Page 18 of Puck of My Life

ARCHIE

In an ideal world, I would’ve loved to have stayed in bed with Archie all day, talking, snuggling, and having some more knotting fun. But the real world existed, and we were part of it. It was probably for the best because I was a little bit sore from our activities. Not that I was complaining. I loved the way it reminded me of where he’d been and what we’d been doing.

Archie was real.

He never forgot me.

We’d spent the night together.

He didn’t even throw me out when I lost my damn mind and bit him. And he scratched me. I didn’t understand why either of us did what we did, but I wasn’t mad at it. My wound hurt at the time, but now it felt like a piece of him was there with me. And, logically, that made no sense. But what place did logic have in love?

The first thing he told me when I woke up was that he was sorry, but he had to work today. They had a pretty big game and he couldn’t get out of it. I’d never ask him to. It wasn’t like I didn’t need to work, too.

Archie fed me a quick breakfast, brought me home, and asked me if I could come see his game after I finished writing my article. Of course, that was very much a yes. I wanted to apologize for biting him, but didn’t want to discuss anything too serious when we weren’t able to dig into it fully. So instead, I left it with “We should probably talk about last night and what that means going forward.”

He kissed me hard and then watched as I went back to my apartment. I know because every time I turned back, he was still standing there. So hot.

It was so great that he had helped me get my information because the article came out pretty quickly, which was exactly what I needed. Because whether I got it done or not, I was going to the game.

Article done, I attempted to upload it. It failed, which meant I needed to go to work and deal with it. Truman hadn’t loved me saying I would work remote today. If I didn’t get it uploaded on time, I’d never hear the end of it.

I knew they were working on the computer system, but today was not the day I needed it to fail.

My first stop was Louisa’s desk to ask which dry cleaner she used. She assured me I didn’t need to do that, but I did. The sooner I got it gone, the better. Archie made no secret that he didn’t like me wearing it. Why did I find that so hot?

My next stop was to get my work submitted in an attempt to get to the game on time.

“I tried to email the article to you.” I plopped my computer on Truman’s desk.

Truman looked up. “Yes. Stupid system’s down.”

“Can I leave my laptop here with it, and have you take care of it once it’s back up and running?” Usually that was an hour, but one day it was three. We barely hit our deadlines that time.

“Yesterday, you tried to leave early, and now you’re trying to take the day off?”

“Not trying to. I already filled out my form.” It was an afternoon game for some reason, and I wasn’t going to miss it. I justified to myself that I worked late last night, so it was fair. Besides, my work was done. I hadn’t expected Truman to care, but then again, I’d tried to get out of my assignment last night.

“Was last night that—” He sniffed the air. “Oh, yeah. You should take today off.”

What was the smelling me about?

“You had to stay late last night. If I have any questions, I’ll call you.” I’d been so sure he was turning me down.

“You’re acting weird.”

“Weird, me? No.” He shooed me away. “Enjoy your time off.”

“I will. I have a ticket to the game.”

“Since when do you like hockey?” Fair question given how I tried to turn down the original assignment. Thank gods, I didn’t.

“Sometimes, it’s not the game you like. It’s the player.”

He leaned back and smiled.

I was trying to play off that “don’t hate the player” thing, and it failed, but Truman was older, so he probably wouldn’t have gotten the reference anyway.

I grabbed a cab to the hockey game, not wanting to deal with traffic or the congestion on the bus. Once inside the arena, I found my seat. It was a really good one. Archie apologized for it not being the best one, but I wouldn’t know which was better to begin with.