Page 103 of Going All In

“Not if you want it to happen later,” Darcy said. Jake’s smile widened before he motioned zipping his lips with his fingers. “Smart man.”

“I’m obviously highly intelligent since I managed to hook you.” Jake tucked her back into his body, his eyes twinkling, almost daring her to contradict him.

“Such a charmer.”

“You two are gross,” Lydia said. “Introduce me around and then you can go be sappy sweet in the corner or at home.”

“I swear, I should’ve made you go home,” Darcy said, but there was no malice in her tone. They were both very different people, but over the last month or so—really, since she started fake dating Jake—she liked to think that her relationship with her sister was improving. That they understood each other better.

“Oh please, you know I’m always a good time.” Lydia paused. “Not like that. Well, okay, maybe like that, and there’s nothing wrong with it,” she finished with a grin, and Darcy couldn’t stop her bark of laughter.

“Come on. I know just who to introduce you to,” Jake said. “Hey, Baz, get your burly ass over here,” he called out.

“This should be interesting,” Darcy said.

“The toothless one?”Lydia asked.

“Hey, most of us have a missing tooth or two. It’s part of the game. Baz just likes to play it up,” Jake said as the defenseman ambled over.

“What’s up, Jakey? Hey, Darcy, you still with this one?” Baz asked, gesturing toward Jake.

Darcy rested her head over Jake’s heart. “Of course.” Her voice held a dreamy tone, and he was this close to grabbing her and bailing on everyone. He was amped up from the game and from his most recent text from Ralph, which contained a few images from the watch photo shoot that were ready to go to print. It also included Ralph’s pathetic attempt to apologize for what he said about Darcy. Jake would accept that for now.

Things were falling into place and he had Darcy to thank. But he wanted to do more than thank her. But blurting out his love—his real, non-fake relationship love—for her at C&B wasn’t the right thing to do. She deserved flowers and candles and everything she ever wanted. And he didn’t want to do it in a public setting in case he’d been reading her wrong this entire time and she wanted to keep it casual.

He’d gone back and forth about this for more than a week now, and he was being ridiculous. He’d never told a woman he loved her before, so it was a big risk that could blow up in his face. He knew he’d never been pegged as the relationship guy. Was it too much to ask that Darcy look past that?

For fuck’s sake. He should be ecstatic about tonight’s win and his hat trick and every fucking thing else going on in his life, but the doubts crept in and he was turning into an emo irritation.

“You okay?” Darcy asked quietly. “You’re rethinking this introduction?”

He laughed. “Nope. I want to see what happens. They’re both crazy. I’m fine. Never better. We should get out of here and go celebrate.”

Her cheeks brightened to an enticing shade of pink, and he knew the flush would spread across her chest and her nipples would be hard little pebbles right now if he brushed his fingers against them.

Fucking hell. He ached to do just that.

He’d been so locked in his head that he’d missed Lydia and Baz introducing themselves; they were now joking about hockey butts and Baz was grabbing a shot glass that Lydia held out for him.

A few of the other guys came over to meet Darcy’s sister and she grinned at all of them.

He turned away from them to focus on his girlfriend. “I’m surprised your mom isn’t here.”

She groaned. And not in the naked-and-in-bed kind of way that he preferred. “She was brutal tonight. You waving at us during warmups didn’t help. She told the entire row in front of us—”

“How cute we are together?” he interjected with a smirk. He’d known exactly how her mother would react when he’d waved at them.

“Oh my god, yes. I mean, we are totally cute together, but she loves to tell strangers that fact.”

Jake leaned in, pressing a kiss to her head. “She’s just happy for you.”

“I know that,” Darcy grumbled. “She wanted to come, but my dad has an early surgery tomorrow, so he didn’t want to stay out late. But he was very excited to throw a hat on the ice for you. Do you know what they do with all those hats?”

“Donate them to charity, I think,” Jake said. “I’m glad you were there to witness it. They don’t happen very often. I’ve only had a handful of them in my career.”

“Me too,” she said before she tilted her head up and kissed his jaw, and then nipped it with her teeth.

He groaned low. “How long before we can bail?”

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