Gloves Off: a marriage of convenience hockey romance (Vancouver Storm Book 4)

“Well, now,” I say to Darcy a few days later at the Filthy Flamingo for her engagement party, wrapping her in a tight hug. “Let me see it.”

Earlier today, Hayden gave everyone a heads-up that he would be proposing to the woman who had been his best friend for eight years. The bar is filled with Vancouver Storm players, partners, and team staff.

She obediently holds out her hand, blushing, her lavender hair around her shoulders in soft waves. I inspect her ring, a sparkling cluster of white lab-grown diamonds around a pink diamond, like the cherry tree blossoms that bloom around Vancouver in the spring.noveldrama

So soft and romantic. So Darcy.

“It turned out beautifully. Just beautifully.”

Seeing someone head over heels like Hayden is for Darcy makes my heart ache with sweetness. They’re so meant to be. I can already picture them living out their lives together, hand in hand, teasing each other, smiling at each other, laughing at their private jokes.

The back of my neck prickles, and my eyes cut to Volkov, glaring at me while in conversation with Rory and Hayden. He’s kept to the other side of the bar all night with rigidity, like the distance between us is court mandated.

I picture us in fifty years. I’m at his funeral, watching his casket being lowered into the ground, flipping him double middle fingers.

“Isn’t that his ex-wife?” someone would whisper.

“Great choice on the dress,” I tell Darcy. She’s wearing a floral sixties-style A-line I found on a consignment site the other week and sent the link to her. “I told you you’d have somewhere to wear it.”

When we met last year, Darcy was fresh out of a long-term relationship, stuck in a boring, soul-sucking job, dressing in a way she hated, living a life she hated. It took a bit of peer pressure from me but I’ve converted Darcy to wearing clothes she loves, that make her feel beautiful.

“Wait.” Her gaze snags on my left hand before she grabs it, ogling the plain, thin band. Nothing sparkly like what she has, but on this finger, the meaning is crystal clear. “What’s this?”

“Oh, that?” God, I really didn’t want her to find out now, during her engagement party. The timing is terrible.

“Yes, this.” She wears a funny, curious smile.

I’m surprised she hasn’t seen the photos yet. “I got married.”

“Married?”

She looks like I slapped her. Of course she does. I will never get married, I’ve told her. I’ve told everyone that.

And I still won’t. Not for real.

“To who? When? Why? I didn’t even know you were seeing someone.”

I didn’t realize how hard this part would be—lying to my friend. I like Darcy. I respect Darcy. She’s smart and funny and wonderful.

“Volkov.”

Her sea-green eyes go wide as saucers. “I have a million questions.”

Just like with my parents, I want to tell her the truth, but I don’t want her complicit in anything. “It’s your engagement party. We don’t want to steal your thunder.”

She makes a face, waving me off. “You know I don’t care about that. We should celebrate.”

“No,” I say too quickly, with a desperate edge, and she gives me a strange look. “I mean,” I clear my throat, laughing a little, “I’m still wrapping my head around it.”

Not a lie, technically.

She studies me before she nods, smiling softly. “Okay. I understand.”

The guilt doesn’t go away, though. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

Darcy is the kindest, loveliest person on the planet, and I am a bag of trash for lying to her. I’m worse than fashion designers who destroy unsold items instead of putting them on sale.

“I did always wonder if you guys were going to,” she lowers her voice to a whisper, “hate fuck.”

My face burns hot. “Darcy.”

She starts laughing. “What? You two have all that sexual tension.”

This again? My parents announcing that they “knew it” plays in my head, and my hackles rise.

“I can’t believe you got married,” Darcy says to herself just as Hazel Hartley walks by.

“Wait.” Hazel stops in her tracks and grabs my arm before lifting it to look at my hand. “Married?”

“Married?” Her sister, Pippa, a singer-songwriter, married to Storm goalie Jamie Streicher, pops up out of nowhere.

“Married?” I hear Hayden say on the other side of the bar.

“You got married,” Rory Miller repeats loudly like he can’t believe it, while Volkov stands there, looking irritated.

Even calm and serious Jamie Streicher looks baffled. One by one, the guys look over to me. My stomach dips with nerves. The bar falls silent as the news spreads like wildfire. I can hear my heart pounding in my ears. Everyone is staring between me and Volkov.

I force an embarrassed smile, my face burning hotter than the sun. “Surprise.”

“There she is,” Hayden singsongs as he approaches. “Dr. Georgia Volkov.”

“Nope.” I shake my head. “Still Georgia Greene. Not changing my name.”

Hayden wraps me in a tight hug, squeezing the air out of my lungs. “I knew there was something between you guys. Didn’t I know it?” he asks Darcy. “I said it, right?”

“Mhm.” She smiles. “You said it.”

I make a low noise of frustration that thankfully no one hears over the music and conversation.

“Georgia, congratulations.” Rory wraps me in a hug. “Maybe we can finally get some peace and quiet now that you two have an outlet for all that tension.”

Hayden, Hazel, and Pippa start laughing, Darcy presses her lips into a firm line like she’s trying not to smile, and Jamie just raises his eyebrows, but his eyes are sparkling.

Volkov and I meet gazes, and it’s on the tip of my tongue to say something like in his dreams, but we’re supposed to be happily married and having loads of loud, passionate sex.

I picture Volkov in bed. I’ve seen him without a shirt—he’s ripped, like most hockey players, and the guy is six foot five. I bet that in bed he’d be like he is the rest of the time—pushy, controlling, overbearing. Selfish. High-handed.

Heat twinges between my legs.

“Yep.” I swallow half my drink. “Doing lots of . . . that stuff.”

Volkov gives me a strange look and I busy myself with finishing the rest of my drink.

“So, you liked him all along?” Hayden presses, still wearing that teasing smile.

Volkov arches an eyebrow, knowing and arrogant. My spine stiffens, and it takes every ounce of my control not to set Hayden straight.

“Yes.” It’s like eating dirt. This is so humiliating. “I liked him all along.”

The athlete recovery program, I chant in my head as I catch a glimpse of his cruel smirk.

Rory gives us a go on gesture. “When did it start?”

Behind the bar, I meet eyes with Jordan. You’re on your own, her expression says.

“We hooked up after the double date.”

“Cool.” Hayden grins at Darcy. “So did we.”

She blushes. They’re all probably thinking that once Hayden and Darcy left, the tension between me and Volkov simmered to a boil before I dragged him by the collar into the bathroom and had passionate, furious sex with him.

In reality, we watched Hayden jealously haul Darcy out of the restaurant before Volkov got up without a word, paid the bill, and left without looking back at me. Just another secret we’ll have to keep.

Volkov clears his throat. “We didn’t think it was going anywhere. That’s why we didn’t tell anyone.”

Everyone glances between the two of us, and my blood pressure peaks again. Hazel’s eyes narrow.

They don’t believe us. We can’t just spout off practiced answers. We need to actually look like a couple.

My pulse picks up as I move to Volkov’s side, and with everyone’s eyes on me, I awkwardly rest my hand on his chest.

It’s like touching a brick wall. The guy’s body is made of armor, and he’s giving me nothing. His T-shirt is strangely soft, though, like it’s been washed a hundred times. A hand on the chest, though? That doesn’t exactly scream true love. No, I need more. What would Darcy do with Hayden?

I tilt my head so it rests on his shoulder. This feels so awkward, but a moment later, his hand comes to my waist. Warmth seeps through the fabric of my dress. Except for putting the ring on my finger a few days ago, he’s never touched me. I touched him during our initial meet and greet, when I examined his injuries to see how they’d healed, and he looked like he was about to throw up.

My heart beats out of my chest. My nervous system is warning me of danger. Is his heart beating faster under my hand? It seems like it. Maybe his nervous system is warning him of danger, too.

“Sometimes you fall for the last person you expect.” I give him my prettiest smile, and his nostrils flare. “Right, handsome?” Fucking say something, my expression says.

“The doctor’s right,” he tells everyone. “She’s the last person I’d expect to fall for.”

Incompetent. I hear the word he said two years ago like it was this morning.

He yanks his hand away from my waist, and tucks it in his pocket. Embarrassment twinges behind my ribcage as I lift my head off his shoulder. Of course he doesn’t want to touch me. He hates me.

Good. Him finding me repulsive means nothing will get complicated between us. He’ll never hit on me, and even if he did, I’d laugh in his face.

I wonder what that would be like, Volkov hitting on someone. Probably him clubbing her on the back of the head and dragging her back to his cave. I haven’t heard of him dating anyone. Maybe he’s celibate. Maybe he’s one of those types who thinks sex or even jerking off is bad for his testosterone.

My gaze roams over his broad shoulders, the way his dark hair curls slightly at his nape. The brush of stubble over his sharp jaw. So he’s hot. So what. There are tons of good-looking hockey players here tonight. It doesn’t give him an excuse to act like an asshole and remind me how disgusted he is by me.

Competition fires through me, and I have the urge to get him back.

“You know what I’ve always loved about Volkov?” I ask Darcy. “He’s a beast in bed. The second we step in the door, he’s all over me. We don’t even have time to take my heels off.”

My gaze cuts to him, catching the flex of his jaw. Delight spreads through me. Pissing off Volkov is going to be my lifeline during this year.

He glowers. I smile wider.

“He has a lot more stamina than you’d think,” I continue. “Don’t be fooled by his age. He can go all night.”

I wonder how big his dick is—an unwelcome thought that I swat away fast.

A big, warm hand comes to the back of my neck, gripping firm but not tight, and a rush of heat moves through my body. The biting quip I’m about to say disintegrates. With his hand on my neck like this, I can’t think.

He brings his mouth to my ear. “Behave, Hellfire.”

A shiver runs down my back.

“All I need to do is flash a couple bills from my wallet and the doctor’s all over me,” he tells Darcy, still gripping the back of my neck. “She’s surprisingly good at begging.”

Low in my abdomen, fury clenches. I would never beg, and especially not with him.

I take a deep breath to clear my head, but instead get a deep inhale of his scent, clean and masculine.

“You’re so funny,” I manage, scrambling for control. With a sweet smile, I give his bad shoulder a playful slap, the one with a metal plate and a handful of pins. His jaw flexes again like he’s biting back a groan of pain. “You know what’s also so funny? How much you love being tied up and spanked.” I give Darcy a knowing look. “It’s always the big tough guys who like to be told what to do, if you know what I mean.”

His hand squeezes my neck and I get another rush of warmth low in my abdomen. I always choose guys who are laid back, affable, and easy to push around, especially in the bedroom. The last thing I want is someone telling me what to do with my own body.

Darcy looks concerned. “This is a lot of personal information.”

I get the feeling Volkov isn’t interested in being told what to do during sex, though. I don’t know why I’m thinking about this. It doesn’t matter.

Thankfully, his hand drops, and my brain works again.

“But you know what he’s best at?” I stare Volkov down, my mouth curling into a smug grin, thinking about that stiff, awful kiss at our wedding. “Kissing. He’s an incredible kisser.”

I barely hold back the laugh as his eyes flare with irritation.

“Sorry, Darcy.” He turns to her. “My little gniloy kluben loses her filter when she gets horny.”

My smile hardens. “Your what?”

His cold eyes flicker with challenge, fire, and something I’ve never seen before. “It’s Russian for sweetheart.” The corner of his mouth tightens. “It’s an endearment, saved for the ones you love the most.”

“Aw.” Darcy melts. “Alexei. Who knew you were such a teddy bear?”

“Yes.” My eyes narrow. “Who knew?”

His eyes glint with dark amusement. He’s not smiling, his mouth is still a cruel slash across his face, but he looks pleased with himself.

Too pleased.

I don’t believe him, but I’ve already forgotten the words he used so I can’t look them up later.

Darcy gasps, like she just thought of something. “Hawaii.”

The trip to Hawaii this summer with her, Hayden, Hazel, Rory, Pippa, Jamie, and Volkov. The one Darcy pleaded with me to join.

“Oh yeah.” Hayden gives us a cheeky grin, shaking his head. “You guys were hooking up the whole time?”

More like, Volkov glared at me in my swimsuit while I attempted to read fashion magazines at the pool.

I wait, giving Volkov a look like, your turn. He can take a turn being humiliated.

He stares me down. “Yes. Georgia kept sneaking into my bed at night.”

My face burns hot. He wishes.

Darcy gets pulled into a conversation with Rory and Hayden, leaving me alone with Volkov.

“Nice work,” he mutters. “This is going to be more believable if you don’t ramble incoherently.”

My temper flares, hot and angry. “Shut up, Volkov. At least I’m trying. You’re just standing there and letting me do all the work. It’s probably what you’re like in bed.”

“You sure seem interested in what I do in bed. You keep bringing it up.”

Heat washes through me again, and I take a deep, calming breath so my head doesn’t explode. Why does he get under my skin so easily?

Later, when I can’t stand beside my new silent, brooding husband any longer, I pay my tab with Jordan and pull my jacket on.

“You weren’t going to leave without saying goodbye, were you?” he says at my side, eyes cruel and mocking.

That’s exactly what I was going to do.

“I’ll walk you out.” He grabs his jacket. “I’m leaving, too. Darcy. Owens.” He nods at them. “Congratulations.”

“You too, buddy.” Hayden claps him on the back.

I give them both a hug, whisper my congratulations in Darcy’s ear, before I walk outside, Volkov’s looming presence right behind me.

In the cool autumn air, I can breathe again.

“Hold on,” he says as I start to walk away without a word. He reaches into his pocket and hands me something. “Here.”

It’s a key. Right. We agreed I’d move in on Saturday. I’m already dreading it.

“Did you decide to stow me in the dungeon or the rotting garden shed?” I ask, studying the key.

When my gaze shifts to him, he yanks his gaze up from my mouth. “I could give you the master bedroom and you’d still turn your nose up at it.”

I roll my eyes, tuck the key in my coat pocket, and start to walk away but he catches my sleeve, frowning.

“Where are you going?”

“Home.” I give my sleeve a tug but he doesn’t let go.

His eyes flick down the dark alley. “Take a car.”

Ugh. So controlling. “Jordan and I live three blocks from here.”

He hesitates, something odd in his eyes. Concern, if I didn’t know him better. For a horrifying moment, I think he’s actually going to offer to walk me home.

“Don’t walk through the alleys.” His throat works, eyes moving over my heels. “It’s dark.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, Volkov. Learn that rule and this agreement is going to be a breeze.”

This time, when I pull my sleeve from his grip and walk away, he doesn’t stop me, but I feel his gaze on me until I turn the corner.