Parental Guidance (Ice Knights #1)(48)

“Hold on.” She stepped up onto a gnarled exposed root that gave her a few more inches off the ground. “Now you need to make up for making me wait so long to properly welcome you home.”

She didn’t have to tell him twice—especially not with that look on her face. Closing the distance between them, he dipped his head down and captured her mouth in a kiss that was the best he could do considering they were both dressed and in public. Her lips parted, and he slipped his tongue inside, tasting her, teasing her until she was pressed against him. It wasn’t that the rest of the park disappeared, it was that it didn’t matter anymore. He had Zara and she was making those sweet, needy sounds, and he could give her exactly what she wanted.

But not here.

He couldn’t afford the bad headline of Hockey Player Arrested For Public Indecency, but more importantly, she didn’t deserve to be at the center of all that. It took just about every last ounce of his self-control, but he pulled back from the edge. They were both sucking in deep breaths as they disentangled from each other.

“Welcome home,” she said, her voice breathy.

Unable to stop himself from touching her, he brushed a strand of bright-red hair behind her ear. “Glad to be back.”

Holding hands again, they walked back around the tree to the bench. Judging by the looks the other dog owners gave them, they hadn’t been as discreet as he’d been hoping. Some people were amused, others openly curious, and a handful were staring hard, looking at him as if they knew him but just couldn’t place how. All the attention made the back of his head itch and his lungs tighten.

All of a sudden, Zara’s grip on his hand tightened and he looked down. Her face was serene, the sun highlighting the sixty billion freckles covering her face, but the tight lines of her mouth told him she’d noticed.

“So, what’s the post-date video plan for this one?” she asked as they sat down on the bench with a perfect view of Anchovy playing with another dog. “Do you know?”

The question yanked him out of the panic zone, and he tapped his fingertip against his thigh three times, the old routine settling him.

“The instructions Bramble sent the team PR guru about this date was that we were supposed to do a casual video of ourselves, talking about the process and what we were hoping to get out of date five and beyond.”

The last word hung in the air between them, a finish line he really didn’t want to cross anymore.

“I guess it would be kinda mean to let them in on our rule number one of no actual relationship after all this,” she said. “They really do have something cool here. I might try it again after the ball next week. Gemma is never going to let me hear the end of that, though, after she and a regrettable amount of tequila got me here in the first place.”

If any part of him had been wondering—and to be truthful, all of him had—about what was beyond date five for them, that pretty much answered it. There would be no more adjusting the rules—and he fucking hated it.





Chapter Fourteen


Oh yeah, going on camera was exactly what Zara wanted right now. She couldn’t wait to see if she could fake this smile long enough to get through a video where she had to listen to Caleb say all the things she wished were true.

“So how are we going to do this?” she asked, her spine stiff and her shoulders tight with tension.

“Why don’t you start.” He scooted down a bit on the bench, turning so he faced her as he held up his phone. “I’ll ask the questions.”

Deep breaths. It’s just for fun. It doesn’t mean a thing, even if it’s starting to feel like it.

“Perfect.” Her jaw was going to ache later from clamping it together like this. “I’m ready whenever you are.”

“So what were your thoughts before that first date?”

Oh man, that seemed like a billion years ago and yesterday all at the same time. It had been hot, and she’d been annoyed, and there was that couple from out of town.

“That the whole thing would be a disaster.” She chuckled remembering how she’d tried to speed-walk past the lollygaggers and had ended up eating the sidewalk. At the time, not funny. Now? Kinda funny. “I got tangled up in a pair of tourists on my way to the restaurant and I didn’t want to be on the date in the first place.”

He turned the phone around so the camera faced him, then pulled a funny face. “Sounds promising.”

“Oh yeah, very.” Especially considering she’d looked a total mess and had walked into the café and spotted him in all of his sexy pro-athlete glory. “Anyway, so I got there and you’re, like, a billion miles tall and hot, and I figured this was going to be a giant waste of my time.”

He lowered the phone enough that she could see the self-satisfied smirk on his face. “So you think I’m hot, huh?”

“That’s what you’re going to get stuck on?” She rolled her eyes. Men. “That part?” She swiped the phone away from him while he was trying to come up with an answer for that. “Okay, same question. What were your expectations for date one?”

“Someone taller,” he teased.

Giggling, she flipped him off from behind the camera.

The smart-ass grin on his face faltered as he leaned forward into the camera, resting his elbows on his hard thighs. “And definitely not someone who was as funny as she was smart and gorgeous. With my mom picking my date, I was expecting someone who was type-A, a hockey fanatic, and probably could beat me in the forty-yard dash.”