Page 3 of Pucking Rebound
Another firm knock on the front door makes me jump as I stare at the unopened entryway.
“Go fuck yourself, Graham,” I shout angrily through the solid wood. “Or your store manager. Again.” I can’t believe I’m the one that helped Graham hire her. Nicole, the traitorous bitch I caught having sex with my fiancé.
Turns out, the man I thought was loyal and head over heels in love with me, isn’t.
Because if he was, he wouldn’t have cheated on me.
I hate them both.
Anguish mixed with fury makes me clench my teeth. If I open the door, I’m either going to whack Graham in the nuts or chop them off with the hockey stick I’m wielding like a sword. I might do both in the hope it makes me feel better.
“And how did you get past security, Graham?” I removed his name from the list. “You cheated on me, and I never want to see you again. Please go away.”
“It’s not Graham. It’s me, Jordy.”
Oh God, what the hell is Jordan Miller, the star wingman for the Edmonton Eagles hockey team I work for, doing here?
“What’s happened, Lola?” His tone sounds worried, then there’s silence for a beat. “Did he cheat on you?”
“Yes.” I choke out the answer.
“Bastard.” Jordy’s muffled voice is then followed by a knock. “Open the door.”
“We broke up.” Covering my mouth with my hand, I stifle my sob, my heart cracking open, leaking pain and the feeling of betrayal into my chest like toxic waste.
There’s another gap of silence before Jordy requests softly, “C’mon, baby. Let me in. Please.”
The hockey stick I’m holding drops to the ground with an echoing clatter as it hits the floor.
When I glance in the mirror, it reveals the toll this day has taken on me.
I run my fingertips over my red, blotchy cheeks, my typically bright eyes have been replaced with puffy slits.
“I look godawful. I don’t want to see anyone.” Or talk to anybody. I’m so humiliated. But I know I can’t stay here all night. I need to find a place to stay as this isn’t my house. It’s Wade Collins’.
I’m Wade’s assistant and I’m here, in his new house, organizing the hundreds of sneakers he collects, while he’s in LA on a photoshoot with his publicist, Kali Roth.
Spoiler alert: she’s more than just his publicist.
I know this because I caught them kissing. Not that I would ever tell anyone because Wade is special to me.
He’s my brother.
Not that he knows that yet.
But he will. Soon. Once the hockey season is over.
Jordy cuts through my thoughts. “You need people around you right now, and I know Wade and Kali are in LA.”
“They are,” I confirm.
If Kali wasn’t busy with Wade today, I would call her to tell her what happened. She’d know what to say to make me feel better. She always does.
“So you’re all alone in there?” Jordy asks.
Painfully so.“Yeah.”
After discovering Graham and Nicole screwing in the stockroom earlier today, I couldn’t face returning to our rental. Every piece of furniture, photo, and memory is a sharp reminder of a life I thought Graham and I were building together. It would have been like stabbing me with hot blades. Instead, I opted to come to Wade’s house and unpack his moving boxes in the hope that it would distract me. It didn’t work, but it was worth a shot.
