Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 91213 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 456(@200wpm)___ 365(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91213 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 456(@200wpm)___ 365(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
“What do they look like?” she asks hesitantly, because this is the first I’ve shared with her about my lucky underwear. I wear them to every play-off game, so they are quite tattered because they get washed almost daily, and now that I think about it, I’ve never won a Stanley Cup before, so why in the fuck I consider them lucky is beyond me.
Whatever…I can’t break the streak now.
“They’re black with a gray band,” I explain to her, miming with my hands at my waist. “Old. The band is frayed.”
She dips her head and covers her mouth with her hand, trying to hide her amusement from me as I turn back to dig through the next set of drawers.
“Simone,” I bellow as I straighten up and push past Jules. When I get to my bedroom door, I stick my head out. “Have you seen my lucky underwear?”
“I moved all your underwear to the tall dresser,” she calls back. “Check there.”
“Goddammit,” I mutter, and let out another string of curses as I stalk to the tall dresser to rummage through. When I don’t find them in the first drawer, I yell out pissily to Simone, “And stay the hell out of my shit.”
“I think someone could use a good orgasm about now,” Stephanie murmurs from behind me, and I hear the bedroom door shut.
As I’m tossing clothing left and right, she presses into my back and wraps her arms around my waist. A slight thrill courses through me, but doesn’t in any way diminish my anger over not finding what I need. I don’t acknowledge her touch, though, needing first to lay my hands on my briefs.
Stephanie’s not deterred, however, as she’s a bold and sensual woman. Her hand drops down to cup me between the legs and desire courses through me, but I push it away because finding my fucking underwear is just more important right now, and fuck…I sound like a girl.
This pisses me off even more, causing me to shrug her off. “Not now, Steph. I’ve got to find that underwear.”
She steps away from me without a word and I push the guilt down for this rough treatment. I’ll make it up to her later.
After the game.
“What can I do to help?” she asks softly.
“Aha!” I yell out in victory, holding up my ratty-looking boxer briefs. “Found them.”
Chuckling, she mutters, “Crisis averted.”
It’s not a laughing matter, though. This was some serious superstition that could have ruined everything if I hadn’t found them. I give her a cursory glance and ask her in a brisk voice as I turn to throw my drawers in my game bag, “You’re going to stay the night here again, right? After the game, you’re coming back here with me.”
“Actually, I’m not,” she returns in a calm, even tone.
My body locks tight and I turn to her in disbelief. “What?”
“Remember,” she says slowly, as if I’m a kindergartner. “They’ve asked me to come in to work tomorrow and I agreed. I have to be in too early, so I told you I was staying at my place.”
I scrub a hand through my hair in frustration as Stephanie watches me guardedly. “You can’t just get up a little earlier to make it into work?”
“Lucas, no,” she chastises me…again, like I’m a child. “It’s going to be a late night as it is with the game, and then I know there’s going to be a celebration after because y’all are going to kick Florida’s ass. It’s just easier to stay at my apartment.”
“Fine,” I snap at her before whipping around and stomping to the closet. I pull out a suit, throw it onto the bed, then turn back to my tie rack to select one.
As I flip through them, I bring up a bit of a sore subject with me, and since I’m a little bit—okay a lot—irritable today, I say, “Max told me that you are going to take Annabelle’s class over to the nursing home Jules works at.”
I look at her briefly and she blinks in surprise that I would know this. Why the fuck would that bother her?
“Um, yeah,” she says carefully, and perhaps she’s reading my pissy vibes or something. “We’re looking to do it week after next.”
“And you couldn’t have told me this why?” I ask a little petulantly—okay, like a snotty-nosed brat—as I snag a butter-yellow tie.
Her jaw is locked tight when I look back to her. She speaks through partially clenched teeth when she says, “I didn’t realize I had to tell you everything I did.”
Wrong fucking words for the mood I’m in right now. “I’d be grateful if you just told me something you did. Anything at all I’d be grateful for.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asks indignantly.
“It means you hold yourself in reserve most of the time and you’re not a big sharer,” I mutter before turning back to my closet to grab my dress shoes. “Getting close to you is like trying to break into Fort Knox, and I’m beginning to think it’s insurmountable and I wonder if you do it on purpose.”