exit of the rink, leaning on each other for stability and giggling like kids. “That you come back to my suite tonight.”
“Ooh.” Matt lifts a brow, and a sexy, intrigued smile spreads across his handsome face. “I like where your head is at, Ellie Vice.”
Once we’re off the ice, we change back into our shoes as fast as humanly possible, hail a cab, and kiss and touch and hold each other the entire seemingly endless drive to the hotel.
After the cab driver drops us off, we race through the VIP entrance of the Vice hotel and into an elevator.
Heat and tension and attraction burst between us like fireworks, every touch of his skin on mine lighting me up and igniting a burning flame inside me.
“This has been one hell of a day,” Matt says on a moaning laugh as we kiss the whole way up in the elevator.
“It’s about to get even better.”
I melt into his arms and body, clinging to every inch of the man who’s making me question my entire life and priorities and future and has me loving every single second of it.
Well, shit. I think I might be falling for my accidental baby daddy.
Nineteen
Matt
Any amount of the foggy, buzzy feeling from the high of the weekend in New York was completely and totally eliminated the second I saw the email from my agent saying that one of the Riders executive managers wants to meet with me privately.
Though I didn’t want to ask a million questions and get my agent all suspicious, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say this meeting has most likely been called by the exec who recently found out I knocked up his sister.
Just a guess.
I walk down the long corridor of the stadium that leads to the cluster of offices and conference rooms on the upper level. The part that, when you’re in it, you completely forget you’re in a football stadium and feel like you’ve somehow teleported into a fancy-ass high-rise office building in the middle of a city.
The part of the stadium where, no matter how massive my contract becomes or how many games I win, still makes me feel like the intimidated poor kid from Texas.
My mind races with thoughts of what Noah Vice could possibly say to me regarding the recent atomic bomb of news. Ellie made it seem like he took it pretty well. But this is man-to-man shit now, and I need to be prepared for him to completely rip me a new one.
I straighten my back and square my shoulders as I approach the office and take a deep breath.
I care about Ellie. A lot. Like, a shit-ton. I get that this situation is very not ideal and doesn’t really make me look like the pinnacle of moral standards, but hey, I’m doing the best I can. And that’s all I can possibly try to get across to Noah or anyone else.
I grab the cool metal handle of the office door and squeeze my eyes shut for a second.
Here we go.
“McKenzie.” Noah Vice stands up, offering a friendly hand for a shake and gesturing for me to take a seat across from his desk. His frame is lean, but he’s pretty jacked and about my height. Built like he could be a football player himself. “How you been, man? Still riding the high?”
The high of beating the Jets in the playoffs or banging your sister afterward?
Nerves and adrenaline pump through me, but I push them away and keep my cool as much as possible. “Little bit, I guess.” I brush off my pants and sit down, leaning forward in the chair. “Mostly just amped up for the Super Bowl and laser-focused on that.”
“As we all are.” Noah lifts a shoulder. “No one more than you, though, probably. I can’t imagine that kind of pressure.” He laughs and shakes his head.
I almost don’t know what to say. I assumed he wanted to meet with me because of Ellie and the baby. I mean, the two of them are super close. I would imagine he’s pretty damn protective, and I really expected him to be pissed.
He doesn’t seem pissed at all. He’s shooting the shit with me about the fucking Super Bowl.
I try my best to block out the stampeding herd of elephants in this room and ride the wave of Noah’s chillness.
“High stakes, high pressure.” He pats the desk with his hands and looks at me sternly. “You’re young, McKenzie. You’re fresh. You’ve never