Page 17 of Hat Trick

“That’s not his way,” I mutter to myself, sipping more of the hotchocolate.

I’ve known Marshall for years, and my first memory of him isn’t hockey-related. No, not at all. Accounting 201. While I’d known even then that PR was my future, I’d still been required to take certain businesscourses.

Accounting it was,then.

On the first day of class, Marshall sat directly behind me. Big, muscular. Without even knowing who he was, it’d still been obvious to me that he was an athlete. Mere mortal men don’t look like they can bench-press women over the age oftwenty.

Marshalldid.

His desk had creaked with his shifting weight, and the next thing I knew, his face was in my periphery, grinning devilishly as his full lips formed the words, “Gotta pen I canborrow?”

My eyes had caught on the pen hooked behind his right ear. “Think you’ve got that one covered,” I’d told him dryly, “but nicetry.”

Marshall Hunt wasn’t aquitter.

For the next week, he purposely stalled by the doorway next to the trashcan. Only when my gaze clashed with his did he theatrically dig out a pen from his backpack and drop it into thegarbage.

Every day I gave him a newpen.

The next day, he trashed it, making sure I witnessed the travesty to poor pens everywhere, and then asked me foranother.

As a way to start up conversation withyou.

Seeking out my hot chocolate like it’s spiked with booze, I try not to think of the disappointment in Marshall’s pewter eyes when I’d clued him in that I wasn’t single a few weeks into the semester, and that I was dating histeammate.

Ironic how we’ve come fullcircle.

“Gwen?”

I jolt at the sound of his voice, though I’ve been expecting it now for nearly fifteen minutes. My gaze lifts from my cup and collides with the bulge in hisjeans.

He’srightin front of me, literally inchesaway.

And so is his jean-coveredpackage.

Feeling heat rise to my cheeks, I hike my gaze up past his belt buckle, the Blades hoodie spanning his wide chest, and then up to his face. Chiseled features greet me, along with an arched brow and a twinkle in his grayeyes.

Oh,yeah.

He totally caught me oglinghim.

Embarrassment mingles with pride as I purposely take a long pull from my drink, daring him to call me out for my shameless once-over.

Thankfully, he lets me off the hook with a flashy grin and a nod to the cup between my legs. “That for me? You shouldn’t have,Gwenny.”

Without waiting for an answer, he drops to his haunches, without a care to anyone who might be watching. The air vacates my lungs in a swift exhale when his big hands settle on my knees and then inches themwide.

The hot chocolate drops from its tight hold, right into his grasp, and in the smoothest move I’ve ever seen, he slides his free hand up my thigh, blunt-tipped fingers skimming my skirt. He watches me over the rim of the cup as he takes a long pull of hisdrink.

The moment is over withinseconds.

Marshall takes the empty spot beside me on the bench, his hands wrapped around the Starbucks blend, his thighs spread wide, his right pressed to my left. Totally casual, as though he hasn’t made my legs quiver or my heart race withsomething.

Need.Lust.

Two things I’ve always been very careful not to allow myself to feel around MarshallHunt.

I’m so consumed with sudden images of him between my legs in a very different NSFW-way that I catch only the tail end of his sentence: “How long have you been a wannabe AaronBurr?”

---