Page 74 of The Grumpy Defenseman
“Sam,” he said against mymouth.
Warning.
Want.
Both.
“I know,” I whispered.
I kissed him once more anyway.
His hands tightened at the backs of my thighs, and for one second the kitchen went narrow around us. The counter at my back. His body in front of me. The bruise under the towel waiting to be iced again. The takeout going cold beside us because apparently noodles were no match for bad decisions and a shirtless defenseman with trust issues.
Then I pulled back.
Because one of us had to be reasonable.
It was very annoying that the one had to be me.
His forehead rested against my stomach for one second.
Then he said, very quietly, “Thank you.”
And that nearly finished me.
Not the bruise.
Not even the kiss.
The thank you.
The sound of a man who had finally let someone see the cost and had not been left alone with it.
Evan
The conference room had the particular smell of high-stakes negotiation: dry-erase markers and the controlled perspiration of men who were paid to remain calm while discussing numbers that could buy houses.
Four people in the room. Three across from me.
Mark, my agent, with his laptop angled so I could not see the screen, which meant the numbers on it were designed to motivate me, and he was not sure they would.
Silas Vane, tie loosened, but expression buttoned tight, leaning back with the practiced neutrality of a man who had learned silence could do half the work for him.
David Walsh, executive leadership in a tailored suit, present because risk always wanted a witness.
Sully was not at the table.
That told me plenty. The head coach belonged in these meetings. Defensive pairings for next year’s second line were a coach question, and what a trade did to Brick and the rookies was a coach question. If Sully had been in the room, the offer would have come with those questions attached.
Walsh did not want those questions.
Walsh wanted the deal.
Sully’s absence was a decision somebody had made that morning, and the decision said this was not a coach conversation. It was a front-office conversation with the agentattached.
And me.
Silas slid a folder across the table.
