know my star sign too there, bud? My favorite food?”
He laughs. “Don’t pretend you didn’t look up my stats just as soon as they announced the full trade list.”
“Of course I did. Gotta know your enemy, right? And my star sign is Scorpio by the way—not that you asked.”
“So, I’m your enemy now? You really want to start the season with an enemy on the team?”
“Hey, they traded you in from Montreal, Langers. I was a Bruin. You do the math. Besides, everyone loves a good enemies-to-lovers trope.”
“Spare me, tough guy. I know you’re a marshmallow under all that angry muscle. And it doesn’t matter where we came from. We’re both Rays now.”
“Rivalries die a slow death,” I intone.
He just shrugs. “Not for me. I don’t like to dwell on the past. Tell you what, the first game we play in Montreal, we’ll find a great dive and split an order of poutine. My treat. Then I’ll have to beat you away with a stick.” He holds out a hand, intending for me to shake it.
I glance down at it. “Oh, so you think it’s that easy to woo a Canadian? A little poutine and I’ll just forget about how you smoked us during the last playoffs?”
“It worked for me before,” he replies, still holding out his hand. “If poutine’s not your thing, I’ll just shake a box of maple candy at you. Either way, we’ll both be dressed in the teal and white of the Rays. Boom. Best friends forever.”
Okay, I officially like Langley. I laugh as I reach out my hand, but the sound dies as I take in the sudden look of panic on his face.
“Uh-oh.” He drops his hand to his side. “Dude, watch your six.”
I hear the soft click of heels coming from directly behind me and my shoulders stiffen. “Oh shit . . . PR Barbie?”
“Yep.”
“No.”
“She’s clocked you, man.”
I groan. “Exactly what color is her pencil skirt?”
“Uhh . . .” He glances surreptitiously around me to check. “Black.”
“Fuck.”
Black means no nonsense. Black means it’s about to be someone’s fucking funeral.
He claps me on the shoulder. “She’s hungry for it, man. Total blood in the water.”
My gaze darts around, noting all the exits. I feel it when her eyes lock on me. “Can I still escape?”
“Not a chance. Sorry, man.”
I grab his arm as he tries to step past me. “Goddamn it. Don’t leave me.”
He twists his wrist, wrenching away from my grasp. “If I stay here, she’ll drag me into whatever mess you’re in, and I’d rather keep my balls attached, thanks.”
“You are dead to me,” I hiss. “This is how we become enemies.”
Langley laughs, ducking around me like a rabbit fleeing from a fox. Only in this case, the fox stands at all of five-foot-two and has pink manicured nails for claws.
“Good luck ever becoming my lover now, you fucking Judas,” I rasp at his back. He uses Teddy as a human shield, darting away from our approaching director of public relations.
“Yoo-hoo, Lukas,” Poppy calls. “Honey, do you have a minute to chat?”
Teddy looks wide-eyed at me while, behind him, Avery just smirks. Arrogant fuck. I hate him. I take a deep breath, filling my chest with air as I spin around.
Fuck me. Why does the biggest ball-buster I’ve ever met have to be so gorgeous? She marches toward me in her kitten heels, that devilish black pencil skirt hugging the narrow curve of her hips. Her blazer is unbuttoned, revealing a silky blouse underneath that hugs her perky boobs.
Fuck—don’t look at her boobs.
My gaze darts up to take in the pointed features of her face instead. Her bright blue eyes are narrowed at me, while that curly blonde ponytail swings from side to side with each step. “Poppy St. James, as I live and breathe,” I say at her approach. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Spare me the sass, Lukas. We need to talk. In private, if you please,” she adds, her gaze darting over to the PT staff. Behind her, Wednesday Addams deadpans me, her phone clutched in her pasty hand capped with pointed black talons.
Avery just chuckles and walks off in the direction of his office. But sweet Teddy doesn’t take the hint. “Good morning, Ms. St. James,” he says brightly.
She turns, blasting him a megawatt smile. “Teddy, honey, haven’t I told you to call me Poppy?”
Sure, for him she coos like an angel.
He gives a nervous laugh. “Right. I’ll remember one of these days.”
“Am I allowed to call you Poppy?” I ask.
She turns back to me, her every feature sharpening. Fuck, it’s terrifying how she can just turn it on and off like that. “That remains to be seen. Shall we?” She gestures with her free hand, daring me to walk ahead of her toward some private location. But I’ve seen this all before. This is the moment in the horror movie where the jock boy- friend named Jason goes down into the cellar alone. No way. I’m not dying like that.
“I’m good right here,” I dare to say, crossing my tattooed arms. I lean my hip against the massage table. “There’s nothing you could say to me that you can’t say in front of my good friend Teddy.”
Poor Teddy glances between us, looking like he’d rather follow Langers out the nearest exit. At Poppy’s shoulder, Wednesday smirks.
Fuck.
I see the flash in Poppy’s eyes as she steps forward, pressing right up in my space. “Alright then. Here it is.” She plops her heavy bag down on the empty massage table and turns her back on Teddy, glaring fiercely up at me. It’s so cute how she has to crane her neck. I’m at least a foot taller, even when she’s in her heels. “Stow the smile, Lukas. This isn’t a courtesy call. It’s a formal reprimand.”
Am I smiling? I think I must be. I clear my throat, wiping the smile from my face as I drop my arms to my sides. “Of course. Give me a second to warm up first, yeah?” I bounce on the balls of my feet and roll my shoulders. “Right. I’m ready. Lay into me. Just not the face, okay? Gotta look pretty for my roster pictures later.”
“Everything’s a joke to you, isn’t it? You can’t take anything seriously—not your career, not your reputation, certainly not the reputation of this team.”
I stiffen, my good mood souring. “I’d argue that you don’t know
me—”
“Oh, I know you, Lukas Novikov. I’ve known cocky showboats like you my entire life. You think I haven’t been following your career— on and off the ice? You think I didn’t do extensive research on every player on this team, every member of the support staff? I have a dossier on you back in my office. You want to know what the top page says?”
“Enlighten me.”
She squares her shoulders, ready to fire her sharpest arrow. “It’s a personal note from your last PR manager that says, ‘he’s your problem now.’”
Shit. Not gonna lie, that fucking hurts. It shouldn’t. The Bruins PR team were a bunch of no-fun Nancys. But hearing Poppy say the words feels like taking a cross check to the chest with no protective pads.
“Is that what you’re going to be, Lukas? Are you determined to be my problem? Because I have to tell you here and now that if that’s what you want, you will be sorely disappointed.”
Something dark and heavy roils in my gut. “Before you tear me a new asshole, why don’t you back up a step and start by telling me what great sin I committed?”
She raises a brow, obliging me by backing away. “Fine. Claribel?”
Wednesday steps in on her left, flashing me her phone screen. She swipes with her thumb, and I see pic after pic of me from the party last night. Gotta be honest, the details are a bit fuzzy. All I remember was being bored at home around nine o’clock and calling some of the guys out to that rooftop bar. None of the married guys came, of course. It was just me and some rookies who all quickly got shit-faced and left me with the bill.
All around, it was a pretty shitty night.
I laugh. “Seriously? That’s what you’re so mad about? It was just a private party—”
“That every single bunny in attendance photographed to kingdom come,” Poppy cries with a dramatic wave of her hand. “And posted all over every social site and fan group. Now the city is calling you all a bunch of playboys and party animals.”
“Wow.” I drag a hand through my short hair. “I didn’t take this team’s management for a bunch of prudes. You know we’re allowed to have a little pre-season fun, right? We’re allowed to have private lives too—or is that banned in the contract I signed?”
“Private implies just that,” she counters. “You think I care that you flounce around from bunny to bunny every night?”
“Hey, I don’t flounce. I wouldn’t even know how to flounce—”
“You think it bothers me one iota that you drink and party and otherwise waste away all your free time in the dark corners of seedy bars and clubs? I don’t care, Lukas. It’s your life. Do what you want with it. Just keep it off the front pages of the gossip rags and fan sites.”
“What do you want me to do? I can’t stop the bunnies from taking pictures—”
“Yes, you can,” she insists. “This is simple PR. You want to throw a private rooftop party? Fine. But make it private. Have security at the stairs and confiscate phones. They can’t post the pictures they don’t take. As for your constant dalliances, all this ‘take a number’ like you’re a one-man deli counter has to stop. There’s this nifty little device called an NDA. Have all your lady friends sign them—preferably before the miniskirts come off. If your lawyer doesn’t have a template ready, I can provide one my clients have used in the past.”
I blink down at her, my anger fizzling. “Wait—what are you doing?”
She leans away. “What do you mean?”
“I thought this was a reprimand. Are you seriously advising me on how best to throw a private rooftop orgy right now?”
She does me the courtesy of blushing, but she brushes it off with another wave of her hand. “I just told you, Lukas. I don’t care what you do. I only care how you do it. If you’re determined to make it your job to party every moment you’re not on the ice, then as your PR manager, it’s my job to ensure you do it with as little damage to your reputation as possible.”
I glare down at her. “Why do you care so much about my damn reputation?”
“Because you’re a Ray now.”
I bristle again. “Oh, and it’s as simple as that?”
“Yes, it’s as simple as that.”
I glance from her to Wednesday to Teddy, who still looks like he’d rather be anywhere else.
Poppy sighs, leaning her hip against the massage table. “Look . . . I don’t relish this part of my job, okay? I don’t want to come off as the morality police. It’s not about that. I’m sorry if, in my frustration, I sounded like a prude just now . . . or made you feel like you should be ashamed of your behavior.”
“If?” I press with a raised brow. “Poppy, you may as well have sprayed me down with disinfectant. Are you sure you wanna stand this close to me? You never know, my proclivity for promiscuity might be catching. I’d hate for you to become afflicted. Don’t they take your pearls away when you join the ‘bad girls club?’”
A heavy moment of silence hangs in the air between us as she doesn’t take my bait.
“Are you finished?” she asks.
Goddamn it, the pink of her lipstick matches her nails. Why does that turn me on? I don’t want to be turned on by this harpy of a PR manager. I want to be pissed. When I signed up to play professional hockey, I didn’t know I’d receive this constant policing of my behavior.
Don’t be too slutty, Lukas.
Don’t chirp the competition, Lukas.
Don’t pull pranks, Lukas.
It’s fucking exhausting. What does it matter what I do off the ice so long as I dominate on the ice?
But it’s been like this on every team in every league. It’s like they expect us to behave like goddamn choirboys. I’m tired of getting my nose swatted with a rolled-up newspaper for daring to live my life on my terms. I’ve done enough of living under the rules and restrictions of others. Lukas Novikov is his own fucking person.
If I want to fuck and drink and party my way into an early grave, that shouldn’t put my PR manager’s pink frilly undies in a twist. I do my job, and I do it better than practically everyone in the League. So, PR Barbie can just get off my fucking back already.
I only think all this, of course. I don’t actually say any of it out loud because I’ve been doing this dance for years. Instead, I grit my teeth and say, “Yeah, I’m done.”
Reaching over, she pats my thigh. I stiffen, my gaze darting down to where her hand is touching me. She moves it away too soon. And then she’s moving away entirely. “Let’s start over,” she says, flicking her ponytail off her shoulder. I bet when that hair is down, it nearly touches her perky butt—
Shit—don’t think about her butt.
I grunt something that may be the word “okay” or may just be a sound like “harglumph.”
She offers me a weak smile. “I don’t want to be your enemy, Lukas. And I really don’t want you to be my new problem. Between the bal- loon arches, and the fundraisers, and the whole ‘newest team in the NHL’ curse I’m trying to break, I have my hands more than full right now.”
“I don’t want that either,” I hear myself admit.
She checks on her buzzing phone, sending the call to voicemail. “So, then let’s find a new way forward. Right, here’s what we’ll do. Lukas, I want you to work with Claribel.”
Okay, shoe fucking drop.
I push off the massage table. “What?”
“Yeah, what?” Wednesday echoes.
“Claribel possesses the skill set you lack,” Poppy reasons, stepping between us to fetch her massive bag. “She’ll coach you in the art of living your private life in private.”
Wednesday looks like she’d rather be torn apart by wild dogs. “I already have a job, boss. And I don’t do charity work.”
“Yeah, and she sorta scares the shit out of me. No offense,” I add.
“It’s fine,” Wednesday deadpans. “Actually, I take it as a compliment.”
Now it’s Poppy’s turn to huff in frustration, juggling her bag and her still-buzzing phone. Our new PR director is clearly in high demand. “Heavens—fine. Lukas, I suppose I’ll just have to deal with you myself.”
Deal with me? Why am I perking up at this? I should definitely still be annoyed, right? Affronted even. And she’d clearly rather sky- dive into a volcano than waste more of her precious time talking to me.
That’s probably why I’m excited . . . God, I’m such an ass.
I smirk. “You’re gonna be my new sexual sensei? You’ll teach me the art of hush-hush hookups? Why, Ms. St. James, you surprise me. They really are gonna take away your pearls—”
“I already said to stow the sass, Lukas.” She slings her heavy bag on her shoulder, nearly hitting me with it, her eyes locked on her phone. “Be in my office Monday morning at ten o’clock.”
“I have a better idea,” I tease, my mood brightening at the thought of wasting her time. “Let’s make this an evening affair and say we meet at seven o’clock over at Neptune Beach. I’m thinking the fish camp. Candles on every table. Very intimate . . . and delicious. Are you a raw oyster kind of girl?”
She lowers her phone and glares at me. That little pointed nose of hers looks so cute when she’s annoyed. “This is not a date, Lukas. This is business. Be in my office Monday morning, or I will assign you to Claribel and watch as she runs you over with the Zamboni.”
I flash her my most asshole-ish smile. “It’s a date.”