Hawke (Cold Fury Hockey 5)

"All right," Vale says after considering her cards and raising those sparkling eyes to me. She throws a quarter into the pile and says, "Call."

Garrett and Max had already folded during the last round of betting, having realized what a deceptively good player Vale is. Dave is a good poker player and he taught his daughter when she was very young. They used to play for Monopoly money, but she's since graduated to the real stuff. Although with her poor bank account these days, we put a quarter cap on the betting.

Max leans to the left and takes a peek at Vale's cards in her hand. His eyebrows shoot high, and that leads me to believe she's got something really good.

Or Max could be playing on Team Vale and trying to bluff me as well.

"You might as well fold," Max says with a devious grin as he settles back in his chair and picks up his beer. Garrett shakes his head and chuckles.

Max and Garrett know about me and Vale. Hell, the whole team knows now.

Not that I got up and made an announcement or anything, but I had told Max pretty much our entire history over beers that day we went out. I didn't spill my guts right away, and I half expected he had a crush on her, but by the end of the first beer, I realized we had a lot of stuff in common with each other, one of which wasn't an attraction to the new athletic trainer.

Both of us are the oldest siblings in our families and thus know the burden of the toughest kind of love. We're both extremely close to our parents and siblings, and Max is Canadian as well, although he's from Quebec. He's bilingual but has only a faint trace of the French-Canadian accent that denotes his heritage. After talking about family and hockey for a while, he mentioned Vale, and next thing I knew, I was spilling the gist of the story to him. I didn't paint details of the breakup nor what it did to me, but it was enough to know we had a history that had ended on the ugly side of things.

By the time Max and I had finished three beers, I came away with some new clarity to things.

First, I needed the truth from Vale as to what happened that night. Max pointed out that we'd never move forward or have a peaceful friendship without me knowing. That's what prompted me to go to her apartment a week ago and pull her out with the guise of taking her to a movie.

Thanks, Max.

The second thing I learned from Max was that my struggle to balance career and relationships is not atypical. Max had a high school sweetheart he lost to the distance and rigors of becoming a professional athlete. He as much as admitted that he didn't put her first, and didn't really even realize her feelings for him had died because of it. It made me feel slightly better about losing touch with Oliver and gave me the final push I needed to reach out to him.

While the call was awkward for all of about thirty seconds, it was clear that Oliver couldn't have been happier for me and my accomplishments, or any more understanding about losing touch. I apologized. He accepted. Since then we've talked one more time and have made "loose" plans to get together.

So with my life seemingly back on track, and old relationships reopened and currently being explored, as well as a mutual decision by Vale and myself to move forward--whatever that means--there was no sense in hiding any of this from the team. Besides, the first time I walked naked through the locker room with Vale's name on my hip sort of told the story. I admitted to one of my teammates it was indeed Vale the AT who had residence on my pelvis, and by day's end, the story had spread like wildfire. I even got an email from Gray telling me she was glad I had reconnected with her.

Something I'd like to do again, very literally, very soon.

"How about an additional bet?" I ask Vale, waggling my eyebrows at her.

"Oh, yeah?" she asks impishly as she turns her cards facedown on the table. "Like what?"

"If I win, we say good night to these two boneheads, you come back to my room with me, and I get to tie you up." I say all of this in a low voice with a direct stare of challenge to Vale. Max and Garrett are all but forgotten, until I hear Garrett cough and mutter, "Awkward."

Vale neither blushes nor looks offended by my suggestion. While she may not be a party girl like the old days, she isn't afraid of her sexuality either. In fact, her eyebrows raise in interest as she stares back at me.

I can tell Max and Garrett are forgotten to her as well.

"What if I win?" she asks while rubbing her index finger seductively along the edge of her cards fanned out on the wooden table.

"You get to take me back to my room and tie me up, have your way with me," I tell her simply.

And I hope she fucking wins.

Please, please, please let her have the winning hand, because the thought of Vale having unrestricted access to do whatever comes into that dirty little brain of hers is completely fine by me.

"Deal," she says, and with a flourishing flick of her wrist, she turns the cards over one by one. Three kings, two eights. A full house.

Standing up from the table, I throw my cards facedown and grab Vale's hand, urging her to stand up too.

"Got me," I tell her with a wink. "You win. Now let's go so you can tie me up."

Garrett barks out a laugh and grabs my cards to see what I had. I glare at him, silently explaining I will rain retribution down on him if he exposes me.

Max clearly doesn't see my quiet command as he grabs the cards from Garrett's hand before I can even pull Vale free of the table and places them face up. "Four of a kind," Max says with a low whistle. "Look at them ladies."

"Asshole," I mutter as I look down at the four queens staring up at me, which clearly beat Vale's hand.

When I look back at her, she's staring at me in sympathetic amusement. She squeezes my hand and then makes my night. "I'll give that one to you, so let's get going. I hope you brought more than one dress tie for this road trip."

I suppress a groan and try not to laugh over Max and Garrett standing there agog over Vale's words. That was just a tiny peek at the woman I used to know, comp

letely unafraid to say how it is. She may have tamed her partying ways, but not her penchant for honest and open talk.

"We're out of here," I tell Max and Garrett as I move past the table, tighten my hold on Vale's hand, and pull her toward the door. Luckily my room is just three down from Max's, and within just a few minutes I'm expecting Vale's hands and mouth to be all over me.

Today has been a perfect day.

Chapter 22

Vale

This is nice.

Lying on my couch with Hawke, his long body stretched down the length of it with my backside snuggled into his front. We're watching Nightmare on Elm Street with all the lights off, and while I'm normally a weenie about scary movies, I don't feel an ounce of anxiety as I look warily at Freddy's long arms and knifelike fingers. I suppose having a big, bad hockey player behind me eases the fear. Dad went to bed about an hour ago and we're content to just lie here like this, his hand resting on my hip in a loose embrace.

Hawke leans forward, which pushes me slightly to the edge of the couch, reaches an arm over me, and dives his hand into the bowl of candy on the coffee table. "Want another?"

"No," I groan. "I'm on sugar overload."

"Well you shouldn't have bought thirty pounds of mini Snickers."

"I didn't know how many trick-or-treaters we'd get in this apartment complex," I point out about my tactical decision. "I didn't want to be caught short and have to hand out protein bars. Plus, bonus, we get the leftovers."

Hawke chuckles and awkwardly unwraps the Snickers. Awkward because my head is resting on his left bicep, which is tucked under me. He brings the Snickers to just in front of my face, where he manages to unwrap it. He holds the naked little candy bar in front of my mouth and teases, "Want a bite?"

I shake my head.

He waves it under my nose and the chocolate aroma changes my mind. "Okay, a little bite."

He feeds it to me, letting me take half of the tiny bar, and puts the rest in his mouth. We chew silently, watching the movie.

I was kind of surprised that Hawke wanted to come hang here for Halloween. I mean, he lives in a gorgeous neighborhood and would probably have a ton of visitors. I didn't think he'd be into it, but it was his suggestion we hand out treats from my apartment. I wasn't quite sure why he suggested this, but in hindsight, I think it's because he knew his presence would mean more to the socioeconomic level of people that live in my complex versus his neighborhood. While not every person to ring the doorbell was a hockey fan, more were than not. It was hilarious to see some of the kids freak out when they saw him, and more than one parent did the same. Hawke got really into it, although he didn't have a costume. He did, however, have a huge sombrero he wore on his head and where he put some of the candy. He'd bend down and let the little kids take the candy from his hat. Dad and I just sat back and watched, highly entertained over how much he was enjoying this.