Page 85 of Moonlighter

“Eric.” Down on the ice, Brooklyn makes a series of aggressive passes. “I didn’t call, because I didn’t think it was a good idea.”

His gaze is focused on the play below us. “It’s okay. I’m used to being everybody’s bad idea.”

Ouch.

“You look great, by the way,” he says, without glancing in my direction.

“You’re just being nice. I look like I swallowed a soccer ball.”

Still watching his buddies down on the ice, he gives his head a little shake. “It looks good on you. All of it.”

“Well, thanks. You don’t look so bad yourself.”

He rubs his unshaven chin. “I get it.”

“You get what?”

“The bad ideas.” he whispers. “I have those too when I look at you.”

Heat blooms across my face, and I make a concerted effort to keep my gaze on the game below. Although I have no idea how it’s going. Because my concentration is shot.

I pick up a cheese puff and take a bite. I try to settle in and watch some hockey. But it won’t be easy. I’m sitting next to the hottest man I know, and every night when I close my eyes, his naked body rides through my dreams.

It was four months ago. But the memories are still fresh. Eric bucking against me in the bathroom. Eric hovering over me in bed. Eric kissing me inside the elevator.

“Cheese puff?” I offer in a strangled voice.

He gives me a single head shake, and a glance that tells me he can see right to the heart of me and read all my dirty thoughts.

Nate wasn’t wrong.Brooklyn looks solid tonight. Near the end of the second period we’re up two-zero. But then our defense bobbles a little, and Pittsburgh gets lucky with a goal right between Silas Kelly’s legs.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Eric mutters beside me. His hands are white knuckled on the armrests. And when Leo Trevi draws a penalty a minute later, Eric’s jaw locks up.

The period ends while we’re trying to fight our way through the power play, and Eric looks like a bomb about to blow.

I stand up. “We can rebuild it,” I insist, getting to my feet. The fact that pregnant ladies always have to pee is one cliché that’s one hundred percent true. “Need anything?” I ask Eric before I go. “Drink? Snacks? Valium?”

He shakes his grumpy head. “No thanks.”

“All right then. You hang in there.”

I head for the ladies’ room, Duff at my heels. “You never let on that you know Eric Bayer,” he says. “You think it’s okay if I ask for his autograph?”

“Sure. Why not.”

I ditch Duff at the door to the ladies’ room. But Rebecca is inside, reapplying her lipstick. “How’s he doing?” she asks me.

“Who?”

She rolls her eyes. “Eric. He’s been a bear this month. I think he’d dive out of the box headfirst if it meant he could play.”

“He didn’t share much,” I admit. “I got the macho brush off when I asked about his knee.”

“Men.” She blots her lipstick. “They won’t give him a timetable for returning to practice, yet. He’s frustrated.”

As a matter of fact, he did seem awfully brittle. “Was it a big surgery?”

“Not at all. But he was already having trouble with his right knee. So when his left ACL tore, it doubled his troubles.”