"Since you're so good on your feet, whaddaya say we play a game of one-on-one." I quirked an eyebrow at him, waiting for what he was going to say next. "Only I make the rules."

"What do you have in mind?"

He chuckled with mild amus.e.m.e.nt. "For every goal you score, I take something off, but for every one I block, you take something off."

"Is it safe?" I asked, clearing my throat as though I actually had to think about it.

"Are you afraid you can't get it past me?"

"No, I'm afraid some old dude on a Zamboni is gonna walk in and see me naked."

"We're all alone," he said playfully, skating over to the bench. He leaned over the boards and grabbed two sticks and a puck.

He let it fall to the ice, the sound echoing throughout the arena. Handing me one, he said, "Ready?"

I gave him a nod, unsure of how exactly to play the game, but I understood the general idea. Get the puck in the goal.

We stood there facing each other. He defended his goal and I stood in front of him with my most intimidating glare. It was all he could do not to laugh.

I tried to act like I had moves, and I didn't, but when I shot the puck at the goal, he let it go by. He didn't even try for it. His jersey came off with that goal.

I smiled, feeling confident, only I knew that one would probably be my one and only goal. I wasn't so sure he was going to let the other ones go as easily.

Next one, same thing. I took my shot and he acted like he was going to get it but missed it.

"This doesn't look that hard, Evan," I said, mocking him, trying to get under his skin.

"You've never met a defenseman like me on the ice, though, in a game where I'm all over you."

I smiled again when he took off his chest pads. "You're right, Mase, I've never met someone like you."

When he grinned, I took another shot between his legs and scored again.

"You're not even trying!" I exclaimed, throwing my arms up and dropping my stick to the ice. Then I crossed my arms over my chest. It was a little hard to do it with all the gear, but I think...I hoped...I proved my point.

With a determined glare, I picked up my stick and skated back a little ways and tried my shot again. I swung as hard as I could and that a.s.shole just simply pivoted a little to the right and deflected the puck as if I had thrown a rice cake at him. My swing felt really good. I thought for sure it would have went sailing right into the goal, and he'd be taking his compression pants off.

I gave another glare when he chuckled. "You didn't want me to take it easy on you."

I reached for my helmet, I wasn't taking off my clothes that easy until Evan stopped me. "Helmet stays."

I threw my gloves down instead.

"You know..." Evan circled around me, his eyes low and focused on the ice before he came back around, his stick tucked under his chin as he leaned on it. In a motion that was meant to tease the h.e.l.l out of me, and was quite possibly the s.e.xiest thing he'd ever done, his eyes traveled the length of my body before focusing on my face. Sighing, his tone was rough. "Dropping your gloves only means one thing: you're ready to throw down."

After that, I was intently focused on trying to get him down to his underwear or even better-naked. I did not succeed. Instead, I was down to my bra and underwear with just a jersey on.

When I shot again, and he naturally deflected it, the bra went with it, but I still had the jersey on.

Evan's eyes were on my b.r.e.a.s.t.s when I took my next shot and I managed to get one in.

Gloating to myself, Evan circled me with a smile. I felt like I was his prey the way he kept skating around me.

"I'm pretty awesome," I mocked with a purse of my lips that erupted into squeal when he hip checked me, catching me off guard with the sudden movement.

"You have no idea what you just started," he warned, grinning, lingering back a bit. I could tell he was still poised to move at any moment should I let me guard down.

"I'm surprised they let you play in the NHL with moves like that. Weak." My lips curved up in a knowing smile as it finally sunk in that I wanted him to actually put some effort into this.

He groaned quietly, as if actually working for it was unheard of.

Deciding to play with him a little more, I lifted my arms and stick over my head, arching my back and pushing my chest out. The jersey moved up my body to reveal my bare legs and panties.

His stick hit the ice with a tap, and when I looked up, he was gone, vigorously skating up the ice toward the other end. When he got to the goal, he swept around the outside, his head down as he made a rush back at me. He had the puck this time, sweeping it with choppy motions from one side of his stick to the other. Each time he hit the ice with his stick, the sound echoed like someone slowly chopping vegetables.

It was such a swirl of movement it was hard to follow, but I knew enough that I was about to be schooled.

I was schooled. He was by me in a whirl, and the next thing I heard was the puck bouncing off the crossbar and the grate of Evan's skates as he cut right away from the goal.

"Play the pipes honey," he said, b.u.mping his shoulder against mine when he came back around. It knocked me just slightly but not enough to take my balance away.

I was going to need to rethink pushing around hockey players.

Watching him gloat in his victory goal dance at center ice, I couldn't stop laughing at him. "Done this a few times?" I tried to tease him and come across sarcastically.

He looked over and wiggled his eyebrows at me, skating closer. "Just a few."

He stopped a foot in front of me, shifting uneasily back and forth between his feet. I felt myself giving in, just like every other time I was around him, my eyes drifting closed. I held my breath in antic.i.p.ation of the feel of his lips on mine.

I didn't have to wait long.

I felt the warmth of his body close in behind mine. His hands reached down and found mine, intertwining our fingers and raising our arms together. His chest moved to press against the back of my shoulders.

He brought our arms up over my head and then twirled me around to face him. Evan could skate backward perfectly. I could not.

So then he was carrying me. I wrapped my legs around his waist. And that position was awesome. His eyes were dark and intense, his fingers digging into my bare thighs.

When he noticed that I was watching him, he swallowed and looked away, continuing to skate around the rink with me around his waist. It should have been hard, but not for Evan Masen.

"Don't," I urged him quietly, stopping him from turning away from me by brushing his hair from his face. "I like it when you look at me like that."

For a moment, I thought he caught on because his lips parted, but no, he just stared.

Then he seemed to snap out of it, grinning back at me. I had to fight a moan.

"Board me," I blurted out.

Evan gave a slight dip of his head, a nod maybe, as his slow skate all but halted and his damp hand slipped around my thigh when he lowered his head even more. He was looking at my body, all of it. My pulse went crazy when he didn't say anything. Was he going to reject me? Or maybe I used the wrong term? Maybe it wasn't even a term in hockey. d.a.m.n Callie. She was always saying s.h.i.t I didn't understand, and now I felt stupid because I had repeated it not knowing what it meant.

"Ami," he growled softly, possessively, against my lips, drawing back with a smile. "Don't say things like that to me."

"And why not?" I countered, my voice low. Leaving one hand on his shoulder, I dipped my hand lower to run over his hardness between us.

His hand caught mine and put it above my head.

"I'm a hockey player..." His eyes roamed over my body. "...We're rough."

I wanted to say more. I was going to say more, but his mouth was suddenly on mine. His lips intoxicating as they moved softly over mine with the slightest hint of tongue. I felt my head spinning with each movement, and then I was jerked forward with a grunt as he boarded me like I wanted, pressed against the boards and gla.s.s. The echoing bang against the gla.s.s was hard to register over our breathing.

He was right. He was rough, but his arms of steel cradled me in a protective way. I felt the movement deep in my bones and was sure there'd be bruises on my a.s.s later. But f.u.c.k if I didn't want those bruises on my a.s.s from Evan.

"Hi," he said, completely Evan-like and grinning.

I giggled. "h.e.l.lo."

I breathed in deeply, lacing my fingers into his hair, gently pulling him into me, wrapping my legs around him a little tighter. We melted together so seamlessly that it seemed impossible that we could be separated, ever.

In a fury of kisses and touches, for a moment, Evan was losing control and taking what he wanted.

The jersey rode up, his hands underneath it, right where I wanted them. When I started to slip, from all his touching and my wiggling, Evan took a deep breath, readjusting his hold on my legs. His hips pressed against mine, securing me against the gla.s.s. He watched me, waiting for my next move.

I kissed him. I couldn't think of much else to do at that moment besides kiss him. There was so much about being with Evan that made me feel like it was too good to be true: a private showing of where the Chicago Blackhawks play and being boarded against the gla.s.s, his hands up my shirt and being able to feel him, obviously just as turned on as I was.

I said what my eighteen-year-old brain wanted. I wanted Evan.

"Have s.e.x with me," I said with sudden boldness.

He pulled back away from my lips, smiled sweetly, avoiding my eyes. "Don't say that..." He placed a cool finger to my lips. His eyes were on fire, his cheeks flushed, and that calm demeanor was slowly fracturing.

"Please."

I closed my eyes, doing my best to listen to him and calm myself down, but d.a.m.n he had ways without trying. Callie was right.

My hand slightly trembled and between my legs was an entirely different story. I could feel him there, hard, wanting what he wouldn't give into. I pressed my knees together, suppressing the urge to groan out in frustration.

"Evan..." I whispered.

He looked up at me, sweeping his eyes from my exposed b.r.e.a.s.t.s to my eyes. They were hooded and begging.

"We can't do this in here, Ami," he whispered. He laughed, too, softly, the sound shaking my own chest with how close we were pressed together. "I know it's hard for you, but you're young and went through something horrible. I can't take that from you."

"I'm-"

"Shhh." Evan moved, trying to set me on my feet, but I wouldn't let go. He touched my thigh, my knee, and then my calf, trying to get me to let go. I wouldn't. He shook his head, running a hand through his hair. "This is where I try to be a f.u.c.king gentleman and tell you that we have plenty of time for this s.h.i.t later, right?"

I smiled, not knowing what to say. Somehow we had moved away from the boards. Evan held me securely around him.

"Come on, Ami. Tell me to be a gentleman, please." He looked scared that I was about to tell him not to. I hated the fact that he was so hung up on my age. I was only three years younger than him. That wasn't that big of a difference. He groaned when I didn't answer, and he jostled me around and then slammed me up against the boards again. A deafening boom sounded through the arena, followed by both of us panting. His eyes searched mine. His hands moved desperately over my body, everywhere he could. One second his hands were on my hips, a.s.sisting in him grinding against me, and then they were back to my face, guiding his mouth and mine together. His mouth, gasping, aching as badly as mine, moved from one spot to the next, searching for relief. He tried to pull back more than once, only to crash right back to me, every time letting me know this was a struggle for him. He may have been trying to do the right thing, but his body had other ideas, just like mine.

Evan was shaking, trying to hold back, when he removed his mouth from mine, gasping. "Tell me to be a gentleman and not take this from you here. Please."

The problem was that I wanted Evan to take this from me, I did. When a girl was raped, it didn't matter if she remembered, if she knew that she was raped, there's still a sense of control and power that'd been taken from you. Intimacy is something you give to someone else, not something that should be taken. For me, I wanted that control back. I wanted to choose who I was with and how intimate I was with them. For me, that was Evan.

I knew Evan had stronger feelings surrounding what happened to me because he remembered. He was the one that saw firsthand what I went through. That wasn't easy on him, and for that reason, I knew I couldn't push this with him. I may not remember, but Evan, his memory was enough for the both of us.

"Be a gentleman." I smiled, not wanting to push the issue.

He sighed in relief, dropping my legs completely and skating a few steps back. Steadying myself against the boards, I adjusted my bra that he'd handed back to me.

He seemed agitated and annoyed as he tried to gather clothing that had been shed on the ice. He picked up his shirt first and then his compression pants and my shirt that were together by the goal before skating toward me.

Evan was right. We did have time. But then there was a good part of me that knew that we might not have time. Andrew and Leslie didn't. What if Evan and I weren't any different? What if Evan was killed tomorrow? What if on the way home we died in a car crash. Those what ifs were sometimes overwhelming.

I had an ache for something. I had an ache to belong to someone again. I grew up loving Josh. At the time, I loved him for what he was to me. Josh was my high school sweetheart. With Evan it was different. I felt different emotions, stronger ones, insanely intense emotions that had me forgetting those sucky parts of my life.

This feeling, with Evan, it burned in the pit of my stomach and consumed my thoughts at times. I was drawn to Evan completely and felt as if I'd known him my entire life. To me this felt right, and my age and the circ.u.mstances in which we met had nothing to do with it.

Evan must have sensed my mood change and pressed against me again, his body still warm and a nice contrast from the cold chill in the United Center.

His now warm palm, pressed to my cheek. "I'm sorry...I just can't take this from you like this."

The problem with that ache I had for him was it never stopped, and times like this, with him so close, I couldn't control it. I wanted to stop, but couldn't, and before I knew it, I was kissing him again, and he wasn't stopping.

Evan had just as much of an ache, I knew that. I saw in it the way he looked at me and the way he touched me from the very beginning.

"f.u.c.k..." he groaned. "We have to stop, or I'm not going to." His mouth moved from my lips to my neck and then my bare shoulders, and back to my neck and lips. His air was my skin. "It'd be so easy right now. f.u.c.k...I want you so bad right now." His hips moved again, and I knew his want was mirroring my own.

"Take me..." I ventured trying my luck one last time.

"Not here." And then he pulled away completely and took me by the hand. His answer wasn't completely no. I knew that.

The moment we got back to his condo, the warmth of his chest was a reminder of how close we were again. His lips skimmed over my shoulder. I turned and pushed him, and we fell back against his couch.

"f.u.c.k, Ami," he spoke against my lips, his hands moving from my hips to the hem of the jersey I was wearing, and he removed it. I liked that. This was new.

I smiled, giving him a wink.

Leaning forward, bare chested now, I peppered kisses over his scruffy jaw and straddled him again.

Next was his shirt. I removed it, feeling his muscles as I did. He hissed out a low breath, his eyes squeezed shut, and his grip tightened against my hips. He reached around to stroke the swell of my a.s.s.

His fingers dug into my a.s.s, urging me closer to him, reading my mind, knowing I needed something from him. His hands were groping me blindly, moving from one spot to the next.

"Don't stop," I gasped when I felt him slowing down.

"I'm not," he promised, his gaze traveling over my face before his mouth was back on mine and he moved his hips up to meet mine, grinding against me slowly.

Goal.