Dirty Score, A Rough Riders Hockey Novel(69)

When he lifted his head, she leaned back and parted her lips in offering. Rafe took them with a moan of relief. He pulled his hand from hers and cupped her face, deepening the kiss with a greedy quality that bordered on desperation. Mia recognized the tactic—drowning himself in distraction.

Mia pulled out of the kiss and reached back to stroke a hand through his hair. “Hey. Talk to me.”

He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers. Sighing, he loosened his hold, allowing her to roll him to his back and turn to face him. She stretched out beside his naked body, resting her head in her hand and let the other one slide over his abdomen. She followed the ridges there with her fingertips while she waited for him to get his thoughts together.

“Weather’s nice here, huh?”

She smiled at his absurdly roundabout way of starting the conversation, but went with it. “Very.”

Silence.

“Your boss and coworkers seem great.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“I was telling Tate at practice that you were solid, you know? That you have everything you need, that you have good people around you. That you’re going to be okay.”

She tipped her head to look at his face in the ambient light. He was wide awake, staring at the ceiling. Her heart pulled, and she lifted a hand to his cheek. “I am going to be okay, Rafe.”

He nodded. “I know. But, Tate, he’s taking it hard.”

“Are you sure it’s Tate who’s taking it hard? I haven’t seen much of him while we’ve been here, and I haven’t been hiding from him.”

Still, Rafe didn’t look away from the ceiling. “I think it has something to do with Lisa.”

A protective instinct surged inside Mia. She lifted her head and sat up straighter. “What about Lisa?”

Rafe shook his head. “I just think you moving away is pulling up some painful stuff for him. I think he’s associating the two and associating your move with some of the junk he’s still carrying around from Lisa leaving him.”

Mia’s gaze blurred over Rafe’s chest. Her teeth clenched. “That bitch.” That got Rafe’s attention, and he finally turned his head toward her. “And Tate’s just as much to blame. He was blind and stupid. I tried to tell him while he was still dating her. Tried to tell him early in their marriage. But he’s so damn loyal. Always believes the best of everyone.”

Rafe heaved a sigh that ended on a groan, and he lifted a hand to rub at his eyes.

A stab of guilt sliced Mia’s heart. “Shit, I’m sorry, Rafe.”

“No.” He laughed, the sound completely humorless. “You’re right.”

Mia squeezed her eyes closed. With her heart already aching, she curled her legs and sat up. “Rafe, maybe it’s time to end this chapter of our story.”

His head jerked toward her, his eyes sharp and surprised. “What?”

“This stress isn’t good for you. It’s affecting your sleep, your concentration, your relationships, your mood, and eventually, it will affect your game. No one can afford that. Not you, not Tate, not any other member of the team. This damn Cup has been a dream of yours and Tate’s since you’ve been kids—”

“No.” Rafe rolled toward her and gripped her thigh with one big hand. “My dream has always been to get paid to play hockey. I was living my dream at nineteen. I’ve never cared how much I got paid to play. And I don’t give a shit about trophies or titles or my name engraved on a piece of silver on a cup.”

Mia frowned, confused. “But Tate always said—”

“Tate is… Tate is…smart and driven and a leader. He’s honest, dependable, and generous to a fault, and he’s the best friend I’ll ever have. But we both know Tate sees things in black or white. Everything is his way or the highway. And he’s so caught up seeing things his way, believes that his way is so two hundred percent right for everyone, he doesn’t even realize there’s another way to see it.”

“Okay, I’ll agree with that. But I still don’t get—”

“Tate wants the Cup. And Tate loves me. So Tate wants the Cup for me too.”

Mia frowned. “Maybe I’m still half asleep, because that’s not computing.”

“Tate wants to share all the good things in his life with the people he loves. He loves you and me. Which is why—”

“We have Joe.”

“And why I got to take lessons with Tate and the private hockey coach Joe paid for. And why I got tutoring with Tate and the math tutor Joe paid for.”

“I get what you’re saying.”

“And I do want the Cup, just as bad as the other guys do. But I want it for Tate. I want it for the guys on the team who need it to fulfill some dream they had skating on a remote pond as kids in Canada or Russia or Sweden. So, yeah, I want that cup, and you can bet I’ll bleed for it, but it’s not my dream.”