Page 21

Chapter 21

Zeke

A s soon as I saw Piper in the therapy room, I smiled. Her head was tilted down as she filled something out on her clipboard, forest green scrubs today hugging her curves, her hair up in her usual high ponytail showing off her slender neck. The neck I had been kissing just last night. I wanted so desperately to walk over to her, wrap my arms around her waist, and pull her back against my chest so I could place several soft kisses along that tempting neck.

When she’d left my apartment early this morning, I’d feared that our perfect bubble would pop. That everything that happened between us would soon be forgotten, like a dream. If I hadn’t had practice and she hadn’t had to work, I would have tried to convince her to stay with me for the rest of the day.

But my alarm had gone off, waking us both up. I had hoped it was just waking us up for the day and not to reality. We’d kissed goodbye this morning, but I still couldn’t be sure how she was feeling now that we were at the arena.

Before she caught me standing in the doorway staring at her, I entered the room and cleared my throat. She turned to look at me, a smile spreading across her beautiful face. That smile had me breathing out a sigh of relief, my shoulders relaxing. At least she was happy to see me.

“Hi,” she said, her voice almost sounding shy as she set down the clipboard and pen.

“Hey,” I smiled. “Long time, no see.”

She laughed, seeming to loosen up a little. I wondered if she was as unsure as me about how things were going to be between us after last night.

“How was practice?” she asked, still smiling at me like she was happy to see me as she motioned for me to sit down on the treatment table.

I sat down, used to our routine by now. “It went well.” I lay back. “But I was looking forward to it being over.” I hoped she understood by my tone what I was really saying.

“Oh, and why is that?” she asked, her feigned innocence bringing a goofy smile to my face.

“Lately I’ve been looking forward to my physical therapy sessions more than practice.”

“Wow.” She gave me a look of satisfaction. “I didn’t think I’d ever hear those words come out of your mouth.”

I chuckled. “Me neither.”

“You must have a great physical therapist.”

“Yeah, she’s pretty amazing.” I gave her a mischievous grin before I reached out and grabbed her hand and pulled her toward me, causing her to fall on top of me.

“Zeke!” She squealed with laughter, as I wrapped my arms around her.

“What?”

“We need to be professional at work,” she admonished but made no move to get up.

“I am. I’m professionally kissing you.” I pressed a quick kiss to her lips. “See?”

Now she gave me a mischievous smile. “You call that professional?”

A fire instantly lit inside me at her challenge, a wicked grin tipping the corners of my lips up. “Be careful what you ask for.”

I didn’t give her a chance to respond as my hand came up and grasped the back of her neck, bringing her mouth to mine. Her hands gripped my shoulders, and she kissed me with as much fervor as I was giving her.

Our kisses last night hadn’t been this frenzied. They’d been slow, exploratory. It was as if the hours we’d been apart had been a few too many, and we needed to make up for lost time.

Her hands were in my hair as I let mine roam her body, from her waist to her back to her neck to her hair, and I couldn’t seem to get enough of the feel of her. I loved the way her body felt on top of mine, her soft curves against the tautness of my muscles. The way she molded against me was pure heaven.

A small voice in the back of my mind, like the very back , told me it wasn’t smart to be making out with my physical therapist on one of the treatment tables, but it was so quiet, I couldn’t be sure it was there at all. Or at least, that was what I told myself. Because I couldn’t stop kissing Piper. Didn’t want to stop kissing her.

“Knock, knock,” a deep voice sing-songed, clearly happy about interrupting.

Piper was up and off of me with so much speed and agility that I questioned if she was the athlete between the two of us. Her cheeks flamed red as she patted her ponytail…that I had thoroughly ruined.

I let out an annoyed sigh. “What do you want, Holden?”

He crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe. “I didn’t know that kind of physical therapy was available.” I wanted to smack the cheeky expression off his face.

I glared at him. “Shut up.”

He lifted his hands in surrender. “Calm down. I was only joking. I know she’s off-limits.”

Good. I couldn’t even think about Piper kissing anyone else, especially one of my teammates, without seeing red. She and I still hadn’t discussed what all our kissing and spending time together meant, but that didn’t seem to matter to me at the moment. I just needed everyone on the team to know she was mine—and mine only.

“The reason I’m here,” he said, bringing my attention back to him, “is to tell you that Coach wants to meet with the team before we take off. I volunteered to come find you because I had a feeling I might find you in a…compromising situation.”

I patted down my hair, grateful Holden had been the one to walk in on us. The team might have thought we were dating, but I didn’t really want one of them walking in on us making out in the therapy room.

“Thank you,” I said to Holden, glad he had my back.

He looked at Piper. “You might want to do something about…” He gestured to her hair. “That.”

She hurried to the large mirror on the wall. Her cheeks, which had started to fade to a pink, went red again at the sight of her messed up ponytail.

Whoops.

I wanted to say that I felt bad, but our kiss had totally been worth it.

“Oh, my gosh.” She scrambled to take out the hair tie, quickly running her fingers through her hair to put it back up.

“C’mon, loverboy,” Holden said. “Everyone is waiting.”

I reluctantly stood, giving my back to Holden. “When I get back, we can do my actual therapy session.”

She turned around to face me but couldn’t look me in the eye. “Um, I forgot, I have something I need to get to, so I won’t be here. But you know a enough of the exercises to be able to do them on your own.”

What? What did she mean she wouldn’t be here?

She fidgeted with her watch and shifted from one foot to the other. What was going on with her? So Holden had caught us kissing—who cared? It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen us kiss before.

“Okay,” I said slowly, not knowing what else to say.

She walked past me to where her clipboard sat on the counter and started to write something down, like she was dismissing me.

I clenched my jaw and tried to hold my anger at bay. How had we gone from teasing and kissing to her icing me out? No pun intended.

This whole thing between us might have started out fake, but we were way past that now. Nothing about last night had been fake. Every word we’d shared, every press of our lips had been the most real thing I’d experienced in over a decade. Or possibly ever.

And now she didn’t want to look at me and had some made-up excuse so she didn’t have to see me later? What the heck?

I breathed in and out of my nose, trying to calm down. Fears and anger from my past were quickly coming to the surface, and I worked to smother them down. Just because she was blowing me off right now didn’t mean last night hadn’t been real. Maybe she was embarrassed Holden had walked in on us making out at work. I could at least wait to talk to her later, to let her explain why she was acting this way, before I let my brain get carried away with all the what-ifs.

I nodded, even though she wasn’t looking at me or paying me any attention, and walked out of the room with Holden at my side.

“Trouble in paradise already?” he asked sarcastically.

I wanted to smack him. Which told me I hadn’t suppressed my anger all the way.

He must have not seen the annoyance on my face at his remark or felt the waves of frustration coming off me because he continued to mock me.

“I thought you were smarter than this,” he said. “Getting tangled up in relationships only ends in disaster. All you can count on is yourself. Not sure why you’ve forgotten this.”

I clenched my jaw so hard this time that I wasn’t sure I hadn’t cracked a tooth.

I was smarter than this but…but Piper was different. Or at least, I’d thought she was.

She’ll leave you, just like everyone else in your life.

That voice in my head made me want to smack myself in the face.

The words still came out of my mouth, even though I wasn’t sure how much I believed them. “Piper is different,” I bit out.

“Oh, that old chestnut— but they’re different .” He shook his head. “I can’t believe she got to you so easily. This isn’t like you.”

It wasn’t like me. But I was still holding out hope that I was wrong about Piper. That we’d talk tonight, and everything would go back to how it had been before. That maybe I could have something with her I’d never thought possible to have for myself. Those hours together cooking dinner and cuddling on the couch had made me think that being happy—maybe one day being in love—was a possibility for me. That I just needed someone like Piper to make me see it.

Or had I just been a fool?

Holden stopped me before we headed into the room where the rest of the team was waiting. “I never thought I’d have to be the one to give you this talk,” he said. “You are better on your own. Tying yourself to people will only leave you with regrets. You know this.” He paused. “We both do.”

My brain agreed with him one hundred percent. But my heart? Yeah, it wanted to argue that I just needed to find my person, and that maybe Piper was my person.

Stupid heart.

I teetered on the edge of decision. Did I listen to Holden and do what I always did, keeping people at a distance? It had kept me safe for the last ten years, and it was a lifestyle and choice I was used to. Or should I follow my heart and see what could happen between Piper and me? Give myself the chance to have a life outside of hockey.

Standing in a random hallway in an arena wasn’t the place to make such an important decision. That, or I wasn’t willing to make the choice. At least not yet.

I needed to talk to Piper.

But what I was really worried about was that I already knew my answer…and what I really needed was just Piper.