That was such a ridiculous statement that she tried and failed not to smile. "I know you"re not a girl. I think you proved it last night."
One corner of his mouth twitched. "You sore?"
"A little. I haven"t worked out like that in a while."
He placed his hands on the sides of her face and looked into her eyes. "You"re not some woman I picked up in a bar, Chelsea. You"re not a one-night stand. Don"t sneak out on me."
If she wasn"t a one-nighter, what was she? "Okay."
He took her hand and moved to the pa.s.senger-side door. "I"m starving. Do you want to eat around here or in Issaquah?"
She turned and looked up at him. At the sun filtering through his hair. She might not be a one-night stand, but she wasn"t his girlfriend either. She wasn"t even in that really nebulous place where all relations.h.i.+ps start. She worked for Mark. She couldn"t date him. So, what was she doing getting into his car? "How far to Issaquah?"
"We were just there a few weeks ago."
"We"ve been to a lot of places in the past few weeks." She sat in the pa.s.senger seat and glanced up at him. "I can"t keep them all straight." Then again, it was just a sandwich. A sandwich didn"t mean anything. It was five bucks and she could pay that herself.
"It"s about ten minutes." He shut the door and walked to the other side. "Or we can go with plan B," he said as he got in across from her. "Go to my house, order a pizza, and eat it in bed."
She laughed. "Was Issaquah just a ruse?"
"No, but we"re going to end up at my house in bed anyway. Why waste time?" He put the Mercedes into reverse and backed out of the s.p.a.ce.
She should probably be offended that he just a.s.sumed she"d fall into bed with him again. Maybe she should put up some resistance. Play a little harder to get. Or just resist temptation altogether. "Don"t you want to see the house?"
"I can see it tomorrow with the Realtor." He looked across his shoulder at her, his eyes and voice a smoky caress. "The choice is yours."
"Plan B." She was weak. A sinner with no will-power to resist temptation.
He chuckled. "Good answer. You won"t be sorry."
And she wasn"t. They ate pizza in the leisure room and watched movies on the enormous television. Of course, he had just about every station.
"Even your television has the premium package," she said.
He chuckled and took her empty plate. "There"s only one package you need to worry about," he said as he set the plate on the floor next to the chaise. He pulled her on top of him until her legs straddled his lap. She put her hands on his big chest and looked down into his deep brown eyes.
"I woke up wanting you again."
"We did it four times." Sheesh. She hadn"t done it four times in one night since ... maybe never.
He ran his warm hands up her thighs. "It wasn"t enough. I want more. I want you." He brushed his thumbs across the silk center of her panties. Her flesh got hot and tightened in response. "Tell me you want me too."
She licked her suddenly dry lips and nodded.
He slid one thumb beneath her panties and touched her bare crotch. "Tell me."
It seemed important to him so she said, "I want you, Mark." She reached for the ends of her blouse and pulled it over her head.
"Why?" He slid his thumb across her slick core and she moaned out loud.
"Because you"re good at making me want you." She lowered her face to his. "Because I need you."
She spent the rest of the afternoon needing him. She slid all over Mark"s hard body, getting hot and sweaty. By the time she left, it was around ten that night, and she fell exhausted into her own bed. Bo had written a note saying that she was spending the night with Jules, and Chelsea didn"t see her sister until they both left for work the next day. By the time she arrived at Mark"s front door, apprehension once again sat heavy in her stomach. It was Monday morning, and the weekend she"d spent with Mark was suddenly real. She"d never wanted to be one of those women who had an affair with the celebrity she worked for, essentially her boss. She never wanted to be one of those women who was left with nothing but a broken heart and no job.
The front door to Mark"s house was unlocked, and he sat in his office at the computer, typing something with two fingers. "That house in Issaquah has been dropped twenty thousand," he said without looking up. "Isn"t that the one with the walk-in closet you liked?" He hit send and reached for his cane leaning against the desk.
"Yeah. It had all those revolving shoe racks." What did it matter if she liked it? "Are you okay? I haven"t seen you use your cane in a few days."
"Some days are better than others." He stood and walked toward her. "If you"re worried, you can come upstairs and give me a rubdown." He pushed one side of her hair behind her ear.
"That isn"t in my job description." She took a step back before she gave in to temptation and turned her face into his palm. "If I"m going to continue to work for you, we have to have boundaries." Maybe if there were rules, she wouldn"t become a sad cliche.
He put one hand on his hip. "What boundaries?"
"No s.e.x Monday through Friday."
"That"s bulls.h.i.+t. That only leaves the weekends."
"Okay," she compromised. "No s.e.x during working hours." And she meant it too. If she wanted to keep what little dignity she had left, she had to at least try and separate her working and personal relations.h.i.+p with Mark.
"I"ll try to remember."
But he didn"t. He didn"t even try. It was up to her to be the strong one and maintain a distance. She had to remind him that sliding his hand to the small of her back or up her thigh wasn"t work-appropriate. And touching her bottom during three-man hockey was definitely illegal contact. Not even when she fell on her b.u.t.t. Later, after Derek left and the clock struck five, she let him kiss it better for her.
During that whole week, she didn"t see very much of her sister. But she wasn"t surprised. That was how Bo operated. Whether it was a job or new boyfriend, she threw herself into it wholeheartedly. Most of the time her relations.h.i.+ps ended in heartache. Chelsea had a good feeling about Jules, though. She had a feeling things would turn out all right. She wished she could say the same for herself.
She didn"t know where her relations.h.i.+p with Mark would lead. It was so new and different and terrifying. Most terrifying of all, moving back to L.A. was losing its appeal. She didn"t want to be one of those women who gave up her dreams for a man. Her head and her heart were at war, and she was terrified that her heart was winning the battle.
"I changed your ringtone," she told him as they lay in bed watching Big Trouble in Little China. For a hockey player he was surprisingly good at remembering dialogue.
He grabbed his phone off the nightstand and dialed. "Trouble" by Pink played from her purse.
"You"re trouble," he said. "That"s for sure."
"You"re the trouble."
He picked up her hand and kissed her fingers. "You"ve been nothing but trouble since the day you showed up on my porch." Once again, she wondered where this relations.h.i.+p would lead.
The Sat.u.r.day after the Stanley Cup party, Mark surprised her with tickets to Oklahoma! and her heart won a bit more ground. "Do you like musicals?"
"Yeh."
What a liar.
After the play, he brought her to his house. Instead of taking her to bed, though, he took her hand and led her through the dark house. He opened the pocket doors to the formal living room-empty except for the Stanley Cup sitting on the floor in the middle of the white carpet. A bottle of Dom Perignon lay in the top of the cup, surrounded by ice, while the crystal chandelier shot prisms of light across the s.h.i.+ny silver.
"Oh my G.o.d." Chelsea moved toward the three-foot trophy. "You took your turn after all."
"Yes."
She glanced about the empty room. "I thought there had to be a representative from the Hall of Fame with the cup at all times."
"Not at all times." He moved behind her and wrapped his long arms around her waist. "All the other guys took the cup to strip clubs or sports bars. Walker took it to the top of the s.p.a.ce Needle, and Daniel drove around with it in his convertible. Every guy who has ever dreamed of winning the cup dreams about what he"s going to do with it. It"s time I lived mine." He kissed the part in her hair. "If you wouldn"t mind, I"d like to spray champagne on your naked body and make love to you in front of the cup."
"That"s the dream you"ve always had?"
He shook his head, and his lips brushed the top of her head. "It"s better than the dream I had."
She reached for the zipper on the back of her sundress. Her heart swelled so big that her chest ached, and in that moment, standing in that room, she couldn"t remember one good reason why she would ever want to leave this man. Of all the people who deserved to share this moment with him, he wanted to share it with her.
The dress slipped to the floor, and she stood in front of him in her bra, panties, and four-inch snake-skin sandals.
"Leave the shoes on," he said as he grabbed the bottle of champagne and took off the cage. "They turn me on."
As far as she could tell, everything turned him on. "You"re easy."
"And cheap too."
Hardly. She tossed her bra and underwear aside as he pushed the cork with his thumbs. "You"re going to make the carpet wet and sticky."
"I"m planning on making you wet and sticky." With a soft pop the cork flew across the room and hit the closed drapes. A fine, ga.s.sy mist curled from the bottle"s mouth and a stream of foam followed. He raised the bottle to his lips and took several long swallows. "Close your eyes."
She did, and a cold mist of champagne hit her chest. It smelled of rose petals. "That"s cold," she complained.
"I"ll warm you up in a minute." He lowered his mouth to her and kissed her as he poured the bottle over their heads. It ran over her closed eyes and the side of her face. The contrast of cold champagne and his hot mouth tightened her nipples, and desire pooled between her thighs. He tossed the empty bottle aside and ran his hands and mouth over her wet, sticky body.
His touch seemed different somehow. Lighter, and he lingered over each erogenous zone. He took his time, in no hurry to get the job done. Even when she tore at his clothes until he was as naked as she, he licked her shoulder and the side of her neck. He slid his mouth across her b.r.e.a.s.t.s to her belly, then he laid her down at the foot of the Stanley Cup. Prisms of light shot across her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and belly and the side of his face. He lifted his lips from her hip.
"Are you taking birth control?"
She knew why he asked, and the thought of hot skin on hot skin almost sent her over the edge. "I had my yearly exam and three-month Depo shot just before I moved up here. I"m clean as a virgin."
He smiled. "After my accident, I had every test on the planet. I"m clean, but I"m not quite a virgin." He moved until his face was just above hers. "Do you trust me?"
"Yes. Do you trust me?"
Instead of answering, he slid into her body, hot flesh against hot flesh. So good, she groaned. "Oh G.o.d."
He held her face between his palms and stared into her face. "You and the cup," he said. "Two of my biggest fantasies." He kissed the tip of her nose as he slowly moved his hips, driving into her and pus.h.i.+ng her to the sweetest ecstasy of her life. Her whole body responded to his touch, catching fire and burning out of control. He drove into her, over and over. Hurling her toward climax. At the point of impact, her heart and soul shattered and she called out his name.
And when it was over, he took her hand and washed her in the shower. His touch was gentler than before. Gentler than it had ever been. "Thank you."
"Thank you." She dried his back and shoulders. "I"m just shocked you wanted to share this night with me."
"Who else?" He took the big fluffy towel from her hands and wrapped it around her shoulders. "You stayed with me when I tried to make you go." He looked down into her eyes. "That means something to me."
"What?"
"I"m not sure. Maybe it means you"re stubborn." He pushed a wet hunk of her hair behind her ear. "Or maybe that you like broken-down hockey players."
She should tell him about the ten-thousand bonus. His thumb brushed her jaw, and his eyes turned a rich velvet brown. "You"re not broken down." Now. She should tell him now. She opened her mouth, and something else came out instead. "You needed me." And maybe she needed him just a little bit too.
"I still need you."
She closed her eyes against the pinch in the backs of her eyes and the pain in her chest. If she wasn"t careful, she"d do the unthinkable. If she wasn"t careful, she might fall in love with Mark Bressler. And that would be bad. She was leaving, and falling in love would be really bad. So bad she"d have to guard against it.
And she did. Right up until the morning that he insisted on driving her to her doctor"s appointment. He sat in the waiting room reading a golf magazine while she had her consultation with the plastic surgeon, and on the drive home, he waited for her to tell him what she"d learned.
"The doctor said I will probably lose sensitivity," she said as they drove across the floating bridge. Now that she knew more of the risks, she was a little scared.
"For how long?"
She shrugged. "Could last six to twelve months. Could be permanent." She"d known about the side effects and risks, but hearing them from the doctor had made them very real.
From behind his sungla.s.ses, Mark looked across the car at her.
"I might not be able to nurse a child." She looked down at her hands clasped in her lap. Knowing all that, she still wanted to do it. She glanced up at his profile. "My family is going to freak out," she said, but what she really wanted to know was what Mark thought. She was too afraid to ask him. Too afraid he could get her to change her mind.
Silence stretched between them for several long moments before he said, "I love your body. You"re beautiful just the way you are." He reached for her, and she fully expected him to tell her that he agreed with her family. "But if you"re not happy with the size of your b.r.e.a.s.t.s, do something about it." He brushed his thumb across her knuckles. "Do what"s going to make you happy."
That"s when it happened. Her heart swelled up into her throat. The backs of her eyes burned, and she fell in love with Mark Bressler right there on the first exit to Medina. Fell in love with him so hard and fast it took her breath away. Fell in love even when she knew better.
The third Monday in August, Mark jumped in his Mercedes and headed to the Chinooks" head offices. They"d set up an appointment to talk about the a.s.sistant coach position, and he wasn"t as adamant against it as he had been a few months ago. In fact, he was starting to warm to the idea. No harm in listening to what they had to say.
He pulled out of the driveway and headed toward downtown Seattle. He needed a job. Lying around and doing nothing was driving him insane. He needed something to do, other than wonder how he was going to change Chelsea"s mind about her no-s.e.x-at-work policy.
Which was bulls.h.i.+t. He"d only agreed because he figured he could change her mind. But she"d never budged from her position. Not the first week or the second week either. Not even when they"d been driving back from viewing a property in the Queen Anne district and he"d reached over and slid his hand up her bare thigh. He"d slipped his fingers inside her panties and she"d been slick and half ready. She"d let him touch her for a few brief moments before she"d pushed his hand away. Leaving him hard and fully ready. He"d fought an erection for the rest of the day, until, at five o"clock, she"d found him in the garage, putting away Derek"s stick and a few pucks. "I"m off work now," she"d said, and practically launched herself at him. She"d torn at his pants. He"d bent her over the hood of the Mercedes, flipped up her little skirt, and entered her from behind. It had been down and dirty. Quick and raunchy.
And sweet.
But not nearly as sweet as the night she"d let him make love to her at the foot of the Stanley Cup. He"d had s.e.x with a lot of women in his life. He"d had s.e.x with her too, but that night had been different. He"d felt as if every cell in his body exploded. He"d felt blown apart, and when he"d come back together, he"d been changed. The way he looked at his life. And the way he looked at her.
He couldn"t say that he was in love with Chelsea. The kind that came with a big diamond and wedding vows. He"d been in love like that before, but this felt different. This was easy, comfortable, like sliding into a warm pool of water as opposed to a jet tub.
No, he couldn"t say that he loved her, but he did miss her when she left. Missed the sound of her voice and her clunky shoes on his tile floors.
He liked being with her. He liked talking to her and making her laugh. He liked the twists and turns of her mind and her sense of humor. He liked that she thought she was impulsive when she was clearly in control of everything around her. He liked the look in her eyes when she was determined to have her way. He especially liked the look in her eyes when she was determined to have her way with him.
No, he didn"t like that about her. He loved that about her. He loved the way she touched him and kissed him and took control. He loved what she did with her hands and mouth and the breathy little sounds she made when he touched her. He loved looking into her face when he was deep inside her small body. The way the determination in her eyes grew heavy, drugged, as he drove into her. And he absolutely loved the tight contractions of her v.a.g.i.n.al walls that squeezed and gripped him hard, pulling an o.r.g.a.s.m from the pit of his soul.
When he thought back to the day she"d first arrived on his porch, he was glad that the stubborn determination that had once annoyed the h.e.l.l out of him when he"d tried to get rid of her was the same determination that had made her stay. G.o.d knew she could probably get a better job. One that might pay better too.
He was not the man he used to be eight months ago. He was not a superstar hockey player. He didn"t live large. Sportswriters were no longer interested in him, and multimillion-dollar endors.e.m.e.nt offers had dried up. He was a broken-down former athlete who woke with sore muscles and needed a cane about half the time.
He drove into the parking garage and parked next to the elevator. Chelsea didn"t seem to mind. She made him feel alive again. Like a man, but it was more than just s.e.x. If that"s all it was about, any woman would do. It was the way she looked at him. As if she didn"t see his scars and broken life. She"d stuck with him when others had walked away. He didn"t know why she"d stayed. He just thanked G.o.d that she was still in his life.
It had been two months since he"d been at the Key. Eight months since his last game. He"d scored a hat trick that night against the Penguins. He"d thought his life was golden. He"d been on top of the world.