Page 6 of Hot for the Hockey Player (The Single Moms of San Camanez: The Vino Vixens #2)
Maverick
Hot damn, Gabrielle was even more gorgeous up close than through my concussed, blurry eyes as I was being wheeled off on a gurney. And just like I remembered, the woman could cook.
As I drove back to my cabin at the San Camanez Brewery, I was unable to stop thinking about her.
Of course, saying no wasn’t even an option when she asked me to come over for dinner, or when Damon practically begged me to hang out and play video games with him afterward. While it wasn’t exactly quality time with Gabrielle, she was puttering around. So I still got to see her.
Quality time with Gabrielle? What the fuck was I getting on about anyway?
I gave my head a thorough shake to dislodge some of those not-so-PG-13 thoughts I found myself having about my former host.
Gabrielle Campbell, as beautiful, smart, and sophisticated as she was, was off-limits.
She probably still saw me as the hormonal, creatine-obsessed teenager she agreed to house when I moved out West to join the Spokane Chiefs.
But just like I remembered, she was also …
reserved. Perhaps even standoffish a bit.
If I didn’t know her as well as I did, I would have thought she wasn’t happy to see me.
But that was just the way she was. Closed off from over-the-top emotion, extremely matter-of-fact, and undeniably responsible.
I bet the woman hadn’t thrown caution to the wind … ever.
And yet, I couldn’t think of a damned thing I’d change about her. To me, she was perfect.
The years had been more than kind to her, and even though I’m pretty sure she was forty—or maybe slightly over forty—the woman didn’t look a day over thirty.
I caught myself more than once staring at her ass as she cleared the table.
If I was a Catholic, I’d be finding the nearest confessional to disclose my impure thoughts to the good father.
Luckily, I wasn’t the religious type. So I’d take those thoughts into the shower with me later and deal with them the old-fashioned way.
She was a stellar mom too. Just like when I lived with them, Damon and Laurel were polite, kind, respectful, and while Laurel was mostly quiet and darted off to her room to read after dinner, she made a point of coming out of her little cave to say goodbye to me before I left.
I could tell they gave Gabrielle a run for her money with their smarts though.
Especially Laurel. She was quick as a whip for eleven.
I drove through the windy roads of the island, loving how dark it was, with nary a streetlamp anywhere to light the way.
The sides of the pothole-riddled pavement were nothing but a wall of trees on either side.
Occasionally, a hidden driveway would appear, only denoted by a small, round, red reflector where it met the road.
Once in a while, there would be an address too, but not always.
I’d already checked into my cabin. So when I reached the turnoff for the laneway onto the pub property, I slowed my roll.
It was only nine-thirty and I wasn’t ready to call it a night. If I was going to call this place home for the next few months, I needed to get to know the locals—and the local watering hole.
I normally didn’t drink much—or at all—during the season, as I prided myself on being in peak physical condition while playing. But if the good doctor said I needed to rest, then I was going to rest with a beer in my hand.
I parked my rental truck—a black Ford F-150—in front of my cabin, but didn’t bother going inside. My gait was still slow, and I used the light on my phone to make sure I didn’t accidentally trip on a fallen branch or a rock as I made my way back over the one-lane grassy path toward the pub.
The sound of the kitchen staff echoed out of the open back door, along with some profanity-riddled rap music I’m sure they weren’t allowed to play at the front of house.
Yanking open the old, weather-worn wooden door, I was instantly greeted by the much mellower sounds of classic rock at a subtle decibel, and pockets of friendly conversation.
“Hey, aren’t you Maverick Roy of the Portland Storm?” asked the blond-haired guy behind the bar. He was probably around my age, with blue eyes, a cheeky smile, and a swimmer’s build—tall, broad shoulders, narrow waist.
I took a seat at the bar in front of him. “I think so.”
His grin grew, and he extended his hand over to me. “Cool. Welcome to the island. I’m Logan.”
“What do you recommend on tap, Logan?”
His lips pursed. “Everything, really. But the Belgian witbier is a favorite right now.”
“I’ll have a pint. I’m staying in one of the cabins, so I don’t need to worry about driving home.”
Logan’s brows hiked until they kissed the thick, chunky curl that fell over his forehead. “Oh really? For how long?”
I shrugged. “Few months, maybe. I’m on medical leave. So …”
He nodded like he knew the rest and wasn’t going to make me relive it again .
“Cool, man. My cousins own the place and they took pity on me. Gave me a job and a place to crash. I just live up the hill.” He grabbed a pint mug from behind the bar and put it under the tap before pulling the lever, filling the clear mug with a frothy honey-colored brew.
I glanced around the big, lively place. High ceilings with dark rafters, lots of recessed lighting with warm bulbs, comfy-looking booths along two of the walls, and what I’m assuming was an outdoor patio that they probably shut down for the winter.
It was modern meets coastal, meets homey-chic.
If that was even a thing. Definite masculine energy with all the dark wood and some sharp angles to the metal ocean-themed artwork on the walls, but not in an off-putting or uninviting way like the way some of my teammates styled their condos.
A white-blonde woman with gray eyes and a rebellious smirk on her lips came up to the POS machine near me. “I know you,” she said, not stopping from punching in the order.
“You do?” I asked as Logan set my beer down in front of me.
“Yeah. You’re that guy. That hockey player that all the girls want to bang.
But some guy banged you—non-sexually—from behind, and now you’re this medical mystery.
Nobody knows if you’ll ever walk, talk, or chew gum again.
” Her gaze roamed me from head to toe. “I don’t see a wheelchair, and you’re talking.
So I guess the only question that remains is … have you tried chewing gum?”
I tossed my head back and let out a loud bark of a laugh.
“Ignore Renée,” Logan said, grabbing a bottle of red and a wineglass from behind the bar to start filling Renée’s order. “She gives everybody a hard time. No one is safe.”
“Not even you, lover boy.” She stuck her tongue out at him, then blew him a kiss.
He rolled his eyes, but the affection Logan had for her was clear on his face. She grabbed the wineglass he put up on the bar and took it over to a table where a couple appeared to be on a date.
“I take it she’s yours?” I asked.
“And I’m a lucky fucker that she is.”
I snickered and took a sip of my beer, the condensation on the glass making my hand wet. “So besides drink, what is there to do on this island anyway? I’m stuck here for a while, doing rehab with Rolph Mazurenko, but that’s not twenty-four-seven.”
“I’ve only been here a few months myself—arrived in November—so I’ve been asking the same damn question for a while now. They tell me the summer is amazing, and there’s so much to do, then the island literally hibernates from November to March.”
I frowned. “There’s got to be something .”
Logan shrugged. “You interested in ordering some food, dude?”
I leaned back and patted my belly. “Wish I could. And I will, just not tonight. I had the best chicken parm of my life earlier.”
He cocked his head to the side for a moment, then started to retrieve the clean glasses from the glass cleaner and put them away. “Where? Not at the Thatch? They’re food’s okay … I mean the nachos are good.”
“No … uh, at Gabrielle Campbell’s. Do you know her?”
The man could barely contain his eyebrows at his point and nearly lost them to the ceiling rafters. “Are you dating Gabrielle?”
I was about to scoff and say, “I wish,” but I caught myself and just shook my head.
“Naw, man. It’s not like that. She was my host—” I couldn’t bring myself to call her my host mom, even though a lot of my past teammates did call their host families, host dad or host mom.
I never could. “When I played for the Spokane Chiefs, she hosted me for three years. I remember those kids when they were babies. And she was a great cook then too.”
Understanding dawned in Logan’s blue eyes and he nodded. “Gotcha. So she’s like a mom—”
“No,” I blurted out, instantly regretting my strong response. I cleared my throat. “Naw, not really. I mean … My parents paid for me to live there. It was like a glorified dorm room kind of thing.”
Was I protesting too much?
Logan’s nonchalant shrug and the easy way his brows settled said he believed me.
Phew.
I was a terrible liar, always had been.
“Anyway, I’m getting PT with Maz at Unger Wellness, and literally bumped into Gabrielle and her cheese at the grocery store earlier today.”
“And her cheese?” Logan snorted.
“Knocked it right out of her hands. But she invited me for dinner, and I probably ate my weight in chicken parm and Caesar salad.”
“As one should.”
I lifted my mug in a one-man toast. “Exactly.”
Another drink order popped up on the ticket machine from the server further down the bar, but Logan fixed the rum and coke while still chatting. “You’re from back East too, right?”
“West Virginia,” I said with a nod. “You?”
“Boston. Couldn’t get the fuck out of there fast enough. I’ve found my happy place, and it is on the West Coast. No more hurricanes for this guy.”