didn’t have time to get involved with anyone. Especially not someone with stormy blue eyes. Who played hockey almost like a guy. And laughed a lot. With a smokin’-hot body.
“Knock it off, Legori,” he muttered before biting into an apple and wondering what the hell he was going to do with the rest of his day, since his plans had been derailed. The team had the day off, so he didn’t have anywhere to be.
He could probably call Logan or one of the other guys to go out tonight, but he wasn’t in the mood for a bar. Too much drinking slowed him down on the ice, and he needed to be at the top of his game, even if he only played once in a while. If he wanted another team to pick him up, to make him a starting goalie, he needed to be epic every time he got on the ice.
Impulsively, he grabbed his phone and texted Miikka.
DONOVAN: How’s Tara?
MIIKKA: Okay. She’s here at our house. We’ll take care of her today.
DONOVAN: Well, tell her I said hi.
MIIKKA: Come for dinner. It’ll be good to have extra company. Charli says six o’clock. Okay?
Donovan hesitated. He liked Miikka and Charli, and hanging out with them was always a good time. With Tara there, it would be a thousand times better. Miikka tended to be funnier than hell, and Tara was as gorgeous as she was sweet. And with Miikka and Tara being from Finland, Miikka’s English was sometimes hilarious. Tara had some kind of degree in English, and she spoke the language almost perfectly, but Miikka had barely spoken at all until he’d met Charli last spring. Now he could communicate well, even if he didn’t always use contractions and sometimes threw in Finnish words that confused everyone. He was a hell of a hockey player, though, and a great teammate, so Donovan hadn’t minded the language barrier.
He hadn’t known what to expect when he’d heard Miikka had a sister, but it hadn’t been the red-haired goddess with the stormy blue eyes. He’d had a crush on her since the first time they’d met, though at the time she’d only been visiting. Now that they knew each other better, he liked her even more. Except he was trying to get traded, so there was no point in starting anything.
Right? Right.
He reminded himself he was probably going to be traded the whole way over to Miikka and Charli’s house that night. You didn’t have a casual hook-up with your teammate’s sister, and you didn’t get serious with a girl five minutes before you got traded who knows where. Too bad his libido was totally ignoring this sage advice.
He’d already been through the basic stages of grief regarding his marriage. He’d mourned for a while, then he’d gotten wild and sowed some oats. Depression set in for a while after that, and he was fully into the acceptance side of the process now. And starting to get lonely. There were women everywhere, but he wasn’t going to make another mistake. He’d known Jane, his ex, didn’t want to be married to a professional athlete, and she’d balked big-time when he’d been traded to the Blizzard. In the end, she’d refused to come with him, and he’d gotten tired of being alone.
Being divorced was no fun at all. Some of the guys he knew around the league used it to their advantage, hooking up with different women in every city they visited. Donovan had done it for a few months, but that wasn’t his scene. He might not be ready to get serious with anyone yet, but it would be nice to have regular sex with someone who wasn’t a stranger and go out on dates here and there. Mostly, he was tired of having nothing to do on his days off.
Hockey took up a lot of time, but not all of it, and most of his buddies were married or engaged now. It felt like the perfect time for a fresh start, but his agent hadn’t had any luck finding him a new team yet. Plus, his contract was for a butt-load of money, and he wasn’t willing to take a pay cut. It would happen, though; it was just a matter of when and where. Hopefully, somewhere farther south, like L.A. or Nashville, where winters were milder.
Despite Miikka telling him not to bring anything, Donovan stopped at a liquor store to buy a bottle of wine. It was the