Page 21

Twenty-One

RIZZO

“Are you sure you want to go out?” Nat asks for the third time. We’ve been kind of laying low with our relationship as far as being in the public eye, so we haven’t had many nights out on the town, just the two of us. I’m not some mega celebrity or anything, but I am pretty recognizable around Seattle and there are plenty of paparazzi and news outlets that like to lurk around and catch the local athletes and musicians whenever they can. I don’t particularly care if the whole fucking planet knows that I’m seeing Nat, but she didn’t choose a life in any kind of spotlight. It’s not fair of me to shove her into one until she’s ready.

“I swear to God if you ask me again, I’m going to introduce you to one of my favorite words, Natalie.”

“And what would that be?” she asks, half challenge, half intrigue.

I turn and hold her gaze when we stop at a red light. I slowly inch my hand upward from where it rests on her leg just above the top of her thigh-high boot. The combination of the tall boots and short skirt made my pulse and cock both jump when she’d opened the door. We almost hadn’t left the house at all and spent the entire night in bed instead, but knowing what I had planned for the evening I’d forced myself to behave. Mostly.

She moans quietly when my fingers brush the silk of her panties, stroking gently.

“ Edging ,” I whisper, that simple word holding the promise of so much. She gasps, her pupils dilating.

“Is that supposed to be a threat?” she asks as I continue moving my fingers. I chuckle low.

“Oh sweetheart, you have no idea…” I start to pull my hand away and she arches her hips forward, silently begging for more. My lips curl. Oh this is going to be fun.

“Are you sure you don’t just want to go home right now…” She bites her lip, her voice full of a nervous hope. I settle my hand on her knee and squeeze gently.

“Patience, baby. Patience .” She squirms a little and I laugh, my nerves forgotten for a moment. But all too soon, my heart is galloping like a fucking Clydesdale inside my chest again. It’ll be fine . I’d admittedly been a little worried about the whole Valentine’s Day thing. I mean, it’s not like I have any experience being a boyfriend on this particular holiday or anything and I wasn’t sure if Nat had big expectations, but, as usual, Shep helped me figure my shit out.

“I don’t know what the fuck to do here, Shep,” I’d said, running my hands through my hair in frustration while we sat on two benches in the gym. “Do I go super huge? Or intimate? Do I just do something stupid like a stuffed animal and some candy? Or maybe jewelry?”

“I think you need to chill before you hyperventilate.” He’d grinned and I’d scowled.

“What’s so fucking funny?”

“It’s just nice seeing Mr. Cool and Collected, Always Knows What Women Want freaking out about Valentine’s Day.”

“Fuck off, asshole.” He chuckled and I’d thrown a towel at his face. “Help, damn it.”

“Ok, ok, here’s what you need to do: stop focusing on the holiday and the pressures of it, and just think about what you would want to do for Nat on a random Tuesday in the middle of September to show her you love her. Big. Small. Whatever. Just do that and stop worrying about all the extra shit just because of the day.”

He’d made it seem so fucking simple, and the plan started to form almost immediately. Now I pull into a parking spot around the corner from the bar and cut the engine, quickly hopping out and coming around to her door to open it for her.

“Well, aren’t you the gentleman?” she says with a smile as she takes my hand and I help her up. I don’t even try to hide my attempt to catch a glimpse up her skirt and she swats at my chest playfully as she stands and tugs her skirt down. Her hair is pulled half up, the rest down in loose, sexy waves that cascade down her back like a waterfall of gold. I reach out and push a few strands away from her temple, grazing my knuckles softly down her cheek before stepping back onto the sidewalk.

“Gentleman in the streets. Freak in the sheets,” I confirm with a grin.

“Oh don’t I know it,” she says quietly. She glances at my hand but quickly pulls her gaze back up to look around. I shake my head in exasperation and grab her hand, interlacing our fingers and bringing the back of her hand to my lips. “You sure?” she asks again and I give her a look that promises she’ll regret that. She bites her lip, not seeming too upset about it whatsoever.

We head down the sidewalk and a light snow begins to fall. Nat leans her head back and smiles, and all I can do is stare. I know it sounds cliché as hell, but she literally steals the breath from my lungs.

We round the corner and I usher her to the front of Delaney’s. She seems to relax when she sees where we’re going and confirms that I hadn’t been lying about our casual night out. Then recognition flashes in her eyes and she gives me a sly smile.

“I remember this place.”

“Oh really? Hmm, hot date with an even hotter guy, perhaps?”

I reach the door first and meet her gaze before I pull it open. She smirks and hikes a shoulder.

“Eh, he turned out alright, I guess.” I narrow my eyes and she chuckles. I lean in to give her a quick kiss and let the feel of her lips on mine calm my racing heart.

Here goes nothing.

I pull the door open and step aside, gesturing for her to go in first. She keeps her eyes on me for a moment as she walks through the door, but then she turns to look inside and freezes.

“AJ, what…”

I put a hand on the small of her back and usher her further inside so we can close the door against the chill outside. The entire place is empty, save Sean behind the bar who inclines his head to us in greeting, and Erica, who’s standing in the middle of the room and gesturing to the small table along the back wall. Almost every other surface is covered in arrangements of lilies and roses and peonies—her favorite flowers—and twinkling lights.

I usher her to the table while she stares around the bar, speechless. My heart is thundering my chest, but I feel good. Better than good. I help Nat out of her coat and Erica takes it with a warm smile, holding her hand out for mine next. Nat settles into her chair and I slide into the one across from her.

“Drinks?” Erica asks.

“I’ll, uh, have a rum and coke please,” Nat says, still very much confused.

“Guinness. Thanks, Erica.”

She nods and heads off to hang up our coats and grab our drinks.

“Ok, what exactly is happening here?” Nat asks, leaning towards me.

“This is our Valentine’s Day, Nat.” She blinks and I lean my elbows on the table. “There’s so much pressure to do a big thing on the fourteenth, but I didn’t want to wait until then to—” I stop talking when Erica comes back, leaning away a bit so she can set down our drinks and a basket of cheese curds. Nat smiles and I grin. I know my girl and her love of all things fried cheese. She grabs one and pops it into her mouth, lips curling up while she waits for me to finish. I take a long sip of my drink and then a deep breath. I let it out slowly.

“I didn’t want to wait until then to bring you back to the place that it happened.”

“The place that what happened?”

“The place that I fell in love with you.” Her lips part as she inhales sharply. “In this bar, at this table, I knew I was done for, Natalie. I knew that night, before we even went back to my place, that I was a goner.” Her eyes water but I don’t stop. I don’t think I can now that I’ve started. “You’ve been one of my best friends, you know me better than almost anyone else in the world and aren’t afraid to call me on my bullshit when I need it most.” She huffs out a laugh as a tear escapes from the corner of one eye, slowly rolling down her cheek. I’m really fucking hoping that’s a tear of joy. I reach over and grip her hand, running my thumb in slow circles over her smooth skin. “You make me laugh even when I don’t want to. You make me feel like I’m more than just a name on the back of a jersey. You…you’re everything, Nat. Everything . I love you. I’m in love with you. And I really fucking hope you love me back because I’ve never done this before and I’m admittedly feeling a little vulnerable.”

She laughs again, smiling through the tears. She reaches across the small table and grips the front of my shirt, pulling me into a kiss that makes my heart stutter and my blood turn to straight fire.

“I love you too,” she whispers against my lips. I feel like my chest may crack in two from the eruption of pure fucking joy that her words send through me. My lips curl upward and I kiss her again, cradling her cheek with my hand. I really wish there wasn’t a table between us right now and that we weren’t in a fucking bar. Maybe this was a terrible plan after all.

Nat pulls away first and when I meet her gaze, we both smile like idiots.

“I can’t believe you planned all this. Did you practice that speech?”

“Not at all. I had a whole other one written that quoted Shakespeare and Celine Dion and shit, but I decided to just go off script instead.” She snorts and tosses a cheese curd at me. I catch it and pop it in my mouth, giving her a huge smile. God this might be the best day of my life.

We eat and drink and laugh and dance…and possibly hook up in the storage room. It’s all fucking perfect, every single minute of it. Jax picked up the Maserati not long after we’d gotten here and Jerry is waiting outside for us when we finally stumble back out into the snow. We barely keep our hands to ourselves in the car, but don’t make it past the entry way once we’re finally back at my place. What feels like hours later, we’re sprawled out in front of the fire place in the living room. I’m not exactly sure when or how we made it from the foyer to here, but this is where we’re spending the night because I don’t think either of us can move a muscle.

Shep and the crew have Zamboni, thank God, so the only thing I have to worry about for the rest of the night is finding the strength to grab pillows and a blanket from the couch a few feet away. I grunt as I heave myself up, grab the goods, and settle back down beside a nearly comatose Natalie. I throw the blanket over us and maneuver the pillow under my head, tucking Nat’s against my chest.

“That sounded like it was difficult,” she mutters.

“It was a Herculean effort, I’m not gonna lie. I think you fucked me into near immobility, Natalie Morgan.” She snorts and snuggles in closer to my side.

“I think this might just be the greatest night of my life, Thirst Trap.” My lips curl at the corners and I sigh in pure, utter contentment.

“Ditto, Nat. Ditto.”