Page 119 of The Wildest One

“I want more, Beck.”

“More.” He said that like he needed to test how the word would feel coming through his lips. “Explain what that looks like to you.” He stretched his arm up, the blanket falling to his stomach.

“It would be everything I’ve always envisioned for us.” I paused. “I’m not talking about just the physical stuff. I’m talking about all of it.”

He wet his bottom lip with his tongue while he listened.

“Being together. A … relationship.”

He stroked the outside of my thigh. “You know that’s what I want.” He gave me a small smile. “And you know it’s what I’vebeen waiting to hear you say. But why now? Why during our first week of travel?”

“I literally couldn’t take another second of being away from you. I was fighting against what I wanted and making myself miserable in the process.” My eyes closed for just a moment. “You’re all I’ve ever wanted, Beck. Since my sophomore year of college, it’s only been you.”

He leaned across the bed and put his mouth by my ear, breathing me in before he kissed my cheek. “You’re making me so fucking happy.” When he pulled back, his eyes changed. “But what about your dad, Jolie? The team. Everything you’ve been worried about. You’re telling me none of that matters to you anymore?”

As my anxiety jolted, I drew in some air and patted the center of my stomach. “I’m filled with worry about it.” I rubbed several circles over my navel and relocated my hand to my chest. “I have no idea how Dad is going to react. I worry I’ll lose the respect of the team when they find out I’m sleeping with their captain. I?—”

“I’m going to stop you right there. That team—those boys—they’re my family. If they’re told we’re in a relationship, they will know the gravity of the situation. You being mine is a very serious thing, Jolie, and they will treat you with nothing but respect.” He slid his hand behind my head.

That part was a relief at least.

But my dad was an entirely different beast that I was not looking forward to tackling.

“What if my dad doesn’t allow me to work for the team anymore?” Things were tightening within me, and I didn’t like it. “What if I get reassigned to my old accounts and I have to move back to Boston? What will happen to … us?”

“I’ll talk to him.”

I laughed. “You’re funny.”

“I’m not joking.” He rolled onto his side and moved his palm to my stomach. “He’s the owner of my team, and that puts me in a position where I need to have a conversation with him. And I’ll explain to him that we’re not new. Things started long before you worked for the Whales.” He moved his thumb around my belly button. “Once he hears that, I’m hopeful he’ll look at things differently.”

The thought alone had me sitting up straight. “So, you think it’s a genius idea to drop theI slept with your twenty-year-old daughterbomb on my father? That I moved into your hotel room and we had a three-night sexfest during one of your stopovers in Boston? You think he’s just going to smile and nod and say,That’s my girl?” I waited for him to voice something as the nausea hit me and then added, “Are you high?”

“What does being twenty have anything to do with this?”

“I was a baby.”

He winced. “You weren’t a fucking baby. You weren’t even living at home anymore. You were working and going to school full-time.”

I crossed my legs in front of me. “You’re saying never once in your mind did you think,Holy shit, am I really into a twenty-year-old who lives in a dorm?” I waited for him to respond. “We both know I just won that round.”

He moved in closer, locking our stares. “Regardless, we need to have a conversation with him. There’s no way around it. I don’t know what details will be included in that talk, but I’m sure as hell not mentioning a three-day sexfest.”

“You just … don’t know my dad.” I focused on my hands as they fidgeted with the comforter.

“That’s true. But I’ve gotten to know him decently well since he purchased our team. We meet almost every day. We have conversations that aren’t always about hockey. Things are good between us.”

I glanced up. “They are now. But just wait.”

He put his hand over mine. “Listen to me. We’re going to deal with this. We’re going to figure it out. Whatever happens, it’s going to be okay.” He raised his hand into my hair. “The most important thing is that you’re mine.”

When I nodded, he pulled me toward him, and I rested my face on his chest, my arm wrapping around him. “I don’t want to leave this spot right here. Our very own little bubble. Where no one knows and it’s our secret and everything feels perfect.”

He pulled my fingers up to his mouth and kissed each tip. “It will be when they all find out too. Stop stressing about this.” As I was letting out a deep sigh, he said, “Is that your phone blowing up?”

My phone was on vibrate—that was how I usually kept it—but Beck was right; I could hear the pulses rattling against something. And that something had to be one of the many items inside my purse.

My purse?