Page 20 of Puck Me Sideways

Not that I blamed him, but this one belonged to me, no matter how she called it. We could argue about semantics later. Hux nodded at Hallie. No one said anything as I picked her up and placed her ass on the chair that had been hers, though she was due a career shift in my opinion.

It looked like my girl kept her jobandwon some hearts at the same time.

Including mine.

EPILOGUE

HALLIE

I went home with Solace. Finally. He didn’t beg after the catastrophe in the office. Actually, he didn’t say much at all. Hux did, though, negotiate the pay rise and diagonal job shift I both appreciated and needed after the WAGS drama that got me right out of the main office and into the coaching department.

In my new role I’d report directly to Coach. Ward Bishop would be my direct boss from now on. The formidable Chimeras trainer glowered at Hux as the team captain laid out exactly why I now shared his space. I understood his mood shift—not that Ward Bishop had more than two, anyway.

No one else dared to invade his space either by choice or by design unless they were one of his team, and in shit at that. Yet here I stood between Solace and Huxley’s combined bulk.

Ward observed me in utter silence for the better part of two minutes. I knew better than to fidget, having seen him discard wannabes from the team’s reserve squad for less.

“She can stay if she can keep up with me.”

Hux pressed his fingers gently between my shoulder blades in a show of support. “She’ll keep up, sir,” he murmured.

Ward’s eyes narrowed. “And she needs to know the team’s stats.”

Solace’s whole frame vibrated as he held in a laugh. “Better than any of us,” he assured his coach.

My new boss’s eyes fixed on me. Cold as the ice the boys skated on, silver hair dominated his temples in a sea of darkness. “I’m not some playboy like these kids, sweetheart. If you think you can waste my time, I assure you, we will be having a different sort of conversation you won’t enjoy in short order.”

I held his gaze. “I just told the WAG squad to take down the porn show they threw of me up on the office walls because I was sick of their bullshit. I couldn’t get my work done with that crap going on. I’d appreciate someone who actually understands what work is, sir,” I added, aiming for Hux’s air of respect.

Ward’s eyebrows rose. “Isn’t that different?” he muttered.

Solace let out that laugh he’d repressed. The sound boomed around the rink. “Yes, sir. She is.”

Which was how I ended up in the passenger seat of his car for the second time that day, headed for his place after we stopped in at mine so I could leave feed out for Mica. My hands tucked into my lap in a knot, I stared at the townhouses passing by in the shitty part of town I lived in near the commercial area where rent was cheap. Slowly the buildings moved into suburban homes, and then grew bigger. My heart stuttered as I took note of the luxury cars lining drives and the house frontages that took up more space than five of my townhouses.

“I think I’m in the wrong area,” I choked, running my fingers along the door handle when Solace pulled up into a black bricked, electric gated drive.

An imposing, three story home set well back from the street with manicured gardens I knew Solace didn’t look after himself surrounded me as he drove us deep into the property. The gates shut silently behind us, locking us in.

“You’ll be fine.” His hand closed around mine in a firm, warm grip.

“I can’t afford to leave the car.”Or be in it.I looked down at our tangled fingers. “Solace, I?—”

He pulled his car up sharply on the dark gravel before the house and switched the engine off, turning to face me. “Come in so you can thank me for getting you a new job today. Then we can work on your punishment for fucking running from me when we arrived at the office and getting yourself into all sorts of trouble before I could be there to help you,” he growled, wrapping his other hand around my wrist. He trapped both of my hands on either side of me against the base of the leather bucket seat.

I gasped out loud at both the indignity and the imprisonment. “I could have gotten myself that job with Ward. And Hux was there to help,” I protested.

“But you got into trouble all by your fucking self, beautiful. I couldn’t breathe. I worried about where you were, what they’d done to you. How much you’d hurt because of them.” He rested his forehead against mine.

Coal dark eyes bore into mine as I stared back, struggling to breathe.

“I can look after myself,” I whispered.

“But you don’t have to. Not anymore, and not every time. I’ve got you.Wehave got you, beautiful,” he murmured, and I knew he meant hum and Huxley. What they’d done this afternoon after I stood up for Hux with the not-WAG who shouldn’t have been in the building in the first place.

I closed my eyes and breathed out. “Alright.”

“Yeah?” He rubbed his nose against mine. “Gonna let me thank you and punish you tonight, welcome you to my place? Cause now you're here, you know I’m gonna want you to move you in.”

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