Page 23 of Puck My Heart

“A dozen, huh?” I kissed her soundly until she whimpered for me, and stole the necklace from her fingers while she was distracted, linking the fine chain around her neck. “Keep making sounds like that and wearing my old jerseys and I’ll let you test out your theories as much as you like.”

“Oh?” Anya ran her fingers over the necklace, cupping the flower I designed for her years ago at a jeweller back home. The sight of her wearing the piece—finally—turned my heart over in my chest. “What about you, Hux? How many fantasies do you want to play out?”

My sassy girl wiggled on my lap until I groaned and lifted her onto the bed, sliding my hands into the loose fitting sweats. She could keep wearing my clothes all she liked if I got to strip her out of them each day. “Just one, Annie. One I’ve been dying to play out since the day I didn’t get to give you that necklace.” I leaned in and kissed her again while she squirmed beneath me and slid my fingers lower, teasing the warm flesh of her soft belly.

“Hux, the door’s open,” she murmured.

“Your brother said the kitchen is out of bounds for a bit. Something about an avocado fetish. Get these off.” I tugged at the sweats, baring her on my old bed like a feast spread out before me.

Sure, I had a fantasy I wanted to play out, but that one could wait until the snow stopped falling. Right now, I needed to find out how fast she came on my tongue when the only thing she wore was an old jersey bearing my name.

Okay, so maybe it was two fantasies.

EPILOGUE

ANYA

Hux’s hand wound around mine as he strode ahead of me, patting down the snow as he went. Two days of weird-ass clear skies left the ground a little harder than I expected, though after I’d soaked my boots that still weren’t dry from my last sojourn into the snow I had no intention of sinking into the ground. Solace had donated a pair of his boots, and the boys double-socked me until I looked like a walking snow woman from the knees down.

My skates I hadn’t used for a really long time, and hoped I wouldn’t disgrace myself on, were slung over my shoulder. I followed Hux down to the pond below the house only a little antsy about his expectations of my skills versus reality.

Hallie and Solace had commandeered the gym in the basement for a round of… something. Suffice to say I wouldn't be going in there for a while. Or ever. Or using any gym equipment my brother touched after seeing the state of the squashed avocados that decorated the kitchen after their fetish endeavor.

Hux helped me played out a few of my own fantasies, then he fessed up to one of his…and now we were out for a day of apparently clean fun.

I wasn’t sure I wanted or trusted that but I wasn’t getting snowed on and the pond, when we broke through the trees, looked reasonably solid. I planted my butt on a log nearest the edge and swapped oversized boots for my ancient skates.

“You know I never skate. I’m gonna be crap at this.”

“It’s okay. This is my day job. I’ll make sure you’re okay. I don’t intend to take my hands off you, anyway, Annie.”

The way Hux looked at me and said my name, the way no one else ever had still left a frisson of anticipation rippling along my spine. I wasn’t sure which direction that went in just yet, but he said clean fun so…

“Let me help,” Hux muttered when I fumbled the double bow yet again. “Christ, girl. How did you graduate school?” But his mouth curled up in one of those sexy as sin smiles that took the edge off his words as he knelt to help tie my skates on, wrapping the extra long laces around my ankles twice and tied them off neatly.

“Thanks.” Warmth crept up my legs as he squeezed my ankles, reminding me of the way we started that morning just a few days ago, when I woke up to him playing with my feet.

A scene I wouldn’t mind doing over again maybe when my brother and his girlfriend left. We hadn’t talked about what life would look like after this, when we all returned to normal life, but I figured we would play it by ear and find out.

It wasn’t like I was going anywhere and I guessed I was about to find out what puck bunny life was like first hand. I’d always stayed well away from team events, leaving my brother and his friends to their own spotlight, preferring to hide away. Now I’d get my fill of something I never wanted…except for one man.

Hux distracted me, pulling me up onto my skates. I wobbled sideways for a second and gripped his arms.

“I wasnotready for that,” I warned him.

“You’ll get used to being in the deep end with me.” He pulled me in closer as I squeaked.

“Not cool, Hux.”

“Yeah?”

He glided across the ice before I could ask if it was safe, if we were likely to die, or if my ass would be wet by the end of this. As a teen, it was fun. As an adult, death loomed. His arms wrapped around me firmly, holding me close as we spun. My hair fluttered out behind us and I felt?—

Free.

He spun us away from everyone else and all the expectations and baggage and heartache andeverythingI accumulated from the last few years. In the space of a few short seconds it all just dropped away. Hux slowed his spiral into something easier, a long arc that took us around the edge of the pond and right across the middle, and slowly drifted us to a stop.

“That was…nice,” I whispered, unwilling to admit how much I liked it. “Just don’t let me go, okay?”

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