The Faker: A Marriage of Convenience Hockey Romance (Boston Hawks Hockey), Gina Azzi [pocket ebook reader .TXT] 📗

to do was stand in a parking lot and talk to a couple of guys with sick ink while I slaved away up here, doing manual labor.”

I snicker and pick up a box. “Shut it. We’ll load up the car and go eat.”

“The Mexican fusion restaurant I’m obsessed with?” she asks hopefully.

“Whatever you want, Claire,” I agree. “Thanks for today.”

“Duh. As if you’d piss off your new husband with anyone but me.”

We both laugh as we carry my few boxes down to her car. As we pull out of the parking lot, I glance at the building one last time in Easton’s car’s side mirror. Relief rolls through me as it grows smaller. I’m happy to be putting it behind me, just like Merck said.

10

Torsten

My thumb runs along the length of my wedding band.

What the hell was I thinking?

After a flight to sunny Florida, a skate to help clear my head, and some good-natured ribbing by my teammates, I should be over it.

Rielle and I made a deal. We signed a contract.

It shouldn’t bother me that I stroked and coaxed her body into the sweetest submission one night and fucked her hard and dirty the next. I should be happy that our sexual connection, our chemistry, is off the goddamn charts.

Instead, I’m pissed off; that one night she looked at me like a man she trusts, like a man she could give her heart to, and the next, like a stranger who can get her off quickly.

What the hell changed in the time between kissing her rosebud mouth at the altar and being on the receiving end of her glare on our wedding night? Does she regret getting married? Did she finally wake up and realize all that she’s sacrificing by making this commitment? The years in her twenties that she could be out, dating, settling down with a man who truly owns her soul, making babies?

Fuck. I spring from the desk chair in my hotel room, restless energy coursing through my body like electricity. There’s nowhere for it to go so it keeps building, layer upon layer, until I feel ready to combust. My hands clench into fists and I check the time again.

I have another hour to kill before I can head to the arena. I’m desperate to get on the ice and play tonight. The game, the mental focus it requires, the physical release it encourages, I’m ready to lose myself in it completely.

A knock at the door has me striding toward it and pulling it wide open.

I grin when I see it’s James Ryan, the other Hawks defenseman. More than anything, I wish I had confided in him about my sham of a marriage. I know Rielle and I desperately needed to limit the number of people who knew the truth but James would have been a solid guy to reach out to for advice.

“Hey,” I say, holding the door open wider. “What’s going on?”

James squints at me, his expression grave, his eyes searching. “You tell me. You in some type of trouble?”

I chuckle and shake my head. “Why would you think that?”

James gives me a look and pushes past me into my hotel room. “You got married out of the blue to a girl no one knew you were even dating. You’re broody—”

I blanch. I don’t brood. Glower, maybe. But broody?

“You’re quieter than normal too.” James points at me accusingly.

I shrug. “Just got a lot going on right now.”

“Torst, my life is a mess. It’s been one big fucking disaster for the past year. For me to even notice that you’re checked out means you’re more than checked out. So, what’s going on?”

I wince at the bluntness with which he says the words. A little over a year ago, James’s wife passed from cancer, leaving him and their young twins behind. He’s been grappling with her loss ever since, existing on autopilot. He shows up when and where he’s supposed to. He volunteers for field trips and waits in school pickup lines. He signs autographs when someone asks him to. But I haven’t seen him really smile since Layla died. I’m not sure if he knows how to anymore.

“I know you’re hurting, man. And I’m sorry.”

James runs a hand over three-day-old stubble. His gray eyes flash, angry and anguished. “I’m not hurting, Torsten. I’m not anything except numb.”

I don’t believe him for a second but empathy rocks through me at his tortured expression. James and I came up through the ranks together. We’ve been the starting defensive line for years and a cornerstone of the Hawks team. He’s only a few years younger than me and yet, he’s lived what seems like a hundred years more.

“I have no idea what you’re going through, Ryan, but if there’s anything I can do to help…”

He shakes his head. “Appreciate it, man. But I’m not so easily distracted by deflection anymore. Tell me what’s going on with you.”

I grapple with how much truth to share with James. For years, I was the guy with his heart on his sleeve, an open book, a call-it-like-I-see-it kind of man. Now, it’s as if everyone gets varying degrees of the truth, just shades of my honesty. It leaves me feeling rotten, like less of the principled guy I held myself up to be for years. I guess marrying not for love is a gateway for other, less desirable traits. I blow out a breath. “Man, I can’t tell you everything.”

He frowns. “You in trouble?”

I shake my head. “You’re a steel vault, right?” I meet his eye and after a second, he nods. I trust all the guys on my team, some more than others. But James is up there. “My knee never fully recovered from my last surgery. My shoulder is fucked up.”

James frowns at me, sitting down in the desk chair. He leans forward until his elbows rest on his knees. “What are you talking about?”

I grab two bottles of water from the mini-fridge and toss one to