She was definitely my girl.

Hooking The act of impeding an opponent by placing the blade of a stick into their body.

Quarter Finals (Game 1) Nashville Predators.

Friday, April 16, 2010.

(Home Game).

It was hard to focus on the game when my attention was constantly drawn to the stands and those douchebags sitting behind the girls. Every play they were mouthing off and had something to say.

I knew Callie could handle herself, and unfortunately her own mouth had a way of getting guys riled up at times. When they started in, so did she.

When the Predators scored, the crowd hung their heads, dejected that we might lose. That was when the chirping of those fans picked up.

Leo and Remy both noticed; their heads kept turning to watch when we heard the commotion. One of the guys had shoved Callie, and I wasn't standing for that.

I took the end of my stick and hit it against the boards, scowling at the guy. He looked up, stunned, holding his hands up, and then flipped me off. Well played. What he didn't see was the security guard behind him.

That game was horrible. Not only were the fans distracting us, but we played poorly and for no reason. It was the start of the playoffs and we weren't starting off good.

Granger, a player known for his aggression and dirty hits, had it out for Leo all night. He finally got him near Nashville's goal. It was a chip shot right at the crease and knocked Leo out cold. Remy and I both went after Granger for that one.

That wasn't the way we wanted to start off the series, and every guy on that team understood that. We had something to prove, and G.o.dd.a.m.n it if we weren't going to prove it.

To try and ease our frustrations about the loss we headed to the bar.

"Hey, man," Remy nudged me. "Pay attention." I looked over to the group in the back. They were standing around a high top table listening to their left wing, Trey Swartz, tell a joke when Ami walked by from having used the bathroom. They must have made a few crude remarks because she raised her hand to flip Trey off and then spun around, making her way back over to us. Her scowl told me she wasn't pleased, and f.u.c.k if I wasn't livid instantly.

If he touched her, I would f.u.c.king kill him. That was just who I was at that point. They still hadn't found the guy, and every time someone looked at her, I wondered. When I'd been drinking, that wondering twisted on me and I was ready to defend her.

Hockey players were notorious for bar fights. It seemed the aggression on the ice had a tendency to carry over. I wasn't an exception, but I liked to start them, and then everyone else got involved.

If you were to get five hockey players in a bar and then they started talking s.h.i.t-that was a pretty potent combination if you asked me. Get two rival teams in a bar, and you were asking for trouble.

Here was the thing: people liked to shove each other and acted like all around d.i.c.ks in the bar. Some chose to ignore it, some didn't.

If you did that s.h.i.t around a hockey player, we were going to turn around and lay you out. We didn't give a f.u.c.k.

I'd been in my fair share of bar fights, even before I was twenty-one, but I I'd been with Ami since I'd turned of age and didn't want to be away from her. Now here we were, inside a bar, and the guys were being d.i.c.ks.

I was by no means a bada.s.s, and more times than not my mouth got me into situations my fists couldn't get me out of. I was a skilled fighter when I needed to be, but there were several times I had my a.s.s handed to me. I liked to think I could hold my own with Trey.

I caught Trey's stare when Ami came back over to us, and he knew what he'd done. His eyes stopped on me, lighting up with surprise that maybe he'd p.i.s.sed on my territory. He f.u.c.king lived for s.h.i.t like that.

He nodded, gestured with a tip of his head to Ami and then winked.

I didn't know what made him think we wanted him to come over to us, but he did and started to make conversation, conversation I wanted nothing to do with. I shoved him, letting him know, physically, he wasn't welcome on this side of the bar.

Catching himself against the table, two of his teammates were beside him. He looked at me, bent that I'd killed his chance to score. What he didn't realize was his chance to score belonged to me.

"What's your f.u.c.king problem?"

"My f.u.c.king problem is you." I gave him a threatening smile. "Get lost."

"Hey, man, I'm not looking for anything special. Just a quick introduction to the twin cities," he said, looking to Ami again.

"I'll introduce you to twin cities all right," I snapped, Ami's eyes immediately shooting to mine. I could feel her staring at me, wondering where this was going to go.

"Relax, Mase," Trey drawled, his lips twisting into a smile. A look of defiance crossed his face. He turned to me, his back facing Ami. "She'll be back on your d.i.c.k tomorrow. What's a little fun for one night?"

"Hey, f.u.c.ker, think your team can win if you're in the hospital?" I taunted, getting in his face.

Ami was in my face then. "We should go." She sprang forward, latching onto me. "Please?" she pleaded in a soothing voice, reaching her hand up to cup my chin, trying to turn my head to make me look at her. Rather than fight against her, I backed off and nodded when Ami added, "He's an a.s.shole and not worth it."

Wrapping my arms around her, in a protective manner that couldn't be denied, I pulled her away from Trey and his buddies, my hand resting on the small of her back.

Surprisingly enough, I wasn't the one that laid the f.u.c.ker out. Remy was.

"Okay, hot shots," Callie teased merrily, a friendly grin on her face reminding me to take it easy. I let my guard down just a little, even if I was uncomfortable.

"What's his deal?" she asked, looking over at Trey one last time.

"We got drafted the same year." I sighed. "Any time you get two hot shot rookies looking for notoriety, you go head-to-head on the ice a lot."

For the next hour we stayed at the bar until finally we were asked to leave when Leo p.i.s.sed on the side of the building. Little jerk had no cla.s.s sometimes.

The real problem for me was every encounter I had like that, I imagined him being the guy that raped Ami. My mind played tricks with me and put his face to the unknown, and I was immediately drawn back into that night and was consumed with losing her.

When we got back to my place, Ami tried to relax me, and well, she succeeded as she always did.

She slowly slid her hand up my thigh, boldly skimming her fingers higher over my hips while I watched SportsCenter.

My eyebrow quirked, curious where she was going with it. Every day we were getting closer and more intimate. Every day we were learning more and becoming comfortable. Like a good line, we had a unity.

Spurred on by the look in her eyes, I raised my hand from the remote and touched the side of her face. It didn't take long before my mind was imagining certain spots of her naked, and yeah, I got hard.

Her hand moved, wrapping around my erection, which she could clearly see through my dress pants, and then squeezed firmly.

"You can't do that if you don't intend on taking care of it," I groaned, grabbing her wrist to stop her, and then pulled her down on top of me to lay on the couch.

She moved, her legs falling to either side of my hips, and sat up. Her hands slid down my chest to my stomach and then to the hem on her T-shirt. Peeling it off slowly, she winked at me when it was off and tossed it on the floor, along with her bra, too.

Without saying a word, she moved my hands that rested on her hips to behind my head.

I chuckled playfully, trying to keep from getting too excited, but the fact that she was pretty much in control here was hot as f.u.c.k.

With my hands behind my head, I let her move at her own pace doing whatever she wanted to do. With shaking hands, she unb.u.t.toned my black dress shirt and then reached for my buckle. Once she had that undone, she sat up o to pull my pants down around my knees but not off completely.

It took me a minute to realize what she was doing, but then it finally dawned on me when her mouth was on my d.i.c.k. I jolted back just slightly, surprised that Ami, my innocent girl with her shyness, would want to do that. f.u.c.k if I hadn't been dreaming about it, but d.a.m.n, I never thought she'd want to do that or even knew how. She said nothing but gave me a look that asked if it was okay. I nodded, groaning deeply, and dropped my head back against the arm of the couch.

My stomach trembled as she trailed her tongue along my hip, following the path with the tip of her finger. I could tell she was scared, not knowing what to do, and it made me feel a little better to think this might have been her first time doing this. I liked to think it was.

She wrapped her fingers around me first, giving me a few lengthy strokes, and then looked up at me. My eyes locked with hers, wanting to let her know with that one look how unbelievably s.e.xy she was.

Then she went for it. She closed her eyes and lowered her mouth onto me.

I must have said something, a few things at least, but I couldn't remember anything other than a few choking gasps. It'd been a while since I had a girl's mouth on me like that, and G.o.dd.a.m.n if it wasn't everything I had dreamed about and missed.

She ran her fingers over my thighs, pressing the tips firmly against the hard muscles that were clenched tightly with pa.s.sion.

My hips thrust slightly of their own volition. She took me deeper, pausing for only a moment to adjust her angle, and then moved back slightly so she had more room. I briefly thought maybe we should move to my bed, but I didn't want her to stop.

My hands that were behind my head moved to her hair, gripping it slightly. She made a whimper.

"This okay?" I grunted, trying not to pull on her hair too much. Other girls would tell me to pull as hard as I could. Ami was different.

"Mmhmm," she hummed in approval, taking me deeper.

My hands remained in her hair, not pushing or forcing, just simply setting the pace. I tried to warn her after a minute. Ami didn't seem like the kind of girl that would want that in her mouth, but as always, she surprised me and smacked my hands away.

Who was I to challenge her?

When she finished, I had to repay the favor a few times. We went at it like that for hours, always trying to one up the other. I wondered where Ami learned how to do the things she was doing, the things she was so f.u.c.king good at, but then I had to shake those thoughts away. There was no f.u.c.king way I wanted details.

I was at the point where I couldn't get enough of her, and I was ready to drop the gloves if she was willing to dance.

Dropping the gloves This is an act by a player indicating to the opponent he's ready to fight.

"You p.i.s.sed on the side of the building because your drink wasn't strong enough. That's a douche move and you know it," I explained to Leo. "I liked that place and now we can't go back because we will always be known as the hockey players who p.i.s.sed on the building."

"Well, it was justified in my mind." Leo took a shot at the goal during warm-ups.

"Your drunk mind maybe," Travis added, circling around to get back in line for his next shot. I pointed at him, nodding my head as if he had the correct answer.

Travis looked over at me when Leo skated away. "Hey, man, you f.u.c.k that girl yet?"

I glared. "Stop asking. What happened to you last night?"

"I ended up naked in the lobby wearing red hooker boots."

"Good night?" I said, trying to control my laughter.

He surprised me when he nodded. "f.u.c.king awesome night."

"What happened to Remy after I left?"

"Ah, man," Travis groaned, leaning on his stick. "That f.u.c.ker left with that Kari chick that was all over him. Turns out he bagged both her and the one with the black dress...together."

"No s.h.i.t."

"s.h.i.t."

Remy was a douche to women, but f.u.c.k if they didn't love him. They knew it from the start, maybe even liked it a little, and they accepted him for what he was: a wh.o.r.e. I wasn't like that, though, and I didn't talk about girls like this. They did.

"My d.i.c.k was red," Remy said, hearing most of our conversation and needing to add his own details. "I'm guessing one of them might have been a virgin."

"Probably the one with the black dress...Laura?" Leo suggested. "Anyway, she looked like she hadn't been cherry picking yet."

"I guess so." Remy shrugged, his attention turning to the sound of the whistle. Drills were beginning. "Either that or I was f.u.c.kin' a chick with issues."

After practice, I had plans to take Ami to dinner before we started the next series and I left for San Jose. This time she was coming with me. Just like I'd asked her to move in with me, I asked her to come on the road with me.

I'd never been in love, but I started to look at my symptoms.

The mention of her name made my stomach tighten? Check.

Heart beating like a f.u.c.king girl? Check.

Any skin revealed and I'm hard? Check.

Watching her sleep like a G.o.dd.a.m.n stalker? Check.

Wanting to know everything about her and what makes her smile? Wanting to be the reason for the smile? Yep. Big f.u.c.king checks all around.

f.u.c.k. I was in love.

My dad once told me that you knew you were in love with a girl when you would do anything for her. You'd be willing to change your life for her and would do anything she asked you to.

He also said you'd know they loved you if they never asked you to change your life or anything else.

With Ami it was so much more than that and had been since the beginning, before either one of us knew what was happening. I would do anything for her. She knew that.

Sometimes I wondered when this had happened. When did I become so focused on this girl that nothing else mattered? Was it when I found her? When she opened her eyes? When I kissed her?

I had no answers, no justifiable ones at least. I was in love.

I knew the time would come when I would fall in love, but I never thought it would happen like this, with a young girl in such a brutal scenario.

When I thought about what happened to her, it felt wrong to love her.

The s.h.i.tty part for me was that not only had I never been in love, but I also never knew what I was missing with Ami. I'd never had a girl that made me feel like she did.

The night before we left for San Jose was when I told Ami my feelings.

Before I got back into bed, I removed my T-shirt. Ami watched, her eyes low on my hips. She inhaled a sharp breath. I could see it in her stare, feel it in her touch. She was waiting on empty words to be defined.

I said what I was feeling in that moment.