Page 83 of Blindside Me
The way her hands fist my hair.
The gasp that escapes her as our lips meet.
The way her body leans into mine, echoing the same hunger, and these details shatter me even more.
Jade’s fingers curl into my T-shirt, bunching the fabric at my chest. Not pushing me away but pulling me closer. Like she’s as desperate as I am, and that destroys me all over again.
The rough cinder blocks must be scraping her back through her thin shirt, but she arches toward me, pressing her body against mine like she can’t get close enough. Like she feels this too. This impossible, consuming thing between us.
“We shouldn’t,” I mutter against her mouth, even as my hands slide down to her waist. “I shouldn’t.”
“Then stop,” she challenges, pulling back just enough to look at me, her breath warm against my lips.
I can’t. That’s the fucking problem. I can’t stop wanting her. Can’t stop thinking about her. Can’t stop imagining what we could be if I weren’t who I am.
My thumb traces her jawline. It’s so delicate compared to the hard angles I’m used to. It’s nothing like elbows in the ribs during practice or shoulders slamming me into boards. Her skin is impossibly soft. I notice everything. The flush spreading across her cheeks. The slight tremble in her hands that still grip my T-shirt. The way her chest rises and falls with each quick breath.
I lean in again, slower this time, watching her eyes flutter closed. Our lips connect, and it’s still urgent but less frantic. I’m memorizing everything about her, like the slight sound she makes when I tease her bottom lip with my teeth and the way her body melts against mine when my tongue slides against hers.
We pull apart just enough to breathe. Our foreheads touch. The intimacy of that simple contact hits harder than the kiss. Her breath mingles with mine. We stay suspended in this moment, my hands at her waist with hers still clutching my shirt.
“You don’t even know me,” I whisper, the words slipping out before I can stop them.
She reaches up, her fingers tracing along my jaw, gentle, so fucking gentle it nearly breaks me. “I see you, Drew. The real you. Not the hockey star everyone else wants you to be.”
And that’s it. That’s what terrifies me. How can she know? How can she see through everything I’ve built around myself when people who’ve known me my whole life don’t? Coaches, teammates, and scouts all see the player, the prospect, and the investment. My dad sees the son he sacrificed everything for. No one sees just Drew.
No one but her.
“What if the real me isn’t worth shit?” The question burns in my throat.
Her thumb brushes my cheekbone. “I think you’re worth everything.”
I close my eyes, letting her words sink in. The honesty in her voice cuts through all my defenses. How can someone who barely knows me understand me better than people I've known my entire life? It makes no sense. It terrifies me.
“I’m supposed to focus on hockey. I need to get invited to the combine. Everything I’ve worked for my entire life is right in front of me.” My voice is raw, exposed. “I can’t fuck it up now.”
“I know,” she says, and I believe she does. She gets what this means to me.
I rest my palm against her cheek, feeling the warmth of her skin. My thumb brushes her bottom lip, watching as her eyes darken. “You’re not part of the plan, Jade.”
“Plans change,” she whispers.
Plans change. Fuck. If I let her in, my whole life changes.
“Not mine. Not after everything…”
Her hand slides up my chest, over my racing heart. “Then why are we here, Drew?”
I don’t have an answer. At least, not one that makes sense. Not one that fits into the careful path I’ve laid out for myself: practice, train, get drafted, sign a contract, make it all worth something. Jade doesn’t fit anywhere in that equation. She’s the variable I never accounted for.
Yet here I am, pressed against her in a storage closet, unable to walk away.
For a split second, images flash through my mind. Coach Howell’s disappointed face if he knew I was here with his niece. The exhausting grind of the combine looming ahead. The NHL contract I’ve chased since I was old enough to hold a stick. My dad’s face when I make it, when all our sacrifices finally pay off.
None of it matters when she looks at me like this.
“I can’t choose,” I admit, voice breaking. “Between hockey and … this. You.”
