Page 65 of Branded (Breakers Hockey)

Thirty-One

Raph

I knew Beth was up to mischief when my watch buzzed with a text and it was just a GIF that said,

“Come here…and bring your friends.”

I glanced up and she was smiling at me. Then she tilted her head slightly to the side.

To Jules.

Who was wearing her CeCe’s shirt, but clearly on break, a soda in front of her and a cheese stick in her hand.

Which told me exactly how highly the girls thought of Jules.

Not just anyone could join in on the spoils of Cheese Night Extravaganza.

Hell, I’d almost lost a finger a time or two trying to steal a fry or chip or mozzarella stick, and I kind of thought they liked me.

Beth—seemingly not liking the delay—widened her eyes at me, tilting her head slightly more toward Jules…and then turning her gaze to Cas before returning it to mine, those widened eyes telling me to get a clue .

Jules.

Cas.

Oh yeah, now I liked that.

Except…if it went bad, then we wouldn’t be able to show our faces at CeCe’s again and Cheese Night Extravaganzas would be no more…not to mention the draft beers we all liked and?—

Another buzz at my wrist.

Trust me?

Since that wasn’t in question, cheese or beer or otherwise, I stood up, said, “Girl’s night is over,” and moved across the space, weaving between tables until I was behind Beth, shifting her hair to the side and inhaling deeply before pressing a kiss to the back of her neck.

“Did you just smell me?” she asked lightly.

A kiss to her cheek. “Yup.” My lips to her ear. “And, for the record, you smell good.”

She grinned. “I’ll accept that.”

I kept my lips on her ear. “Jules?”

“Decided to play matchmaker myself,” she whispered, turning her head so her lips brushed mine. “Mostly because Cas can never take his eyes off her.”

I’d missed that.

But as I glanced to the side, I saw Cas join us at the table…directly across from Jules and not being shy about watching her as she told a story about her son, his kindergarten teacher, and the confusion between diaphragm and digraph.

I chuckled, as did the rest of the table.

But Cas didn’t.

His gaze was glued to Jules.

And I also supposed that could be why the woman Cas had been dating might have been more than a little pissed about Cas just talking to Jules.

“I’m seeing that,” I whispered, nuzzling her throat.

“So”—she flashed me a grin—“I’m giving Smitty a run for his money with his matchmaking.”

I stroked a finger down her cheek. “You giving him a run for his money in anything isn’t even a question.”

“Aw,” Beth said, turned her head and pressing a kiss to my palm.

“Well,” Jules said then, picking up her empty soda glass and sliding out of her seat—and I didn’t miss that she seemed to be deliberately avoiding looking at Cas. “I should get back to work before Matt gets pissed at me for slacking off.”

“What does Matt do when he gets pissed?”

It was a quiet question.

But Cas’s voice had taken on a dangerous edge.

One that I had only heard in rare instances when an opposing player was being a total asshole on the ice.

Jules stilled, and her gaze finally went to Cas’s.

The air tightened.

I found myself holding my breath, and Beth seemed to be doing the same.

But then Jules’s responding laugh was soft. “He scowls at me. Matt is a good guy.” She glanced away and nodded to the rest of the table, smile seeming as though it was a bit frayed on the edges. “Okay, then.” A tap to the table. “I’ll just make my rounds and then come back to close you guys out.”

“Thanks, honey,” Beth said, squeezing Jules’s forearm. “No rush.”

A glance to Cas, but then back to Beth and me, her expression warming, that smile turning genuine. “Yeah, I’ll bet you don’t mind cozying up to your hot hockey player.”

Beth laughed, leaned back against me. “Nope. Don’t mind that at all.”

With a grin, Jules slipped away.

Smitty bent, sticking his head in between ours, forcing us apart, his features fixed in a narrow-eyed glare. “Trying to take my job, Bethie?”

Beth blew on and then buffed her knuckles on her shoulder. “I think that glare and your question both speak of insecurity.” A beat, lips turning up. “Mostly because I’m doing a better job.”

Smitty growled, but then he surprised me and Beth, too—seemingly—by pressing a kiss to her cheek and straightening. “All right gents and ladies, Cheese Night Extravaganza is on me this time.”

“Smitty—” Beth began. “You don’t?—”

“On me,” he repeated, rounding the table, and slinging an arm around Kailey’s shoulder. “Now, all of you beat it so that I can pick up my woman in a bar.”

Kailey blushed but just leaned back against Smitty, added, “One of you guys can get next time.”

Quiet where he was loud.

But smart, strong, and with a steel backbone. We all knew she battled social anxiety, so her speaking up now was something we weren’t going to ignore.

“Okay, Kay,” Hazel said in her usual gentle tone, looping her arm through Oliver’s and leaning on him slightly in a way that told me she might have had one too many beers.

Pru was doing the same to Marcel.

But my Bethie, obviously, was sober.

She still leaned her body against mine, though, and I might not know all of her yet, but I knew enough, felt enough. “Come on, love,” she murmured, yawning, before rising on tiptoe. “Let’s go home and give Smitty his time for his reconnaissance.”

Love.

I smiled.

“Let’s go home.”

Her ass was pressing into my cock.

And I was trying to be good.

But it was pressing, rocking and rolling against my pelvis…and I was hard, growing harder by the second.

So, I was thinking about stats and not the soft sounds that were coming out of Beth’s parted lips.

Not the fact that she was dreaming about me, and that dream was hot.

How did I know this?

Because she’d also been talking in her sleep.

And some of the things she’d said included my name and a plea for me to fuck her.

Christ.

“Raph,” she moaned, head falling back against my shoulder, hips pressing hard, and?—

I couldn’t help it.

I thrust forward, one hand gripping the curve of her hip, drawing me into her, and I couldn’t stifle my groan.

But it had barely crossed my lips before Beth went still.

Fuck.

“Shh, honey. Sleep.”

Her back arched, ass rubbing against me, and?—

Fuck.

“Raph?”

“Go to sleep, baby.”

She rubbed again. “What if I don’t want to?”

I inhaled sharply. “It’s late and you’re tired?—”

Another arch of her back. “I’m not feeling so tired anymore.”

“No?” I asked, dropping my head, dragging my lips along her throat.

Her hand slipped between us, wrapped around my cock. “No, honey. I’m not tired.”

I stopped thinking right around the point her fingers slid under the material of my underwear and landed on my bare skin, but I definitely stopped thinking when she pushed me back, clambered on top and tore my T-shirt that she’d commandeered over her head, dropping it to the side.

Breasts.

Fuck, her breasts made me crazy.

I sat up, cupping one in my palm, guiding it to my mouth, sucking deeply on her nipple.

“Raph!” she gasped.

Then I was…undone.

Suckling both breasts, dragging my lips and tongue along her jaw, her throat, nipping on her earlobe, rearing back to kiss her deeply. Dragging her beneath me, kissing down along her ribs, softly over the top of her growing belly, then down .

Tugging her underwear off.

I pressed my face to her pussy and inhaled deeply. “You smell fucking good here too, sugarpie.”

She shuddered, cried out when I thrust my tongue into her folds.

But I didn’t stop, just fucked her with my fingers and my tongue until she was crying out again, this time because she was coming.

And then I was inside her, stroking probably too fast and too hard, but she had wrapped her legs around my waist, and I was cupping her breasts, rolling her nipples.

Eyes half-mast.

Lips swollen and parted.

Neck arched.

Skin sheened with sweat.

“Oh God,” she whispered. “Oh God. There. Right— oh ? —”

She bucked beneath me, pussy convulsing so tightly I saw stars…and then I wasn’t seeing anything.

Because my orgasm was rippling through me, sucking me dry, and it was taking everything in me to not collapse on top of her.

Chest heaving, brain muddled, I managed to roll us to the side.

And then we lay there, quiet as our breathing slowed.

I didn’t realize that tension had crept into me until she rested a hand on my chest. “I’m fine, love. Promise.”

There that was again.

Love.

The tension left me.

“Okay, sugarpie.”

Her lips curved, eyes closing, and she snuggled into me. “It’s getting better. I’m getting better.”

But she hadn’t shared all the demons.

And though I was trying to be patient, though I understood she needed to come to terms with her past on her own timeline—and I was so fucking proud that she was working so hard on doing it over the last month—in these moments, it was killing me.

She’d given enough that I knew her past was heavy.

Heavy enough for me to want to shoulder its weight.

But how could I if she didn’t give me the rest?

And how could I ask if she wasn’t ready?

And how could I just fall asleep without knowing for sure she was okay?

And how?—

She fell asleep, soft, slow breaths puffing on my throat, and I knew that answered one of my questions, at least for the moment.

How to fall asleep?

After she was safely ensconced in her dreams.