Page 54 of Perfect Score

“He’s a lucky man. But then again, so am I,” he says.

I hear my grandmother giggle, and Zoey turns to me.

“Should we get something to eat before we meet everyone for ice skating?”

She doesn’t address what my grandmother just said but I know she heard it too.

“Yeah, I’m starving. I haven’t eaten since this morning.”

“Me either,” she says.

We turn and head for the buffet table.

I let her step in front of me in line.

She grabs a crisp white dinner plate and a bundle of silverware that’s wrapped in a Christmas green napkin. I follow behind her and pick up the same.

“Hey, sorry for all the wedding talk. She’s just excited but after this weekend, I’ll set it straight,” I assure her.

We take a couple of steps forward, following the line of people ahead of us.

I can’t see her face, so I take the opportunity to study her long chestnut hair, which cascades down her back, stopping just past her shoulder blades. It’s the same color it was in high school, with its light caramel highlights from the sun. Though there’s less of them now. Probably since she’s been living in Seattle for the last year.

I remember staring at the back of her hair in Spanish class. My fingers itching to reach out and run my hands through it to feel how soft it is.

Now I know from touching her skin last night that every inch of her feels like silk.

Especially between her thighs—Jesus Christ, the way she felt when she came on my fingers.

I hold myself back from the temptation to reach out and touch her skin again.

I’m already walking a thin line as it is, and getting any closer will only make things worse between us.

She might have given me license to do something to her that I've fantasized about for years but she won't let that happen again.

“Your gran is pretty great,” she says.

I follow where she’s looking like her head is turned toward the dance floor instead of the line in front of us.

She continues to take additional steps as the line moves up and we inch closer to the food.

"Yeah, she is," I say as we both take another step forward in line.

"You know… it's not such a bad thing that she wants you to be happy."

"Settling down with the wrong person won't make me happy. I either find the right one or I don't. I'd rather be alone than attached to someone for companionship. It's as simple as that." And that's the truth if she really wants it.

Besides, there's more to it than that.

The truth is that I’ve lost a lot of people that I love. Either from death or from just straight walking away when I didn’t give them what they wanted from me, like Liam. And the professional sports world is cutthroat.

How much pain can a human endure in their lifetime before the pain gets so intense that they just stop breathing?

There were days after my parents died that I thought I might die from crying so hard. How can a person hurt that much and still live?

How can your best friend, who you saw as a brother and the captain of your high school hockey team, turn his back on you just because he’s jealous of the one and only good thing that has happened for me—my NHL contract?

The world took my parents from me, and then he took Zoey. Didn’t I deserve something? Didn’t I work my ass off for that contract?

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