Page 55 of Puck Happens

“Is any of this a butt pad?” I asked, breaking the tension. Trying to make him smile. “Because that’s what I really need.”

* * *

Dillon

What she really needed was a solidfucking kiss. She needed to be pressed down on the floor and given half a dozen orgasms. I was sure I was the man to do it for her.

Not gonna lie, that had been my plan coming over here. I’d started to convince myself as long as we were away from the team it was okay. This apartment complex was Siberia. Only I had to go and ruin that by running my big mouth to the downstairs neighbor.

Fuck me.

I was still dealing with my reaction to what had happened earlier today. I’d heard her scream, in obvious pain, and it twisted something inside my chest.

Something that felt really big. Like, irrationally big.

Then Ron Morgan was in my head telling me to shut it down. The guy was an asshole, but he wasn’t wrong about distractions.

You had some wives and girlfriends who understood the life. When their man was playing during the season, they basically treated them like deployed troops. The women knew their men were going to be gone, they knew communication was going to be infrequent. They also knew they had to take a backseat to the game. Support was its own full time job.

For the most part they were okay with that.

Or at least they told their boyfriends and husbands they were okay with that.

But I’d seen guys fall, and fall hard, for women who didn’t understand how the season worked. Who chaffed against the loss of their own identity.

Carver, who had been traded last year, had a wife who had been a chemist when they got together. When he got traded, she gave up her job, her family and friends, to go with him. Of course she did. Only I just heard through the grapevine they were now getting divorced. That kind of shit happened over and over again.

Why risk the heartbreak?

We were a privileged few who got to participate for a limited time in a game we loved and got paid well for doing. No sense in potentially ruining the time we had, dividing our focus.

Those guys who fell for a woman during the season, a woman who didn’t understand how to fit into the life, those guys would turn themselves inside out trying to serve two masters and it never worked.

Either the relationship crashed and burned or their play on the ice did.

Morgan was right. Liv was a distraction.

Taking a puck to the ass was something that the coaches, assistants, hell, even the Zamboni driver, accepted as part of the job.

Like she said – puck happens.

The problem was me. Her reaction when she fell nearly undid me. So much I could barely talk, barely look at her. I’d been ready to tear Novek’s head off. I was furious and worried all at once.

What the fuck was that?

Where did all that emotion come from?

More importantly, how did I shut it down?

Not coming to her house with dinner and gear and nearly kissing her would probably be a good start.

She tried on the helmet and I adjusted it for her. Tightening the setting, pulling the straps until it fit snugly on her head.

“This is not comfortable,” she grumbled.

“Turn around,” I said, ignoring her complaints. “You got anything on under that sweatshirt?” I asked.

Without a word she pulled the sweatshirt over her head. It got caught on the helmet and I helped her pull it off. Under the sweatshirt, she had on one of those tank tops she wore all the time. Thin little straps. Thin fabric. I could feel the heat of her skin. Smell the shower she must have taken after practice. If I stepped forward, one tiny step, my chest would be pressed to her back. My aching cock, constantly at half-mast around her, would be pressed against that perfect ass of hers.

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