Total pages in book: 156
Estimated words: 155203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 776(@200wpm)___ 621(@250wpm)___ 517(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 155203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 776(@200wpm)___ 621(@250wpm)___ 517(@300wpm)
So I leave my beer on the kitchen counter and shrug. “Let’s go.”
CHAPTER SIX
RYDER
No kiss goodbye?
I SLEPT THROUGH MY ALARM.
Fucking hell.
I hurl myself out of bed like a rocket, taking half the comforter with me. Carma whimpers in her sleep from the heat loss. Her bare legs and pink panties now exposed, she curls over and tucks her knees up.
I don’t typically do sleepovers, especially during the season, but we were both pretty exhausted last night, and I felt bad telling her she couldn’t crash. I did make it clear I had to be up at six, but Carma shrugged it off. Said if she was still asleep when I got up, don’t wake her. Just lock up, and she’d leave through the back door.
I fly into the bathroom, wondering how the fuck I managed to sleep through my alarm. Since I got to Briar, I’ve been setting the alarm for six to be at the rink for seven. I always go early to train, even though practice doesn’t technically start till nine. Carma and I didn’t even stay up that late. We crashed around midnight.
I’m so pissed at myself right now. It takes fifteen minutes to drive to campus. I won’t even have time to eat breakfast. Goddamn it.
Why didn’t the others wake me? They usually leave around eight. They would’ve seen my Jeep in the driveway.
Furiously brushing my teeth, I scroll one-handed on my phone to call Shane.
“Yo,” he answers. “Where are you?”
“At home. Why didn’t you guys wake me?”
“I don’t know. We figured you were taking a day off from your overachiever routine and showing up to practice at a normal time like a normal person.”
Ha. He calls it overachieving. I call it being a hockey player.
“I slept through my alarm. I’m on my way now, though. Can you have a coffee waiting for me in the locker room so I can chug it while I gear up?”
“Anything for you, darling.”
I return to my room, where I dress quietly while Carma continues to sleep. She’s wormed her way back under the comforter and cocooned herself in it.
Since she asked me not to wake her, I leave her in my bedroom and take the stairs two at a time. I lock the front door and throw myself into the driver’s seat a moment later.
When I turn the key in the ignition, the Jeep doesn’t start.
Mother.
Fucker.
Not now.
I cannot fucking deal with this right now.
I waste about five minutes of precious time trying to start the engine, but the vehicle is dead as a doornail. I then release a series of expletives that would horrify even the filthiest of mouths.
Back in my bedroom, I’m done catering to Carma’s beauty sleep.
“Hey.” I shake her awake. “Do you have a car?”
She blinks drowsily. “Yeah…why?”
Relief pours into me. Oh, thank fuck. “I need you to drive me to practice. Please.”
“But it’s so early.”
“No, it’s late. I should have been there at seven, but I slept through my alarm.”
“I changed it,” she says groggily.
I freeze in place. “What?”
“I changed the alarm on your phone. You said your practice was at nine, so I don’t know why you had to set the alarm for six—”
“Because I go for seven,” I snap, practically vibrating from the anger that surges through me. “I can’t believe you changed my fucking alarm.”
And then, right on cue, to add insult to injury, my phone alarm starts blaring.
She reset the damn thing to eight thirty.
“Eight thirty?” I growl. “Are you kidding me right now? It takes fifteen minutes just to drive there. How am I supposed to suit up and be on the ice at nine—” I stop talking.
Jesus fucking Christ. There’s no point even arguing right now.
I exhale a long, calming breath.
“My car won’t start,” I say flatly. “I need a ride. I would’ve gone with my roommates, but they left already.”
“Please don’t be mad at me.” She’s wide awake now and jumping out of bed. “I didn’t realize it was such a big deal.”
It’s difficult not to snap at her. Who randomly sleeps over at a hookup’s house and then changes his alarm? I’m close to exploding again. So I ignore her while she gets dressed and call Shane back.
“Hey,” I say urgently. “I’m going to be late. Try to cover for me with Jensen if you can. Tell him my car broke down.”
“I told you that Jeep was going to fuck you over one day.”
Sure, it was the Jeep that fucked me over.
I’ve never been late for practice a day in my life. And while I hate being reliant on anyone other than myself, there are zero drivers available on any of the ride apps, so I have no choice but to catch a ride with Carma. Luckily, the fire I light under her ass does its job. She and I are jogging out the door and across the street to her driveway less than five minutes later.