Page 73 of Test the Ice
Finally, he breaks the moment.
“I need a shower,” he blurts.
I jump up from the bed and tug on my shirt to cover my legs.
“A cold one,” he mumbles, heading right to the bathroom.
I barely make it out of his room before one last dirty thought about him in the shower enters my head.
Twenty-Five
MALAKI
“Where’s yourfiancéetonight?”
I’m lacing up for the game when Lars’s smug grin comes into view. I’m someone who is hard to rile up, but his tone makes my blood run hot. “She’s at home…in my bed.”Hopefully. “Where’s your mom tonight?”
Someone sniggers from a few lockers down, and I don’t have to look to know it’s Kane.
“A mama joke? Grow up,” Lars sneers.
I wink. “Can’t take the heat, stay out of the kitchen.”
Rhodes busies himself with lacing his skates and asks, “How long have you and Reese been together? I’m surprised we haven’t heard you spouting at the mouth about her if you’re serious enough to get engaged.”
I glance away as guilt hits me. I hate lying. “A while, but she wanted to keep things under wraps since I’m in the media.”
“What’s a while?” Lars asks in that annoying accent of his.
There’s a twitch in his eye, which tells me he’s skeptical. When I don’t immediately answer, he squints.
If I'm not careful, he’ll catch me in a lie.
When I don’t answer, he questions me again. “A while, as in…she had your bub?”
“What the fuck is a bub?” someone asks from a few lockers over.
Lars answers, “Ah, sorry. The term bub is used for baby in Australia.”
I grip my jersey tightly before pulling it over my head.
Through my rising blood pressure, I hear someone say, “A baby? His fiancée has a baby?”
“Well?” Lars’s face comes back into view.
I ignore my unusual possessiveness. Charleigh isn’t something I can lie about, so I tell the truth. “She’s not mine.”
There’s a collectiveoooohthat moves through the locker room like a tidal wave, followed by the term, “Stepdaddy Malaki”. I have to act like it doesn’t irritate me, because any other day, it wouldn’t.
“Hey, baby or not. She’s fine as hell. I’d become a stepdaddy too.”
I jerk upright and search to see who said that.
“Hey.” Rhodes steps forward, his shoulders bundling with anger. “Show some fucking respect.”
“Yeah.” I try to brush off my anger with a joke, per usual. “Rhodes is the real dad of the bunch. Listen to him.”
The chatter is broken up right away but not without a few chuckles here and there. Emory catches my eye across the locker room and flicks his chin to Rhodes. I nod, silently giving him the go-ahead to make Rhodes privy to my situation.
