Chapter 12: Faking It with the Forward: Chapter 12

As much as I’d hoped the post-game gathering at the Manor wouldn’t be too big, my teammates had other ideas. First, Pete showed up with a keg. Then Axel invited every puck bunny in his contact list and half the rowing team, which meant Zeta Sig also showed up and they’re notorious for taking everything up another level. Reid plugged in his playlist and by eleven, we have a full-scale, bass-thumping rager going on.

“We have to stop letting Axel invite people to these things,” I say to Jeff as I stub out a lit cigarette someone left on the porch. “He has zero discretion.”

He shrugs, eyeing a new group of girls coming up the path. “I know you hate the frat boys, but they always bring a nice selection of sorority girls with them.”

“Sure, if they don’t burn the house down first.” Eyeing that little Zeta prick Miller Hansen take a drag from a joint and shotgun it into his girls’ open mouth. “Or get us busted for possession.”

“Dude,” he says, “you’ve got to chill out. When did you get so uptight?” Probably when I decided to get into this relationship with Twyler which includes no sex. “Where’s your girl? Is she coming?”

“Not sure. She had some stuff to do.”

“Hopefully she gets here soon so she can help you relax.” He winks and heads back into the party.

“Congratulations, Captain. Two goals, very impressive.” Ginna steps onto the porch and presses a cup in my hand. I sniff it and then take a sip. Jack and Coke.

“Thanks,” I say, sitting in one of the rocking chairs. “It was definitely what we needed to kick off the season.”

She comes closer, perching on the arm of the rocker, her short skirt riding up and showing a wide swath of her upper thigh. “You alone tonight?” she asks, hand landing on my shoulder.

“Alone? Yes.” I take another sip of my drink and cut my eyes to her. “Available? No.”

She frowns. “So you’re really dating this girl? The meek little trainer I saw you with at the bar?”

I don’t like the description, but I don’t owe Ginna any explanations. “Twyler and I are together, yeah.”

“Then why isn’t she here?” Her hand runs down my arm, fingers squeezing my bicep. “Because part of the perk of having a big win is having a hot girl ride your dick.”

She’s not wrong, and that’s exactly what the majority of my teammates will be doing before the night is over, but it’s none of Ginna’s fucking business. I’d hoped Twyler would come, but it was obvious she was both tired and eager to get home to find out if Nadia got her concert tickets. I open my mouth to tell Ginna to cool it when I see a familiar head of dark hair step off the sidewalk and stride purposefully toward the house. I stand, ignoring the way Ginna’s hand tugs me back, walking down the steps to meet Twyler.

“Hey,” I say, unable to contain my smile. “You came.”

“And you’re a dick,” she snaps, stopping me in my tracks. I get a better look at her face. Her eyes are ice cold and filled with rage, but more than that, I see the red rim underneath and the pink in her nose.

“You’re crying.” My stomach clenches. Shit. “Why are you crying?”

“Because you suck. You and Nadia and Ethan. You all fucking suck.”

Ethan? The ex? What the hell?

On the porch I hear a snort and look to see Ginna and a few other puck bunnies watching us. I shoot them a dirty look and realize I need to take this somewhere quieter.

“Hold on,” I say, resting a hand on her lower back and leading Twyler around the front of the house. There’s a side door that leads to a small, enclosed porch that we never use. I open the door and usher her inside the dimly lit space. Once we’re alone, I say, “It’s completely possible that I’m a dick, but do you think you could give me a few more details?”

“Nadia didn’t get my tickets because she was fucking Brent Reynolds.” Her arms are folded over her stomach. “Sound familiar?”

It does sound familiar. I’d made that joke earlier in the day, but it’d been just that. A joke. “That’s… fucking uncanny. I didn’t know. I swear. I was just fooling around because I know Nadia has a history of jersey chasing and what bigger jersey is there to chase than the quarterback of the football team?” I give her a cocky grin. “Well, other than mine.”

She glares at me, but I see the quiver in her lip. She wants to laugh. At me maybe, but that’s better than the murderous look she was giving me when she got here.

“Hey,” I say, stepping closer and resting my hand on her shoulder. I resist the urge to pull her closer, but I do hold her eye. “I promise that was a bizarre coincidence. I didn’t know anything.”

“I believe you.” She sighs and then shocks the hell out of me by leaning into me and pressing her cheek against my chest. Slowly, I wrap my arms around her shoulders, drawing her into a hug. I rub her back and the feel of her body sinking into mine is unreal.

“It sucks that Nadia flaked—and for Reynolds too. What a douchebag.”

She laughs, the vibration bouncing off my chest.

“He is a douche, right?” she asks, wiping her nose. “Ugh, that’s twice today I’ve left fluids on your body. First my drool. Now my tears and snot.” She frowns. “I’m sorry I barged into your party and accused you of being a dick. It’s been a shitty day.”

“I’m just glad you came.” I brush her hair behind her ear, finding it impossible to keep my hands off of her. “Do you want to go join the party? Have a drink?”

She looks down at her outfit—the same one she wore all day for training the team. “In this? No way. I look terrible.”

“Sunshine, you have a way of making a T-shirt and joggers look pretty sexy.”

She rolls her eyes. “Stop.”

“It’s true.” I shrug, even though I know she doesn’t believe me. “But if you’d rather go, that’s fine too. Do you want me to walk you home?”

She tenses. “I don’t want to see Nadia yet.” She looks up at me, expression guilty. “But you go back inside and hang out. You deserve it after the win today. Go have fun. I can just…” She looks around at the small room. There’s nothing in the room but a small metal table and chairs, some dead potted plants and a worn-out loveseat we pushed out here the day we moved in. “I can stay here.”

“We can both hang out here,” I tell her, taking her hand and leading her over to the small couch. I take up more than half the space, but it’s an excuse to sit close to her. “So stuff is bad between you and Nadia?”

“Yeah, we had a big fight and we both probably said a few things that crossed a line.”

She doesn’t say more, so I let it drop. Getting between chicks when they’re fighting is a no-win situation.

“I’m sorry about the tickets. I’m not sure why it’s so important to you, but I know it is.”

I don’t know if it’s the dimly lit room, the only real light coming from outside, or the fact we’re truly alone for a minute, but I feel a shift in Twyler. She looks down at our intertwined hands and says, “I first got into the New Kings in high school. They were pretty indie back then. Kind of obscure, but everything about them just resonated with me.” She keeps her eyes down. “I struggled with some depression—and making friends. I was lonely and things got kind of dark. William and Trey, the guys in the band, their lyrics hit on a lot of those things, and it helped me find my way out.”

I don’t like the idea of teenage Twyler being alone and depressed any more than I like the idea of her being hurt now.

“My dad took me to my first New Kings concert. I didn’t have anyone else to go with. He got the tickets, drove us down to this shitty little club in a terrible neighborhood. He always supported my need to be part of that community.”

“That’s cool that he gets you like that.”

She looks up at me, and there’s something written on her face that makes my gut drop. “Got me,” she says. “He died three years ago.”

“Fuck, babe.” There’s zero hesitation as I wrap my arms around her, and I expect her to fight it—to fight me—but for once she doesn’t, just allowing me to pull her small frame against my chest. “I had no idea. I’m so sorry.”

“It sucks.” Her voice is small, not like the ball-busting, quirky girl I’ve gotten to know. “He was always there for me, even when shit got dark.” Exhaling, she adds, “When they announced this tour, I figured it would be impossible to go with the team’s schedule, but then they added a location locally, and it happens to be on Dad’s birthday.” She takes a deep breath and lays her hand flat on my stomach. “It seemed like fate that it was all aligning, but…”

But Nadia.

Now I’m pissed.

She leans into me for a moment longer and I feel her breathing even out and her limbs relax. Fuck, this girl feels right in my arms, and the way her hand rests on my stomach makes my pulse quicken. Unfortunately, it also sends an alert to my dick, sending a false signal for it to wake up. Twyler’s confiding in me as a friend—leaning on me for comfort—not as a gateway to a hookup.

“Hey,” I say, running my hand down her hair. “I know you don’t want to party, but how about we go make an appearance. Let Nadia and everyone else know we’re on good terms and then I’ll walk you back home.”

She shifts, turning her gaze to mine. “Sure. We can do that.”

We disentangle and I help her off the couch, using it as an opportunity to keep my hands on her a minute longer. I have more questions, like why she was ranting about her ex, but I know Twyler well enough to realize the amount of personal information she shared tonight was huge.

“Wait,” I say. Lifting my sweatshirt over my head, I place it over hers, dropping it over her uniform. It engulfs her, hanging down below her thighs. “That’s better.”

Following her through the door that leads back into the house, I keep my eyes on her, the way she looks in my shirt—how seeing her wearing it makes me feel.

Terrified.

I like it.

More than I should.

“You’re disturbingly good at this.”

Reid shakes his head in disbelief as he takes another shot after Twlyer lands her tenth quarter in a row, directly in the red party cup across the table.

“It’s a gift.” She grins, and the action lights up her face. Other than a little smear of mascara under her eyes, there’s no evidence of her earlier upset.

At first, she didn’t want to play, but the guys egged her on, pushing at her buttons until she relented. Me? I just sat back and watched my girl go on a winning streak.

“Rematch?” she asks Reid, holding up her lucky quarter.

“Nope. I’m out,” he says, eyeing a puck bunny across the room. Guess whatever happened between him and Nadia was mutual.

“Anyone?” Twyler asks, looking around the room.

It’s getting late, and the adrenaline the guys came into the party with has started to fade. They’re either drunk or horny—or both—and ready to settle down.

Reaching out, I grab Twyler by the waist, dragging her in my lap. “Looks like you’re the reigning champion, Sunshine,” I tell her, pressing a kiss to her cheek. It’s been hard to keep my hands off her tonight. She turns to face me, and her eyes are clear enough to tell me that the beer she drank over the last two hours hasn’t given her more than a slight buzz. She shifts again, dragging her ass over my dick in the process. The innocent look in her eye tells me she has no fucking clue what she’s doing to me. It’s sweet.

And frustratingly hot.

I desperately want to taste her again. Full mouth, lots of tongue.

But we made an agreement and I’m not seeing a loophole here.

“You spending the night, Twy?” Jefferson asks, grabbing two bottles of water out of the cooler on the porch. I shoot him a dirty look and he winks back. I know what he’s doing. He knows Twyler hasn’t spent the night yet and he’s trying to get me laid.

“Nah,” I say, resting a hand on her thigh. “I’m going to walk her back soon.”

“You know,” she says, brushing her fingers over my knuckles, “maybe I should just stay.”

“If you want.” I don’t know who she’s saying it for. Jefferson, to continue the ruse, or herself, because she doesn’t want to go home. If I had to guess, this is about Nadia. “I’m happy for you to stay.”

“Aww, have fun, you two,” Jeff says, gesturing for the girl waiting for him by the doorway to follow him up the stairs. “See you two in the morning.”

Slowly everyone takes off. Some for home, some for couches or beds inside. It’s not unusual to wake up to five guys sprawled out in the living room after a party. I nudge Twyler. “You sure you want to spend the night here?”

“Is that okay?”

“Of course it’s okay.” I ease her off my painfully throbbing dick and rise off the chair. “I just don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

Leading her up the stairs, I take her to my room. It’s tidy-ish, although I didn’t expect to have a girl up here tonight. The bed is made, a habit from childhood, and most of my clothes, clean and dirty, are in separate baskets. My desk is a mess, but that’s how I keep it, relying on some kind of internal organization system.

“So this is where the magic happens,” she says, walking over to my dresser. She lifts the MVP award I got last season, despite the shit show at the Frozen Four. I kick off my shoes and when I look up again, she’s studying a poster hanging on the wall. She juts her thumb at it. “You go to bed every night looking at your face?”

“I mean, you could bring me a photo of you—preferably in a bikini—and I’d happily go to sleep looking at you every night.”

It’s not a bad idea.

She rolls her eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”

“The team PR department gave me that after I was named captain. I left it rolled up in the tube it came in. Jefferson and Axel thought it would be hilarious to hang it up.” I shrug. “I just didn’t move it.”

While Twyler snoops around my room, I grab a pillow off the bed and an extra blanket from the closet. I toss both on the chair in the corner of the room. She turns and says, “What are you doing?”

“Sleeping in the chair. You can take the bed.”

“What? No.” She shakes her head. “You take the bed; I’ll sleep on the chair.”

We stare at one another for a long beat, a standoff brewing between us. I break it off first, dropping my hands to the hem of my shirt and pulling it over my head.

“Did you just use your chest as a way to distract me and get your way?”

She blinks, managing to both look away and stare at my chest at the same time. She looks like she may have a stroke just from seeing my upper body.

“Did it work?” I ask, because yeah, I’m vain. I work my ass off to keep in top shape. But there’s a little vindication that after making it clear she wasn’t into jocks, Twyler likes my body.

“No.”

Liar.

If this is how she reacts to my upper body… “Unless you want to see my junk, maybe turn around,” I say in warning.

“Oh, right.” She spins, facing the wall, and I drop my pants and grab a pair of shorts from the top dresser drawer.

Pulling them on, I say, “You’re in the clear.”

She’s slow to turn, peering at me with those big eyes. I head to the bathroom and smear toothpaste on my toothbrush. I point to a drawer. “If you want, there’s an extra toothbrush in there. T-shirts are in the top drawer of the dresser.” My eyes drag over the sweatshirt she’s been wearing like a dress all night and our eyes meet in the mirror. “Or you can keep that on.”

She watches me go through my routine and as I’m walking out and dropping onto the chair. It’s not uncomfortable, just a little small for my frame. There are no arms to hold me in, but I can manage. One of the skills learned from years of travel hockey is how to sleep anywhere.

“Do you do this a lot?” she asks, still standing by the bed. “Have to offer girls toothbrushes and clothes?”

I snort and drag the blanket up to my waist. “Their mouths are usually too occupied, Sunshine, to worry about a toothbrush.”

Her nose wrinkles and her cheeks move past pink to flaming red. Her glare is intense. “You’re doing it again. Trying to embarrass me.”

I lean back and arrange my pillow. “Wrong. Most girls that come up here with me have their clothes off before we cross the threshold. None stay long enough to stay the night. I’m not trying to be a dick. It’s just the truth.”

She watches me closely for a minute, then enters the bathroom, shutting the door behind her. I hear the water run, and the sound of her brushing her teeth. I don’t know if Twyler is a virgin or not. She obviously has had a boyfriend, and despite her arguments otherwise, she’s a pretty fantastic kisser. But kissing and fucking are pretty far apart.

I’m still thinking about it when she emerges from the bathroom, still wearing my sweatshirt. Then there’s the bundle in her hands—another look down her legs and it’s clear what she’s holding. Her joggers. Fuck me.

I drag my eyes away from the lure of her pussy, but not before I see the flash of ink on her upper thigh. A tattoo?

Hell, I want to see it.

Just the sight of her climbing into bed wearing my shirt and no pants, does something to my insides. My cock? It raises a flag, like it wants to stake a claim. Mine.

But from my chair across the room, I know this girl isn’t mine to claim. Not in any real sense. I understand better what Nadia meant by her being vulnerable and not having men to count on. That fucking sucks about her dad, and I wish I’d been there when it happened to support her.

What I can do, is not fuck this up, and support her now.

I reach for the switch on the lamp on my desk. “Night, Sunshine,” I say, turning off the light.

Across the room, I hear her sigh at the nickname and after a beat, she replies, “Goodnight, Reese.”