Bruiser (Seattle Sharks 7)

I turned after hanging the dish towel from the oven handle.

“Hi,” I responded.

Her brown eyes flew as big as pucks, and she dusted her hands down her denim and T-shirt combo like she was self-conscious.

I offered my hand. “Hudson Porter. Nice to meet you.”

“Grace Wilborn. I’m Charlie’s mother.”

Shea appeared over her shoulder. “It’s right here,” she said as she slid past her. Opening the first cabinet, she pulled a pink thermos down. “She left it after the last sleepover, and I knew if I didn’t snag it right now, I’d forget.”

“Oh, thanks!” Grace took the thermos from Shea, her eyes still on me. “You’re Elliott’s Big, right? The hockey player?” She flashed Shea a look that suggested they’d spoken about the hockey player on more than one occasion.

“I am,” I confirmed.

“She says great things about you.”

“She says wonderful things about your daughter, too,” I told her.

Grace’s eyes lit up, erasing a few lines of exhaustion on her face. “Thank you. She’s my pride and joy.”

“Ready!” Elliott shouted as a couple sets of running footsteps came to a halt in the living room.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to keep them tonight? I can absolutely do a sleepover,” Shea offered.

“Oh, no. They’ve been looking forward to this all week. Besides, you know how they are, practically entertaining themselves.”

“Amen,” Shea agreed, and the women shared a secret smile.

Elliott bounced into the room, hugged Shea, and to my surprise...me.

“Thank you for talking to her about the hockey stuff,” she whispered in my ear when I’d leaned down to hug her back.

“Anytime, kiddo. Have a great sleepover.”

Within moments, they left, and Shea and I were alone, facing each other in her living room.

“I should probably get going.” I offered Shea the out, even though the last thing I wanted to do was leave.

What I wanted to do was to suck the last half hour back into whatever dimension it had come from. I wanted to erase our fight and go back to the effortless, easy feeling we’d had during dinner.

But it would have happened sooner or later.

“You could stay,” Shea offered quietly. “I mean, for a drink or something. I might have the world’s oldest bottle of tequila in the freezer. I think I bought it when Elliott was five or something.” She gave me a quick, forced smile, but her eyes lingered on mine, and it was the longing that kept me there.

“I actually don’t drink.” I tucked my thumbs in my pockets.

“Oh. You don’t?”

“Shocked?”

“A little, I guess. Not that I think hockey players all drink or something. God, I’m so sorry. That...that escalated in there way faster than I could seem to stop it.” She tucked a strand of her hair back behind her ear. She’d opted for contacts again today, and though I missed the sexy librarian vibe her glasses gave her, she was just as beautiful without them.

“When I was a teenager, I read that addiction can be genetic. That there was something in the genes that made someone predisposed to an addictive personality, whether it was drugs or alcohol, or even sex. So I decided I’d never drink or do drugs, ever. I wasn’t going to chance that I’d be one of the statistics.”

“But the sex was okay?” she smirked.

“Well, there are some things a man can live without, and some…” I shrugged, a smile forming on my lips.

“Some you can’t live without. Yeah, yeah, I know. Nine years, remember?”

“All too clearly,” I replied.

Just like that, the space between us grew tense, thick with possibility. Her eyes dropped to my lips, studying them with such intensity that I felt her stare like a caress.

“As for the rest, don’t worry,” I quickly said, trying to distract myself. As much as I’d loved kissing her before, she obviously hadn’t been ready for it, and I wasn’t about to push.

“The rest?” her head tilted to the side, her attention still fixated on my mouth.

My tongue swept over my suddenly dry lower lip, and her pupils dilated.

Fuck, she wasn’t making this easy.

“The hockey stuff.”

She blinked, then met my eyes again. “Oh, right. Yeah. You’re right. I can’t really judge what I haven’t seen. That’s not fair.”

“I get it.” Unable to stop myself, I reached for one of her hands, and my thumb traced the lines on her palm.

“You do?”

I nodded, savoring the softness of her skin. This might be the only way she ever let me touch her.

“I could be wrong. But I think someone hurt you. And it’s up to you when and if you ever want to tell me who and how, or if I’m even right. But something forced you to build some pretty thick walls. And I don’t just mean the normal walls we build with failed relationships. I mean Great Wall of China-sized walls. Violence, in any matter, scares you, even more so when Elliott is involved, and you need to know it’s okay. I get it.”

Instead of pulling her hand back from mine, she leaned in, her empty hand resting on my chest. “You’re right.”

I nodded. “I didn’t want to be.”

She eyed my lips again, then my throat, and down the lines of my chest until she traced the logo on my shirt. “I feel safe with you,” she admitted. “That’s something I haven’t felt in...so long. And the last time I felt that with a man, it turned out that I...wasn’t.” She picked up my hands and held them by my wrists. “Your hands are beautiful, did you know that?”

“I’d never thought of them that way,” I said as she studied them. “They’re just my hands.”

“They’re capable of such amazing things. Driving Elliott to whatever adventure you planned, bringing me bubble tea, spiking a volleyball...setting my body on fire with nothing but a simple touch.” Her voice dropped to a near whisper.

Damn if I didn’t want to touch her now. It had been weeks, and I could still taste her, sweet and chocolatey on my tongue.

“They’re capable of wielding a hockey stick, and…” She swallowed.

“Fighting,” I supplied.

She nodded.

“Yeah, they are, but I’m in control of them, you know,” I teased. Her eyes shot to mine. “You’re always safe with me. I need you to know that. I know you think my job is the very thing you can’t stand, but I need you to know that hockey didn’t make me a monster—it kept me from becoming one. It taught me to channel that energy, to leave it all out there, to never let anger bottle up and become dangerous.”

“You’re dangerous to me.” It was the most honest she’d ever been with me. “You make me want things I shouldn’t want. You make me feel selfish. Possessive, even, and that’s just ridiculous because the only claim I have to you is that you’re Elliott’s Big, and you kissed me once.”

Just like I wanted to do right now. Over and over. Endlessly. If that was all she wanted, then I’d kiss her until our mouths were swollen and red, until we both ached. Hell, I’d kiss the woman until I died and be thankful for it.

“I’d have kissed you a hell of a lot more in the last two weeks if you’d given me the okay.” A corner of my mouth lifted.

“What? Really? I thought I’d freaked you out.”

I lifted one of my hands from her grasp and cupped her cheek. “It would take a lot more than you asking me to stop, than you drawing physical boundaries, to freak me out.”

“All I had to do was ask?”

“Yes.” Fuck, my voice dropped, which was the opposite of what my dick had decided to do.

“When you caught me at the end of the rock climb?” She ran her hand up my chest to rest on the side of my neck.

“Yes.” That moment had tested my restraint, but I’d passed.

“When we were at the yoga studio, and you helped me get into that twisty position?”

“Hell. Yes.” I hadn’t jus

t wanted to kiss her, I’d wanted to peel those spandex pants off her body—they didn’t hide anything anyway—and put my tongue on her.

“Now?” Her question was breathless.

“More than I want air,” I answered.

She slowly took my hand and wrapped it around her waist. “Porter?”

“Shea?”

“Would you please kiss me?”

So polite, when everything I wanted to do to her was so very dirty.

I answered with my mouth on hers, kissing her softly, sucking on her bottom lip. “Is that what you want?”

She used her free hand to clench my shirt and tug me closer. “Almost.”

I kissed her harder, running my tongue along the seam of her lips, and when she parted them, gently teased that lower lip again, licking the tender strip of flesh just inside her lip.

“That closer?”

“Fucking. Kiss. Me,” she ordered, pulling at my neck to bring me lower.

I let her, hovering just above her lips, millimeters out of her reach, even with her on her toes. The anticipation was as excruciating as it was erotic.

“Porter!” she snapped, then swiped her tongue over my lower lip.

I almost broke. Never in a million years did I ever think I’d have Shea Lansing begging me to kiss her.

“Say my name,” I ordered.

“Porter,” she pled.