Page 27 of Dirty Pucker

“Just the fact that you smiled more in two minutes of talking to her than I’ve seen you smile in a month.”

I roll my eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

My sister chuckles. “You like her. It’s so obvious.”

“Of course I like her,” I say. “She’s nice and funny and cool.”

“And drop-dead gorgeous,” Dakota adds.

“Yeah. That too.”

“And you’re totally into her,” she teases.

“We’re just friends,” I grumble. “She’s the team social media manager, so she offered to help me with my Instagram. It’s strictly professional.”

Dakota grins. “Uh-huh. Sure.”

Just then, Ingrid turns to show me her phone screen. I see that my Instagram post already has two thousand likes. That post has been live for not even ten minutes. No question it’s going to hit ten thousand likes by tomorrow night.

“What the…” I trail off when she shows me that she’s shared my post on her Instagram account, which has more than a million followers.

I look at her. “You cheater.”

She giggles. “You owe me a silly TikTok dance.”

A smile tugs at my mouth. I roll my eyes even though excitement flickers in my chest. I can’t wait to look like an ass on TikTok because it means I get to spend more time with Ingrid.

Chapter 10

Ingrid

“You want me to what?” Del frowns at me as he stands on the ice, decked out in his hockey gear.

I try my hardest not to laugh. Phone in hand, I carefully step toward him so I don’t fall since I’m not wearing skates.

“Just a few simple dance moves that are trending on TikTok.” I pull up a video of the dance and show it to him.

His eyebrows crash together. He looks pissed and bewildered all at once, and it’s honestly really cute.

He shakes his head. “Nope. I don’t dance,” he says, his tone gruff and hard.

I chuckle. “Fine. But you still owe me a TikTok. You lost our bet, remember?”

His forehead relaxes and that playful gleam in his eye returns. When I see the corner of his mouth twitch as his lips curve up in a smile, I feel tingles in my chest.

Maya was right when she said that Del doesn’t smile much. I think back to the other night, when we were hanging out at Spanky’s after the Bashers’ game. He didn’t smile much when he talked to the guys or his sister.

But every time he talked to me, he did.

That tingling feeling in my chest intensifies. I feel special knowing that I’m the only one who can get this fierce and grumpy hockey player to crack a smile.

It means he likes me, which isn’t exactly news…we almost kissed on day two of knowing each other because there’s an obvious physical attraction between us.

But it’s more than that. I’ve noticed the way Del talks and acts around other people. He frowns a lot. When he speaks, his tone can be pretty curt and harsh.

But when he talks to me, it’s a different story. His face relaxes. His tone is softer. He actually smiles. And he looks at me like I’m the only person in the room. And it makes me weak in the knees every single time.

I tilt my head at him. “You’re not going to get out of this,” I tease.

---