Page 68 of Slapshot Baby

“No, I’m not sleeping here.”

"Mom assigned the rooms."

"Then tell your mom we need two."

"The house is full. Some other couples are already sharing. If I ask for separate rooms, everyone downstairs will know this isn't real."

I keep staring at the bed.

"You take the bed. I'll take the floor," he says, stepping into the room.

"The floor?"

He drops onto the edge of the mattress and unlaces his shoes, completely at ease.

"I've slept on worse. Hospital beds, team buses. I can name more if you want."

The door clicks shut.

The room shrinks.

He's too close. The only sizable thing in this room is the bed. With Kai here, it feels enormous.

And I can't sort through a single thought because they're all tangled up in the image of that woman's hand on his arm. The sound of her laugh and the burning knot in my stomach that won't loosen.

"Who is she?" I blurt out.

Kai looks at me. The ease drains out of his expression, replaced by something alert.

"Who?"

"The woman on the porch who you spent all afternoon talking to. The one whose hand was on your arm the whole time."

An infuriating wide smirk stretches across his face.

12

KAI

You'll Beg Me

She's standing by the closed door like she's blocking an exit, her chin up, her arms folded.

All afternoon I watched Ava pretend she wasn't watching me.

Every stolen glance across the yard. The way her jaw locked when Lena touched my arm. The way she stood up so fast from those porch steps that Biscuit flinched.

She's spent weeks telling me she feels nothing. Her body has been screaming the opposite since the hospital.

But this is new. It’s possession, and she doesn't even realize she's showing it.

"Well?" She shifts her weight against the door. "Are you going to answer me or just stand there looking smug?"

"Lena is a family friend. She introduced herself. I was polite."

"Polite?" She repeats the word like I've insulted her intelligence. "Her hand was on your arm. She was laughing at everything you said. You're not that funny, Kai."

"You seem to think I'm funny enough to visit five days a week."