Page 34 of The Pucking Proposal

“Sexiest thing I’ve ever seen,” I hiss. I shift my hips, trying to give my painful cock some relief, but find none. I push back into my heels, standing slowly and adjusting myself.

“Your turn,” she says with an expectant smile.

I want to slide inside her. At a minimum, I want to jack off and coat her with my cum, mark her so she sleeps with me on her.

So this is going to be the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

I step away.

When Joy realizes that I’m not reciprocating but am instead leaving, she gasps in horror and reaches for her shirt, holding it over her tits. “You’re an asshole, One-Night,” she snarls.

I flinch at the name I’ve always hated, but especially hate on her lips. “Your pussy is mine, whether you admit it or not. This isn’t over.”

I sound sure of myself, but when I walk out, I pray I’m doing the right thing and haven’t destroyed any chance I have with Joy Barlowe.

Chapter 15

Joy

Dalton calls on Sunday, and again on Tuesday. I don’t answer.

On Wednesday, he texts me.

Going home for the rest of the week. Miss you.

Pshaw, I think.You miss jacking off with me and are regretting not doing it Saturday night when you had the chance. Because that’s all this is, all it’s ever been, and all it ever will be—a physical scratch we’re both using to cure an itch.

Eventually, the season will be over and his pregame ritual won’t be needed any longer.

He’ll keep playing like the awesome goalie he is, and one day, he’ll meet some puck bunny who charms her way from his dick up to his cold heart, and I’ll be just another funny story about how he got through that one season back in the day.

Because of that, I don’t tell him to travel safely, or say I miss him back. I simply put my phone away and go back to watchingFalling Inn Loveon the Hallmark Channel. At the end, when there’s no one to dissect the plot holes and level ten stupidity of the character’s choices, I look at the other end of the couch, and then my phone. But instead oftexting Dalton, I decide to make popcorn. It’s a poor excuse for what’s usually the best part of movie-watching with Dalton.

On Thursday, around noon, he sends me a picture of a plate loaded with a Thanksgiving feast and the wordyum.

I still don’t respond. I’m too embarrassed, too furious, and too confused.

At least there are no games this week, so it doesn’t affect the team, which is all that matters. Right?

“Penny for your thoughts,” Hope says as she comes into the kitchen and invades my bubble to bump into my shoulder, grinning unapologetically. Instead of answering her or returning fire, I hand her a stack of plates, which she adds to the piles on the island in preparation for our holiday dinner.

Hope and Ben flew in last night, and in the less than twenty-four hours since, they’re already going stir-crazy from staying at Mom and Dad’s house. It’s not that our family home is particularly tiny, but the guest room’s full-size bed wasn’t the comfiest for the two of them to share after scrunching up in the small airplane seats on the overcrowded holiday flight. And then there’s the fact that Mom and Dad have apparently grown accustomed to the empty nest lifestyle, and despite Mom’s repeated reminders that they have guests, Dad walked to the kitchen in his tighty-whities like it was no big deal. He grabbed his morning cup of coffee, told a horrified Hope and chuckling Ben “Happy Thanksgiving,” and strutted back down the hall, sipping on his caffeine to start the day.

Hope deemed it the worst way to wake up ever and said she might need to invest in eye bleach and therapy. I feel sorry for them, but not sorry enough to offer my fold-out couch or share my single bathroom. Not when they’re still newlyweds, doing what newlyweds do ... quite often, I suspect.

“Good to have you home,” I tell her as if that’s what I was thinking about. It’s the truth, I am glad to see Hope and have her here for a few days, but it’s not what I was ruminating on while getting dishes out of the cabinets, and she knows it.

“Good to be home ...mostly.” She rolls her eyes, and I know she’s thinking about this morning again. “But what’s up with you? Something’s off, and my twinny spidey-senses are itching my brain because I can’t figure it out.” She makes scratchy hands near her head, taking care to not muss her perfectly fixed hair, and peers at me thoughtfully.

I shouldn’t tell her. I should absolutely, 100 percent, not tell her a thing because it’s a huge risk. She can’t control her face, and we’re about to sit down to a holiday dinner with the one person I most need to keep in the dark—my brother. But also ... I’ve always told my sister everything, and I could really use her take on what the hell happened at the festival, and more importantly, after it.

“You have to promise not to tell Shepherd,” I answer.

Hope’s eyes bug open and her mouth drops in surprise, but it takes only a split second for her to fix her expression into one of utter seriousness that says I can totally trust her. “I won’t. There are lots of things I don’t tell him.”

I’m sure that’s true. These days, there are things she doesn’t tell me, too, and as hard as that is to consider, we’re adults on different paths with full-spectrum lives outside of each other now. It’s not like the old days when we shared a bedroom, classroom, and friend group and were basically living the same life side by side. But I’m still making a choice for both me and Dalton to bring someone else in on our arrangement.

I’m just that desperate for some objective reality on all this.

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