Page 9 of Rookie Move

Nope. Stop looking, dammit.

Seriously, she’d never had this problem before. She’d bailed from his room that night. It’d seemed like a one-night deal. But she still wanted him. Maybe because she shouldn’t want him. Don’t you always want what you can’t have?

Yes. That must be the reason she couldn’t stop thinking about him, and what he could do with his fingers and his tongue and all of the rest of him.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

He looked up in time to catch her creepily staring at him. He tilted his head to the side in question.

She shook her own head and turned to focus on where she was going—and almost walked right into the side of the guesthouse.

She pulled up short, an awkward laugh bubbling up.

She was a damn disaster.

She slipped into the guesthouse before she could do anything else, like faceplant into the door or something.

She quickly changed into another dress and applied stain remover to the other one and was back on her way across the lawn to the house. She would get it together and stop acting like a spaz.

“Rylie, come hang out with us,” Amanda said. The captain’s girlfriend was seated at the firepit with a few of the other WAGs.

Rylie had met a handful of them over the last two years, but since she’d been away at school for the bulk of the seasons, she hadn’t gotten to know any of them well. Though they’d always seemed like a fun group. She knew she would be working with them more since a lot of the WAGs helped with the Strikers’ charity foundation.

She grabbed a beer from one of the large coolers and headed toward them.

“Hi, everyone. Having fun?” she asked.

There was a chorus ofyesesas she took an empty chair next to Penny, Harty’s fiancée, if the massive rock on her finger was anything to go by.

“You’re working for the team now, right?” Amanda asked.

“Yep. Started a few weeks ago. In marketing,” she said, taking a sip of her beer. She could only imagine what they thought of her. Young girl, newly graduated, and working for a team her father coached.

“That’s great. You interned for another team before. I think Cheese mentioned it,” Amanda said. Rylie let out a small sigh of relief. The judgment she’d assumed wasn’t there.

“Yeah. AHL level, so this is a bit bigger,” she said, and then laughed.

“I know you’ll get to work with us on the foundation events, but if you need anything, like wrangling the guys to participate, let me know,” Amanda said.

Penny laughed. “She’s very pushy, but she means well.”

Amanda shrugged. “I’m pushy for a good cause.”

“Of course you are,” Penny said, then turned her attention back to Rylie. “If you need anything, let us know.”

“And now that we have you here, are we really getting a dog?” Amanda asked.

Rylie grinned. She’d been finalizing the details for the last two weeks. The team’s general manager and the owner had approved her idea faster than she’d expected, but they’d wanted to get a dog in time for the season to start. Good PR and all that.

“Where did you hear that?” she asked, trying to play it off.

“I overheard Brenda talking about it when I stopped in to deal with foundation stuff. I love the idea of getting a puppy for the team to socialize. So many teams are doing it already, and who doesn’t love puppies?”

Rylie laughed. “That’s exactly how I pitched it. I’m finalizing everything, but hopefully we’ll have a new teammate before the first regular-season game.”

“Fantastic,” Amanda said. “Any chance we can bring him to our events?”

“I’ll have to check, but our goal is to socialize him in all situations, so I don’t see why that would be a problem.”

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