His fingers scratched his beard, somehow appearing casual, like he’d forgotten to shave for a few days and not as if he meticulously crafted it for twenty minutes every morning—mustache wax included.
The man was handsome enough to charm more than the scarf off Gladys. She pulled the clip from her hair and shook out her platinum dyed waves, doing her best to hide the streaks of grey peeking between the strands.
“Normally passengers aren’t allowed back here…” Gladys said. “But…if there’s anything I can help you with…”
I shooed her away with an impatient hand. “He’s with me. Just needs more pretzels.”
I shoved another bag into his mammoth hand.
His fist curled, pulverizing the snack into dust.
Uh-oh.
“You wouldn’t happen to be an athlete, would you?” Gladys reached for the coffee pot if only to brush against his thick arms. “You look the type.”
Adrian stared at me, as if I’d crack open the hatch and make a break for it over the Rockies. Knew me too well. I was considering the aerodynamic possibilities of the escape slide.
“I am,” he said.
Gladys clapped. “I knew it! You must an Ironfield Rivet!”
He flinched. I hissed between my teeth.
“Uh, no,” I said. “Wrong sport. The Rivets play football. He’s the new captain of the Ironfield Forge.”
She frowned. “What’s that?”
“The hockey team.”
“Ironfield has a hockey team?”
Adrian rubbed his face. I’d run out of fingers and toes to count the number of people from Ironfield who had missed the Forge’s announcement, media blitz, draft, and rampant television and radio promotions for tickets and events.
“Is that why they built that monstrosity in the middle of the city?” Gladys asked.
“The Maxwell Intimates Hockey Arena,” I said.
“Huh. I thought that was for concerts. Got Trace Adkins tickets for this summer.”
Sensing an opportunity to make an impression—not a good impression, but an impression, nevertheless—Gladys gave her badonkadonk a wiggle and tugged on Adrian’s clothes.
“You know the song—no shirt…” She fiddled with his hem. “No pants…” She reached for his buckle. “No problems…”
“It’s shoes.” I banished her wandering fingers with a quick smack. “Pretty sure they don’t strip tease with country music.”
Adrian had tensed. Not that I could blame him. He’d confessed that after his surgery, his nurses had left the radio in his room tuned to a country station. Now, the sultry twang of a guitar instantly ached his Stetson and boots.
Poor guy.
“I can handle the galley from here.” I edged Gladys away from the man before she tried to save a horse by riding a hockey player. “Why don’t you go take a break?”
“You just ring that call button if you need me.” Gladys tugged on her summer-time-barbeque-little-too-snug blazer and gave him a wink. “I’ll come running to give you an encore.”
Adrian groaned as she sashayed away. I lowered the jump-seat for him before he crashed to the floor of the plane. Not that the seat did anything. His bulk just didn’t fit anywhere but on the ice. He one-cheeked it as best as he could and stared at me.
“How many members of the flight crew now expect me to knock them up?” he asked.
“Only me…but I haven’t talked to the pilots since dinner service.”
“Christ.” He held his head in his hands. “You wanna remind me where the emergency exits are again? I gotta get off this plane.”
I threatened to bind him to the chair with a seat belt extender. “I just want you to consider this proposal.”
“You want a baby. You’re insane.”
It was just my luck that he’d regain his faculties in record time. Here I’d hoped that I’d have all of Texas to figure out my next move.
“It’s what I want to do with my life,” I said. “I would like to have a baby. With you, preferably.”
The prospect nearly bowled him over again. Hell, it confused me, and it was my proposition. Babies were one thing, but sex was completely new and uncharted territory for us. I wasn’t a stranger to a naughty fantasy or two…but allowing visions of Adrian to prowl around those midnight thoughts? His athletic, beastly muscles, and his dark, I-know-where-you’re-touching-under-those-blankets eyes?
What girl wouldn’t get a little flutter deep inside when imagining a night swept in Adrian’s possessive embrace?
He ran his fingers in his hair, but I didn’t trust the creeping hesitation clouding his features.
I rummaged through the alcohol cart, grabbing a tiny bottle of whiskey. Normally, he’d never drink anything but water and sugar-free Gatorade this close to the season, but we both needed it.
Adrian downed the contents of the bottle with a single swallow and grimaced. “Do you even know where babies come from?”
I pointed between his legs.
The man shifted, and his frown would’ve instantly ended the conversation if it hadn’t been this important.
“I get that you’re worried about your injury,” I said. “It’s gotta be scary for any man to take a slap shot to the…Zambonis.”
Adrian swore. “I said I was fine. I’m recovered. It’s good. We never have to talk about it again. Ever. Get me?”
Damn superstitious hockey players. They never wanted to talk about their issues in case it spawned more bad luck.
But the accident was all I’d thought about since the night it happened, nearly a year ago. I hated that I hadn’t been at the arena, though I’d managed to swap shifts with a flight attendant on standby so I could race to the hospital.
When I arrived, Adrian had been delirious with pain and begging for either painkillers or a gun to finish the job.
Then came the surgery.
I didn’t even know testicles could rupture, but Adrian had learned the hard way. And so did men across the country who happened to watch any show on Sports Nation for the next two weeks. The anchors had replayed the clip again and again and again, simultaneously wincing when they whispered the word rupture and praising Adrian’s selfless actions and quick thinking which had blocked a would-be game winning shot to secure the Marauders a playoff berth.
He’d been a hero.
A very sore, very embarrassed hero.
And I was one terrified best friend. Especially once he’d started talking after surgery, groggy from the anesthesia and brutally honest with me.
He didn’t remember what he’d said.
But I couldn’t forget it.
I’d never forget it.
“I’m sure everything is in…working order,” I said. “The doctors insisted you made a perfect recovery.”
“I’m not worried about the…” He glanced down. “Players on the bench. I’m worried about you.”
“Me?”
“Look at me.” Adrian waved a hand over his bulky, mouth-wateringly large frame. “Now look at you.”
My tippy-toes did their best, but I remained woefully petite and comically undersized next to Adrian.
“I’d break you in half, little girl.” Adrian laughed. “It’ll never work. We won’t fit.”