Grinder (Seattle Sharks 1)

“About the incredible, mind-blowing sex? Or the fact that we kind of blew apart the line we’d agreed not to cross? Or how I can’t keep my mind from wandering to how perfect you fit around me?”

She blushed. “Quiet,” she ordered in a whisper.

“Why?” I shrugged. “I don’t care who knows. Hell, I might need to kiss you publically just to mark my territory around these guys. You can’t trust horny hockey players.”

“Let’s just keep this between us for today, ok? At least until we can talk alone, later?”

I wasn’t a fan of the way that sounded. I leaned down and whispered in her ear, “Sure, as long as you know that I plan on getting you very naked later.”

She smiled and shook her head at me. “Later.”

It took every ounce of restraint in my body not to kiss her, but I respected her wishes. Hopefully she didn’t think I was going the one-night stand route, but after all she’d seen, I couldn’t blame her if she did.

I’d just have to rectify that line of thinking tonight. I could hardly wait.

Hammer in hand, I climbed to flat part at the top of Lettie’s castle and started to attach the shingles to the top of the towers. After each row, I looked down to see Bailey at work, her concentration purely on the green-scaled dragon that would guard my Princess’s keep. Not that Lettie needed it. My girl was more likely to grab a sword and defend her own castle.

But I fucking loved that Bailey was pouring her love into Lettie’s present the way she had our home—with no reservations and no regrets. Yet.

I kicked that thought out. Bailey wasn’t every other woman. If she left, it would be for a damn good reason. I just had to make sure I didn’t give her one.

“Hand me another one?” I asked Warren, and he continued our assembly line as I conquered this side of the roof and Rory hit the other.

Another shingle in hand, I lifted it to the roofline and started to swing—

“Well, if this isn’t just the cutest thing!”

The saccharine-sweet voice grated on my every nerve and shot them all to hell in the millisecond it took her to speak. Helen. My head swung to see our intruder, and my jaw dropped at the same time the hammer did.

Onto my mother-fucking finger.

“God fucking damn it!” I shouted, tossing my hammer to the floor next to me and examining my hand.

“Well, I don’t think it’s really appropriate to use that language around our daughter, do you?” she asked, putting her perfectly manicured hands into fists and placing them on her Prada-clad hips. She pursed her lips under huge sunglasses as her long, blonde hair trailed down her back, and ice-cold rage charged my veins.

Every hammer stopped around us as we became the center attraction. “Since Lettie isn’t here, I’ll use whatever language I see fit. What the fuck are you doing here, Helen?”

“Screw that, let me see your hand,” Warren snapped, examining my throbbing third finger on my left hand. “Damn it, you smacked it hard. Can you bend it?”

“Lettie. What a horrid nickname. I came to see Scarlett since her birthday is tomorrow, of course,” she said like it was simple—like she was the kind of mom who even thought about her kid.

“Oh, are you coming to the party?” The rookie asked.

“Shut the fuck up, Rookie,” Rory snapped.

“Party, tomorrow, huh?” Helen asked.

“Can you bend it?” Warren demanded a second time.

It was hard—like looking away from a spider you need to kill—but I took my eyes off her. And bent my fingers. “Yeah, but it hurts like hell.”

The digit was angry, red, throbbing and probably going to need to be taped.

“At least it isn’t broken.” Warren looked over to where Helen waited. “Maybe take it inside,” he whispered. “Not all these guys need to hear your business two days before we take on Ontario.”

I nodded my agreement and jumped down from the top of the castle. Stupid, given that I could have just fucked myself up in a myriad of ways, but this wasn’t going to wait any longer.

“Gage,” Bailey called.

“Later,” I snapped at her, then closed my eyes. I took a deep breath and turned toward where she stood, splattered in paint, even on the tip of her delectable nose. “God, I’m so sorry, Bailey. Just...I need to deal with this.”

She nodded, the motion small. I wanted to kiss the frightened look off her face, to assure her that I wasn’t going to do anything with Helen that I might regret, but I needed to get the viper out of our house first.

“So nice to see that you’re still trailing after Gage, Bailey,” Helen sang.

I saw red. “Get in the fucking house, Helen.”

She sashayed her ass up the stairs ahead of me as I composed what I was about to say. I wanted to rip her limb from limb for abandoning our daughter, but I had to keep my head on straight. I’d been waiting for this opportunity for almost two years and I couldn’t blow it.

“It’s nice,” she said, surveying our breakfast room into the kitchen. “An artist, huh?” she asked as she saw the twin easels Bailey had set up in the sunlight so she could paint with Lettie.

“Bailey’s a good influence,” I said, as I passed her and went straight to the desk in the kitchen. I pulled open the file cabinet at the bottom and pulled a manila envelope from the bottom.

“I’m actually really glad you came by,” I said, trying to keep my voice as even as possible as I came back into the breakfast room. I didn’t want her in the kitchen. Helen was like a disease, and I wanted her as far away from Bailey’s favorite room, and my favorite memory as possible.

“Me, too,” Helen said, pulling her sunglasses to the top of her head. “I’m sorry that Scarlett isn’t here, though. Does she ask about me?”

Her eyes were wide, but there was no sadness there, no genuine concern for the little girl we’d created.

“No.”

Her mouth popped open. “Really? I mean...I’m her mother.”

“In biology,” I admitted, but that was it. “You left when she was barely two, the minute the doc said I’d miss the rest of that season and all of the next. All she knows about you is that you’re not here.”

She straightened. “Well, I’m here now.”