This is it, Luke
BOTH THE MEN’S AND WOMEN’S TEAMS DOMINATE THE REGIONAL finals. For the first time in a decade, both Briar programs will be competing in their respective Frozen Fours this April.
After crushing our opponent in the regional tournament, we’re riding the momentum and eager to get into the arena with the final four teams. Minnesota Duluth and Notre Dame also made it through. But the real upset of the playoffs was Arizona State, who slayed the dragon known as UConn to advance forward. Luckily, they’re facing Notre Dame next, and I pray we don’t face them in the final. I haven’t shared the ice with my former teammate Michael Klein since we were eighteen and I was cracking his jaw open with my fist.
We have two weeks off before the game. And we lucked out this year—our Frozen Four is being held in Boston. The women’s tournament is a week before ours, and Gigi’s lying in my bed when she suddenly rolls over and says, “Do you feel like coming to Vegas with me?”
“Are you asking me to marry you?” I inquire politely.
“No, I’m asking you to come to Vegas and watch us play. My parents will be there. My brother too.”
“Gee, great. Can’t wait to see them.”
She lightly punches me in the arm. “Come on. They’ve warmed up to you a lot.”
“Only your mom.”
In fact, Hannah Graham is pretty much my best friend now. Gigi teases me about how frequently we text. It started after the winter holidays, and at first, I pretended it made me uncomfortable. Shrugged it off. Said it was weird she kept contacting me.
That was all talk. Whenever her mother checks in on me, it unleashes a flood of warmth in my chest. It’s a totally foreign sensation.
But it’s not entirely unwelcome.
A few days later, I’m boarding a plane with Gigi. Since I have the time off and we both have a good handle on our schoolwork, we decided to skip classes and go a day early to get in some tourist shit. She’s never been to Vegas.
She seems to regret that decision within hours of our arrival, though, looking around the strip in dismay. “Oh God, these lights are the worst. Why are they all shining at me? It’s the middle of the day! I feel like I’m on a spaceship.” She glares at a gold fountain shooting ten-foot-high water arcs as if it personally insulted her. “This is not fun. I’m not this extravagant.”
I link our fingers together, chuckling. “Not my cup of tea either.”
Our gazes lock. I lick my lips.
“Should we go back to the hotel?” I drawl.
“Yes, please.”
We spend the rest of the evening fucking. I go down on her in the huge shower in our room, tormenting her by denying her an orgasm for a solid forty minutes. She returns the favor by blowing me in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows. I don’t care that everyone can see my bare ass and that someone’s probably filming us and posting it online. All I care about is how warm her mouth is and how wet her tongue is, how silky smooth her lips are as they travel along my shaft.
We lie in bed afterward. I stroke her hair. Reach for the remote and flip channels until I land on TSBN. They’re airing a countdown show touting the ten greatest hockey players of all time. Number one is Gigi’s dad.
As his face fills the flat-screen, I chuckle. “I can’t wait to see him tomorrow. I’m sure he’ll be super delightful.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you at all. Now you know how it feels to be around a prickly asshole who doesn’t want to make conversation with you.”
“I wasn’t that bad.”
“You were worse. You communicated exclusively in shrugs. Infuriating jackass.”
I grin. “Call me that again, and I’ll go back to shrugging instead of talking.”
“Nope. The floodgates have opened. You can’t dam that back up, baby.”
She’s right. I can’t.
I turn off the TV and move onto my side, propping up on one elbow. I bite my lip as I gaze down at her.
“I don’t want anybody else. You know that, right?”
Gigi blinks. “Where did that come from?”
“I don’t know. I just need you to know I don’t want to be with anyone else. Ever.”
A soft smile tugs on her lips. “Me too.” She reaches up to touch my face, rubbing the stubble on my jaw. “This is it, Luke. I think we both know that.”
Yes, I think we do.
I jerk when the loud growl of her stomach vibrates between our bodies. We skipped dinner because we were busy having sex.
“You doing okay there, Gisele?”
“I’m so hungry. Why does this hotel not have room service?” she moans.
“Because you specifically asked me to book one that didn’t,” I remind her, rolling my eyes. “To quote you, you’re on a championship diet and must not be tempted by room service dessert.”
“Why do you listen to me?”
“I’ll start ignoring your wishes,” I promise.
She snorts and climbs out of bed. “Well, I guess we’re venturing onto the horrible strip again in search of nourishment. I need to put something in my belly.”
“I’ll give you something to put in your belly.”
“I don’t know what that means, Ryder. Are you talking about a baby, or is it a semen swallowing thing?”
I keel over in laughter. “Why do you always have to ruin my jokes by digging too deep into them?”
“Tell better jokes,” she advises.
I haul her off the bed. “Come on. Vegas, take two.”
Two days later, the morning of the women’s Frozen Four championship game in which Briar will play Ohio State, I wake up with a huge smile on my face. Although that’s what happens when there’s a gorgeous woman in your bed and she’s giving you a handjob. She brings me to the edge and then shoves me right over it, while I lie there panting. Gigi’s equally giddy, beaming and bouncing with excitement as she gets dressed.
“I wish I could spend all day with you,” she says, crawling back on the bed to throw her fully dressed body on top of my naked one.
After last night, I’m in full agreement. I just want to keep the high going. Stay naked with her forever, but she has a championship game to play.
“I need to get to the rink,” she says reluctantly. “And my parents’ flight lands soon.”
I offered to pick them up, but Hannah said they’re fine taking a cab. I suspect Garrett just didn’t want me as his chauffeur because he hates me.
But there’s nothing I can do about it now, nothing to change the way I feel about his daughter and the way she feels about me. She’s mine and I’m hers, and he’ll have to deal with it eventually.
After Gigi is gone, I shower and dress, then reluctantly leave the hotel to meet the Grahams for lunch. Garrett and Wyatt talk to each other the whole time, while Hannah and I have our own side conversation. I anticipate quite a lot of this in my future.
I’m drowning in relief when it’s finally time to head for the arena, where we have excellent seats directly behind the Briar bench. The game is being televised, so cameras are everywhere. Flashbulbs going off. A hum of excitement travels through the rink and it’s contagious. I rub my hands together as we settle in our seats. My gaze seeks out Gigi, landing on the back of her jersey. #44. Her long dark ponytail is sticking out of her helmet.
The game is fast paced from the get-go, but it’s exactly what you’d expect from the championship. The best female college players are on that ice right now.
Halfway through the first period, Gigi twists around to grin at us from behind her visor. She’s just heaved herself onto the bench after scoring a goal that sent the entire rink into a deafening frenzy.
“She looks feral,” Wyatt remarks. “You guys raised a feral child.”
I snicker.
“Hey, blame him,” Hannah says, jerking a thumb at her husband. “He’s the one with the hockey gene.”
I’m fully on board for this matchup. On the edge of my seat the entire time. It’s like a seesaw. First Briar has all the momentum, leading Ohio State around by their noses. Then a sudden momentum shift, and Ohio is wiping the ice with Briar. Then another abrupt shift, and Whitney Cormac is on a breakaway. She doesn’t score, but Briar’s on the attack. They’re going hard—Whitney, Gigi, and Camila Martinez shooting bullets at the net like a trio of snipers.
I’ve never experienced more pride than when I see Gigi pivoting behind the net like a fucking professional. Distracting the goalie, creating an opportunity for Camila to get a shot in the back door.
2–1, Briar.
The second period is much of the same, although I notice a couple of the Ohio girls starting to get more physical than they should. Sometimes it’s just incidental contact. Sometimes it’s a surreptitious check cloaked in incidental contact. It usually depends on the refs whether they’ll call it or not.
The opposing center, #28, is taking a lot of liberties, though. The chick’s at least five-nine, so a decent bit taller than Gigi. But my woman holds her own. Angling her body with ease, winning every face-off against #28. And yet the chick is relentless.
At one point Garrett jumps to his feet, shouting at the refs. “The hell are you doing down there! Use your eyes! That was clearly checking!”
His outburst draws attention. Several pairs of eyes widen in recognition.
Hannah yanks him back to his seat. “Garrett, sit down. I didn’t bring your fake beard and glasses.”
Wyatt laughs.
As he resettles in his seat, Garrett exchanges a look with me. I can’t deny I’m also a bit annoyed.
“This chick is too rough,” I tell him.
He nods. “Those refs better start paying more attention.”
Luckily, it’s as if #28 realizes how close she is to earning herself a lifelong vendetta from Garrett Graham. She backs off. They’re tied 2–2 now, after a goal courtesy of an Ohio winger.
Christ, this game is a nail-biter. I lean forward with my forearms on my knees, my eyes glued to the action below.
Gigi’s got the puck and is crossing the blue line. She dumps it; then she and Whitney give chase, tangling behind the net with an Ohio defenseman. #28 throws herself into the mix and I’m instantly on guard. So is Garrett. Our hawklike gazes focus on the net.
“Get it out,” Garrett is murmuring. “It’s too dangerous back there with number twenty-eight.”
I agree. Normally I’d want Gigi to hold her ground, but I don’t like this girl. I breathe a sigh of relief when Gigi snaps the puck into the boards and skates toward the bench when Adley calls for a substitution.
She’s trying to make the line change, but #28 is breathing down her neck, not letting her get off. Fucking asshole. I understand wanting to put pressure on your opponent, but come on. There’s still honor amongst hockey players.
Two new forwards pop on, one of them coming to Gigi’s aid against the boards. The Briar player wins the battle for the puck and careens off while Gigi gets in position in the slot. She’s shouting something. The puck snaps out and lands on her stick at the same time she collides with #28.
It’s a total accident. Even I, who now has a personal blood feud against #28, can tell she didn’t mean to do it. Her stick breaks, knocking her off balance. And the abrupt shift in body weight sends her slamming into Gigi’s back.
We all watch in horror as Gigi flies forward. My panicked eyes track the blurry streak of #44 as Gigi slams headfirst into the boards, helmet flying off.
She goes sprawling onto her stomach, one hand still gripping her stick, the other one outstretched on the ice near her discarded helmet. We’re all on our feet. At first, the crowd continues screaming because they don’t realize what’s going on. Then the entire rink goes deathly silent when the fans realize she’s not getting back up.
My heart stops. Just quits beating in my chest, a useless, motionless mass of pure fear.
“She’s just winded,” Wyatt says, his green eyes glued to the ice. He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself. “She’s fine—”
Before he even finishes speaking, I’m racing down the aisle. Pushing through people without excusing myself, Gigi’s dad hot on my heels.
We practically vault over the wall below to the walkway between the bleachers and the plexiglass.
“Let me through,” Garrett snaps at the staff member in front of the door to the bench. “That’s my daughter.”
I’m frantically peering at the ice, my heart still not beating because she’s still not moving. There’s a ref bent over her, as well as Coach Adley and some of her teammates. Finally, I’ve had enough of the man at the door. I step forward and attempt to shove him to the side. I think it’s one of the Briar assistant coaches, but I don’t give a shit about being polite.
“You can’t go out there,” he insists, getting in my face again.
A fucking stampede wouldn’t be able to stop me from getting to Gigi.
“Like hell I can’t,” I growl. And then I give him another firm shove, forcibly moving him out of my way. “That’s my wife out there.”
