Page 5 of Playoffs & Promises

"Don't you have somewhere else to be?" Tipping my head back so he can see my glare at him. "I hear the competition for village idiot is starting downtown."

His stupidly handsome face remains unfazed. Not even his square jaw clenches, and there's not even a hint of a brow lifting. He's completely unbothered by my retort. Although there is a spark of something in his honey eyes.

"I don't have a membership for such things. Good to know you do."

My jaw drops at his implication. "I most certainly do not."

He lifts his broad shoulders in a casual shrug, "How else would you know where they're competing?"

"Why do you have to be so—" my brain struggles for a word to complete the insult, "just, ugh!"

He wins this round of insults and I hate him all the more for it. I turn my back to him and have to set down my bag of groceries in order to open my apartment door.

I'm careful as I step next to the lemons so I don't accidentally step on them. Grandmother would roll over in her grave if I wasted produce.

"Need a hand?" Lou asks me.

"Take all the lemons you want," I tell him.

"Oh, I couldn't." He places a hand on his muscled chest like a good Southern woman steadying herself from a shock. His eyes are wide as he says, "I wouldn't know the first thing to do with them."

"Well you buy them often enough you should," I told him.

He most certainly did know something to do with lemons, because there had been that infamous day we'd first met in the produce aisle, that he conveniently pretended didn't happen. I know though and I'm not going to forget about it anytime soon. He can ignore the incident all he wants, but he'll live to regret it. I'll make him as many lemon desserts as it takes to refresh his memory.

He drops the mockery of shock and barely hides his snicker as he says, "Just trying to ensure I get my lemon bars."

"I should ban you from those too," I mutter under my breath.

Lou is on my banned customer list. Unfortunately, my best friend Lia took pity on Lou and since she's engaged to his friend and teammate, she didn't enforce the ban. Lemon bars are the only thing I allow Lou to have now and even those were supposed to be an insult reminding him of the day we met. A day he pretends not to remember.

The day in the supermarket when we'd reached for the last bag of lemons at the same time, only his hockey reflexes were much faster and his arms much longer than mine. I'd been so startled by his hulking handsomeness I'd sputtered some half-coherent offer to split the bag. Then the store clerk threatened to call security on me.

I hang my purse on the hook next to the door and put my keys on the hook next to that. Turning back for the lemons, I find Lou has picked up all of them. He's holding two bags in each hand.

"Where do you want these?" He asks.

"I'll take them." I move to take a bag out of his hand, my hands barely touch the closest bag.

"Maria."

The sound of him saying my name, makes me pause, and I stare at my hands.

"Where do you want me to put them?"

Of course, he'll only do what he wants to do. Why would he even care what I want?

Pulling my hands away, I straighten my shoulders and stand up straight. "The kitchen would be great."

I step aside, and he enters my apartment and strides past my couch for the kitchen. I close my apartment door quickly and follow behind him. He places the bags on the square table big enough for four normal-sized humans. Lou makes the oak table look like it was made for kids because he has to have all the muscles to skate around the ice. I can only imagine how much bigger he must look with all the pads on.

He looks around the room since it's the first and only time I'll be letting him in. I immediately wonder what he's thinking and second-guess my choice of decor when I notice him staring at the bright color accents. The lease didn't let me make more drastic changes or there would be more color on my walls. Instead, I'd settled for red hand towels, blue and green dishes, and a painting from my cousin leaned up against the wall waiting for when I'd get around to hanging it up. But the counters are clean, and the dishes are clean.

I point at my kitchen table. "You can put the lemons there."

The bags of lemons thud on the table as he drops them onto it.

"Careful!" I chastise him and hurry to put my groceries on the counter so I can save the lemons from his mistreatment.

---