Page 13 of Suck My Puck

She smiles up at him. “I’m kidding. You know how happy I am.”

He flashes a relieved smile and kisses the top of her head. “I booked you a prenatal massage this weekend at that spa your sister recommended.”

Lauren’s face lights up. “You did?”

He nods. “Massage, pedicure, and facial.”

She reaches up and pulls Lance down for a kiss. When they break apart, they’re both beaming at each other.

“So sweet. You two make me sick,” I joke.

Lauren chuckles and sips her cocoa as Lance walks back to the register. “How are you holding up?” she asks me. “You’ve been putting in late shifts at Spanky’s every night and working here almost every morning.”

I yawn. “Surprisingly well. Turns out I need only about five hours of sleep to operate like a humanbeing.”

Her hazel eyes shine with concern. “Lance and I appreciate you helping us at the coffee shop so much. But you know you can take a break, right? You don’t need to help out every morning.”

I pat her leg. “I do though. I need the money.”

She undoes her long, blonde hair from her messy bun and ties it into a ponytail. She shakes her head like she’s annoyed. “I swear to god, if I ever see Matt again, I’m going to kick that jerk in the balls for what he did to you.”

I let out a heavy sigh. “I should have known better.”

She grabs my hand. “Hey. Don’t you dare blame yourself for what he did. You moved from Denver to Toronto for that jackass. You bought a house with him. You supported him and cheered him on while he focused on his hockey career. And how did he repay you? By cheating on you. Multiple times.”

I shake my head. “I still can’t believe it.” My cheeks heat with embarrassment. “Like, how did I not know?”

“Because he was a sneaky motherfucker,” Lauren says without missing a beat. She squeezes my hand. “Seriously, stop blaming yourself, Bella. You couldn’t have known.”

I nod despite how I truly feel. I should have noticed that something was off. Matt was always cagey with his phone. He never let it out of his sight, even when we were just hanging out at home. And he never let me use his phone, even for little things, like to look up directions or check the time.

Looking back, that should have been red flag number one.

Red flag number two was the way he handled his female fans.

Being the girlfriend of a hockey player for almost four years, I knew that overzealous female fans came with theterritory. But sometimes we’d be out and female fans would come up and kiss Matt on the cheek or slip him their phone number or ask him to autograph their boobs. He was always happy to play along.

I tried to brush it off at first, but after years of seeing my boyfriend flirt with other women in front of me, I finally told him how much it bothered me. But he just brushed it off.

“It comes with the gig, babe,” he said to me. “You know how a lot of women act around athletes. They lose their minds. It’s harmless. Besides, I don’t want to alienate fans. I need their support if I wanna make it to the next level.”

So I bit my tongue while I watched my boyfriend openly flirt with other women…and eventually discovered that he had been cheating on me with a lot of them.

I think back to the day I found out.

I surprised him at his hotel during one of his away games. When I knocked on the door of his room, I expected him to answer. But instead, two women in lingerie met me at the door. And there he was, lying on the bed naked…

My chest tightens. I shove the memory out of my brain.

“You should sue his ass for all the money he owes you,” Lauren says, pulling me back to the present.

I shake my head. “Nothing he did was illegal. Unfortunately.”

Lauren gives me a pitying look.

“I was stupid enough to follow him to Toronto. I was stupid enough to use all my savings to buy a house with him. I thought we’d be together forever. I thought he’d make good on his promise to me…” I trail off when that ache in my chest deepens.

When Matt and I were together, he promised that he’dhelp me open my own coffee shop. Having my own cafe has been a dream since I was a teenager.

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