The bar is dead tonight, which makes my shift all the more painful. Like I need it to drag on more than it already is. Every day for the last six days has been painful and slow. I can’t believe how much I miss Luc. What really keeps me up at night—even more than the fact that his big, warm body isn’t naked beside me like it has been every night since we worked things out—is that in two more weeks a Luc-free existence may be a long-term reality.
My trip to Europe is looming and when I get back to Silver Bay, he won’t be here. We don’t know where he will be—he was working that out now—but it won’t be Silver Bay. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t know what team he’ll be playing on, but he hasn’t yet asked me to join him anywhere. Or maybe he isn’t ready for that just yet.
I zombie-walk through my shift. Cole knows something’s up because I’ve been like this since Luc left for Vegas, where he is meeting with the Vipers management.
“What’s with the sad face? Do you get more tips if you look depressed or something?” he asks with a wink.
“I just… I miss him,” I confess and it makes me feel weak just saying it aloud. “And I don’t want to be away from him like this next year.”
“You guys will work it out,” Cole assures me, his hazel eyes twinkling. “You didn’t go through all that drama for nothing, I’m sure.”
I nod. Oh, how I want him to be right.
A couple hours later, after we’ve ushered out the last customer and I’ve cashed out, I say good night to Cole and head into the warm night air. I turn the corner into the parking lot and there he is—sitting on Claudette’s hood staring at me with a small smile.
I squeal and run to him. He jumps off the truck and catches me as I hurl myself into his arms. He swings me around, laughing at my overreaction. When he pulls back and sees I’m crying, his smile disappears and he cups my face in his hands.
“What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“Yes. I just… Sorry.” I feel embarrassed as I sniff and try to get a grip. “I just missed you so much and you aren’t supposed to be back until tomorrow night!”
He smiles. “I’ve missed you, too. Things wrapped up sooner than expected so I checked flights and was able to get out on a late one tonight instead of waiting until tomorrow.”
He bends his body over me and kisses me softly, his big hands still gently holding my face. The kiss goes on forever—slow and needy—as we revel in the luxury of being able to enjoy the taste and feel of each other again. When we pull apart, my lips are swollen and my heart is pounding. I look at him—really look at him—and realize he looks beautiful but tired. Exhausted, actually.
“Keys, please, Fleur.” He holds up his hand and I drop the keys to Claudette into his big, open palm. I’ve been driving her to work, at his request, while he was away. Esmeralda is officially retired.
On the ride to his house he talks about his meetings. The owner of the team, the coach and the general manager were all there. I guess there’s a lot of smoothing over that needs to be done when they publicly shop one of their top players but don’t end up trading him. The management expressed their concern over his performance, over the team’s general subpar attitude, and Luc explained what he could do to turn things around. When not dealing with the management, he was dealing with the media, who were all over him hoping for some dramatic scene. I’d been glued to TMZ Sports. The most they got the whole time he was in Vegas was video footage catching him leaving the gym one day. They’d asked him, “Luc! Do you have anything to say about your girlfriend partying without you in L.A. all summer?”
Without breaking his brisk pace across the parking lot, he said, “My girlfriend has been in my hometown, with me, all summer. I have no comment on my ex-girlfriend’s social life.”
That little clip just went up this morning. I had decided not to ask him about it over the phone. But now that he’s in front of me, I can’t stop myself.
“Did the TMZ Sports thing at the gym piss them off?” I ask quietly.
“No. I’d already told them about you,” he explains and gives me a wink. “Turns out Maurice remembered you from the charity event and thought you were a very sweet girl. He didn’t look pissed. He actually looked impressed.”
I feel a flood of relief at that. “So you’re staying in Vegas?”
“For now,” Luc explains and I can tell by the serene look on his handsome features that he’s okay with that. “They still think I have a lot to prove, on the ice. But I’m confident this season will be a good one for me. And that’s all I can do. Be great and win back their confidence in me.”
He rolls into his driveway and we get out of the truck. After he grabs his bag out of the truck bed, I lead him up the front porch and use my key to open the door. I’m unofficially living here now.
He drops his bag on the floor and I tug on his hand, pulling him up the stairs to the master bedroom. He steps inside our room and I watch him carefully. While he was gone I just added some photos in dark wood frames to the wall near the bathroom. He sees them right away and walks over to them. He smiles at the one of him and Jordan in their Silver Bay Bucks uniforms when they were seventeen. The smile widens at the shot of him at fourteen fishing at the lake with a sixteen-year-old Devin. When he sees the photo of him and me from Cole and Leah’s wedding, he reaches out and runs his fingers over the frame. “This is the second best addition to the entire house, ma Fleur.”
“What’s the best?”
“You.” He grabs me by the waist and throws me down on the bed, then lands as gently as possible on top of me. He still almost knocks the wind out of me. His beautiful, rugged face is suddenly sad as he brushes my hair off my face.
“I missed you so much it was ridiculous,” he tells me honestly. “You’ve made me into a total wimp, Rosie. It’s embarrassing.”
“It’s awesome,” I counter with a proud smile.
He buries his face in the pillow beside me as he yawns. I laugh. “Let’s get some rest, okay, sleepyhead?”
He nods and rolls off me. I get up and head to the bathroom. I strip out of my clothes in there, leaving on only my bra and panties, and brush my teeth. When I walk back into the bedroom, he’s lying on top of the duvet in nothing but his boxer briefs. He looks like heaven, so chiseled and with the perfect sun-kissed tint to his skin… and a bandage on his side.
“What happened?” I ask in a panicked voice as I crawl up the bed to take a closer look. I reach out to touch it but he takes my hand in his and guides it away.
“Got some work done on the tattoo while I was there,” he whispers groggily. “I have to keep it covered for another few hours.”
“What did you add?” I ask curiously but he just smiles lazily. He’s going to make me wait to find out. I stand up again, unhook my bra and reach for a tank top, my usual sleepwear.
“No clothes, Rosie,” he begs in a murmur. “I want to feel you.”
I leave the tank on the chair and walk to the bed and slip out of my underwear as he holds the covers up and I ease under them. I roll to face him and watch him pull off his boxer briefs and then slip under the covers and cuddle in next to me. The heat of his bare skin against me—all of me—is like an instant stress reliever. My whole body relaxes.
I roll onto my side and he spoons me, kissing the back of my neck. “Sweet dreams, ma Fleur.”
I fight the urge to cry again. “You too, Luc.”
How am I going to live without this? I’m going to flat-out die of loneliness.