Every man here looks like he was carved out of stone and dipped in tattoos.
Every woman looks like she walked off the cover of a summer swimsuit issue.
No one notices me at first. Faces blur past me, bodies pressed too close, conversations folding over each other like waves.
I scan for my brother, searching for something familiar, but he’s nowhere to be seen. I push further into the crowd, hoping I don’t look as lost as I feel, when a woman bumps into me near the kitchen.
She’s tall, legs for miles, wearing what I think used to be a shirt, now functioning as a dress with six inches to spare. Her blonde hair is glossy, lips over-lined, and her smile is anything but warm.
“Oh my God,” she drawls, pausing to give me a once-over. “I love your dress. It’s so... vintage.”
Her voice drips with that syrupy, manufactured sweetness that makes my skin crawl.
I blink with a smile and tilt my head.
“Thanks,” I say, cheerfully. “I love your dress. Very landfill couture.”
Her smile falters, and her veneers—too big for her mouth—slowly disappear behind pumped lips. Before she can recover, I brush past her like a breeze.
I disappear back into the noise, chin high, stomach tight.
A loud cheer erupts near the entryway, deeper voices overlapping like a ripple through the room.
“Yo, finally!”
“There he is!”
“Took you long enough, man!”
Something about the tone makes me glance over. Just a peek, to see what all the noise is about.
A man steps through the front door with the kind of confidence that says he belongs here. He’s tall. Stupidly tall. Hair the color of burnt chestnut, pushed back in an effortlessly messy, windblown way that should look unkempt but somehow doesn’t. His jaw is sharp and prominent, like it was hand-carved from stone. Tattoos coil down both arms, dark ink against goldenskin, stretching over a build so broad and solid, he could probably crush granite with his hands.
His eyes—hazel, I think—scan the men in front of him slowly. And then he smiles.
Holy. Shit.
Dimples. And a full, easy, dangerous smile. The kind that makes your stomach flip and your brain short-circuit.
I go completely still. Because in a room full of NHL stars, he’s the first man who’s made me stop and stare.
But before I can even process the electricity curling low in my stomach, the woman from earlier appears again.
She instantly throws herself at him, laughing way too loudly with her underboobs poking out from a hole in her “dress.” She places a hand on his bicep like she’s been waiting for this exact moment since birth.
And he grins, amused. It’s not flirty, but he doesn’t move away either.
“Of course,” I mutter under my breath, tearing my eyes away.
A sharp stab of something bitter twists in my chest before I can stop it.
Jealousy. Irrational jealousy.
I don’t even know him. He’s most probably one of Dominic’s teammates—another pro athlete who’s had women tripping over themselves since puberty.
Which means... I’ll probably be seeing him around.
Great.
