Awk-Weird (Ice Knights, #2)(61)

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry.” Tess hurried over and grabbed Kahn before the pissed-off kitty could make a break for it. “I guess the good news is that we’ll be out of your hair soon. I can move back into my apartment.”

A kick in the balls would have felt better. An illegal check from behind that sent him sprawling into the boards would have been less of a shock to his system. Everything stopped for him—his heart, his breath, his fucking world—and for once he had no plan, no spin move, no guidance on what to do when he’d embraced change and the change told him she was moving out.

“And you want to do that?” he asked, wishing like hell that her answer would be no.

“Of course—this was just temporary.” Her hand went to her belly as she magically managed to hold onto the squirming kitten in her other arm. “Let me get Kahn locked up in my room, and then I’ll get this mess cleaned up.”

“Don’t worry about it. I got it. I want to take care of things and put them back in order.” For her. He wanted to do that for her, but he couldn’t let that part out, not with her leaving.

Her bottom lip trembled and Kahn let out a meow of protest as if her grip had tightened. “Of course.” Her lips curled upward, but it wasn’t a smile so much as it was a faulty mask. “I’ll just get out of your way. Good night.”

His gut dropped and he clenched his fists. He’d said the wrong thing. “Tess…”

But nothing came out after her name, and he had no idea what should, so when her steps didn’t falter but actually sped up, he shut his mouth and watched her walk away.





Chapter Eighteen


“I shouldn’t have come,” Tess said as she looked around the Ice Knights family suite at the arena between the first and second period during the next day’s afternoon home game. It was filled with the people who had actual ties to the players, wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, family members. There was even a three-year-old running around with a giant glob of jelly doughnut on her chin. “I don’t belong here.”

“Why not?” Fallon asked as she handed Tess a bottled water and then popped the top off her own beer.

“This is for families,” she said. “That’s not me.”

Fallon shot her a smile. “It will be.”

“Cole and I aren’t together.” And he didn’t want them to be. He’d made that perfectly clear last night when he said he just wanted to get everything back in order.

Message sent. Message received.

Her best friend gave her a you’re-so-full-of-it look of disbelief. “So you keep saying.”

She was saved from having to respond by the puck drop. The first line was on the ice, a guy by the name of Hedrick taking Cole’s usual spot against the hated Cajun Rage. The Ice Knights were down by one when the coach called for a line switch and Cole hopped over the boards.

Tess’s chest clenched the moment his skates touched the ice.

God, he was amazing out there, skating and weaving through the other team’s players like he didn’t just see them but as if he could anticipate where they were going to be. It was the new plays. He was running them as if he’d always been doing so.

And if she could breathe while she watched, she would have been able to appreciate the beauty of getting to watch a man at peak physical condition do the one thing he’d trained for all his life.

She jumped up from her seat, the unopened water bottle clutched close to her chest as he zoomed toward the goal, all dangerous grace and feral determination. He pulled back his stick to send the puck flying toward the net and right before he made contact, a Rage defenseman came practically out of nowhere and slammed into Cole, sending him straight into the boards.

In an instant, everyone in the family box was on their feet screaming for a penalty, but Tess couldn’t get any sound out. Cole was still facedown on the ice, unmoving. Each thump of her heart was like a battering ram against her ribs as she watched the other players skate over to him, circling him. A heavy silence slammed down when the team doctor rushed onto the ice, as if the rest of the world had stopped existing. Hand on her belly, Tess stood there watching, helpless as a sickening dread seeped into her, making it hard to stand, or breathe, or do anything except stare at the man she loved despite knowing she shouldn’t as he lay still on the ice.

Fallon slid her arm around Tess’s waist, anchoring her as she watched Cole on the Jumbotron waiting for any hand motion or jerk of his foot—anything to show he was going to be okay. There was nothing.

Her lungs ached from not taking in any air. Her entire body was shaking. Everything, her entire world, collapsed down to one man.

“Tess,” Fallon said, her voice sounding distant even though she was right next to her. “Are you okay?”

“Garden worms have five pairs of hearts,” she said, the words tumbling out as she stared at that giant screen. “A rhino horn is made of keratin.” Her voice was getting louder, higher pitched as the panic roared through her while a gurney was rolled out onto the ice. “There are twenty-two bones in the human skull.” She sucked in a ragged breath, trying to bury the howl just under the surface as Cole lay on the cold ice as still as death. “Cumulonimbus clouds can form tornadoes.”

And one was building in her, violently whirling around and shrieking, slamming against every part of her as her attention remained glued to the image of an unresponsive Cole as panic screamed through her.