Sugar and Ice #4
Summary:When love is on the line, the worst decisions can end up having the best endings.
Tate Collins, an all-American hockey phenomenon, was the highly marketable face of Dallas hockey. Loaded down with endorsements and playing his best game, he was a superstar and a household name. No one ever expected him to fail, but overnight, after the worst decision of his life, everything spirals out of his control. Abruptly, his reputation is in tatters, and he’s traded to the Arizona Raptors in a shocking move. Brushing off the wild and unfounded accusations that he faces on social media, and stuck on the second line, he keeps his head down and works hard to earn his spot. Tate knows he can make a difference if only his teammates would let him. Something has to change for him to earn their respect, but falling for the captain might not be his best move.
Vladislav Novikov has been called many things over his long and illustrious career, but the new nickname of Iceberg seems to fit best. Perhaps it’s due to his icy blue eyes, or the way he rams into opposing players as he defends his goalie. Or maybe it’s because of his cool demeanor when not playing the game he loves. Whatever the reason, it’s why he’s the perfect team captain for this wild bunch of puck-pushers. His perfectly controlled life is smooth as ice until Tate Collins rides into Tucson with his apple pie ways and those damn dimples. The young superstar immediately catches his eye. Despite knowing better than to start something with a teammate, the big, bad Iceberg is about to have that chilly veneer around his heart melted away by Tate one sweet kiss at a time.
School and Rock #5
Summary:When Colorado Penn finds an unexpected package on his front step, his life will be changed forever.
Colorado Penn is living the dream. Starting goalie for the Arizona Raptors when in season, lead singer for a hard rock band when summer rolls around. He’s the quintessential free spirit who’s making sure he enjoys all the carnal blessings of his athleticism, and gritty singing voice. Now the Raptors are moving into their first playoff appearance in years, but the arrival of an unexpected package means that hockey may have to take a backseat to something way more important. Instead of the usual undergarments from adoring fans, he finds a newborn baby with a small note tucked under her carrier, naming him as the father. He refuses to give up his daughter and is determined to be the kind of father he’d dreamed of having. But to keep Madeline, he’ll need help, and he’ll need it fast. Enter handsome emergency manny, Joseph. They may be opposites, but Colorado starts to see that Joseph’s stable, calm influence makes his chaotic lifestyle choices seem less appealing. There’s something about the man that soothes not only his infant daughter but also the wild child inside Colorado.
Joseph is one year away from getting his degree in planetary science, working cover shifts at the planetarium, and pulling in income with short term manny gigs. Stars collide as he provides emergency childcare for the wild man of hockey, a man who moves so fast through life that he doesn’t know how to stop. Homeless, and caring for his niece, Emma, fate brings Joseph into Colorado and baby Madeline’s life. Madeline is a sweetheart, and Colorado is trying his hardest to make the best decision for his baby girl. He offers his home and an indecent salary, to keep Joseph in his life until summer’s end. Colorado brings mysticism and metal to Joseph’s sanctuary of science, but somehow Joseph needs to tame this shooting star and create a family. Nothing in the contract said Joseph had to fall in love to make that happen, but when it’s time for him to leave, will the void in his heart ever heal, or will it remain as cold as space itself?
Sugar and Ice #4
Original Review July 2020:HOLY HANNAH BATMAN! and THE FROCE IS STRONG WITH MASTERS SCOTT & LOCEY!(Even more so in Sugar and Ice as one of the MCs is an adorable Star Wars collecting geek like myself - a definite plus in my book when it comes to character quirks).
I've said it before and I'll say it again, when reading a multi-couple series I always(98%) fall head over heels for the original pairing that no matter how much I enjoy those to follow, they never quite top the first. Well Arizona Raptors is no different but each entry's couple definitely gives Mark and Rowen(Coast to Coast) a run for their money and Tate and Vlad are right up there running neck and neck. Before anyone who has read the authors' Railers series finds themselves comparing Tate and Vlad to Erik and Stan, don't. Sure they both play hockey, they both play for the same team, one is Russian one is not but despite some of these similar elements, Tate and Vlad are very much their own people, their own couple, and S&I is their own journey.
There were times where I wanted to smother both men in Mama Bear Hugs and there were quite possibly just as many times I simply wanted to smother them. Now this is a point I mention often, that isn't because I've run out of things to say but because it's become almost a measuring stick for me to how suited the characters are for each other. If they can both raise those contradictory emotions within me than there is hope for them, their journey, and the storytelling.
As to Tate and Vlad, there is just so much I could say but won't😉. Tate being a Star Wars geek like myself was a plus, I mean a cat named Obi, how delicious is that? I wanted him to get his HEA from page one. Vlad? Well he took a few chapters to grow on me but once he did I knew I wanted to see him nothing but happy. I'll admit, I'm not sure why, it took about 2/3 of the book before I started reading Vlad's dialogue in a Russian accent in my head. It didn't even dawn on me that I wasn't "hearing" him in Russian until all of a sudden I did, I tried asking myself "why?" but couldn't come up with anything specific, it just was. However you hear his voice, the character is fun and together they have the makings of a lasting love.
Sugar and Ice is a brilliant blend of hockey, romance, friendship, heat, humor, passion, with just the right mix of drama to create a great read that doesn't disappoint from beginning to end. Certainly worthy of the Arizona Raptors moniker and the whole hockey universe Scott & Locey started way back in Changing Lines, Harrisburg Railers #1.
School and Rock #5
Original Review November 2020:
WOW!
Who knew you could still create amazing couples after so many books in this hockey universe the authors created? Okay, any fan of RJ Scott & VL Locey knew they could do it but to actually read the latest one and watch it unfold is, well, it's something special.
School and Rock is amazing, no simpler basic term that says it all than "amazing". I knew Colorado's story would be fun, he just has that way about him that makes you think he looks at life as one big smorgasbord where everything is up for whatever he desires. Let's be honest, it probably was and then one day a package arrives at his door. Little Madeline Celeste, or Maddie Boo as the big carefree goalie calls her. I think the minute he picks her up he knows his whole world has just slipped it's axis and is headed on a completely different course, he just doesn't know what that course will look like but he knows it's different than before he opened that door.
I'm going to take a minute to talk about Joseph. I'm not a sciencey kind of gal, if there was one subject in school I had to put in the hate column it would have been science, I trust it but I don't need to know the why or how. HOWEVER, though the subject matter would have been different I can certainly understand the predicament he finds himself in when we are introduced to the character. A subject you've spent your life loving and learning about and someone who should know it too gets something wrong and refuses to accept being corrected? Yeah, I would not only call them on it but I probably would have been even less tactful than Joseph was. Unfortunately, his boss sides with the other guy. That's okay because it puts him in an opportunity to meet Colorado.
I'm not going to go into much more than that, I don't want to spoil the pairs' journey that gets them from chaos to HEA. If you've been reading Scott & Locey's hockey universe(not sure what the universe name would be, perhaps Harris-tonna-ptors😉😉) you are well aware that a HEA is in the cards but the path that gets Colorado & Joseph there is where all the fun, all the meat and potatoes happens. Now if you are new to this world, I highly recommend going back and starting from the beginning with Changing Lines(Harrisburg Railers #1) if only for supporting/cameo character continuity, you won't be lost if you don't I just think you will have a helluva lot more fun experiencing it all.
One last note, I want to mention the supporting cast, the new members to this eclectic world: Simon, Colorado's bodyguard/problem-solver/keeping-things-in-line-minder and Natalie and Emma, Joseph's sister and niece. They each not only bring a bit of themselves to the story but they help to tell the boys' tale as well. Through them and their interactions with Colorado and Joseph we see sides of the men they maybe wouldn't let otherwise shine.
I guess what I'm saying is Scott and Locey have made everyone and everything play a part in School and Rock, none of it is page filler and that is what makes this story, this hockey universe so fun and delightful reading.
RATING:
Sugar and Ice #4
Chapter One
Tate
My cancelled wedding day passed in a blur. I was drunk, obliterated, because I’d woken up this morning and decided it was the only way I could deal with the shit storm that was my life.
I knew I was at home, that was where the drinking had started, and I knew for sure both my brother and sister were there, but the rest was a haze of not caring what the hell I was doing, and reveling in breaking all the goddamn rules that guided my life.
Be nice to people. Always be nice. Don’t be a dick. Don’t let the money go to your head. Play the best hockey you can. Don’t fuck up. And mostly don’t fuck guys.
No one had told me the one about not hooking up with Lacey, my psychotic, murderous, cat-stealing, ex-fiancée.
Where was that in the how-to-be-a-perfect-hockey-professional rule book?
“IblimissaObi,” I slurred, and felt my sister’s arm on my shoulder. I did miss my cat, Obi, he was a good cat, a Maine Coon who was all fur and big woobly eyes, and he loved me.
Lacey wouldn’t let me take him when I left.
I could’ve bought a million cats if I’d wanted, maybe two, but it was Obi I wanted right now, all curled up in my lap, or riding around on my shoulder. Obi was my friend.
My best friend.
My only friend.
“LeeblissaObi,” I repeated some jumbled up mess of words.
“We know you do, little brother,” Josie murmured.
I tumbled sideways into her, but I must have misjudged because I sprawled onto my huge-ass sectional in my huge-ass front room, in my freaking empty-as-fuck mansion. I lived close to a singer whose name I’d forgotten but who’d won some show and did Insta shit, and opposite a championship boxer who was all bling and very little conversation, other than muted grunts. Millionaires’ row, exactly where I belonged with my twenty-million something sign-up to the Arizona something or other. I belonged here. Obi my beautiful Maine Coon belonged here with me, not down in Dallas with Lacey and her acid tongue, and her interviews, and her big eyes dripping tears on daytime talk shows.
Did he ever hurt you? they asked her, and fuck me if she just shook her head a little whilst dramatically looking down and left. People drew their own conclusions, Tate Collins, the Captain America of Hockey had hurt this cute, sweet young woman who loved cats.
My cat!
And then Dallas had told me to get the fuck out, they’d expected more of me, they’d told me things, vital things, and I’d told Lacey and now things were out there for everyone to know. Lies. It was all lies, but no one believed me. Not even the freaking Raptors with their rainbow shit, and their crappy games, and the fact that no one on the team liked me.
“FuckemRaptors,” I slurred, and snapped my fingers, sliding off the sofa and onto the thick white carpet, leaning to one side and then flailing as I ended up lying flat on my back.
“Jesus!” The voice was far away. Far far away, like a million billion miles from me. “What the fuck, Tot?”
“G’way!”
“Have you got him? Get his other arm… 911?”
911? Wasn’t that a television show? With like all these heroes doing hero shit and rescuing people? Important dudes who deserved to be called heroes. Not messed-up idiot hockey players who just play a game.
“He’ll kill us if we call—”
“Phnargle shump,” I blurted, which totally made sense in my head, telling whoever was here that I didn’t need the paramedics, because that would shatter any illusions left about the perfect guy everyone bought into.
“What did he say?”
“Hell if I know.”
I twisted to stand and smacked my head on something hard, and I opened one eye. Why was there a toilet in my front room?
Wait? The floor is hard. Where was the carpet? I wanted my carpet back. I gripped the porcelain, felt sick, lost whatever was in my stomach, which was basically any alcohol I had in the house, from vodka to alcopops, plus as many packets of the shittiest snacks that Josie had left on her last visit.
“Ja-hossseeeeeee,” I managed.
“S’okay, Tot, we got you,” Josie reassured.
“We have?” The second voice, decidedly male, belonged to my big brother Logan, who levered me to stand, and then I was wet. It was raining in my bathroom, tropically raining in a rainy kind of way, with pulses as if the clouds were squeezing themselves. I was so wet that I wish I wasn’t in my clothes, only… I was naked, no clothes, nothing, and was Josie in the room?
“Jo’eee cock.” I scrambled to cover myself but whoever was holding me up sniggered, and then slathered something that smelled of oranges all over me. I hoped to hell it was Logan; it sure sounded like Logan.
“She’s gone,” Logan reassured me. “It’s just you and me, Tot, and you stink.”
I opened the other eye, which wasn’t working, then realized I’d actually shut the first one, and I tried my hardest to open both, wanting to cry because this was my wedding day and I was in the shower with my brother who was supposed to be my best man, Logan. He was wiping sick and shit and holding me up, and Josie was out there probably crying or something that would break my heart, because she was my sister and she was everything to me.
“Love you,” I put all my attention into forming the words clearly, and they didn’t sound bad, echoing, and a little loud, but they made sense.
“Love you too, Tot, now wash your ass.”
I tried, I really did, but he had to hold me up, and I felt as legless as a newborn kitten. No, not legless, kittens had legs. Some didn’t, though. I felt tears push up past the bile thinking about all the lost and lonely kittens who didn’t have legs.
“Imma gonna ‘dopt legless kittens,” I managed.
“Okay, okay, come on, let’s get this soap off.”
“Gonna call Bob, he’ll get me legless kittens in a bucket…” That didn’t sound right. “No, bucket load.”
“Your agent is the best person to get you kittens,” Logan lied. I knew he was lying. He hated Bob. Said that Bob only stayed after the shit hit the fan in Dallas because of my money. Of course he did.
All people wanted from me was money.
Logan rinsed me off, and some of the water went into my mouth, and I needed that, warm water that quenched my thirst.
“Nomorebeer,” I managed.
“We got this.”
“Kittens though.”
“All the kittens, Tot, all of them.”
I wished my big brother wouldn’t call me Tot now that I was super-old, but then I wished he wasn’t holding me up in a shower, and I was glad of both at the same time. Somehow he got me out of the shower, and then wrapped me in fluffy, soft towels, and the caring and gentle words he used cut through my drinking pity party for one. I gripped his shirt, finally opening both eyes, nausea dragging at every cell of me, and looked at Logan. Emotion welled, maybe it was the kittens, or the love he showed me, or the way he called me Tot. Maybe it was because today was supposed to be the day I married Lacey, and I’d never loved her, and this was all my fault.
Whatever it was, my emotions began spilling in tears and curses and being sick again, only this time Josie stroked my head, Logan held me, and neither of them moved away. We ended up on the sofa, Logan forcing me to drink blue water with electrolytes, my favorite, and Josie stroking my head and telling me I’d be okay. Slowly, the stupid, self-pitying, emotional, life-ending tears subsided, and the cursing stopped, and the intense reaction to today’s date subsided one teeny tiny legless kitten at a time.
“I don’t understand what happened,” I said.
Logan sighed. “You see, Tot, the way this works is that you drink the alcohol, and your body—”
“I meant with Lacey. I know she’s had issues with her mental health, but I thought… I really thought that she loved me.”
“I know, Tot.”
“And I thought that I loved her.”
“Let’s get you to bed,” Logan murmured, and helped me stand.
Somehow he and Josie managed to get me to my room, which was bigger than our entire house had been when we were kids, and they helped me into my bed, with its billion thread count whatever, and the pillows that were as gentle and soft as clouds. The room was spinning, but I closed my eyes.
“There’s water here, Advil, and a bucket, and we’ll be outside.”
And I think I must have slept, and I only recall being sick once more.
When I cracked open an eye I reached blindly for the bottle of water and Advil that Logan had left me and swallowed enough that I hoped this headache would leave me the hell alone.
What had I done?
I’d woken to a hundred regrets, and none of them made any sense this morning. I managed to get up and out of bed, the cool air of the room hitting my naked everything.
Shit. Had Josie seen all this? What must she have thought? But more importantly had she got an eyeful of my…
I couldn’t even go there.
I moved so slowly that a snail would’ve overtaken me on the outside, but I swear the carpet was making a loud noise, or the wall, or maybe it was the vibrations in the air, because my head hurt with the hell of it.
I headed for my kitchen which was left from there. I think I’m going left; the wall is really fucking loud right now, as I trailed my fingers along it. Then there were the voices. Not ghostly voices in my head. This was my baseball pro brother arguing with my actress sister.
“— Yeah right,” Logan said, and he sounded exhausted.
“You want me to delete the entire freaking Internet?”
“Whatever, JoJo, just don’t let him see it.”
“It’s on TMZ, she’s plastered it all over her Instagram, and she tweeted it and the tweet is freaking trending, Lo, there is no way he’s not going to see this.”
I heard a scuffle. “Give it to me, I’m gonna break the Internet,” Logan snapped.
More scuffling, and when I stepped into the kitchen I saw a typical Collins standoff. Logan holding something up high and Josie trying to reach whatever it was, which was my brand new iPad.
“Hey,” I croaked, and both of them whirled to face me so fast that Logan threw my iPad, which hit the wall on the other side of the room and smashed in slow motion to the floor. Damn Logan and his freaky throwing arm. I couldn’t even be bothered to care; they were there for me, and I was so grateful.
Josie reached me first, guiding me to the kitchen table, a seats-twelve affair made of glass, with chrome legs. It was shit to keep clean, so I never used it. What was the point; it wasn’t as if the team was over here having pizza and beers.
I can’t even think about beer.
Silently she placed water in my reach, and then a magic plate of pancakes with maple syrup and bananas appeared in front of me. My favorite, and she knew it, although she couldn’t cook if it was a matter of life or death, so I knew Logan had made them. I forked up a mouthful, swiping the pancake in the syrup and stabbing at a banana, then chewed and swallowed. I wasn’t sure that my taste buds would have survived last night, but after a few bites the banana-pancake-syrup goodness hit me right where I needed it to.
“What did she say?” I asked after I’d finished my first entire pancake. If I knew Logan there would be a whole pile of them somewhere; he stress-cooked, and this right there, his little brother trying to drown his sorrows on the worst day of his life, was definitely going to stress him. Logan didn’t understand half the things that had gone wrong for me, and told me so, often, but he had my back the entire way.
“You don’t want to know,” he said.
I looked up at a face so similar to mine, his eyes narrowed, and temper creating twin flags of scarlet on his cheeks.
Josie started, “I’m sorry Tate, but she shared a photo with bed hair in her jammies, pouting—”
Logan cursed, “With a face full of makeup—” “Logan, shut up. The caption was that she wanted privacy on this terrible day, but that she had someone who was helping her find her inner light, or some shit.” She air-quoted the last part.
“The usual places picked it up, TMZ ran an article on what happened, blah blah, the ongoing new start.”
“What a bitch,” Logan snapped, but I placed a hand on his arm.
“No. She’s not, Lo. There’s something wrong with her, she’s so unhappy, and I should never have asked her to marry me. But now, I don’t let what she says hurt me.”
“She is hurting you, little brother,” Josie murmured and patted my cheek.
“I can’t think about that, I just want to play hockey.”
Logan smacked the counter, making me jump. “I don’t get this, Tot. All you need to do is tell people what she was really like, explain that the person you fell in love with changed, and that she blackmailed you into marrying her—”
“She didn’t blackmail me. She was honest with me about the despair she felt with life, and I knew I couldn’t leave her.”
“But if you went out and said something, anything, then you wouldn’t be seen as the bad guy here.”
“I’m not airing… sharing stuff,” I managed. The whole mess had been on me too, and I was a god damn gentleman.
“She was the one who went on that reality show and blabbed all your secrets, she’s doing this to get sympathy for what was her own freaking fault.”
“She has issues,” I began, still in defense mode.
“Too right,” Logan muttered.
“Look, guys, I don’t care anymore, I had my day of self-pity. I’m done with it all now.”
“There’s something else, and you won’t believe it,” Logan said.
I heard Josie’s sharp inhalation, and saw her shake her head in warning. “What?” I was tired of this, I was tired of being the bad guy, the one pushed off the pedestal I didn’t even want to be on in the first place. Dallas had wanted a poster boy for manners and friendliness, the league wanted the nice guy they could label a superstar and could wheel out for any and all occasions. They’d made Tate Collins, superstar, and all the other parts of me had been destroyed.
What else had been made public? The entire NHL, plus fans, knew I collected Star Wars stuff. I’d never made a secret of it, and my first ever Instagram photo was of me in one of the rooms in my Dallas place with whole shelves of merchandise. The fact I was bi, and liked men just as well as women was a secret, but that was my personal life and nothing to do with anyone. I groaned. Fuck. Was it out that I’d had an impossible crush hard on Tennant Rowe when he was at Dallas, and that I avoided him?
It had to be a Star Wars thing. She hated I wasn’t into collecting something more, in her words, manly. When I’d pressed her on what she meant by that, all she could come up with was dumbbells.
Who the hell collected dumbbells?
I’d never judged Lacey for what she’d done to my original Boba Fett that first night I’d caught her in bed with another guy. She hadn’t seemed herself, and after I’d gently asked the guy to fuck off out of my house, I’d held her for a while as she cried. Then I’d taken a pillow and slept on the couch. Lacey wasn’t the one but she ticked enough boxes that she could have been.
If I’d tried harder, maybe? I know some of it’s on me.
Finding the guy in her bed was bad enough, but having a Boba Fett, with his head snapped off, ripped from his original packaging and thrown at me was more of a shock. That was how numb I’d been to the whole Lacey/ Tate love affair.
“She says she might have found new love, and that her heart is finally full blah blah,” Josie didn’t add anything else, and hell, what about that was going to worry me that it got Logan all riled up?
“I’m pleased for her.”
“Tell him about his cat, tell him about Obi” Logan pushed.
Josie held my hand tight, and I knew this was serious.
“What about Obi? What happened?”
The photo of her in bed? You could see the other guy’s arm, but worse than that? He was holding Obi.”
You have got to be kidding me.
I had the rest of the day to get my shit together, I showered five times, worked out in the huge basement gym for three hours, drank coffee until my hands shook to get some spark in me, mainlined electrolytes, then spent a good four hours out in my huge yard which had a cleared area, with its own net and markings for deck hockey, shooting the puck and not happy until I shot fifty pucks in a row without missing one.
At nine I was in bed. Alone. Logan and Josie had both left after breakfast. Josie back to the set for her vampire time travel show in LA, and Logan back to San Francisco where he was a starting pitcher.
The only good thing I clung to when I’d been traded to Arizona was that the three of us were close together again. Add Mom and Dad, and I had unconditional love in my corner, and when I pulled into players’ parking I had them in my heart, knowing that whatever happened in the Raptors locker room I could get through it.
I was early, hoping to hell I’d be first in, but Ryker was sitting in his cubby, taping up and singing along to whatever was on his iPod. He glanced up when I arrived, and took out the earbuds.
“Hey,” he said, and I could tell just from the tone that he’d seen the insta stuff where Lacey had implied shit about me. We’d had an off day; they’d given me a personal day, but now I was back. Tomorrow we were home against San Diego, a local rivalry, and I had a small hope that today everything would have been forgotten, but no, I could see his expression.
“Hey,” I said back, still awkward with Ryker that one day he would find out that his stepdad had been my first crush, but hey, what the hell, life is screwed up.
“Saw all the insta stuff, forget about it,” Ryker murmured, and stood to stretch. “No one will mention it, and once we start training—”
A commotion at the door had us both turning. Colorado with one of his famous entrances.
“Sugar, saw the shit on the web, damn dude, it’s nice for someone else to take some heat around here.”
“Sugar?” I asked, sounded weak, because who the hell knew what was going on in Colorado’s head.
“Yeah, Tate-sweet-as-apple-pie, Sugar for short.” He tossed me something, and I caught it on reflex. An apple.
“Thanks,” I said because I was lost for words, but was pleased he hadn’t gone for the whole Tater Tot shit I got from my brother.
Then Colorado moved and behind him stood our captain, Vlad ‘The Iceberg’ Novikov, all focused as he looked from me to the apple, to Ryker, and to Colorado who was trying for innocent. My heart beat faster, my nerves tingled, and I swear I was getting hard.
What was it about Vlad and the way he came into a room? Or the way he stood? Or talked? Or even freaking breathed.
And why did it get me so flustered?
School and Rock #5
One
Colorado
There were quite a few ways to wake up that ensured a day would be a good one.
Not being able to roll over due to the hot, nude bodies sharing a bed was one of my favorites, hands down. Speaking of hands…
I touched a thick leg, a thigh, quite hairy. Tossing my left hand outward, the back of my fingers rested on a substantial breast. I breathed in the smells of warm skin and sex, and rubbed my whiskery cheek against the firm belly my head was pillowed on. A little purr bubbled out of me when my nose bumped a soft cock. Shifting one leg back, I found a hard, muscular body with a meaty calf. I smiled as my eyes remained shut to block out the blazing Arizona sun. Three to one. Yeah, that sounded about right. Even though I was pan I did tend to prefer dudes. That didn’t make my orientation any less valid though. My bed and heart were open to all.
Taking a moment to center and listen to the gentle sounds of so many sleeping lovers, I let my mind wander to the party last night. It had been one hell of a blowout. My place had been packed with fans, groupies, my fellow musicians, and even a couple of the Raptors. The braver ones. A lot of the team shied away from the rock parties.
Which I respected. I didn’t do drugs and drink. Ever. I had few rules in my life but drugs and booze were totally off limits. If others wanted to toke up, snort a line, or dive into a bottle of Jack that was on them. Live and let live. My days were all about pleasure, penning songs, and playing hockey. Oh yeah, and the occasional party like last night’s…
The Chaotic Furballs had signed a record deal with Black Crack Records after the rep, Dilly Andrews, had wooed us fucking hard. And we were more than pumped to sign on the dotted line. Black Crack was one of the biggest and hottest recording companies on the metal scene. They’d risen from obscurity over the past two years by signing new hard rock bands that the other companies were scared to take on. While most places were lusting after K-Pop bands and anyone who sounded like Taylor Swift, Black Crack was all about the metal. They were my kind of people. The band was looking at a massive influx of cash and prestige, something we had worked our asses off for. Now that we’d signed, we’d have to produce. But all that had to wait for hockey to end after we’d just clinched a wild card slot in the playoffs. It was hard balancing two great loves. I’d have been hard-pressed to pick which I adored more, hockey or rock. Both were fundamental to my soul. Both were the most important things in my life. I wasn’t going to turn my back on my band or my team. A real man didn’t walk away from responsibility.
Whoever was playing my pillow was hungry. His belly rumbled in my ear. I kissed his navel, opened my eyes, and snickered to see it was Dilly whose stomach was making so much noise. Right, the record exec had wooed us hard and I’d fucked him twice as hard. And the pink-haired dude, and the blonde chick with the nice tits, and the big roadie who’d been carting drums for us over the past few months. Love was meant to be shared. I should’ve gotten that inked on my ass cheek.
“Rock and roll,” I mumbled, wiggling free of the arms and legs, knotted blankets, and stuffed emu tangled around a skinny dude with pink hair and the lone female in my bed. Pouting when I saw my stuffed Kricker— I missed my fucking emu, stupid wildlife laws— I stumbled around my bedroom naked. A warm wind blew through the open sliding doors carrying the heady scent of desert lavender. Nice.
I found my jeans, a retro pair with huge bell bottoms, and pulled them up over my bare ass. Then I spied the sheer zebra-print kimono the busty blonde sleeping under the roadie had worn last night. I pulled it on then padded out of my room on bare feet. The satiny robe rubbed my neck and I winced. Stopping by a mirror on the wall, I tipped my head to the right. The new ink I’d gotten last night was tender. The redness had gone down and the musical notes were fucking intense. My gaze fell to the tattoo of Kricker wearing a bowler hat on my pectoral.
“Always in my heart, bruh,” I mumbled then patted my chest.
As I ambled through my airy desert home I stopped to check on people, my bandmates in particular, who were all curled around a woman, or two, sleeping off their well-deserved celebrations. I was the only Furball who liked cock, or at least the only one who would freely admit it. Yawning and scratching my belly, I stopped to use the bathroom and stepped over a dude in a kilt sleeping with a red bong in one hand and a green dildo in the other.
“Looks like you had a good night,” I said then relieved myself, flushed, and washed my hands. I took a closer look at myself in the mirror, smiled at the man I saw, and then pattered downstairs, taking care to avoid the empty bottles of booze, a few random kegs, and assorted people I knew and didn’t know. Not to mention there was a drum set in the living room that someone had filled with water and the four fat koi from the cement pond out back. Sniggering at The Beverly Hillbillies reference, I cruised into the kitchen, blinked at the brightness, and glanced around for the electric tea kettle as I wondered where my phone had gone. I found the kettle in the fridge filled with prawns. My phone was sandwiched between the massive cookstove that I never used, and the counter.
“Dudes,” I sighed then washed out the kettle and turned it on.
I always started my day with two cups of ginseng tea sweetened with honey. It was one of a dozen things that my grandmother Alchemy did every morning that I’d incorporated into my routines. Most of my grandmother’s habits were pretty righteous and aimed at taming the beast inside my breast. I missed her company but she was living in Vermont now, heading a co-op of hippie seniors. Soon as hockey was over and the band had laid down some tracks, I was heading to Vermont— the land of Ben & Jerry’s.
While the kettle heated, I dropped my phone into the charger and whispered, “Alexa, play ‘Dude (Looks Like a Lady) by Aerosmith’ on the whole house system. Volume setting concert level.”
I threw my head back, spun in a circle, and started belting along with my idol Steven Tyler. My voice was similar to his, and my stage screams were close. Not that anyone could possibly recreate the majesty of his voice, of course. Shaking my ass through Joe Perry’s guitar solo— if I had a fucking buck for every time I spanked my meat to the fantasy of being wedged between Tyler and Perry I’d own the motherfucking Grand Canyon— I sang along as I filled a mug with hot water, dunked my tea bag, and stirred in some clover honey that Alchemy had sent me last week.
I got a sip in when I thought I heard the doorbell ring. Hard to tell with Aerosmith rocking so loud the windows were humming, but it sounded like the bell. I jumped over two half-naked Asian dudes sleeping on the Italian marble in the foyer curled around each other like a couple of cats. Dio’s “Holy Diver” fired up next. I dropped to my knees, silky kimono fluttering out like wings, and offered up a rock prayer to the dearly departed legend.
The guys behind me giggled. I gave them a wink and then passed my tea along to them to warm themselves before getting to my bare feet and yanking the door open. I expected to see a dude with a brown truck asking me to sign for a delivery. Furball fans and Raptors backers were always mailing me shit. I looked out at the sweeping driveway but there was nothing to be seen but cactus, a roadrunner, and a well-tended flower garden that I never paid any attention to. Gardeners took care of it, just like a cleaning service would come in after I was on the plane to tidy up the house. My agent took care of all that. Who had time?
“Colorado, we’re cold,” one of the dudes— they might have been twins— behind me called in a sing-song voice.
Assuming someone from the party had pranked my ass, I was about to slam the heavy front door shut and warm up the two chilly groupies when a small little mewl, like that of a kitten, drew my attention downward. Thank all the fucking gods I’d passed along that scalding cup of tea to those guys. My whole mental state went blank as I gaped at the tiny baby staring up at me from within its carrier-tote thing. It had a big head with soft, dark peach fuzz and blue eyes. It was all in pink so I figured it was a girl, but why not be more gender-neutral? Come on people. The edge of an envelope stuck out from the base of the carrier, so I wiggled it free.
“Yo,” I said to the baby. It gurgled. “Where’s your mother, little person? Is she around back sleeping it off with Buick? He’s into MILF’s.” Drummers were horn dogs. Proven fact. Just like goalies are weird. I totally owned my shit.
Ripping open the wrinkled letter as a breeze ruffled my stolen kimono and the baby’s soft fuzz, I sat down cross-legged beside the infant and shook open the incredibly short missive.
Colorado,This baby is yours. I named her after my grandmothers Madeline and Celeste.
My gaze flicked to the kid chewing on her fingers. “Grandmothers are cool,” I told her and she gabbled around her fist. I gave her a lopsided smile then the first line of the note sank in and my gut flipped. I focused back to the note written in purple pen.
Raise her well. You can afford her, I can’t. Next time use a condom you slutty man whore.One of a thousand
“Shit,” I whispered, the note fluttering off in the morning wind. Madeline Celeste and I started at each other for a millisecond. Then I dove into what could only be described as a major freak-out. Like I lost it biblically. Snapping up the carrier with the baby I then raced back into the house, a banging tune by Tenacious D blaring throughout the sixty-seven thousand square foot Mediterranean-style mansion. The baby, Madeline, began wailing, which really didn’t do a damn thing for my mental state or Jack Black’s ripping vocals. The twins took one look at me and the screaming infant and melted into the shadows.
I raced into the kitchen, placed the baby on the counter, barked at Alexa to shut the hell up, and then pounced on my phone. There was no way to be sure Madeline was mine without a blood test, but she had some impressive pipes so maybe she was my kid. Although she had blue eyes and mine were a greenish-brown hazel so maybe she wasn’t?
I called Alchemy but her answering machine— honestly, who the hell used an answering machine anymore other than hippie octogenarians— informed me she was on a spirit quest and would not return to this realm until Friday so please leave a message.
In lieu of saying anything, I held out my phone so she could hear my kid… the kid… screaming bloody murder. Allegedly my kid. Right. Allegedly. No proof. Just a letter from someone who thought they were a member of the Borg collective. One of a thousand. Did she hang out with Seven of Nine?
Colorado, stop with the Star Trek shit and focus on the problem before I kick your fucking ass.
“So yeah, this is happening. Can you please call me when you’ve returned to your mortal shell?!” I shouted at my grandmother then immediately felt terrible. “Sorry, just a bit stressed. Please call me, okay. I really need to talk to you. Love. Peace out. Oh my shit, she’s like red in the face!”
I hung up, unfastened the little belt holding the raging baby in the carrier, and slid a hand under her. Recalling holding a teammate’s new baby at a social function last month, I cradled Madeline’s head and placed her against my chest. She quieted instantly. Snot and drool coated my shoulder. Not that I was freaked out by that. Life wasn’t worth living if you didn’t have some sort of bodily fluid on your skin.
“Okay, yeah good,” I mumbled, rocking side to side as I made another frantic call. “Yeah, that’s a good girl. Not everyone can relate to Tenacious D in the bright and early. Come on, Vlad, pick up the mother… loving phone before I— Vlad! Oh man, I have a small issue here. Like, really small. Maybe seven pounds and… no, dude, it is not a baby emu. It’s a baby.” Madeline nuzzled my collarbone, sucking madly. Shit. Was she hungry? When had she eaten last? What kind of person dropped a kid off at the door of a notorious asshole rock and roll goalie without some grub? “What do you feed a baby? What? No, dude, I told you it’s not a baby animal. Seriously? Why would I buy a tiger cub? Okay, yeah, it would be cool and does kind of sound like something I’d do. I’ll grant you that one. Vlad, listen, some chick dropped a baby off at my front door and— Yes! A real baby. A human baby. Note said it’s mine.”
My whiskery cheek rested on her soft head as we waltzed around the kitchen. She smelled good, like sunshine and warm kitten fur. A rush of Russian flowed into the room from Vlad. I rolled my eyes as we danced around my phone lying on the counter. All I’d wanted was some tea, some food, maybe one quick round with the four people still snoozing in my bed, and a shower before I left for the airport. Was that asking too—?
“Stay there. I will be over quickly,” Vlad said then hung up.
The panic attack backed off a bit, just enough to jar me into motion. Someone in this mansion had to know what to do for a baby. Every chick I woke up to feed Madeline got super pissy and called me a sexist asshole for asking only women how to care for a baby. Who was I going to ask? Buick? My best buddy in the band could barely feed himself let alone an infant. A mewling, whining baby cleared out the house fast. I suspected she may have shit herself as well if the stench I was smelling was coming from her and not my unwashed skanky man whore ass. I was never so happy to see the arrival of my team captain in my whole life. I was less happy to see Coach Carmichael and his boyfriend.
“Dude, why the hell did you call them?” I barked at Vlad as soon as they entered the house.
“He called because I’m your head coach,” Coach C snapped.
Mark, one of the owners of the Raptors, slid between us with bags of stuff dangling from his fingers. “Take these,” he said and reached to take Madeline from me. I jerked to the side, holding her little body tightly to my chest. Mark gave me a look that screamed irritation. “Take the bags. There’s formula, bottles, and diapers for her.”
I glanced from Vlad to Coach to Westman-Reid while my… Madeline nuzzled my clavicle.
“Thanks.” I hooked the shopping bags on my fingers then carried Madeline into the white living room. There were two. One was white and the other was… sort of an off-white.
“What the hell happened in here?” Coach asked as I laid the baby on a loveseat and sat there staring at her. She really stank.
“We signed a record deal and got a wild card slot,” I replied as Madeline stared holes into my soul.
“Ah, did you party all night?” Mark asked in a tone that immediately sent his comment to my mental trash bin. The owners had never liked me. There were days I wasn’t sure Coach did, but he’d headhunted me, so here I was, in all my Penn family glory.
“I’m clean. I’ll go piss in a jar when we arrive in Vegas, but right now the band and the team kind of take a back seat, yeah?” They all nodded sheepishly. Vlad muttered something about calling Child Services just as I’d worked up the courage to unsnap the tiny pink sleeper Madeline was wearing to check for a diaper disaster. The stench that rolled up from inside her sleeper made us all choke. “No,” I said as my eyes watered and Coach took a step back. “We are not sending my kid to foster care.”
“Colorado, you don’t know she’s yours,” Coach pointed out. I gagged a bit. How could a person so small make such a massive stink? “We’re due in Nevada in five hours for the first round of the playoffs. You cannot travel with that baby. The wise thing to do would be to call Child Services, have the blood test, and if you’re determined to be the father then you can search for the mother. Don’t shake your head, there are legalities that need to be—”
“No. I am not turning my back on her. She’s mine until it’s proven otherwise. Good parents do not leave their kids for other people to raise!” I yelled.
Coach glowered but he didn’t call me out. Mark and Vlad stood in the distance like golems for several seconds until Westman-Reid said something that was actually useful.
“My sisters-in-law use nannies all the time. They might be able to help us out.” Mark glanced around. I nodded. Coach nodded. Vlad nodded. “Okay, so change that diaper and we’ll figure out the formula so she can eat.”
Mark turned his back on us while he rang up a sister-in-law. I peeled open the diaper, just one side, and drew back in total horror. Coach and Vlad left the room like Satan was nipping at their balls. Madeline kicked and giggled.
“Yeah, you think it’s funny but it ain’t,” I mumbled as my eyes watered. “I got you though, baby girl.”
Saturday's Series Spotlight
Arizona Raptors
Harrisburg Raptors
Owatonna U
RJ Scott
RJ Scott is a USA TODAY bestselling author of over 140 romance and suspense novels. From bodyguards to hockey stars, princes to millionaires, cowboys to military heroes to every-day heroes, she believes that love is love and every man deserves a happy ending.
USA Today Bestselling Author V.L. Locey – Penning LGBT hockey romance that skates into sinful pleasures.
V.L. Locey loves worn jeans, yoga, belly laughs, walking, reading and writing lusty tales, Greek mythology, Torchwood and Dr. Who, the New York Rangers, comic books, and coffee. (Not necessarily in that order.) She shares her life with her husband, her daughter, one dog, two cats, a pair of geese, far too many chickens, and two steers.
When not writing spicy romances, she enjoys spending her day with her menagerie in the rolling hills of Pennsylvania with a cup of fresh java in one hand and a steamy romance novel in the other.
VL Locey
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