Page 50 of Pucks and Likes

Peepaw sets me with a look, his chest heaving. “The hell I didn’t. But also, they weren’t carrying on with them throughout the arena.”

Alex goes to say more, but I pat his chest. “Fine. It won’t happen again.”

“You’re damn right, because this is over,” he announces, looking between us. He then sets me with a demanding and authoritative look that has me itching to rebel. “You can’t work for me and date the players.”

My jaw drops as my breath catches, but not in a good way. How dare he! He tried this with Austen, but she left him for the Assassins. Who the hell am I going to run to? Panic seeps into my core, but before I can even fathom what the hell to say next, Alex laughs.

“Again, sorry but not sorry. We aren’t dating. We’re in a relationship.”

“End it,” he demands, and once more, Alex’s crazed laughter fills the hallway.

“No can do. She’s the mother of my child.”

Then his hand lands on my stomach.

Peepaw’s eyes about come out of his fucking head before he looks at me with undiluted shock, anger, hatred—I mean, you name it, it’s in his gaze. Beside me, confident and cocky as ever, Alex says, “I love her, Mr. Davenport, and I intend to continue to love her and raise our child with her.”

All I can do is stand there.

And wait for the floor to open up and swallow me whole.

CHAPTER 22

Alex

I’m pretty sure Dan Davenport is about to blow a gasket.

Or have a heart attack.

Maybe even both.

Beside me, Elliot is slack-jawed, her eyes pleading with me to calm the fuck down. I don’t know why. She knows how I am. I don’t hide a bit of what I’m feeling, and my mom always tells me if my mouth doesn’t say it, my face will. The only time that’s different is when I’m on the ice. On the ice, I’m focused and blank-faced because I’ve got to win. When it comes to Elliot, all that goalie training doesn’t mean a thing.

I’ll be damned if someone is going to come between her and me. We are finally getting somewhere. She is smiling more, and my self-assurance when it comes to her is growing at a rapid rate. She wants me. She wants us. I just have to knock down the rest of the walls that she has up.

I’ve got this.

We’ve got this.

She is mine forever.

And no one will make her feel any kind of way except happy.

He leans in, his eyes crazed as he seethes to the mother of my child, “You’re pregnant?”

I don’t like that even one bit.

I step in front of her, my eyes meeting his, and he instantly takes a step back. Smart man. He’s a big dude, but I’m way bigger.

“Yes, she is. With my child. And I know this is a shock and not how we wanted to tell you, but here we are. Nothing, and I mean nothing, will come between Elliot and me. So, the choice is yours. Would you like to be in our lives and know your great-grandchild, or would you like to fuck right the fuck off?”

“Alex!” Elliot scolds, pushing me to the side and setting me with a look. “Like you said, this is a shock. Give him some grace.”

I shake my head. “I won’t. He won’t speak to you like you’ve done something wrong.”

Something flashes in her eyes, and the guilt eats at me. I hate it. I just want her to let it the fuck go! She looks at her grandfather—or peepaw, a name I still don’t understand. Who came up with Peepaw, and why aren’t they in a mental institution?

She shifts her shoulders back a bit, and her pleading gaze meets mine once more. “Please,” she asks in a way that has my heart squeezing in my chest.

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