Page 40 of Hat Trick

“Not really,” Zoe tells me, “but it does help set the scene for the sexytimes.”

“Well,then!”

The elderly lady I’d spotted earlier smacks her carriage into mine as she angles past us in the narrow aisle. Behind a pair of wire-rimmed glasses, her blue eyes turn into slits. “Heathens,” she mutters. “Your generation has no common decency. You take up the aisle space, you steal the handicapped parking spaces without consideration for anyone else. You talkabout—”

“Sex?” Zoe offers up, crunching away on her chips like this is the best form of entertainment she’s had in months. “Hey, Gwenny, did Hunt spank you, by anychance?”

So much for keeping this between us. To support the cause, I nevertheless swallow down my embarrassment and fake a casual smile. “Only once. I guess I haven’t been a bad enough girl for anythingmore.”

The woman’s lips part and, with a shake of her head, she gives a hand-shove to my cart before marching down the rest of the aisle and turning thecorner.

For a moment, Zoe and I stand insilence.

Then, “You think she hasn’t gotten laid inyears?”

I cover a laugh with my hand. “I was thinking that she might have some pent-up aggression toward anyone under the age ofeighty.”

“Heathens,” Zoe agrees with a sage nod, “the lot ofus.”

We both erupt into laughter, and I wrap my arm around my best friend’s shoulders to touch the side of my head to her shoulder. For a girl who never allowed herself to have true friends, the last year has been something of an awakening forme.

I don’t have blood sisters, but Zoe and Charlie fill a hole in my heart I never even realized I’d beenmissing.

Zoe demands I open my mouth for a chip to, and I quote, “Prove that you are a plebeian like the rest ofus.”

I’m fully aware that not everyone grew up the way I did with butlers and chefs and a mother who couldn’t be bothered with myexistence.

To be honest, I wouldn’t recommend my childhood to anyoneeither.

As we turn the corner, Zoe latches back onto our earlier conversation with barracuda-like claws. “So,” she says, “you, Hunt,sex.”

“Facetimesex.”

“Ah.” Zoe winks at me. “So itwasFaceTime. A-plus quality and allthat.”

“You’reinsane.”

“Not as insane as you. You and Hunt went from deciding that no sex was happening at all, and then you got down and dirty while he was away at agame.”

When she puts it that way, I totally am insane. Marshall and I have always had chemistry—in some capacity or another—but I’ve never let myself dwell too long on it. What good would it do when I didn’t have plans to sleep with him? But the way we were last night . . . the way he looked with his hand wrapped around his cock, every lingering protest in medied.

Hearing him order me to come, to stroke myself for him . . . it did it for me. Marshall pushed me over the edge with nothing but the deep timbre of his voice and the visual of his hardbody.

In a whisper, I carve up my heart and spill it all to my best friend. “I worry I’m going to be in over my head soon, Zo. What if it’s all part of a plan or something?” Insecurities rise up—particularly those that deal with wondering if I’m even good enough for a guy like Marshall. “What if he’s just giving me a taste of my own medicine after all these years? Like, she fucked with me and now I’m going to mess with her emotions inreturn.”

We step in line at the nearest register, and I push the carriage up to the conveyorbelt.

“I’d kick his ass,” Zoe tells me, and then gives me a littlenudge.

I follow the direction of her gaze, only to swallow hard at the sight of Marshall on aSports Illustratedcover. Since I’m not his publicist—he opted to sign with Harris Publicity during his farm team days—I had no idea that he’d been chosen to represent the month ofDecember.

I skim the cover, taking in the headline: Marshall Hunt Brings Heat To The Ice. And then, directly below: No Other Player Has Scored As Many Hat Tricks In A Single Season. Will The Streak Continue? Hunt Explains How Hockey Is More Than Just A Test Of PhysicalStrength.

In nothing but his navy-blue uniform pants, Marshall rests his hockey stick across the back of his shoulders. His upper body is a work of art—rippling muscles, tattooed arms, smooth, tan skin with a dusting of hair on his chest that narrows into a thin happytrail.

Last night, I had the chance to see where that trail led, and it washeaven.

“Ma’am, are youready?”

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