Page 6 of Any Second Now (Fort Collins Blizzard Hockey #2)

Atticus was always tagging along with me, Lucy, and January, even though I’m sure he got invited to so many frat and hockey parties. I pretended to roll my eyes, but I enjoyed the casual flirting between us. That delicious untouchable attraction to my best friend’s brother.

I slide onto the picnic table bench. He shrugs and flashes me a pearly white smile, settling down across from me.

“The wine’s a bit nicer than when we were at JMU. We don’t have to open it right now, since it’s barely two o’clock in the afternoon.”

“I’m more of a red wine drinker these days, but thank you. I’ll save it for the next time I have company over.”

“You have a lot of visitors?” Atticus raises his eyebrows.

“No. It’s called sarcasm.”

He blinks at me, a barely contained smile on his face.

“And I wasn’t sure about what you drank, so I brought a red as well.

This one’s from my mom’s vineyard. I order it by the case.

” He pulls another bottle from the grass next to the picnic table along with a bottle opener.

“I also brought you a cork screw. Just in case you didn’t have one in… the Pink Palace.”

“First of all, that’s amazing that this is your mom’s wine. Second, maybe it is okay to have a drink at two o’clock in the afternoon. I had a long drive, and you’re in the offseason.” I reach for the wine and the opener.

“I’m game. Have glasses?”

“I’ll go grab a few.” I let him open the bottle and I go grab two mismatched mugs from my mini-kitchen. “This is the best I got.”

I don’t tell him that I’ve had several bottles of wine over the past two weeks, but I’ve only been buying twist off, like the sophisticated lady that I am. I have no problem drinking it out of my JMU mug. “Anything else you got under the table?” I look pointedly at his reusable cloth bag .

He shakes his head and flips open the pizza box. The smell is delicious, and Atticus pushes the box toward me for first dibs.

This feels surprisingly normal. Sitting at my campsite with Lucy’s brother, six months after kissing him on New Year’s Eve.

Seeing him is a lot less weird than I thought it would be.

Because let’s be honest, I knew I’d see him if I showed up in Fort Collins.

Even if—especially if?—Lucy wasn’t here when I arrived.

Which I knew she wouldn’t be.

We bite into the cheese sticks at the same time, and I moan.

“These are so good. I forgot they even existed.”

“Well, I don’t get them often because the team dietician isn’t the biggest fan of greasy food. But it’s summer, so.” He shrugs and gives me a sheepish smile.

“How’s your injury?” Lucy had told us all about Atticus hurting himself in the last game of the season. She said he was recovering fine and it wouldn’t affect him long-term.

He shrugs but his face tightens. “Fine. Good. Getting myself back in shape for the charity game in August.” Atticus reaches for his second rectangle of cheesy bread. He shoves the entire piece into his mouth and swallows disturbingly fast.

“Oh, I actually do have one more thing for you.” He jumps up and heads to his car.

“Really?” I stare at his departing back. His shoulders lift in a shrug, and he opens the back door to his red Jeep Wrangler. “Is that car even practical in the Colorado winters?” I call, watching him lean in, appreciating his t-shirt taut against his back and shoulders.

“It’s great in the snow,” he says when he gets back to the table, carrying an oversized rectangular box under his arm. Atticus flips it around so I can see the label and image. I crack up.

“A hammock?” I look up at him with a smile.

“Yeah. And you have the perfect two trees to set it up between.” He nods next to the picnic table, where he’s right— there are two perfect hammock trees with a view of the beautiful lake. “Happy housewarming. RV warming?”

“Most people bring a plant.” No one’s brought me a plant. In fact, only my mother has even seen the Pink Palace.

“You’re surrounded by plants. Want me to hang it?”

I nod and Atticus grabs the box and begins unpacking it.

Sometimes my ex-husband would buy thoughtful things for the house.

But he’d leave it in a box for months and months until I put it together myself, hired someone to do it, or shoved it in the back of a closet.

There was a lot of that to donate after he moved out.

Divorcing that man broke my heart in a different way than my first husband had.

Ryan had cheated on me. Leaving him was easy.

Jacob lied to me, kept secrets, lost a ton of money, and kept at it until I filed for divorce a year ago.

All those lies both suddenly and gradually pulled me out of love with him.

Seeing Atticus is a breath of fresh air. He reminds me of carefree, happier days, surrounded by friends and optimistic about the future.

“So your travel plans got cancelled for the summer, huh.”

Atticus looks at me with raised eyebrows.

“Lucy told me.” I shrug. At least it goes both ways—Lucy tells too much to both of us.

“Of course.” He turns back to the pile of materials for the hammock and bends down to pick up the directions. He takes one look before crumpling it up and tossing the paper into the empty box. “Lachlan bailed on me for his new girlfriend. A university professor.”

“Bummer.” I pull on my skinny ponytail. “Who are you going to pick up women with then?”

“Hey, I’m not like that.” He glances up and a flash of hurt crosses his face.

“Not these days, anyway. And definitely not this summer. Harley’s home in Maine with his girlfriend.

Kellen’s traveling with Lucy. Lachlan’s busy being in love.

And I’m here.” He secures one hammock strap around the tree and pulls the material gently across to the other tree, then wraps that strap securely around the trunk.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to imply anything bad.”

Before leaving on her trip, Lucy had told me that Atticus hasn’t really been himself the past few months, even before his injury. Kellen told her he’d not been bringing girls home when they traveled.

A flash of him kissing me against the wall in that hotel on New Year’s Eve pops into my brain in full detail. Has he thought about our kiss as much as I have? No way. I pull at the neck of my t-shirt, grateful he’s not still sitting at the picnic table where he would be observing me close up.

“There, perfect.” Atticus steps back and admires his work, then looks at me for approval.

“Thank you.” I smile at his proud expression.

“I’ll just test this out.” Atticus gracefully slides into the hammock and sighs happily, his body lying snugly horizontal. “Perfect. Care to join me?”

“What? No.” I laugh, and so does he, but I picture climbing on top of him and snuggling up to his hard, muscled body. I shake my head and he takes it as a firm no.

Oh—new cross-stitch idea. Hammocks: the worst place to hookup. Or maybe something like hammocks are a reminder being single is better .

Okay, that one’s terrible.

“How long are you staying in Fort Collins?” Atticus rolls to the side and hops out of the hammock. There’s no way I’m doing that in front of anyone. I’ll probably loop around like a fidget spinner. Atticus runs his hands over his clean-shaven chin. “Lucy’s not due back home for another month.”

“I don’t know. There’s a few things I want to get fixed on the Pink Palace, like touch up the paint—” I gesture toward the scraped and peeling pink paint next to the door. “—and reseal that window so the AC works better. ”

“That shouldn’t take too long.” He crosses his arms next to the picnic table.

“I’ve also got a side hustle to catch up on.”

“Side hustle?” One eyebrow shoots up.

“Yeah. I, uh, do cross-stitch? And sell them online.”

“You do cross-stitch.”

“I do cross-stitch.”

“Like a grandma?”

“No, not like a grandma, like a… millennial, I guess.”

“Well, alright. What do you cross-stitch?”

I shrug. “Sayings. Quotes. I swear a lot.”

Atticus chuckles. “Can you give me an example?”

“Sure. In the last week I’ve gotten four orders for one that says Abso-fucking-lutely not .” It’s my best seller so far, which I know because of how few orders I’ve gotten overall, carefully tracked within my cross-stitch spreadsheet.

I have a spreadsheet problem, I know.

Atticus bursts out laughing.

“And it has some flowers on it.” I love the sound of his delighted laugh. “You know, to soften the swearing.”

“That is so weird, and so amazing.”

“So good weird?” My face heats.

“Definitely good weird.”

Weird is kind of what I’m going for these days. I want to find what makes me unique, not just be the woman with a spreadsheet plan.

“Well anyway, I need to catch up on some orders.” I try to look casual. “And I might just wait for Lucy to come back from her trip. I don’t have a plan.” I have to kind of choke those last words out.

“Raleigh doesn’t have a plan? You are the most organized person I’ve ever met. You’ve always had your shit together.”

“I’m a free spirit, Atticus.”

Atticus lets out a long, contagious laugh, throwing his head back and exposing the stubbly skin of his neck. “You are not. ”

“I am!” I practically stomp my foot. “I’m reinventing myself.”

“As what?”

I shrug. “Not a boring pharmacist?” I became a pharmacist because my mother and I decided it was a stable career path that would pay well and allow me to capitalize on my strengths.

Too bad my detail-oriented nature didn’t notice the fact that Jacob was gambling behind my back.

“Nothing wrong with being a pharmacist.” Atticus sits back down across from me. “And reinventing yourself involves changing into something, not only changing away from something. So what are you changing into?”

“That’s very deep, Atticus, but I haven’t thought that far ahead.” I try to keep my tone light, but his words hit me harder than they should for a throwaway comment.

He’s right. What am I trying to turn into?

“You’re a proper grown up.” He shrugs. “You’ve always been a proper grownup.”

“Driving around in a pink RV?”

“That’s definitely a choice.” He laughs again. “But don’t be hard on yourself. Back in college, you reminded me all the time that I was a completely unserious person, unlike you. Maybe you could be a little less serious.”

“I think I’m already halfway there.” I glance at my crappy RV. “And I might have been kind of hard on you in college.” Being hard on him was a self-defense mechanism. There was no way I was going to let myself overtly flirt with my best friend’s little brother.

“Nah. You kept it real.” Atticus stretches his neck to one side. “You were probably the only one besides Lucy who treated me like a normal person. January ignored me except to laugh along with you two. And most other girls threw themselves at me and were totally fake.”

“You’re welcome?” I press my lips together.

I watched girls fawn over Atticus Knox in college, and besides the fact that he was Lucy’s brother, I was zero percent interested in crushing on someone who was given so much damn attention.

I was not his type. And we couldn’t be more different in our goals, ambitions, interests…

I had to make sure I wasn’t obvious about my attraction to him.

Atticus looks at me, a cute smirk on his face, and I’m sure that he’s thinking about New Year’s Eve.

“Hey, want to come to drinks tomorrow night? At a bar in town. The Black Diamond. Lachlan will be there.”

I consider coming up with an excuse as being around Atticus makes me feel a bit squirrelly. I could make something up, but he’d know, and why would I want to avoid human interaction? I’ve been going nuts driving around by myself.

“It’s my birthday. You have to come.” A pained look flashes across his face, then is gone.

“It is? Happy birthday! Are you…” I do some quick math. “Thirty? Tomorrow?”

“Today.”

“Today! Happy birthday!” I glance at our leftover cheese sticks. Sort of a sad birthday lunch.

“Thanks.” Atticus nods. “So yes for tomorrow?”

Well. I can’t say no. It’s his birthday.

I think it’ll be nice to be here and not drive for a bit. I can just wait for Lucy to get home.

I don’t want to drive more than a few miles for a long time.

“No other plans.”

Atticus smiles even wider. “Wanna give me a tour of the Pink Palace?”

I blink at him and picture the inside of my RV, where there’s piles of empty hoops and half-finished designs everywhere. I basically move the pile to my bed when I’m driving and to the living area when I’m sleeping.

Also, not sure I can handle being in such a small confined space with Atticus.

“No, no I do not. I need to… clean.”

“Another time, then.” Atticus quirks a smile at me. “Hey, I don’t think I have your number.”

“Oh, okay,” I say.

Then I casually give my phone number to a hot professional hockey player.