Page 68 of Tempting the Goalie
I lay her on her back and keep my gaze glued to hers. “I love you, baby.” I spread her legs and dip my head between her thighs. It doesn’t take long for her to be writhing beneath me. Watching her quick breaths, her eyes closed, and the pleasure on her face does something to me. But I don’t focus too long on that. Instead, I spread her pussy lips with my index and middle finger and flick her clit with my tongue. She goes off like a rocket, grinding her hips and pressing her sweet pussy into my tongue. I lick up her juices, enjoying how unhinged she is right now. When she comes down from her high, I want to hold her in my arms, but she insists on riding my cock. She sits on me, spreads her thighs on my lap, and rocks her hips on me. I’m buried so deepinside her that this feels like nothing I’ve ever felt before. We are connecting on a different level as she moves above me. My arms are wrapped around her. Our gazes are connected, but it feels like I can see through to her soul, and what I see looking back at me is pure love and admiration. It’s in this moment I know what I need to do to make myself a better man. A man who deserves the love of Isabelle Thorne.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Luc
Over the past week I’ve been working up the courage to speak with Papa. Mr. Thorne told me he saw him at The Frosted Mug every day this week when he was making his rounds around town. When I asked him how Papa could afford to keep going there, he told me he receives disability payments from the government. It was the first I was hearing of it. Apparently, Papa served in the Canadian Armed Forces for a few years. He was never deployed but he was stationed at CFB Gagetown, New Brunswick. During a routine training exercise on base, Papa was participating in a simulated obstacle course designed to test agility and endurance. While maneuvering over a high wall, he slipped and fell awkwardly, severely injuring his lower back and spine. Despite immediate medical attention, the injury caused chronic nerve damage, resulting in permanent mobility limitations. Due to the severity of his injury, he was medically released from active service before ever deploying overseas. That’s when he decided to become a plumber. The story didn’t add up to me. Why would someone with nerve damage in their back become a plumber? It was a job that required a lot ofbending. The thing is, I needed to face Papa. I had this picture in my head of who I thought he was, which was a weak alcoholic but good at heart. Instead, he seemed like a con and a drunk. Yet, he was my papa so what did that make me? On a logical level I understood I was nothing like him, but on an emotional level I was scarred by life. If I was going to be able to move forward in my relationship with Isabelle, I would have to figure myself out because if there was one thing I knew, it was I wanted to see her happy. I wanted to give her the world on a silver platter. It was a little much, but both of us had a rough start to life. We both deserved happiness, and my girl was blossoming before my eyes. She was becoming more confident every day and fighting the demons of her past. I had to do the same for her. With my shift in the orchard done for the day and Elyna getting ready for a shift at the Maple Valley Microbrewery, I asked Izzy to watch Braden so I could finally confront Papa. Now I was walking over to my family property. Seeing it with a set of new eyes was mind opening. Papa never did take care of this place. I wondered how a woman like Mom got caught up with a man like him, but maybe he scammed her into believing he was someone else. I went knocking on the door. When Elyna and I moved out of here we took all our belongings, knowing this time we would never be returning. He had threatened Braden and acted like a madman, and we were both done. I turned the rusted knob on the door to check if the door was unlocked because he usually left it that way, and it was. I walked into the house and called out to him, but there was no sign of him. All I saw was a stinking dirty mess that made a cold shiver run down my spine. Since he wasn’t here, I walked out to the front of the house and headed back to the Thornes’. It was possible to take a cab from the airport to Val-Du-Lys, but finding a cab to take me anywhere in town was going to take hours I didn’t have. Mr. Thorne told me to help myself to any of the cars in his garage. I hadn’t taken him up onthe offer until now. I went to the garage and grabbed the keys to one of the pickup trucks they owned. They were all black and had the Maple Valley logo on the side of the door. I went straight for town, knowing The Frosted Mug was Papa’s bar of choice. I felt a rush of adrenaline knowing this was something I should’ve done long ago. In order to know where I was going in my life, I needed answers. I needed closure, dammit.
I had my window open, and it whipped the hot summer air into my face and had my hair windblown. I pulled up to the Frosted Mug and headed inside.
A bunch of people I knew from high school were sitting around a table drinking beer. It was wishful thinking to hope I wouldn’t be spotted.
“Luc Chabot, is that you?” a girl named Cherry calls out.
I wave and smile. “Uh, uh, you get that cute butt over here,” she continues. I want to roll my eyes, but I hold my smile and my friendly demeanor and walk over to the table.
I fist bump some old friends and people I could do without in my life.
“You’re heading to the NHL,” my friend Mathias says.
“Not yet, but that’s the plan,” I reply.
“At least you’re making it out of this town.” Etienne smirks.
“How is that friend of yours?” Clara asks. “What was her name? The good girl. We haven’t seen her around.”
“Her name is Isabelle, and she’s my girlfriend now,” I state, feeling my jaw clench. Izzy wasn’t friends with this crowd. They were cliquey and mean and up to no good.
“You’re joking,” a girl name Camille snorts.
“I’m serious as a heartbeat. Izzy is the love of my life,” I say, knowing it is the most honest thing I can say in this awkward situation. Some of the group begin laughing and muttering all kinds of comments that I don’t care to hear.
“Well, I better be going. I have someone to see.” My eyes land on Papa, and I wince. I didn’t know how drunk he was, but trying to find him sober wasn’t a reasonable request. I hate that all these people from my past are here to watch the interaction, and I’m sure they’ll watch because they love getting into other people’s business.
From a few feet away I see Papa is watching a baseball game on TV at the bar. I walk up and sit on the barstool beside him. We are far enough away that I hoped my old friends, if I could call them that, wouldn’t hear our conversation.
“Hi, Papa.”
Kammy came up to me. “What can I get you, Luc?”
“I’ll have a Coke, please,” I say to her.
“Sure thing,” she replies with a wink, sliding a glass in front of me and filling it from the fountain, spray hissing behind the bar.
“Why are you here?” Papa mumbles.
“Come on, that isn’t a nice way to greet a son.” I can’t help the sarcasm dripping from my tone. He is just so unwelcoming.
“I thought you and your sister were gone for good,” he says, and he takes a large gulp of beer.
“How did you meet Mom?” I ask him. “Did you love her?”
His gaze cuts to the left where I’m seated beside him. I must have his attention now.
“What kind of question is that?” he snarls.
“An honest one. Pierre Thorne just enlightened me that you had been a soldier. I never knew that about you,” I say to him.
“The army is where people go when they want to get away from their families and they don’t have a penny to their name,” he explains.
