Page 16 of Cold Shoulder, Hot Take (Seattle Puckaneers #2)

“Her kids. Her work. Making sure the men in her life aren’t going to create chaos or hurt her family.” Elliot ticks off on her fingers. “You know, adult concerns. Things that matter.”

My phone buzzes again and Elliot glares at it like it personally offended her.

“When’s the last time you went more than an hour without checking that thing?”

“I don’t know.”

“Of course you don’t. You’re addicted to the attention, even when it makes you feel like garbage.” She stands up, pacing now. “You want to know what your real problem is?”

“I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“You don’t know how to be alone. You don’t know how to exist without constant validation from women who want to use you for bragging rights.” She stops in front of me. “And until you figure that out, you have no business pursuing someone like her.”

The room falls quiet except for the sound of Elliot’s pacing and my phone’s occasional buzzing.

“You know what?” Elliot says suddenly. “I’m going to help you.”

“What?”

“I’m going to be your wingwoman. Figure out what the deal is with this Golda situation.”

“Wait, I don’t think?—”

“I just watched my husband’s team lose a charity game because you can’t handle a woman having talent,” Elliot interrupts. “You’re taking my help whether you want it or not.”

“How are you going to?—”

“Leave that to me. I’m very good at getting information when I need it.” She smiles, and it’s not entirely pleasant. “Sometimes the direct approach is the most effective.”

Brody and I exchange glances.

“What are you planning?” I ask nervously.

“Nothing dramatic. Just a little reconnaissance.” She’s already moving toward the kitchen. “You focus on getting your own house in order. Delete those apps, stop reading desperate messages, learn how to function like a normal person.”

“Elliot—”

“Trust me,” she calls over her shoulder. “I’ve got this handled. You just try not to have any more public breakdowns before I figure out how to fix your mess.”

I look at Brody, who shrugs helplessly.

“Once she’s made up her mind, there’s no stopping her,” he says. “Besides, you clearly need all the help you can get.”

My phone buzzes again, and this time I don’t even look at it.

Maybe Elliot’s right. Maybe I am a mess. Maybe I do need someone to take control of this situation before I make it worse.

But as I sit in their comfortable living room, listening to Elliot already planning whatever scheme she’s cooking up, I can’t help but feel like I’ve just unleashed something I’m not prepared for.

My condo feels like a mausoleum when I get home. Thirty-four hundred square feet of marble and steel and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Elliott Bay, and it’s the loneliest place on earth.

I drop my keys on the granite counter and stare at my reflection in the black window. Still look like Dex Malone, professional hockey player. But Elliot’s words echo in my head: “You’re not that smart.” and “You’re too dense to see the problem.”

Fuck.

I pour myself three fingers of scotch and collapse onto my couch. The same couch where I’ve entertained a parade of women whose names I can’t remember, who took selfies in my bathroom and posted them with captions about “living their best life.”

My phone sits on the coffee table, screen lighting up every few minutes with new notifications. More messages from women who watched me get humiliated today and somehow found it attractive. More offers to “console” me, to “make me feel better,” to remind me why I’m still their “daddy.”

The thought makes my stomach turn.

I pick up the phone and start deleting apps. Tinder, Instagram DMs, the dating apps I can’t even remember downloading. Each deletion feels like removing a tumor.

When I’m done, my phone looks naked. No red notification badges, no constant buzzing. Just silence.

That’s when Elliot’s words really sink in: “That poor woman just sang beautifully at a charity event, and now she has to wonder if she somehow caused a professional athlete to have a public meltdown.”

Jesus Christ. Golda probably thinks it’s her fault. She did something amazing—something that reminded everyone in that arena that she’s talented and complex and so much more than just a hockey mom—and I turned it into a disaster.

She’s sitting at home right now, maybe replaying the moment, wondering what she did wrong. Wondering if she somehow embarrassed her son’s coach. Probably feeling guilty for something that was entirely my fault.

The scotch tastes like ash.

I’ve spent months thinking about what I wanted from her. Coffee dates, dinners, the satisfaction of being the guy who finally got the unimpressed woman to say yes. I never once thought about what she might want from me.

Or more importantly, what she didn’t want.

She didn’t want complications. Didn’t want drama. Didn’t want some hockey player making her life harder than it already is.

And what did I do? Made a charity game about my pathetic inability to handle being surprised by her depth.

My laptop sits on the coffee table, mocking me. On impulse, I open it and search for her name. “Golda Adler voice over.”

Her professional website loads—clean, sophisticated, showcasing commercial work for brands I recognize. There are audio samples, client testimonials, a brief bio that mentions her “versatile range and professional reliability.”

I click through her demo reel. Her voice fills my empty condo, selling breakfast cereal and luxury cars and pharmaceutical products, shifting seamlessly between warm and authoritative, playful and serious.

It’s the same voice that sang today, just contained in thirty-second clips instead of soaring over an entire arena.

I scroll further down the search results and find something I didn’t expect—audiobook samples. Romance novels, historical fiction, mystery series. Dozens of titles with her name listed as narrator.

“The Duke’s Desire.” I click on the sample without thinking.

Her voice flows through my speakers, reading about ballrooms and stolen glances and a heroine who “felt her breath catch as the mysterious stranger’s eyes met hers across the crowded room.”

I buy it immediately.

Then I buy the next one. “A Lady’s Secret.” And the next. “The Rogue’s Redemption.”

By the time I realize what I’m doing, I’ve purchased seventeen audiobooks narrated by Golda Adler. Historical romance, contemporary fiction, even something called “The Vampire Detective Chronicles” that sounds absolutely ridiculous.

I don’t care what they’re about. I just want to listen to her voice without having to earn it through careful conversation and repeated rejection.

It’s pathetic. I’m a thirty-two year-old professional athlete buying romance novels because I’m desperate to hear a woman’s voice. A woman who won’t even have coffee with me, who probably thinks I’m exactly the kind of man she needs to protect herself from.

And she’s right.

I queue up “The Duke’s Desire” and settle back with my scotch. Golda’s voice flows through my speakers, professional and controlled.

“Chapter One. Lady Margaret had always prided herself on her composure, but as the mysterious Duke of Ashworth approached across the ballroom, she found her carefully constructed walls beginning to crumble...”

This is fine. Historical romance. Ballrooms and proper ladies. Nothing problematic about listening to Golda read about?—

“His dark eyes held promises that made her breath catch, suggestions of pleasure she’d never dared imagine. When he finally reached her side, his voice was a low rumble that seemed to vibrate through her very core.”

I take a larger sip of scotch.

“‘Lady Margaret,’ he murmured, his lips dangerously close to her ear. ‘I’ve been watching you all evening. The way you move, the way you laugh... it’s driving me to distraction.’”

Fuck. Her voice has dropped to that intimate register, the one that probably sells a million copies. Professional, but with just enough breathiness to make it feel like she’s whispering secrets.

“She should have pulled away. Should have maintained proper distance. Instead, she found herself leaning closer, drawn by the heat radiating from his powerful frame. ‘Your Grace,’ she whispered, ‘this is highly improper.’”

I’m gripping my glass too tight.

“‘Improper?’ His laugh was dark velvet. ‘My dear Lady Margaret, you have no idea how improper my thoughts have been since the moment I saw you.’”

Christ. I can practically hear the smile in Golda’s voice as she reads this, like she knows exactly what effect her narrator voice has on people. Professional as hell, but there’s something underneath?—

“His hand found the small of her back, and she gasped at the contact. Even through the layers of silk and propriety, his touch burned. ‘Tell me to stop,’ he commanded softly, ‘and I will walk away. But if you want to discover what lies beyond these walls of yours...’”

I hit pause so fast I nearly knock over my drink.

Silence fills my condo, broken only by the sound of my own rapid breathing.

What the actual fuck.

I just spent eleven minutes listening to the woman who rejected my coffee, dinner, and breakfast invitations describe a duke’s seduction techniques in excruciating, breathy detail.

The same voice that gets nervous asking for extra foam in her latte just narrated a scene that has me shifting uncomfortably on my own couch.

My phone buzzes.

Bro you see the highlights from tonight? That pass to Luca is already a meme.

I ignore it and stare at my laptop screen. Sixteen more audiobooks in my queue. Sixteen more opportunities to torture myself listening to Golda’s voice doing things to fictional men that she won’t even consider doing with me.

This is insane. I’m insane.

I stand up and head for the bathroom, cranking the shower to cold. The water hits my skin like ice, shocking my system back to something resembling sanity.

But then I’m standing there under the freezing spray, and all I can hear is her voice echoing in my head. “His touch burned.” “Tell me to stop.” That low, intimate register she uses for the Duke’s dialogue.

Fuck it.

I grab my phone from the counter and scroll through the audiobook app. “The Duke’s Desire” - Chapter Seven: “A Lady’s Surrender.”

Of course there’s a chapter called that. Of course.

I crank the volume to territory more fitting for a nightclub and let the phone rest on the shower ledge, then turn the water from arctic to steaming. If I’m going to lose my mind, I might as well be comfortable.

Golda’s voice fills my bathroom, bouncing off the marble walls.

“Margaret found herself pressed against the library door, the Duke’s body caging her in. ‘We shouldn’t,’ she whispered, even as her hands fisted in his shirt.”

I close my eyes, water cascading down my back.

“‘Tell me what you want,’ he commanded, his voice rough with need. ‘Say the words, Margaret.’”

Christ. The way she drops her voice for his dialogue, makes it sound commanding and desperate at the same time. Like she knows exactly what that tone does to people.

“‘I want...’ she breathed, ‘I want you to touch me. Please.’”

My hand moves without conscious thought, and I’m imagining it’s not some fictional duke and lady. I’m imagining it’s me pressed against that library door, Golda’s voice whispering those words meant for me instead of narrating them for thousands of strangers.

“His hands found the laces of her gown, fingers working with practiced skill. ‘You’re so beautiful,’ he murmured against her throat. ‘So perfect.’”

The professional control in her voice makes it worse somehow. She’s reading every word of pure sin, articulated to perfection. Clinical precision wrapped around absolute filth.

My hand wraps around my cock, water streaming down my back as I close my eyes and pretend those words are meant for me.

“She arched into his touch, a soft moan escaping her lips as he traced his fingers along her collarbone, memorizing the silk of her skin.”

Christ. She actually moaned while she was saying that and I throb in painful response.

“‘I’ve wanted this since the moment I saw you,’ he confessed, his breath hot against her ear. ‘Every conversation, every stolen glance... you’ve been driving me mad.’”

The words hit too close to home. Way too close. Because that’s exactly what she’s done to me—every careful conversation, every time she looked away when I got too close, every polite rejection that just made me want her more.

“‘Show me,’ she whispered back. ‘Show me how much.’”

My grip tightens as her voice turns gravelly. Professional but breathless, like she knows exactly what effect she has.

“He pressed her harder against the door, his mouth claiming hers with desperate hunger. She tasted like wine and promises, like everything he’d been denied for so long.”

I’m moving faster now, thighs locked tight, water cascading over my shoulders as Golda’s voice fills every corner of my bathroom and my breath comes in harsh pants.

Imagining it’s her pressed against my shower wall instead of some fictional lady.

Her copper hair dark with steam, her hands fisted in my hair instead of some duke’s shirt.

“‘Please,’ she gasped against his lips. ‘I need ? —’”

“‘I know what you need,’ he growled, and his voice was pure possession, pure male satisfaction at having her finally surrender.”

That’s it. I come harder than I have with any other woman recently, Golda’s voice washing over me as I imagine her saying those words to me, for me, because of me instead of strangers buying romance novels.

The aftermath hits immediately. I’m standing in my marble shower, having just gotten off to an audiobook narrated by a woman who won’t even have coffee with me. A woman who probably reads bedtime stories to her kids in that same voice.

What the fuck is wrong with me?