Page 9

9

“ W hy am I here right now?” I say under my breath as I make my way up the steps to his front door. Because you want to make sure he is okay. And no matter how much you hate him, he is your brother’s best friend. You’ve known him for ten years. And he fricken got in a fight with Dean and made a complete ass of himself in front of everyone. And he got laid out by the opponent before that and had to go to the locker room to get checked out after he went to the penalty box.

Tristan answers the door in just a towel. Seriously, who does that? Tristan Lawson, that’s who.

“Seriously, Hot Shot? Who answers their door in just a towel? Who were you expecting? One of your many ice girls or puck bunnies you keep on standby?”

He smirks a little. “I wasn’t expecting anyone–especially not you , Cupcake.” He looks super confused as to why I am standing there. Join the club, buddy . “Brooke, what are you doing here?”

What? He never calls me Brooke. And my God, look at his face. There is a cut right on his cheekbone and another one across his eyebrow. I instinctively want to reach out and fix what is injured. But I restrain myself.

“I don’t know…” I say. “I just… wanted to make sure you were okay.” Am I really going to admit this next thing to him? “I tried to go down and see you in the locker room, but security stopped me because I’m not family. Can I come in?”

Tristan hesitantly steps aside and I make my way through his doorway.

I don’t know what I expected Tristan’s place to look like. A bachelor pad? Laundry strewn everywhere. Dishes piled up in the sink. Trash bins overflowing. But I see none of that. In fact, it smells so crisp and clean. Controlled. I guess we are more alike than I thought. This is exactly how my apartment looks. The only exception is there is a stark lack of color in his house. Everything is grays and blacks. Probably to match his personality. My apartment looks like a rainbow exploded in it.

I am greeted excitedly by a couple of big dogs. I hold out my hands for them to lick and say hello. Their tails are wagging so they seem friendly enough, which is ironic since I know who their dad is. And he has been anything but friendly to me for the majority of the time that I’ve known him.

I slowly walk through the foyer that has a massive chandelier hanging from the tall ceiling. And look around. This is the nicest house I’ve ever seen. It has a modern farmhouse feel to it, which hello Chip and Joanna Gaines. I am obsessed with them. I try to go to Waco every chance I get so I can visit the Silos. Tristan’s house looks like he got the majority of his decor from their catalog.

I walk into the kitchen and run my fingers across the island as Tristan stations himself on the other side of the massive counter that is separating us. I finally shift my gaze from the countertop to Tristan and get a good look at his body. My heart leaps for a second. Calm down, you’ve seen plenty of men naked. Well not plenty, but enough. Ugh, stop staring, Brooke.

“Can I get you anything to drink? Water? Poison?” Tristan raises an eyebrow and smirks in the process.

“Ha ha. Water is fine.” Tristan walks over to his kitchen cabinets and takes out a glass. When he reaches up, I see not only how ridiculously muscular he really is, but also the bruises that cover his torso. My goodness, he was not this muscular when we first met. Then again, he wasn’t playing in the NHL. He also has a lot more tattoos than I remember. I guess over the years, I’ve noticed a little, but I made it a point to not give Tristan any more of my attention than the obligatory hello and goodbye when he would come by my parent’s house.

My face must be contorted in a wince because Tristan says, “Is something wrong, Cupcake? You look like you’re in pain.”

“I can say the same about you.” Then some force outside of my own control takes over. I walk toward Tristan and reach out my hand, gently touching one of his bruises. “Is this from earlier?”

“Yeah. That piece of shit got me good. That’s just the nature of the game.” Tristan hands me the glass and I have to actively peel my eyes off him and grasp onto the glass. “Also, fans love a good fight.”

Geez, I don’t understand why. I mean did Tristan look incredibly hot while throwing punches…of course, I would never tell him that. I couldn’t help but flinch whenever anyone ran into him. And it bothered me that Tristan was the only one I was paying attention to. I was there to watch and support my brother. But, when I saw Tristan on the jumbotron, my eyes would automatically follow him wherever he went on the ice. It’s like he inadvertently cast a spell through the screen and I was not immune to it.

“A lot of good that gear does you. You still get hurt anyway.” I slowly caress the bruise. My goodness, what is coming over me?

“Trust me, I could look a lot worse.” I wince at the thought. I’ve hated seeing Bradley in this state all these years. Anytime he would come home from a game with cuts and bruises, I would cringe. These men must be masochists for enduring that amount of pain. I finally take a sip of the water. For some reason my mouth is turning dry every second I am near this man. And I hate him even more for that.

“Do you have a first aid kit here?”

“Um, yeah. Why?”

I reach up and barely touch Tristan’s face. “Your cut on your left eyebrow is starting to bleed again. Did your trainer do a concussion check on you? Because you know that concussions are serious, right?”

Tristan chuckles and reveals a smile that I’ve never seen. A genuine smile. His chuckle makes my body stupidly vibrate with excitement. “Yes, Cupcake. We have only the best athletic trainers on staff. I checked out fine.” After taking a sip of his own water, he says, “Why are you looking at me all goofy like that?”

I bite my bottom lip. “You laughed. You should always do that.”

“You should always make me.” He steps closer and now the air is completely knocked out of me.

Okay, we are entering unfamiliar territory here. We are no longer bantering about how much we loathe each other. We are talking about how we make each other laugh and I am touching his perfect fricken body out of pure worry. While he is in nothing but a towel.

I clear my throat. “So, that first aid kit?”

“Hold on, I’ll be back. Apparently you have a problem with people being in towels, so I will go change into my clothes and get that kit.” He runs up his stairs to where I assume his bedroom is. A small part of me wants to know what his bedroom looks like. My cheeks get hot as that thought enters my mind.

As Tristan is changing, and to distract myself from thoughts of his bedroom, I take this opportunity to peruse his home. I walk into the living room and notice a large bookshelf. I did not take Tristan as a reader, but he is surprising me at every turn. Just like he surprised me by looking up at where I was sitting in that damn arena after he got into that fight with Dean. I could sense that he was looking directly at me. I even have evidence from the jumbotron to back me up. For some reason, I had this strange feeling that with every punch he swung at Dean, he was trying to prove that he cared for me. As if each punch was its own pick-up line for me.

I know that’s ridiculous. Because he hates me. But one thing I know is that players don’t punch their own teammates for entertainment. Tristan had a reason that wasn’t directly linked to hockey.

The real question is why.

Picture frames filled with Tristan’s sisters and his parents grace his bookshelves. He almost looks normal and not like my arch nemesis. Every smile in those pictures provides glimpses of who Tristan maybe truly is. He is a son. A brother. A best friend. At least to my brother, he is. Then I come across the best picture of all. I pick it up off the bookshelf to study it closer. A photo of Tristan with two elderly people, who I am assuming are his grandparents, with the Stanley Cup. He looks so happy and I can see the pride in his grandparents’ eyes as they pose next to him. Now, that’s a smile I’ve never seen come across his face.

“Best moment of my life right there,” Tristan states from right behind me. I jump a little. I can feel his breath near my ear. Heat radiates off Tristan’s enormous body and it sends chills up my spine. And not in a bad way. In a way that makes my core heat up and butterflies enter my vacant stomach.

“Your grandparents look so proud of you. I remember that night. Bradley was so happy. That’s the night he met Jen.” I vividly remember that night two years ago. We were celebrating their Stanley Cup win at a rooftop bar off Greenville Avenue. My brother saw Jen across the room and it was as if stars in the sky came down and took up permanent residence in Bradley’s eyes. They’ve never dimmed. I also remember that Tristan was surrounded by a swarm of women, ruthlessly throwing themselves at him, hands all over, caressing his chest, playing with his hair, whispering in his ear things that made him smile deviously. A knot of jealousy tightens in my stomach as that memory infiltrates my mind.

I shake my head a little, setting the photo back on the bookshelf. Back to reality . I turn around and hold my hand out, waiting for the first aid kit. “Kit?”

Tristan places the small white-and-red box in my palm. His thumb lingers a little too long against the side of my hand. And just when I think he will move his hand, he keeps it there longer. “What were you thinking about, Cupcake? Your cheeks are red.”

Stupid pale skin. Always betraying my inner thoughts. Why wasn’t I blessed with olive skin like Tess? And then I take him in. My God, can this man wear light gray sweatpants and an old Boston University shirt that clings to his sculpted chest. His sleeves of tattoos are the only ones exposed, unfortunately. His damp hair is starting to set in slight waves and even though he has a short, almost scruff-like, beard, his jawline looks more chiseled than ever. It is fucking annoying how he can look like this without any effort at all.

I clear my throat again and gesture to his couch. “C’mon, let’s go sit down.” I pry myself out of the intense gravitational pull that Tristan apparently has on my body and walk toward his charcoal couch that probably costs more than my annual salary.

“I’m seriously fine, Cup–” Tristan starts.

“Can you not fight with me for once, Lawson? Come sit on the couch so I can help you!”

Tristan lets out a small laugh and plops down next to me. A little too close, in my opinion. I scoot slightly as I open the first-aid kit. I take out some gauze, q-tips, and antibacterial ointment. As I softly press against Tristan’s open wound on his eyebrow, he flinches slightly but says nothing. For once, Tristan Lawson is vulnerable in front of me. No fighting. No quips. No mischievous smirks directed at me after he says something that pisses me off. His guard is down. He put down his firearms for a second. We are at a ceasefire. And I am going to take full advantage of it.

As I apply more ointment, I say, “Tristan.”

“Yes, Cupcake?”

That damn nickname. I roll my eyes, shake my head and continue, “Why did you fight Dean?”

Tristan doesn’t answer straight away. I shift my eyes from his cut and look into his hazel eyes, searching for some way to his inner thoughts. Maybe they are a portal into the inscrutable mind of Tristan Lawson. Maybe I can finally crack the code. “Because Dean is an asshole.” His jaw clenches and he doesn’t look directly at me.

He’s holding back. “That’s it? There is no other reason? From what I know about sports, you usually don’t punch out your fellow teammate.”

“He is dangerously close to getting something that I desperately want.” He looks intensely at me, with fire in his eyes.

My stomach flips and my heart starts to race. “And what’s that?”

Tristan plays with a piece of my hair. He leans a little closer. My breath hitches when I realize that Tristan fricken Lawson is the closest he’s ever been to my face and…wait, is he about to kiss me? My fingers get tingly and my hands start to shake. My body aches from the possibility of having his lips on mine. Having his fingers grab my hair and not just twirl it around.

A knock at his door breaks the magnetic pull between us. I lean back and I swear I hear Tristan let out a small growl, as if he is frustrated that whatever was about to transpire between us got interrupted. I know I feel the same way.

The knock becomes incessant and finally Tristan gets up from the couch and makes his way to the door. I frantically place the ointment and extra gauze back into the kit. I place some hair behind my ears and try to will the goosebumps covering my entire body away.

Tristan unlocks the door and opens it and there standing in the middle of his doorway is none other than an ice girl, in just a hockey jersey. No scratch that–in one of Tristan’s jerseys. Her eyes look hungry as she gazes up and down Tristan’s immaculate body. That son of a bitch was waiting for someone. He fucking lied to me.

Tristan scratches the back of his head and says, “Uh, Alison, I kind of have company right now.”

“No, no he doesn’t.” I snap the first aid kit shut and get up from the couch. My face is hot again, but this time out of pure embarrassment. I look nothing like this girl. Her platinum blonde hair and stark blue eyes are almost blinding, and she is perfectly spray-tanned. She is devastatingly beautiful and definitely Tristan’s type. Which I am clearly not.

“Brooke…”

“It’s fine, Hot Shot. You were waiting for her anyway, right?” I sear my stare into his eyes and his eyebrows furrow as if he is insulted at that accusation. He almost looks mad at me for leaving! Why the fuck would I stay?

I address the ice girl: “I was only cleaning him up for you. Alice, was it? He’s all yours.”

I brush past her and quickly make a safe distance between me and my enemy. I am glad Alison did show up so it could snap me the hell out of whatever trance I was in. Stupid me for thinking that Tristan Lawson has changed his colors. Nope, he is still the sullen gray man I’ve always known him to be.