Page 87 of The Goalie in Room 1

“I’m sure,” he said dryly, but the corner of his mouth twitched before he took another drink.

His attention shifted toward the tree, and he stopped with the mug halfway back to his mouth. His gaze moved over the presents underneath it before returning to me. “What’re those?”

“Presents.” The man could be completely adorable when flustered. And the way he stared at the presents I’d ordered and wrapped for him put him firmly in the gasted-his-flabber realm.

“Who for?” he asked, the shock and disbelief lightening his mood to something close to the ceiling.

“You, unless somebody else named Thad lives here.”

“Cash.” My name came out quieter than I expected, and something about his face made my stomach tighten.

Fuck. No. We weren’t doing that.

“They’re mostly little shit.” I waved my mug toward the tree. “Don’t make it weird.”

His eyebrows went up. “I’m not making it weird.”

“You’re doing the face.”

“What face?”

“The one that’s about to make me regret buying you shit. Open a fucking present.”

That got me a smile. “Which one?”

“Small one first.”

“You have an order?”

“Of course I have an order.”

Thad shook his head as he crossed to the tree. “God forbid I disrupt the system.”

“Now you’re learning. If I have to adhere to your system, you can open presents in order.”

He smirked as he came back with the small package and sat beside me. I lifted my leg without thinking. Thad caught my ankle just as automatically, settling my leg across his lap before he started on the paper.

My eyes dropped to his hands. The same warm fingers that wrapped around his dick last night wound around my ankle this morning. The same thumb resting near the edge of my brace, tracing my leg, had gathered precum from his tip. No hesitation. No awkwardness. Nothing different because of last night.

Thank God. I’d worried so much that things would get weird.

He opened the first present and laughed. “Seriously?”

“Your old one is disgusting.”

“There is nothing wrong with it.”

“There are approximately eight million things wrong with it. Starting with the fact that I’ve seen you scrape burned shit off it with a knife.”

Thad turned the new grill scraper over in his hand. “It’s a grill scraper.”

“It’s a good grill scraper.”

“You researched grill scrapers, didn’t you?”

“I had time. And you’re a loaded doctor. Quit using nasty shit when you can afford to replace things.”

His laugh followed me as I pointed him toward the next present.