Hard Checked (Ice Kings #4) - Stacey Lynn Page 0,10

is already sitting, digging into her food, acting way too interested in her toast on her plate which makes something perk up inside of me.

Was she checking me out?

It doesn’t matter.

I wobble the chair across from her, testing the weight of it which makes her giggle.

“It won’t break. Dad comes over and eats here all the time. They look more breakable than they are.”

“Sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“All right.” I take a seat, not surprised at all when it creaks beneath me. “If I fall flat on my ass and bust something though, I’m telling the team trainers it’s all your fault.”

She shoves a bite of toast into her mouth and chews. “I’ll accept that. You feeling okay?”

“Like I got ran over by a truck.”

“I don’t mean to pry and you can tell me to mind my own business, but last night really didn’t seem like you. You sure you’re okay?”

“Madison left me.” It’s out before I can suck it back in and it takes me a minute to realize what I’ve said, and to register the look of surprise on Gigi’s face. “So no. I’m not really okay. And yeah, last night wasn’t me. Any of it.”

I’m pretty low-key. Mads and I grew up in a relatively small town in Minnesota where we went to high school together. Our families went to, and still attend, the same large Lutheran Church. I’ve known her since we went to Sunday school together. The first fight I ever got in was because I beat up a kid in middle school for yanking on her bra strap. One of my oldest sisters was best friends with one of her older sisters all through high school and even roomed together their freshman year at the University of Minnesota shortly after Madison and I started dating.

We spent our weekends fishing and swimming at our families’ lake houses, because that’s what you do in Minnesota in the summer. We spent our winters skating on the ice rink my parents built for me in the back yard every year.

We drank some, tried pot, but mostly, ever since I was fifteen, I was focused on three things: school, hockey, and Madison. And definitely not in that order.

“I’m sorry, Sebastian. Is it…”

Over? She doesn’t ask. I shrug and swallow a large bite of eggs. “We’ve had problems for a while and the divorce papers made it seem pretty final.”

Admitting it to someone else makes me feel worse and I focus on my eggs, which are really damn good, so I don’t have to see her expression. Why I’m confessing this to Gigi and not one of my friends is befuddling. What’d she say last night? A bartender is like a therapist? Maybe there’s truth in that.

“Again, I’m—”

“Sorry. I get it.” I really don’t want to hear apologies for things that aren’t anyone else’s fault. Or see pity in their eyes.

“Sebastian.”

I act like I don’t hear her and when she says nothing else, silence descends. It’s thick and it’s heavy and I have to change this subject. I gesture to the wall where she has one huge area covered with neatly arranged canvas photos. It’s vastly different from the chaos with the rest of her apartment. I can’t help but notice how precisely arranged they all are. And how vastly different all the photos are.

“What are those from?”

“Oh.” She smiles softly, and even her blue eyes seem to sparkle. “Dad gave those to me as a gift when I returned. They’re pictures I texted and emailed him when I was gone.”

I stare at her for a moment. Then two. Then I realize I’m still fucking staring at her mouth and God damn it.

I focus on my sausage and my breakfast while she babbles on about Turkey and Hungary, pointing out where some of the photos were taken and I’m glad she gives me that play, knowing I was getting the attention off myself. But truthfully, Gigi is easy to listen to. That husky voice of hers is calming, melodic with softness and it’s all things I should definitely not be noticing about the bartender who helped me to her apartment and let me sleep in her bed but it can’t be helped.

Gigi might be the most interesting woman I’ve ever met in my life. That she’s beautiful and I’m noticing shouldn’t make me feel like such an asshole, and yet I can’t stop it.

I finish my meal with gusto, shoving down how it threatens to revolt in my stomach and when I’m done,