Page 97 of The Game Plan
But he’s also a player – on and off the ice – who doesn’t take anything in life seriously. He’s three years my junior but that feels like a gulf.
Yet, right now, that also appeals a lot more than a forty-year-old heading for a midlife crisis.
“You don’t think this little white dress is flirtatious, Sienna?”
The drinks are going to my head because the way he says my name travels from his mouth to my panties like a speed train.
“See. You’re overstepping boundaries, Jax, and that’s why I made a conscious decision to stay on the bride’s side of the chapel.”
That ghost of a smile is back, dancing in eyes the color of his costume. “Okay, I’ll go back to my side of the room. You let me know when you’re ready to let your hair down, won’t you?”
Scowling, I rouge my Marilyn wig. “My hair is down.”
“Sure.” He starts backing away, his bell-bottoms floating around his heeled boots. “By the way, where’s your ring?”
He holds up his big fat Elvis fancy dress ring and it takes me a beat to realize he means…
“Your engagement ring.”
“Long story.” I shrug, biting down on my lip.
He holds out his arms from his sides, as if to say, I’ve got time. He hasn’t, not for a long, drawn-out story and drunken tears of a woman whose pride has been crushed.
So I rip off the Band-Aid, nice and quick. “Carl’s been banging our secretary.”
On reflection, that wasn’t the most appropriate way to respond because it seems to stun the fun right out of the party boy.
“That explains the foul mood.”
“Hey!”
I’m affronted, until he laughs, and I have to fight against my lips’ betrayal as they curve up.
“For the record,” he says, stepping nearer to me. “He’s a fucking idiot.”
This is Jax, being the perennial good vibes he always is, or flirting on autopilot. Still, it’s kind of him to say.
“For the record, I don’t have to be in a foul mood just because two days ago my fiancé and business partner fucked our secretary and I’m staring down the barrel of two bullets.”
“Two bullets?”
I sigh and quickly offload my options to keep working for Carl, as his employee, whilst he’s screwing Marcela. Or leave the company I’ve built, throw it all away, and be deported to small-town Canada.
* * *
Jax
“I think you deserve another drink, Sienna, you’re all shook up.”
“Elvis puns?”
“Ahaha.”
“I really do need another drink.”
“Ah, love me tender, baby,” I drawl.
Her eyes widen as I deliver the pet name. Having worked with Sienna enough times, I know she’s always a professional. Stoic, even. Never once slut-shamed me.
