Page 4 of The Pucking Date (Defenders Diaries #3)

SEVENTEEN LOOKS GOOD ON ME

JESSICA

Seven weeks later

T here are exactly three reasons I agreed to this weekend at Dmitri Sokolov’s Fire Island house: free booze, Sophie’s threat to tell our mother I’m ‘tragically single,’ and the fact that my apartment still reeks of Chad Vanderbilt’s cologne six months after he decided I wasn’t Vanderbilt-wife material.

What I didn’t expect? Sand in places sand has no business being…and Finn O’Reilly showing up to ruin my carefully constructed emotional walls.

By the time I drag myself up from the beach, everyone’s already showered and glowing, sipping beer or cocktails and tossing salmon on the grill.

I walk straight into a scene; my brother Adam cracking jokes, though his gaze keeps drifting toward Jenna with an intensity he probably thinks no one notices.

Liam and Sophie on one of the loungers, Erin’s laughing at something Dmitri just muttered in Russian, and Kieran, Erin and Liam’s brother, is back for the weekend before heading into his next season at BU.

He’s perched on the arm of a deck chair, beer in hand, soaking it all in with the easy confidence of someone who knows exactly how much charm he’s working with.

Wesley—the newbie—and Nate are next to him, quietly sipping on their beer and taking it all in.

Somewhere behind them, Dmitri’s daughter Amneris comes tearing across the deck with a group of sandy-footed little girls, giggling like maniacs and weaving through the adults in a mini stampede. She hurls herself at her dad with wild abandon, and Dmitri catches her mid-sentence.

Finn’s not out here.

Yet.

Thank God.

I haven’t seen him since Montreal. Since that night.

I disappeared the next morning, shaken, unraveling, completely wrecked in a way I didn’t see coming. Because what he made me feel wasn’t something I could file under rebounds or flings. It wasn’t a temporary lapse in judgment. It was something that could destroy me.

So I panicked.

But the China trip wasn’t impulsive. Just…convenient.

I’d had my eye on NYU Shanghai’s summer Mandarin intensive for months.

After Chad dumped me, it felt like the perfect out; six weeks of total immersion, a chance to sharpen the language I’ve been speaking since I was in diapers but had let slide somewhere between adulthood and emotional self-sabotage.

It was supposed to be a clean break. A distraction. A way to forget Chad. And convince myself Finn was nothing more than a mistake.

From early July to mid-August, I threw myself into language labs, cultural excursions, dumpling-making workshops, and conversation practice with strangers who didn’t know a single thing about me except that I was trying to learn how to say “I’m fine” without lying.

And maybe it was also a chance to disappear into a city where no one cared that I was Coach Novak’s daughter. Where I wasn’t anyone’s almost or bad decision waiting to happen. Just a girl with a suitcase and something to prove.

My parents had known. Sophie and Adam too. Probably Liam, but no one else—not the team, not the media.

Not Finn. Especially not Finn.

I left without a word, without even leaving a note. Just sheets tangled in silence and my heels clutched in my shaking hands as I crept out like a walk-of-shame cliché.

I knew exactly what message I was sending. Knew exactly how it would land.

Thanks for the good time. Don’t call me, I won’t call you.

The universal language of a one-night stand. Cheap. Disposable. Forgettable.

It was cruel, and I knew it. But I told myself Finn O’Reilly wouldn’t care. Why would he? He probably had women leaving his bed every other weekend. This was just a regular Tuesday for him.

Except.

Except the way he’d held me afterward. The way he’d traced patterns on my skin in the dark, fingers spelling out secrets I was too terrified to read. The way he’d whispered my name.

I knew it was real, the kind of real that ruins you for anyone else. And I couldn’t handle real. Not after Chad.

So I ran. Fast and far and final.

He’d texted me. Once that morning. Twice that night. Again two days later. Nothing dramatic. Nothing demanding.

Just: You okay ?

And then: Jessica?

And finally: Tell me you didn’t run because of me.

I never answered. It wasn’t just distance I needed, it was time. Space. Silence. I thought seven weeks would be enough to forget.

It wasn’t.

Now back on Fire Island, the memories flood in with the tide. The burn of his gaze, the brush of his fingers, the way he made me feel like the only woman in the world.

But I can’t go there.

I haven’t seen him since Montreal. And now I have to face him. Look him in the eyes and pretend it didn’t mean a damn thing.

“I’m grabbing a shower,” I announce, mostly to the wind. Sophie’s too busy flirting with her terrifyingly gorgeous boy toy. Everyone else is halfway to tipsy territory and deeply invested in setting the world’s largest porch dinner table.

“I’ll be quick,” I add, not that anyone’s listening.

Dmitri’s house is precisely what you’d expect from a Russian hockey god with unlimited funds—sprawling, sleek, and stupidly gorgeous, like a Bond villain’s beach retreat with better lighting. Everything is top-tier: glass walls, infinity pool, furniture that looks too expensive to sit on.

And then there’s the outdoor shower.

Still luxe, but in a quieter, more intimate way—stone tile underfoot, three rainfall showerheads, and just enough rustic charm to make it feel like a hidden spa tucked into the dunes.

It’s quiet here. The moon’s out, casting silver streaks across the floor. I toe off my sandals, skin still sun-warm from the day.

The air smells of sunscreen and distant bonfires. My muscles aren’t tense, not exactly, but there’s a weight I can’t shake. Something heavy behind my ribs. A little leftover heartache. A touch of pride still bruised.

Chad. Ugh.

I shake him off. He’s not part of tonight. Not part of my next chapter.

I reach for the water and twist the knob. It sputters once before surging to life, hot, deliciously so. Steam rises, swirling around my shoulders as I step into the spray. And then I let the water do the work washing off the salt, the sand, and whatever’s still clinging to me from before.

I close my eyes. Inhale deep. Let the moment settle.

Then I hear it. The soft creak of the bamboo gate behind me.

I freeze, eyes snapping open, heart slamming against my ribs, just as someone steps in.

Tall. Broad-shouldered. Tugging a fitted gray T-shirt over his head, the fabric sliding up to reveal golden skin and a ridiculous stretch of abs.

Faded across the back just visible in the moonlight is the number seventeen.

Finn O’Reilly.

The shirt clears his face at the exact moment our eyes meet, and for one charged, electric second, neither of us moves.

Of course he’s here.

And of course he looks like he stepped off the cover of Sports Illustrated: Sin Edition .

My chest tightens. All that work in Shanghai, all those weeks convincing myself it was just a meaningless one-night stand, crumble in an instant.

He’s pure hockey sin, designed specifically to wreck women’s resolve—defined abs, a devastating V disappearing into board shorts, cut obliques that short-circuit my brain.

I’ve traced those lines with my mouth. Tasted every inch of skin between them.

And now, just looking at him—at the body I remember far too well—all my synapses go offline and my knees forget how to function.

I’m fully naked, standing under a stream of hot water, and he’s just there, dripping moonlight and confusion, staring at me like I’m something he forgot he wasn’t supposed to touch.

My body remembers him before my brain catches up. I force myself to look away, but it’s too late. He’s already seen the want in my eyes.

He removes his ear buds, his gaze dropping, slow, assessing, remembering.

My stomach flips. My pulse forgets its job.

“Are you fucking serious, O’Reilly?” I snap, crossing my arms, only to immediately regret it as it pushes my breasts up like a goddamn display window. I want to sound confident, but my voice cracks on the last word

He stops cold, sucks in a breath.

“Jesus, Novak. Seven weeks of nothing, and this is how I find you?” His voice is low, rough around the edges.

I glare. “The door was locked.”

“Not locked enough,” he mutters, eyes dragging over me. His jaw flexes. His eyes drop, and it’s not curiosity on his face.

He looks like he’s about to burst into flames.

Seeing him again, in this light, with that look in his eyes, I know exactly what’s racing through his head.

Because it’s tearing through mine too .

The feel of his hands. The weight of his mouth. The way he touched like he had all night but no time to waste.

My brain starts short-circuiting; cue the dirty highlight reel in full HD.

The first time he touched me, it was like touching a live wire in a thunderstorm. Desperate. Rough. Possessive in a way that had no business feeling as good as it did. In a few hours, he erased every man who came before and left nothing behind but him.

Later that night, his hands got gentler. His mouth slower. He kissed me like he’d waited months for the chance and wasn’t about to rush a single second.

Like we were already something.

It didn’t feel like a one-night stand. It felt like home. And that’s when I knew I had to run. Because he didn’t just fuck me.

He made love to me.

And I felt it.

Which is also when the panic kicked in.

Men like Finn don’t stay. They burn bright and leave you ash. And women like me don’t survive being left twice. Not when it feels like that.

Now, standing here, dripping wet, his eyes all fire and memory, and I’m unraveling all over again.

What if I stepped closer? Would he touch me the same way? Would it be rough again, or slow? Would he look at me like he did then, like I was the only thing in the world he wanted?