Page 15 of Game Misconduct
Me: And this is why you’re stuck with me.
Tessa: I think I can handle that.
Tessa: Close the laptop and go get some sleep.
Me: LOL it’s like you know me.
The TV screeches into another commercial break, bright colors and bodies too shiny to be real.
I follow Tessa’s advice and close the laptop, setting it aside and numb out on reality TV for a while.
After I watch two episodes back to back, it’s nearly midnight, and while I’m tired as fuck, I’m still wired.
I walk over to the wall of glass overlooking Boston as the city sparkles outside the window.
Pressing my forehead to the cold pane of glass, I think that somewhere out there, Maddox is still awake. He strikes me as the kind of man who doesn’t sleep easy.
He’s pacing. Thinking. Stewing.
Maybe still shirtless.
God, get a grip.
My phone rattles on the coffee table and my stomach somersaults.
For some reason I know who it is before I check the screen.
Maddox.
When I grab my phone, I see his text on my lock screen.
There’s no hello, no lead-in.
Maddox: You want your signature. Meet me at the Common Ice Rink. 10pm tomorrow night.
My stomach drops. Then clenches. Then flips over completely.
I read it again. And again.
Like some lovesick teenager instead of a twenty-eight year old CEO of a hockey team.
And I need to start thinking like one.
I read it one more time from the lens of what I am. The owner in negotiations with a stubborn ass mule of a man.
He’s not surrendering. He’s pulling me into his world. Onto the ice. Out of my comfort zone and into his.
The businesswoman in me is annoyed at him barking orders at me. But the woman in me?
Well, I shouldn’t like it.
But I do.
My thumb hovers over the screen. I could sayFine. I could sayI’ll be there.
I could sayFuck you.
But I don’t type anything.
