Page 76 of Puck Love

Holding my shoulder, I follow Eli out of the building and climb into his SUV. We’re dogged by reporters, but Eli just rolls down the window and tells them to move or get run over. He’d never do it, of course.I don’tthink.

“You wanna go to a bar and get shitfaced before Torres turnsup?”

“No. No bars—too many eyes,” I say. “Besides, you get caught drunk and disorderly and you’ll be hit with more than a two-game suspension. What the hell were youthinking?”

“I was thinking what everyone else in that room has been thinking since the day they joined the team. Gagnon is an asshole. That fucker needs togo.”

“Yeah, well all you achieved with that little stunt was getting suspended,too.”

“Yeah, that kinda sucks. So, my place, it is.” Eli pulls onto 12thAvenue. “I love you man, but I not driving you an hour home in eachdirection.”

“Your place is fine. I just need somewhere I can drink myself into a stupor andcrash.”

“Mi casa es su casa,” Eli says. “You want me to call somebunnies?”

“No! No bunnies. Fuck thatshit.”

“You know you’re gonna have to move on,dude?”

“Just . . . drive,okay?”

“Suit yourself. I’m gonna call Sue Lei, have her work on your shoulder, and then maybe when she’s done, she can work on my dick. She’d do yours, too, if youwant?”

“Jesus.” Sue Lei is a certified sports therapist. She’s also a certified whack job who’ll throw in a happy ending for an extra hundred bucks. It’s like a running joke with the team, and I’m pretty sure she could get into a heap of trouble, but no one’s reporting her any time soon because she’s damn good with her hands. Yes, I’ll admit it. I’ve paid extra for the pleasure of her . . . er . . . services, but I’d needed to blow off steam after a bad game, and I had no intention of bringing any bunnies around Emmett. It wasn’t my finest moment, and to be honest, I’ve spent plenty of time paying for it because I’ve been dodging her advances to work me over eversince.

“No, I don’t want Sue Lei touching me at all,” I say, staring out the window at the traffic and faceless pedestrians as we whiz by. The really fucked up truth is that I don’t want any woman touching me . . . unless it’s a fearsome, tiny blonde who goes by the name of StellaHart.

After Rookie and Torres leave, I sink farther into Eli’s couch and nurse my beer. I haven’t touched it since he handed it to me ten minutesago.

“This isn’t like you, man. Getting all hung up on a country music singer, or any female at all. What the hell has gotten intoyou?”

“Stella got intome.”

His brows shoot skyward. “Shit, like strap-on got into youor—”

“No, dickwad.Jesus.”

He takes a long pull on his beer. “She wasn’t really a virgin, wasshe?”

“Pretty much.” I sigh and stare up at the ceiling. “I mean, she’d slept with some other guy when she was seventeen. Sounded more like statutory rape to me. He was twenty—bent her over in her dressing room when she was dealing with some heavy personalshit.”

“Dude. That’s low.” I think it says something when NHL’s biggest player is shocked by this lowlife who preyed on a young woman. “So, what about thisboyfriend?”

“I don’t know—she never mentioned him to me. Notonce.”

“That’s a toughbreak.”

“No shit.” I grab the remote and switch on the TV, flicking through several channels until I notice one playing Stella’s interview, so I cycleback.

“Come on, man. You’re really gonna torture yourself likethis?”

“Yep.”

“Alright then. I’m going to wash my sweaty ball sack. Sue Lei will be here in twentyminutes.”

Stella’s hair falls in front of her face and she brushes it back, and that’s when I see it. They’ve covered it pretty well with makeup, but she has a bruise and a little swelling over her eye. I sit up and study her on Eli’s giant flat-screen. My head swims. What the fuckhappened?

I pick up my phone, ready to dial her number, which is stupid because I don’t have her fucking number.FUCK!I have no way of getting in touch with her, short of going to her label and demanding they give me her address, which I’m pretty sure they’re not going to do after she just declared me amistake.