Charging (Gold Hockey Book 10) Read online

  They had reservations at a nice steakhouse nearby that she’d raved about—another meal that would be ruining his diet. Although, he’d eaten fairly well that week, so that was good enough for him at this point.

  Salads for breakfast and lunch to get those greens in. Counteract all the unhealthy dinners they were consuming.

  She closed the door, touched the corner of his mouth. “Why are you smiling?”

  He nipped at her fingertips. “I was thinking if I ate like we have been during the season, that Nutritionist Rebecca would have my ass.”

  Char grinned. “She would at that.” A bump of her shoulder against his. “Let me just grab my coat and we can go.” He followed her to the small closet, helped her slip on her jacket.

  “It’s a crime to cover up this dress,” he said, smoothing a hand down her back.

  “You like it?” she asked, glancing over her shoulder at him.

  He pressed a kiss to the side of her neck. “Like is too bland a word.”

  A trace of wicked in those eyes. “You should see what’s under it.”

  Groaning—because, blue balls—he skimmed his fingers under the edge of her dress. “When are you going to show me?”

  Hot eyes on his, white teeth biting into a bottom lip. “Tonight.”

  One word, but a wealth of meaning. Not just desire or need. Not just something physical. More.

  So much more.

  The fear had gone, taken anger with it. And hope and affection had replaced them.

  “Mmm,” he murmured and pressed a kiss to her lips. “I like tonight.”

  Heat trailing across her expression, her hands coming to rest on his shoulders, to grip tightly as she moved close. “Or we can skip dinner, and I can show you now.”

  Fucking hell.

  He hadn’t had this many erections since he’d been a teenager.

  And, just like when he was sixteen, he couldn’t do anything about them. At the moment, anyway.

  “Come on, Trouble,” he said, taking her hand and leading her out the front door. “You know you want that loaded baked potato you were waxing poetic about earlier this week.”

  She groaned and rubbed her stomach. “Cheese. Sour cream. Bacon. Butter. Green onions. Yes, to all.”

  “Sounds delicious,” he said and opened the passenger door for her, buckling her seat belt. “No lipstick tonight?” He’d seen all shades of red and pink over the last year, but he hadn’t often seen her lips naked of color, and especially not when she was going out somewhere.

  “Nope,” she said with a soft pop at the end.

  Fingers over her cheek, along her jaw, to the corner of that smiling mouth. “Why?”

  “Because then I wouldn’t be able to do this.”

  She laid a kiss on him that should have blown his head off.

  As it was, it had him thinking about other things blowing, and then not thinking much further than that. Her arms wove around his shoulders, and she pulled him close, nipping at his bottom lip, slipping her tongue past his lips to tangle with his.

  Long and deep and wet, she kissed him until his lungs burned.

  “That’s why,” she whispered, her words bursts of damp heat on his mouth.

  “I vote for no lipstick ever,” he said, voice sounding like he’d swallowed a flamethrower. His hands—one on the console, the other on the seat by her hip, convulsed, wanting to unbuckle her seat belt and carry her back into the house.

  But then he wouldn’t be taking care of her.

  Reluctantly, he pulled back, ducking out of the passenger’s side, and starting to close the door.

  Her voice chased him as it slammed shut.

  “You must really want that baked potato.”

  He burst out laughing, love for this woman burning down into his soul.

  Char was it for him. It was simple as that. Funny, sexy, smart as hell, she was in a whole different league from him, but he’d already given her up once, and there was absolutely no way he was going to lose her again.

  No fucking way.

  Twenty-Six

  Char

  The baked potato was glorious.

  The way Logan was eye-fucking her was even more so.

  “Dessert?” the waiter asked, coming over to the table.

  Log opened his mouth, and she knew he was going to indulge her in a slice of that mountain-tall chocolate cake or a cherry-topped slice of cheesecake. But she’d reached her limit on indulging.

  At least in food. And in talking, as she’d dominated the conversation.

  “No, thank you,” she said, shaking her head at Logan when he would have pushed. “I’m full.” She wanted something else. “Did you want something?”

  He shook his head, and the waiter left.

  “Log?” she asked. “We can just go.”

  Hot green eyes on hers.

  Her lungs froze, her pussy throbbed, and she actually reached for her purse, ready to throw a wad of cash on the table when he asked, “Tell me more about the meeting with Pierre.”

  “Logan,” she warned. She’d already blabbered about her day. Now, she wanted to go.

  “We have to wait for the bill anyway,” he said, reaching across the table and taking her hand. “Give me all the gory details of the Pierre talk.”

  “Gory meaning budget talk?” she asked, instead of calling him out. The stubborn glint in his expression was obvious, and she knew he was going to insist she answer, even without dessert.

  He shuddered. “Well, obviously.” A grin. “Though, feel free to skip to the interesting parts.”

  Char mock-sighed then smiling, she answered him, telling him about the minor changes the Gold’s owner, Pierre Barie, wanted to make for next season. But when she tried to turn the topic back to them leaving the restaurant so she could act on those molten emerald eyes, he asked her about another meeting.

  Her lips pursed, but she quickly outlined that interaction. However, when she went again to turn the focus to Logan, he dodged and pointed it back at her, asking another question about one of the Gold’s vendors who’d been giving her a hard time and ensuring she’d gotten to say all of what she wanted to say.

  She would have to be careful with this one. To make sure he didn’t keep giving to the detriment of his own needs.

  Because all meal long, he’d been attentive, listening to her rant about her meetings—yes, she loved her job, but, also yes, people were still idiots in a multitude of ways. She’d managed to coax him into sharing what had kept him busy—spoiling her with meals, taking care of her gate that he kept barging through, spending one morning hanging out with Coop and his baby girl while Calle had a spa day. He’d talked about his plans to go home and visit his family during the same week she went to see hers, but aside from deciding to go to the movies the following night—in which Logan again had indulged her by letting her pick the film—she had done more than her fair share of speaking.

  Not that he seemed to mind.

  And truthfully, she’d been tempted to choose the rom-com that just released when they’d discussed movies. Instead, she’d gone for action.

  He’d watched her show about marrying at first sight without groaning. He’d not uttered a single complaint when she’d picked the historical romance movie earlier that week. Nor that drama the next day.

  Accommodating, taking care of her, making sure her needs were met.

  Well, she could do some of that in return, and he’d mentioned in passing wanting to see the action flick about a senior citizen assassin—not the premise intended, Char knew, but seriously, why did male action stars always get the cool jobs, even when they were old enough to sign up for the AARP? The female actors just got cast as cranky old ladies and—

  Not the point.

  The real reason she’d chosen it was because Logan wanted to see it.

  And cracks about male action stars aside, she was fully aware that she’d definitely consumed worse movies and TV shows (her recent obsession with reality television a prime example)
. But, further than that, she could do something for him simply because he deserved it, simply because she wanted to treat him kindly, simply because she wanted to make him happy.

  That was how real relationships worked, even though she hadn’t spent too much time in one, as of late.

  Unless she considered her job to be her boyfriend.

  If so, he’d been very demanding and only minimally fulfilling.

  Lie. Her job was very fulfilling.

  It just wasn’t great at giving her orgasms.

  Heh.

  Anyway, Logan had been very good at giving orgasms, and she wanted to explore how good he was at giving them now. Tonight. Five hours ago. Last week. That night he’d kissed her in her kitchen.

  Shifting in her seat, her sensitized thighs rubbing together, she was very aware that she wanted to give some back.

  Tonight.

  Now.

  Five hours ago.

  Last week.

  He reached across the table and cupped her jaw. “Why are you smiling?”

  Char turned her head, pressed a kiss to his palm, and told him the truth. “I’m smiling because I like being with you.”

  Emerald eyes turning molten, slightly rough fingertips on her cheek. “I l—”

  The waiter deposited the bill. He tried to do it slyly, tried to slip it onto the table silently, but it bumped into her wine glass, breaking the moment and drawing her focus.

  “Sorry,” the college-aged male murmured, slipping away almost as silently as he had arrived.

  “I guess I should stop staring adoringly at you.” Logan picked up the check.

  She shook her head. “Nope. I like it when you stare at me adoringly.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yup.” She snagged the bill from his fingers.

  He snatched it back. “Not a chance, Starlight.”

  “We should split it.”

  His gaze fixed hers in place. “Are we dating?”

  The change in conversation made her frown, mind spinning to understand. “Um, yes?” She felt a sudden thread of uncertainty. “I mean, I thought so. I—is this not a—”

  “This is a date, Starlight.”

  “Then why—?”

  “I want to date you and be your boyfriend, your lover, more,” he said, his voice quiet but no less intense for the lack of volume. “Don’t insult me by not letting me take care of you.”

  Uncertainty disappeared, was replaced with aw and also annoyance.

  “And taking care of me involves paying for things?”

  “Yes,” he said simply, but when she would have opened her mouth to argue, he added, “When I ask you on a date, I pay. End of story.”

  She thought of snatching the bill from him and shoving it along with her credit card at the waiter. Instead, she let him throw some cash on the table then take her hand after he’d stood, allowed him to hold it as they walked out of the restaurant.

  This was an argument she wanted to have in private.

  “And when I invite you out to dinner?” she asked after they’d buckled—well, after he’d buckled them both, something she’d allowed because she felt squishy inside when he did it and liked him close enough to smell his shampoo, his deodorant, to feel the heat from his body—

  Focus.

  He hit the button to turn on the engine. “Then I pay.”

  She’d been momentarily lost in LaLa Land, remembering his fingers trailing over her cheek as he’d straightened.

  As thus, it took her a moment to process his answer.

  “What?” she snapped. “Absolutely not.”

  “I’m the man. I pay.”

  “Logan Walker, as I live and breathe, you did not just say that.”

  He shrugged. “What are you going to do about it?”

  Her anger spiked, and she went to tell him exactly what she was going to do about it, starting with her spiked heel ending up in a very particular location.

  Then she saw the edge of his mouth.

  It was curved up.

  The fucker was playing with her.

  She mentally shifted, about to tell him that he’d be out of her life so fast . . . but the words stoppered in her throat.

  He was teasing her, just teasing, and she didn’t want him to stop teasing or to worry about what he said around her. She could take a joke and dish one back, just as she knew he could take her teasing in that same vein.

  But . . . more she didn’t want him out of her life, and instinctively, she knew that joking in that way would hurt him.

  Probably, because it would hurt her just as much to say it.

  So instead, she shrugged and said, “I’ll just go down on you until I convince you otherwise.”

  A blue word.

  A curse that blistered even her used-to-profanity ears.

  Then the car slid over onto the shoulder, the transmission shifted into park, and suddenly a six-foot, two-hundred-pound alpha athlete was crowding her back into her seat. “And if I say I’d go down on you to convince you otherwise?”

  She lifted her chin, drifted closer. “Then I’d say we both win.”

  Hot breath on her cheek, her jaw, her ear. A rough voice whispering, “I think you’re right.”

  And then he kissed her.

  Twenty-Seven

  Logan

  The knock came on the door well after the windows had fogged up, long minutes after he’d tugged Char into his lap and kissed and kissed and kissed her.

  “Fuck,” he muttered, wincing against the beam of a flashlight.

  Bright lights shone from behind, making what they were doing, and where both of their hands were very obvious to the officer outside the window. Logan smoothed Char’s dress down, plunked her into the passenger’s seat.

  “What—?” she asked, eyes glazed.

  “Hang on, Starlight.” He pushed the button to roll down the window. “Hello, officer,” he said through the window, feeling her stiffen next to him, her soft gasp barely reaching his ears.

  Dark hair, deep brown eyes, a smile teasing the corners of his mouth. “Sorry to . . . interrupt, but you can’t park here.”

  “Apologies,” he said, trying desperately to not think of the fact that his dick was all but poking a hole in his slacks. “We’ll head home now.”

  A nod, before the policeman disappeared back into the night.

  Logan watched him get into the patrol car, sucked in a breath, and turned to the woman sitting next to him. “Buckle up.”

  She did so, and then he drove on.

  “I’ll have you know that’s the politest conversation I’ve ever had with a police officer,” she muttered.

  Heart hurting for her, he reached over and squeezed her thigh. “I’m sorry you’ve had to deal with that bullshit. There shouldn’t be a different standard for our interactions with them.”

  “Log.”

  His eyes cut to hers before turning back to the road. “What?”

  “I like you.” A beat. “So much.”

  More heart action, only this time it was alternating between squeezing and filling up like a balloon. Hurt and hope, who knew they were so closely intertwined?

  “I like you, too, Starlight,” he murmured, even though it was so much more than just like. He loved and adored her. His heart beat steadier when she was near, his skin settled when he held her hand. But . . . he was continuing with slow and steady and patient. And no one in their right mind would declare their love while still rebuilding their partner’s trust in them.

  Go slow.

  On that train of thought, he slowly lifted his hand from her thigh, deliberately gripped the steering wheel. Then because his cock was still threatening to poke a hole in his slacks, he made a joke. “I can say, however, this was the first interaction with the police where I’ve been sporting a boner like a teenager.”

  Silence.

  Shit.

  He turned to look at her, about to apologize.

  But then he saw her face, saw that the corner of her mouth w
as upturned. “How does one sport a boner like a teenager?”

  “Namely by frequency and a lack of fulfillment.”

  She burst out laughing.

  He joined in, even though it was at his expense.

  “Come on,” she said, once she’d gained control of herself. “Don’t tell me you ever had difficulty with girls. I saw you as a twenty-one-year-old, and you had swagger even then.”

  “That swagger didn’t accompany me in high school. I can assure you of that,” he muttered. “I hadn’t grown into my body, despite my poor attempts at weightlifting. And worse, I had acne.”

  “Aw, poor baby.”

  “Somehow your tone doesn’t sound sympathetic,” he grumbled.

  “Well, clearly the awkward stage didn’t last long, based on the young man I knew then,” she said. “The older man I know today.”

  “Now, you’re just being mean,” he muttered, turning onto her street. “Cecily likes to remind me that, at thirty, the end of my career, and thus my life, is near.”

  Char giggled. “I did always like how Cecily teased you.”

  He pulled into her driveway and tapped her on the nose. “Only because you took notes so you could tease me better.”

  Another giggle, this one paired with her fingers tracing over his brow. “Only because I love seeing you glower at me.” She leaned over the console, those straps shifting enough to allow him to look right down her dress. And just like that, he had the teenage boy problem again. Her lips quirked. “Like what you see?” she asked, leaning a little farther toward him, making his hands itch to pull her onto his lap again.

  But they were in the driveway of her house.

  Much more comfortable surfaces awaited them inside.

  “Come on, Trouble,” he said, pushing open his door. “Let’s go in, and I’ll show you exactly how much I like what I see.”

  He slipped out, closed his door, had just made it to her side of the SUV when hers opened and he got a glimpse of the sexiest pair of legs he’d ever seen.

  Click. One high heel on the ground. Click. The other.

  They weren’t inside the house, didn’t have any more privacy than they’d had on the side of the road, but Logan didn’t care.