So Over You (Chicago Rebels #2)(24)

Her brows formed a V in plain annoyance. “Later.”

Kelly nodded, apparently pleased with that. Later. When they would discuss important things. Like dates. Or orgasms.

Ted asked Vadim about the adductor muscle that had been bothering him, and the distraction meant that Vadim missed Isobel’s exit. Had she shared a longing look with Kelly before she left? Were they now communicating without words?

Vadim was not enjoying this. Not at all.

But maybe Isobel had nothing to do with the cloud hanging over him. He preferred to attribute his mood to the phone call he had received an hour ago from Mia. She wanted to meet up with him at the next away game in New York, which meant the pressure was on once again. Would his body be ready for play? Would his mind be ready for Victoria Wallace?

Yes, that was the reason for his irritation. Not Isobel Chase.



Mr. Siberia was a total joy this morning.

Of course, that conclusion would assume that degrees of joy were possible with the Cat’s Meow from Moscow. (Violet’s latest nickname, even though Vadim wasn’t from Moscow and the rhyme sucked.) Isobel put Vadim’s chilly demeanor this morning at a 9.5 on a scale of one to ten—“seriously pissed off, speech impossible”—but the scale didn’t even go below an eight, which was “annoyed with a chance of Russian swearing.”

Ever since he’d unloaded that glare when she popped her head into the trainers’ room, he’d been acting as if someone had cut out the crotches in his designer suits. Now they were running sprint drills from the center line to the blue zone. At first he seemed to be working through it, but with each rep, he’d up the growl quotient at her as he skated by.

Kind of sexy, but that was neither here nor there.

Isobel didn’t have time for sexy, growly, bad-tempered Russians playing havoc with her hormones, not when she might be headed out on a dinner date with a mere mortal who was just her speed. She hadn’t had a chance to touch base with Kelly, but she’d gone home last night after their chat feeling more hopeful than she had in a while.

Kelly Townsend might be the one.

Nice and harmless, a guy she could talk to. What better basis on which to build a relationship? Lust as the foundation might work for other people, but not for her. The proof was muttering to himself on every skate-by.

“Want to talk about it, Russian?”

He stopped, spat a curse at the ice, and then continued with the drills.

Fair enough. She wasn’t here to be his sounding board. Lord knew she understood what he was going through, but everyone had to deal with injuries in their own way and on their own timetable. Isobel would focus on Vadim’s skating and leave whatever was happening between the ears to the team’s shrink.

After ten more minutes of semidecent skating and Olympic-quality cantankerousness, she called a halt and took a seat on the bench rinkside. As she entered notes into her iPad, she became aware that he had skated over, cleared the rink barrier, and now stood before her. In skates, he loomed close to six feet seven, everything about him supersized.

She peered up. Damn, he was pretty, even when grumpy. “How does the knee feel?”

“Good. Best it’s felt in a while.”

Surprised at his even tone, she studied him more closely now, looking beyond the superficial perfection. She’d assumed his temper tantrum was related to his uncooperative body.

“That’s great. But if you’re pretending it’s better to get me to sign off on you quicker . . .”

He sat on the bench beside her, pressing his muscular thigh against hers, its heat a bulwark against the chilly rink. There was plenty of room on the bench. He didn’t need to sit so close or flaunt such a balls-out pose. She could have pulled away, but manspreading was just one of the many crosses women had to bear, and she refused to let him think this bothered her. Because it didn’t. It was just a thigh. A pillar-thick, incredibly massive, heat-conducting thigh.

“Believe it or not, Isobel, I’m a team player. If I wasn’t ready, I would say so.”

Sure you would. “You looked good out there today. You didn’t tire like the first time we did this.”

He stared at her, into her. There’d been a lot of that intimidating staring back in the day, and she was quite immune thankyouverymuch—oh, who was she kidding? Vadim Petrov in thermonuclear glare mode was enough to make her melt.

Lust. Not a good foundation.

His lips were moving, but she missed what came out of them, or rather her muddled brain couldn’t quite compute what came out. She rewound the last two seconds. She could have sworn—“What did you say?”

“Are you dating Kelly?”

He must have spotted her in the Empty Net and jumped to the right conclusion. “And this is your business because?”

“I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“You don’t think—you don’t think—” Sputtering, she knew she sounded like a loon, but how was she supposed to respond?

Turned out she didn’t have to, because Mr. Nosy Parkov was still spouting unsolicited opinions. “Your position is precarious.”

“What position is that?”

“As a team owner who is female and trying to obtain a job on the coaching staff.”

Right, that position. “What have you heard?” Was someone else gossiping about what they’d seen in the bar? Kelly shouldn’t have kissed her cheek. Damn.