Axel (Carolina Reapers 1)

“Yeah, I’ll be there in forty minutes,” which was the driving time to downtown Charleston. “Or as long as it takes me to find the damned jail. I can’t believe you.”

“Thank you. We owe you.”

“You have no idea how much.” I hung up the phone and raked my hand through my hair.

“Baby?” Langley asked, already slipping her panties back up her legs.

Every childish part of me wanted to whine, no! Instead, I took a deep breath. “Well, as the Reapers’ PR, you’d know anyway, so we need to bail out MacDhuibh, Price, Ward, Caine, and Chandler. Apparently, they got into a bar fight.”

Her eyes widened slightly before she nodded. Then a transformation came over her. “I need three minutes.” She raced by me, her heels taking the stairs two at a time.

“Good, because it’s going to take me longer than that to get my dick to go down,” I muttered.

She reappeared with her hair and makeup perfect, and her messenger-bag style briefcase over her shoulder. “Let’s go. I have the directions.” She had a wide smile on her face as we headed for the new Rover I’d bought when we moved in.

“What’s got you grinning?” I asked, opening her door for her, which I did even after she told me it wasn’t necessary.

“Besides the fantastic double orgasm you just gifted me with?” she asked as I climbed in next to her.

“Don’t even bring that up,” I growled. “I’m already harder than the damned gear shift.

“I’d take care of that, you know. If you’d let me,” she said, her smile damn near devious. “And,” she continued. “I was thinking that at least the team did something together.”

I tried to glare at my wife but ended up laughing as we pulled out of the driveway.

Guess it worked, because we won our first home game the next night, five to three. We marched out of the bench at the Reaper Arena like the badasses we were.

I stopped just outside the bench when I saw the brunette in the suit that brought me to the Reapers in the first place. Then I ditched my helmet, passed Lukas’ wife at her side, and kissed my wife senseless, taking her until she didn’t care that I dripped sweat onto her designer threads.

“I’m proud of you,” she whispered against my lips, touching the cheeks that would no longer be smooth after tonight’s win.

Yeah, that was worth fucking everything.

8

Langley

“This. Is. Awkward.” I stood on the wrong side of the Seattle Sharks’ arena, watching as the Reapers took the ice for morning skate. We were scheduled to face off against the Sharks tonight. My past and my present, all out there and exposed. Good God, I couldn’t imagine how Lukas, Noble, Porter, and Gage felt. The other Reapers had little stake in this game, but my boys? This would hurt, no matter the outcome.

“You can say that again.” Faith nodded. “Not that it wasn’t nice to have dinner with Eric last night, but yikes. I’ve never cheered against him.”

“This is the NHL,” Harper said from the other side of Faith where we sat in the visitors’ family box. “This happens.”

Faith and I shared a smirk. “So what? Your brother buys the Reapers, you invent a revolutionary helmet, and suddenly you know the ins and out of the business?” I teased her.

Harper laughed, shrugging. “You knew it wouldn’t be long before I figured out this game.”

“You always do,” Faith said. “But—”

“Holy hell!” I cut her off as we all jumped to our feet. Fields, our goalie, was down. “What just happened?”

“Wasn’t that our backup goalie?” Harper asked, concern in her eyes.

“Yes,” Faith said. Thurston, our starting goalie, immediately headed toward Fields, as did Hartman, the goaltending coach. “Shit, he’s grabbing his knee.” She bit her lip. Eric Gentry—her brother and Seattle Sharks’ goalie—had suffered a knee injury that had kept him out a season. She knew how hard it could be on a player.

“What the hell are we going to do if we lose Thurston, too?” Harper asked.

Gage was already on the ice with the trainers, and Axel shot a worried glance in my direction. Whatever he heard down there, it wasn’t good.

Holy shit, they were carrying him off the ice.

“We need an emergency goalie on contract,” Faith said, her eyes locked on Lukas.

“A one-game contract,” I said, vaguely remembering the rule. Being on the road with one goalie already down meant we had to contract out an emergency goalie for a one-game contract. Sometimes it was one from the farm team or a local college player—

I glanced between Faith and Harper, lightbulbs hitting us at the same time.

“Sawyer,” we all said in unison.

“Call him!” I urged Faith.

“You get down there and talk it out with Gage,” she said, already dialing on her cell.

Sawyer McCoy had been two seconds away from being selected for the Seattle Sharks at open tryouts. He’d been a hairsbreadth slower than the other goalie, but he could absolutely hold his own if Thurston went down tonight, too. I hurried through the stands, positioning myself in Gage’s line of sight as he came back from the ice.