Page 2 of Wicked Serve

I cock my head to the side. “Izzy.”

She gasps. “Take that back!”

“What back?” I say, feigning innocence.

“You know what.”

I kiss her again, hefting her onto the railing and stepping between her legs.

“Isabelle.” My fingertips tap down her spine, ribs expanding with precarious warmth. “My sunshine girl.”

Chapter 1

Izzy

August

I pick through the M&M’s packet for the rest of the yellows, jiggling my foot against the floor. I’m still flushed from practice, hair sticking to the back of my neck uncomfortably.

I spent the summer in dresses, chasing after vendors for my wedding planning internship, so aching legs and chafing after the first volleyball practice of the season is no big deal, but all the same, it’d be great if Coach Alexis could hurry. The longer I sit outside her office, the greater the temptation to check my phone.

It’s not like I’m expecting anything new. Nikolai hasn’t texted in two weeks. Two weeks is like two years when it comes to flings.

I work my way through the rest of the yellow M&M’s, then the orange. Why are there even brown ones? The fact that pink isn’t a standard color is practically criminal.

I give my phone a tiny peek. No notifications; I don’t even need to open my texts. The unfinished thread will still be there, taunting me, and that’s just going to make me want to get started on the green M&M’s, too.

I know I should delete it. My summer fling is over, and it involved way more dirty bits than feelings. But the last texts that Nik sent me aren’t something I can just forget, even if I woke up alone the morning after our last hookup.

I peer down the hallway. No Alexis yet. As soon as our team meeting ended, I ran upstairs to her office. She can’t ignore me if I’m right in front of her door, after all.

I open the thread.

N

You’re a beam of light in a person, Isabelle

So fucking beautiful

My heart squeezes tightly.

He can’t have meant it. If he meant it, maybe things would be different. It’s just a line, no matter how good, and the fact I’m still obsessing over it is several shades of pathetic. It doesn’t change the fact that what we had was casual. An exploration in attraction with no promise of anything deeper. A fun time, exactly what I’m good for, and one my family—especially my brother Cooper—absolutely can’t find out about. He and Nik are two of the top college defensemen in the country, captaining rival programs. They already got into one fight their sophomore year, and that was just because of hockey. The last thing I need is to encourage another, more personal one.

At least Nik is back in Massachusetts at UMass Amherst for his senior year, and I’m in New York at McKee University for my sophomore year. I’ve never been so grateful for state lines. Soon, I’ll forget his crooked smile, and how he handled my body with as much skill as his hockey stick, and especially the way he said my name—always my full name, Isabelle—like a velvet caress.

His mother was my boss this summer, and the first day of my internship, he sauntered into her office without knocking while she was out at lunch. He teased me until I realized who he was... and he called me Isabelle from the first introduction. Isabelle, not Izzy, like everyone else.

I can still see him in perfect detail: the blue button-down, sleeves rolled to the elbow. Messy hair, sharp eyes. He stole my M&M’s and didn’t even eat any—bastard—and scrawled his number on one of my pink sticky notes with a wink that made me go molten.

The rest of the day, I couldn’t stop thinking about the way my name sounded coming out of his mouth. I broke down and texted him, and somehow, the first kiss we shared felt like the hundredth. Once we started, I couldn’t help but let it happen all summer long.

I stare at those two brief texts until my vision blurs.

“Izzy?”

I whip my head up, shoving my phone into my bag. “Hi, Coach.”

Coach Alexis arches an eyebrow. She’s dressed casually, just in leggings and a McKee sweatshirt, but the full face of makeup and perfectly placed bleach-blond hair give her a sense of unsettling sophistication. Nik’s mother, Katherine, is equally glamorous, but she never made me squirm like Alexis can with a mere look.

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