Destiny on Ice (Boys of Winter #1)(57)

Damn, I can’t wait for December to get here.

Fueled by feelings I’ve never felt before, like an intense sort of joy, I come out flying on the ice. Three minutes in and our goaltender, a Russian guy named Ruslan Brezzenov—we call him Breeze—sends the puck to my stick when he’s clearing his net and sees there’s no defensemen around me.

The other team is in the midst of a personnel change so I skate down the ice mostly unimpeded. One of their defensemen finally notices me and comes in for a hard check.

I outmaneuver him and shoot the puck at the net.

Their goalie never sees it coming, and the light behind the net goes on. Sirens erupt and the crowd goes crazy. Our team is doing so well, in large part because of me. I’m playing better than I ever have in my career, and it’s all due to Aubrey.

I realize right then and there, on the ice, as my teammates are congratulating me on my goal, I’m in love with her.

Shit, I’ve never been in love. Not like this.

I go on to score another goal and two assists. It’s a great game and we end up leading 6-2 with only two minutes left to play. But then Benny gets hurt. After he goes down hard against the boards on a wicked check, he has to leave the ice.

We still win, and word from the team doctor is Benny will be okay.

That night, after interviews conclude in the locker room, and after I take a quick shower, I join the guys for a late dinner. I text Aubrey that I’ll be home in a bit, and she messages me back to have fun.

We go to a fancy steakhouse in downtown Las Vegas. The food is great, but I’m not too thrilled that there’s a strip club next door. I have a feeling the guys will want to stop in after we eat. If Benny were here with us, I could take off with him. He avoids all drinking situations. Unfortunately, he had to stay behind for X-rays.

Sure enough, dinner ends and Nolan suggests we stop in at the strip joint.

“Come on, Oliver,” he says when I attempt to decline. “You haven’t been out with us in ages.”

“Yes,” Breeze, the goaltender, chimes in with his choppy accent. “I owe you drink from last season when we go out. Hell,” he goes on, “with all the booze you bought me, I probably owe you twenty drinks.”

“One is good,” I assure him with a clap on the back. It’s not like I’ve been keeping count, but I do recall buying multiple rounds for everyone after we were knocked out of the playoffs in early May. I guess that’s what he’s referring to.

“Does that mean you’re actually going to hang with us tonight?” Nolan raises a brow.

“Yeah, sure.” I shrug. “What can it hurt?”

I regret those words when I walk into the strip club and see how out of control things are. This could end up badly. There are three bachelor parties going on…and now us.

Breeze buys me the drink he owes me. I try to nurse the watered-down vodka and tonic, but various players keep buying rounds for everyone. Before I know it, I’m f*cking hammered.

“So much for three months of sobriety,” I say to Nolan.

“You’re not an alcoholic, Brent,” he says. “I don’t know why you talk like that.” He pauses for a few seconds, then says, “Oh, wait. I actually do know why you say shit like that. It’s because of Aubrey and her mouth.”

Lifting my fifth vodka and tonic of the night, I murmur, “Yeah, okay, but she has a point. My downward descent always seems to start out this way.”

He makes a scoffing noise. “That also sounds like something Aubrey would say.”

Leaning back, I ask him, “Dude, what is your f*cking problem with her?”

He blows out a breath. “I like her just fine. It’s just that I see the way you look at her. And the way she looks at you.”

“So?”

“You’ve slept with her, haven’t you?”

I shrug. “Maybe.”

“More than once, I presume?”

I nod, and he says, “Damn it, Brent. What are you two doing? She’s an employee of the team, same as you. Nothing good can come of you and her together in any way.”

I don’t like what he’s saying, especially since it’s true. So when a skimpily clad cocktail waitress comes along, I order yet another drink.

“Man, you are such a downer,” I mutter. “Just because you had a bad experience with love—” I shut the hell up when I realize what I’ve just blurted out.

Nolan’s head jerks up. “What did you just say?”

I wave him off. “Nothing, I was just thinking out loud.”

He’s not alarmed that I brought up his past. Well, maybe he is, seeing as it’s a closely guarded secret that not only was Nolan once madly in love, but he married the girl. Both of them were still teenagers. He was just out of juniors and thought she was the love of his life.

Too bad she loved nothing but dick.

She cheated on him with half the team he was on at the time, as well as many other random men. When he found out about all her flings, he filed for divorce and everything was swept under the rug. No one really remembers since he was a “nobody” at the time. But he sure remembers. He told Benny and me all about it, in confidence, this past summer. He even admitted that he’s never been the same since, not when it comes to love. He just doesn’t believe in it—at all.