Hockey With Benefits
: Chapter 1

I liked hockey. I already knew it, but by the third period, I really knew it.

The wine might’ve been a factor, or the two beers that my roommate bought me, but either way, I was having fun. I had a new appreciation for the sport.

I was also enjoying watching Cruz Styles, the team’s star player, zip around the rink like he’d been born on skates and not with two normal feet. He wasn’t the only one, though. They were all going so fast, like they were flying on ice. It was exhilarating to watch. It wasn’t my first hockey game, but it was my first hockey game at Grant West. Everyone on campus had been raving about the new guy for a while now.

His looks didn’t hurt either.

His picture was flashed on the jumbotron so many times over the night that I’d lost count. It was having an effect on the three girls in front of me, and also in my vagina. With the hockey mask on, you could still see his fierce dark blue eyes. His high cheekbones. With the mask off, he had a whole chiseled jawline that wasn’t legal. I swear. And those cheekbones were set high and wide, giving the sides of his face an indented look, but it worked on him. Not to mention the messy dark hair on top of his head and how he had the look where he could rifle his hand through it, let it go and he still looked fucking hot. Comb that shit back, put him in a suit, and he’d be giving off 007 vibes.

The guy wasn’t just pretty. He was sizzling hot, and right now, he was whipping down the ice, going left, through two defenders, creating an opening to the goal and bam–the puck was slapped–denied. The goalie thrust his leg out, and the puck went off it, going behind the net.

It was picked up by the other team and sent sailing to the other side of the rink.

Off Cruz went, but he’d be back in two seconds because that’d been the theme of the night.

Grant West was pushing hard the whole night, but Cruz was leading the charge. Over and over again.

I was half winded just watching them.

“Yo.” Miles Gaynor moved next to me, his shoulder lightly bumping into mine. “You know Race Ryerson?”

“What?” I was fully in a drunk haze, and I was enjoying it.

Miles had first been a class friend. Then a party friend. Now he was kind of a roommate. A little skinny, floppy brown hair, but where it looked cute on him, and baby fresh cheeks, the guy was a looker. It’d been because of him that I was living in my own little space in the attic of a house where he and his cousin, a guy from the football team, and a couple other girls all lived as well. They were all chill, but I’d only met them twice and hanging out at the hockey game was the second time of those two instances. When my roommate from first semester left college to pursue a job in her family business, I hadn’t wanted to stick around and see who else my college chose to be her replacement. Hence, Miles.

He nodded to my left. “He’s been staring over here at you almost the whole time. Isn’t he with someone?”

I frowned, but looked around, the edges of my vision blurring before I focused and saw the guy Miles was talking about. At my look, he diverted his head, but bent down to his girlfriend, who was cheering for the team.

There went my nice buzz.

Tasmin Shaw and Race Ryerson.

As he talked to her, she stopped cheering, her smile falling as she leaned forward, her eyes searching, searching, and replaceing me. I frowned, narrowing my eyes, but she only went still before raising a hand up and giving me a slight wave and smile with it.

I scowled, but she barely blinked at that.

Goddamn.

“What’s the deal there?”

I jerked forward, my whole body going stiff. “Nothing.”

“He’s never been a creep before.”

“He’s not. His girlfriend is next to him. Tasmin Shaw.”

“So?”

I shrugged. “Taz is probably just confused why I moved out of the dorms. She lived across from me, that’s all.” I was lying because while she wasn’t from my hometown, she knew people who were, and I was guessing that she’d heard the gossip. Her boyfriend too.

My phone buzzed, and I glanced at the screen.

Kit: OMG! Your mom?! Are you okay?

Dad: Checking on you. Wanted to see how you’re doing? I’m so sorry you’re going through this. I know you like your space and you don’t process like that, but I’m here if you want to talk. Any time, no matter what day or hour. Love you, honey.

Nope. Kit was a friend from back home. Panic burst in my chest, right before everyone and everything began to swim around me. Turning my phone off, I refused to deal with what I knew that text was about, what the gossip that Taz and her boyfriend had heard about me. It’d been the catalyst of why I came to the game tonight. What my mom did earlier, why I panicked, drove three hours home and three hours back wasn’t going to be dealt with tonight.

I wanted more to drink, and the sooner the better.

“OH!” His eyes got big, and his shoulders went low. “I didn’t even think about that. Good to know. Just thought it was weird, that’s all.”

I fixed him with a look. “Look. You don’t have to do this.”

My stomach was swirling, and I wasn’t getting a good feeling here. Miles and I partied. Sometimes we shared a table at the library, but that’d been the extent of our friendship. I had rules with friends, no personal questions. There was a reason for it, and it was significant. I was usually able to handle that rule with friends because so far, I picked the party crowd. Deep meaningful conversations weren’t the norm. It was mostly drinking, flirting, all that jazz. Sometimes there was a catty comment from another girl, and I had a few run-ins. It happened with me, not because I sought them out but because a guy was hitting on me, and the girl got jealous. Guys liked my face. It was round, but my chin somewhat gave me a heart-shaped face. They also liked how my hazel eyes looked combined with my long cinnamon dark hair. Plus, the fact that I was tiny, petite, but I had a rack and some ass. I also had sex appeal, and the reason for that is because I enjoyed sex. God. With my life, it’d become my coping mechanism, but guys could sense that from me and that’s what they were only interested in from me. Beyond that, I wasn’t the girl that got the guy.

I knew the deal. The guys knew the deal. It was the other girls who didn’t.

I was fine with the deal, not that I partook. That’s just what the guys wanted from me, but it gave me space sometimes with people. But what Miles was bordering on was something that felt like what a friend would do for someone.

I didn’t want those types of friends. Or, to be more accurate, I couldn’t have those types of friends.

“What?”

“You. Me. This.” I gestured to the roommates, and the game. “I’ve got walls. I know this. You know this. They’re there for a reason. You don’t owe me anything. You don’t have to be protective because a guy is looking my way.”

He took a step back, his tone coming out cold. “Fine. I just know we watch out for each other at parties. Didn’t think it was different here, but cool. Good to know. I won’t watch out anymore.”

Crap.

He had me because he was right. We did do that.

“Miles,” I started.

“I’m out of here.” He pushed his hands in his pockets and shouldered through the crowd.

Another roommate came over. Wade Kressup, Miles’ cousin. His gaze slid to where Miles had just disappeared before he bent down to me. I was almost a whole foot below him. “Do I ask?”

The buzzer went off, signaling the end of the game, and I shook my head. “Nope.”

I sighed, needing to refocus my thoughts. I was off today.

I turned my phone back on long enough to send a text to Miles.

Hey. Some stuff happened earlier today, and it was serious. I don’t want to get into it, but it’s no excuse. I’m sorry for being a bitch. Thank you for being you.

Everyone was heading out, but I stayed for a beat. I needed to get grounded. Too many emotions I was trying to ignore and thoughts I was trying not to think were creeping in. Add to all that, I’d been a bitch to a friend and yeah… I wasn’t doing so well on being a decent human being here.

The whole day had gotten away from me.

My chest felt like it was being sucked out of me.

It took me a little bit before I realized Cruz was down on the ice. He was staring up at me and he half raised one of his gloves up. I gave him a small nod right back. Which, okay, I was down for what he was asking to do. Because that whole gesture was an invitation, but also crap, because that meant I’d have to turn my phone on.

“We’re heading out.” Wade was still there. The crowd was starting to disperse. I couldn’t see where the other roommates were.

“I’m going to replace my own way back. Thanks for inviting me out tonight.”

He frowned a little but nodded. “Okay. Well. I’ll catch up with the rest. See you later.”

He headed off, and I went to the bathroom. When I was done, the crowd had lessened significantly. Still. I knew it would be a wait, but I couldn’t bring myself to turn my phone back on. Because of that, I went over to the door that the players used and slid down to the floor.

I got comfortable.

I didn’t have to wait long.

Fifteen minutes later, still sweaty from the game, Cruz Styles found me in the hallway. He’d changed into his Grant West hockey sweats and hoodie. He also had a ball cap pulled low over his forehead, and both his hands were inside his hoodie.

He tapped my foot with one of his and gave me one of those smiles I’d been seeing on the jumbotron all night. “Need a ride?”

“You’re supposed to look intimidating for your team pictures.”

He frowned but held out a hand.

I put mine in it, and he pulled me up. “Huh?”

“For your pictures.” I motioned behind us to where there was a six-foot mural picture of just him. He was in his hockey gear, holding his stick and smiling wide for the camera. “That doesn’t strike fear in anyone. The opposing team comes through here. They look at that and want to be your friend.”

“No, no, no. You got it all wrong.” We turned for the door. “That smile gets under their skin. They’ve already come in hearing about me, and then they see that, and they get confused. Some guys want to wipe that smile off my face and others want to be my friend. Then I leave ’em all in the dust when I make the first goal and by then, wham. They’re all sorts of fucked up.”

I laughed because it wasn’t true at all. Cruz was just being Cruz.

He opened the door and I stepped out, knowing which one was his truck and heading there. “You didn’t shower?”

He went to the driver’s side as I got in the passenger side, and he smirked my way. “What? And forget how hot and bothered I saw you were up in the stands? Figured we could shower together. You game?”

He sent me a smile as he started the engine, and I couldn’t help but smile back because like Miles, Cruz knew the deal. No personal shit.

He knew the rules because he was my not-friend with benefits.

And he was right. Showers with him were the best.