Page 173 of Face Off
“I swear to god if you pull another deke on me, Hartwell, you’re going to be in big trouble. You’ve got me out here looking like a fucking rookie,” Maverick yells across the ice, and I grin.
“It’s not my fault you fell for it.” I skate a lap around the opposite goal and tap the puck with my stick. “Oldest play in the book.”
“I’m thinking about what you’re wearing under your jersey.”
“You know what I’m wearing. You saw me put it on.”
“I did. And now I want to take it off.” His eyes gleam. “Give me your best effort, Red. You know I’m a big boy who can take it.”
I bite back a response. I know he’s trying to rile me up. He’s trying to get under my skin the way he got under me before we left his apartment, one hand cupping my breasts and the other slipping between my legs.
An hour on the ice, and my body is covered in sweat. Neither one of us is giving the other an inch, and Ilovethat we can go back and forth like this. I love that he’s not letting me score and I love that I’m not going easy on him.
Maverick defends the goal like his life depends on it. I go through trick shot after trick shot, firing the puck left, right, and center, hoping to sneak a score through his knees.
He’s had months to study how I play, and he makes more stops than he did the first time we went at each other. I’m at a disadvantage but I don’t give up, hitting the puck again and again until my arms feel so stiff, I know I’m going to be sore for days.
“Baby,” he pants, keeling over and gasping down a breath. “We need to stop.”
“Tired, Miller?” I skate up next to him and touch his shoulder. “I can keep going.”
“I know you can. You’re a machine.” He pulls off his gloves and tugs me toward him, his helmet resting against mine. “But you need to leave for the airport soon, and I want time to shower with you.”
“You drive a hard bargain.” I smile and loop my arms around his neck. “Fine. We can go. As long as you admit defeat and tell me I won.”
“You did not win.”
“Your save percentage was less than seventy percent.”
“Better than the first time I had to defend the goal from your talented ass.” He pinches my butt, and I laugh. “I want to show you something before we go.”
“What is it?”
“Come on.”
Maverick holds my hand across the ice, heading for the tunnel to the locker room. He leads me carefully down the carpet, stopping at a door that’s labeled Audio and Visual Equipment.
“We are not making a sex tape,” I say.
“Aw, come on, Red.”
“I’ll send you all the videos you want, but I draw the line at using an NHL team’s video equipment to film me giving you head.”
“That mouth of yours.” He rubs his thumb across my bottom lip. “The things I want to do to it.”
“Is that why we’re going into a closet?”
“Not quite. Close your eyes, Emmy girl.”
I listen to him, my eyes snapping shut and my palm on the wall. There’s a jangle of keys and the turn of a lock. The door creaks, and Maverick nudges me forward.
“Is this some sort of trap?” I ask.
“Give me one more second.” I hear the flip of a light switch, and the closet grows brighter. “Okay. Open.”
I blink and look around me.
The room that used to hold old video footage from decades back has been moved, and I’m staring at a small locker room.
