Page 1 of Stand Your Ground

Bark, Bark

Carter

“Did you take a pill before coming in?” Livia asked me, hanging one hand on her slim hip as the other pointed a very sharp tool in my direction. “Because that shot only numbs your jaw, and Iknowyou gotta be high to say what you just said to me.”

“Come on, Liv. Look—”

“Doctor Young,” she corrected me, one dark brow sliding up into her hairline. “This isn’t a barbecue at Daddy P’s house. You’re in my chair, at my job, and you will respect me and call me by my hard-earned title.”

Fuck.

My cock hardened at her tone, at the way she snapped at me, at how she made me feel small and somehow made me buzz to life at the same time.

“Yes, Doctor,” I breathed.

Livia narrowed her gaze, dropping it to my lap before she rolled her eyes. She was trying to keep her sassy attitude intact, but I saw the smile she was fighting. “Oh, my God, Carter, you don’t seriously have a boner right now?”

“Can you blame me? That was fucking hot.”

My words slurred a little as my jaw began to numb.

As a professional hockey player, I’d had my fair share of dental work. But somehow, I’d managed to avoid taking a highstick hard enough to break my tooth and send most of it flying onto the ice.

Until last night’s game.

Which was why I was here now, in Dr. Livia Young’s chair, shooting a shot that, until now, I’d been too afraid to shoot. And no, I wasn’t just asking her to fix my tooth.

I was asking her to take me under her wing and train me to be better in bed — and in dating, period.

I’d known Livia for years. She was the dentist for the Tampa Bay Ospreys, the team I was now on a one-way contract with. She was also best friends with Maven Tanev, who was married to one of my teammates and closest friends. Because of that, we ran in the same circle — attended the same parties, went out to the same places, watched the same group of friends grow up and get married and move on while we played on the sidelines.

Maybe that was what had courage swelling up in my chest like a wave. It hadn’t even been two months since we celebrated the wedding of our friends Aleks and Mia, and now, the whole friend group was preparing to celebrate Will and Chloe andtheirnuptials.

I had a sneaking suspicion Livia didn’t care one way or another, but I was tired of watching everyone else find their happiness when I couldn’t even find a fucking date.

Don’t get me wrong — I loved my teammates, even when they ragged on me, and I was happy they were all finding their soulmates.

I was just alsounhappythat my confidence had been eviscerated by an absolute hard ass of a coach when I was fifteen, and I had yet to recover it.

It pissed me off that something I should have been over by now had soiled not only my performance on the ice, but off it, too.

But that’s how trauma works, as my therapist so often loved to remind me. We don’t get to choose how long it sticks around and keeps its claws in us. We don’t get to turn a dial and make it suck less. It’s a part of us, like a mole or a scar, and we have to learn to live with it.

So, that’s where I was now — acceptance.

My confidence was shit. I couldn’t land a date to save my life, let alone a girlfriend.

But Livia Young was just the woman to help me change that.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, that sharp tool still dangling in her other hand. Her dental assistant stood by silently, a mask covering part of her shocked face, though I could see the young girl’s eyes flicking between me and Livia. What I could see of her pale skin was flushed red. But I had no shame when it came to Livia Young, and she’d never been afraid to speak her mind, either.

That was just one of the many reasons I knew she was right for this job.

“Carter, you are in my chair because you were hit in the face and your two lower central incisors have been blown to bits like a mortar went off in your mouth.”

“I love when you talk dentist to me.”

“And the only lesson I will be giving you,” she continued, waving that tool around like a wand. “Is to get a better mouth guard and learn how to dodge a high stick.”