Page 65 of Dirty Pucking Player

“Sorry, Steve. I was lost in thought.” I force a smile at our equipment manager. “What did you say?”

He smiles and leans closer, so I’ll hear him over the noise. “I asked if you were all right. You looked a little distressed.”

I force a return smile. “I’m fine. Just thinking about what’s coming.”

For the team and for this thing with Bash.

The man himself catches my eye again, his gaze narrowing on Steve and me, and he says something to Mac, smacks him on the shoulder, and makes his way across the room toward us. Every step he takes ratchets my heart rate up until it’s thundering against my rib cage and throbbing in my ears.

My entire body heats at his assessing gaze raking over me. He’s undressing me with his eyes; there’s no question about it. And he’s seen me enough naked now that I know he’s visualizing every single inch of me—every single inch that he knows so goddamn well.

Bash handles me and plays my body the way a musician would a guitar, the way a hockey player handles the stick. He’s so damn good at it, and he knows it. The smug smirk that accompanies every time our eyes meet assures me he doesn’t need to be told.

I hate to stroke his ego—I wouldn’t want his head exploding—but there’s no denying it…Bash fucking Fury is a god in bed and on the ice.

Damn him.

He finally reaches us and glances at Steve. “Hey, buddy. Can I get a word with Coach quick?”

Steve shifts back and nods. “No problem, Bash.”

Bash slams him on the shoulder, and we both watch Steve disappear into the crowd before Bach turns back to me and tilts his pint glass toward mine. “Congratulations, Coach. You got us here.”

I shrug and take a sip of my champagne. “The team did it. It wasn’t just me.”

He shakes his head and turns to lean back against the bar next to me. His forearm brushes against mine, and a little electric jolt shoots through me and straight to the place I crave him the most. I press my thighs together and shift to relieve some of the ache there.

Does he have any idea what he does to me?

Of course, he does. I’m talking about Bash here.

He inclines his head toward me. “Don’t downplay your role here, Greer. I played for one of the best teams in the league for the last half-decade, and you’re as good as any coach I’ve ever had. Maybe better.”

I twist my head to face him. “You don’t mean that.”

Given what he said to me during that heated argument we had in my office—or “the towel incident” as I like to remember it—this is a new development. If he does really mean it and isn’t just blowing smoke up my ass to get in my good graces after how he acted the other day.

Maybe this is just his version of an apology because something tells me Bash Fury doesn’t say “I’m sorry” very much or very easily.

He grins at me. “Why do you say that?”

I press my lips together and search his gaze for the lie. The warm amber depths hold a lot of things, but I don’t see deception there.

He leans in closer until his lips practically brush my ear. “I’m not just saying it to get in your pants, Coach. We’ve already established I can do that whenever I want.”

I jerk my head back, my mouth agape. Glancing around the room, I check for any eyes on us, but no one seems to be paying us any attention. “Bash…You can’t say something like that to me.”

“Why not?” He shrugs slightly as his eyes scan the room, too. “Nobody’s paying attention. No one gives a shit, and no one heard me. Besides”—he takes a sip of his beer—“it’s true.”

There is that lack of tact and arrogance I love to hate so much.

It’s infuriating…because he’s right.

It is true.

And right here, right now, even in this room with all these people who could expose us and ruin my career, and even though he hasn’t apologized for being such a dick the other day, if Bash pressed his hard cock up against me and told me to bend over, I would do it.

Because my body craves him.

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