Charming as Puck(85)

He would not harm a cow. And neither would his mother.

But they are definitely up to something.

“You’re sure there aren’t any more farm animal pranks being planned in that locker room?” Mom asks as we all troop back to my car.

“Positive.”

Except I’m actually cringing at the thought of what else might be going on in the locker room. Because a little birdy told me things are heating up again between Nick and Zeus after our phone-sex-gone-wrong incident.

And by little birdy, I mean all of my friends, because it hit the underground hockey blog network, and of course Felicity heard from Ares, though she’s kindly refrained from mentioning it.

“Nick learned his lesson,” Mrs. Murphy tells my mom. “The real question will be if that Zeus Berger has learned his.” She sniffs. “Just because he’s seven feet tall doesn’t mean he gets to be a bully. I sometimes can’t believe he and Ares are identical twins. Such very different boys.”

“Nick can handle Zeus,” I tell Mrs. Murphy quietly.

Because he can.

But after hearing a few more stories about the bullies in his childhood, I can see why she’s testy. Nick’s a big guy—well over six feet and built—but the Bergers both dwarf him.

“And he’s hardly innocent,” I add with a head nod toward Sugarbear.

She looks at the calf like she’s going to blame Zeus for taking the prank too far, but even she seems to realize it would be pointless.

Nick doesn’t do anything small.

That is, after all, why the four of us are headed to the arena with front row seats tonight.

“Think he can get another shutout?” Muffy asks when I put the car in gear.

“I think he plays his best games on home ice,” I say.

“With his favorite cheerleaders in the front row,” his mom agrees.

I should probably worry about when she’s going to start asking if I’ve had my period lately. The thought makes me both smile and worry, because while I know she’d be over the moon at the idea of two grandbabies within a year, I don’t want to do babies unintentionally. Especially because Nick and I still haven’t talked about our future. But I decide that for now, I’m just going to enjoy that we’re all ignoring the shed incident and heading into the arena.

Plus, who wants to worry when we’re on our way to a hockey game?

It’s going to be an awesome night.





Forty-Four





Nick



I’m pulling on my pads when my phone buzzes at the top of my locker.

Kami’s texting.

It’s a selfie of her, both our mothers, and Muffy in front of the new Thrusty statue outside the arena. All four of them are in Thrusters jerseys.

Our mothers are arguing over which one of us is more perfect. I think they’re trying to sell each other, she adds to the picture.

I’m so distracted, smiling at the photo of them all happy and bunched together around the giant metal Thrusty for a picture, imagining my mother telling Kami’s mom that I potty trained myself at two and a half and that I always give the best Christmas presents, that I almost miss Zeus walking in.

“Ready to kick some ass?” he asks the room at large.

Grunts and Fuck yeahs fill the room.

He saunters to his locker and stops with a smirk at the box sitting on the bench in front of it.

“Funny, Murphy. I’m not falling for your shit,” he tells me. “You open it.”

“It’s from your mom,” I reply.

He’s still smirking when he reaches around it and grabs his jersey.

Like I’m going to put the good stuff in a clearly labeled, very suspicious box.

There’s a pop!, and everyone around Zeus scatters while a puff of glitter and confetti explodes in the air.

“Fucking damn it!” he barks before he rounds on me, glitter and confetti sparkling all over his face. In his eyebrows. Up his nose. Square on the neck. Sticking to his stubble. It’s sprinkled all over his Thrusters T-shirt and down the front of his sweatpants, and he hasn’t yet realized what’s special about the confetti. “Did you talk to my sister, you fucker?”

I scratch my chin. “You got a little dick there on your face.”

Snickers and outright belly laughs are going through the room, because the entire team’s in here.

Berger scratches his face too, pulls the confetti away, studies it for a minute, and his face breaks into a big-ass grin. “You sneaky motherfucker,” he says. “Come give us a hug.”

Fuck.

Can’t help but like a guy who takes a glitter bomb well.

Especially a dick glitter bomb.

So I let him hug me and smear glitter all the fuck over my pads.

He gets me with a hand to the face, and I shove a second glitter bomb down his pants.

“Not the first time,” Ares mutters with a head shake when confetti explodes out of Zeus’s ass.

“That was you who sat on that fucking bomb the first time,” Zeus replies to his brother, rubbing confetti all over his twin too. “Who’s next? Come get your game makeup, fuckers!”

He snaps a selfie, and I can’t help but stare at the grin.

He got owned, and he’s standing there taking it like a champ.