Breaking the Ice

Chapter 19

19

An hour and two full carts later, Samantha stepped into the elevator with Nick close on her heels. They were going to grab an Uber once outside to ferry them and their cargo back to the shop and she couldn’t wait to be out of his company. She could feel his suppressed laughter slowly seeping out and filling the cramped elevator space and she was way too hungry for this.

So, of course , given how much luck she’d already had tonight, the elevator chose that moment to grind to a halt. The lights flickered out, then came back on again but the elevator did not move.

She fixed Nick with an incredulous look. “You’re kidding me, right?”

Shrugging, he pushed some buttons. And then some more buttons. Nothing. Opening the hatch to the emergency phone, he lifted the receiver and Samantha listened as he talked to the person at the other end, hoping like hell this was just a momentary glitch.

Please do not let me get stuck in a lift with Nick on an empty stomach with the Timmy disaster still so fresh.

“There’s been a mechanical failure somewhere in the system,” he said as he replaced the phone. “They’re working on it, but it could be up to an hour.”

“Great.” Just great. Samantha pushed their carts forward till they touched the doors then slid down the wall to sit on the floor, her stomach letting out an almighty growl.

Nick shook his head. “You have the loudest intestines I’ve ever heard.”

“Yeah? You should hear them from over here.”

“Have you checked your bag?” He pointed to her DKNY holdall. “There must be some stray food in that monster?”

Samantha shook her head. “Looked already.” She’d hunted around it an hour ago.

“Are you sure? I’ve seen that bag hold two hundred condoms. It’s full of surprises.”

Samantha ignored his condom reference, but dumped the contents of her bag on the lift floor because what if he was right? It was a roomy bag and she did tend to just toss things in.

A plastic wrapped tampon rolled free and before she could stop it, rolled beyond her reach, coming to rest against Nick’s foot.

Excellent! Diet, Timmy and now this.

Crouching, Nick retrieved it and handed it over. Ignoring the embarrassed girly screaming get-me-out-of-this-elevator hysterically inside, she returned to her hunt, acutely aware of him as he also sat his ass on the floor opposite.

She picked up everything one by one, faltering when she came across a little foil packet. Damn things were like prickles, just when you thought you’d gotten rid of them all, along came another.

That’s when it hit her. She was alone in an elevator with Nick. Worse than just alone because that implied she could change the situation if she wanted. She was actually stuck with him. Stuck with Nick and one condom and his orgasm boast working its insidious way into her brain along with his response to her drunken proposition.

She was sober now. And they did have a potential hour to kill.

Samantha stared at the condom . Then at Nick. He was looking at it also before his gaze slid to her. They stared at each other for long, laden moments, a slight tremble not remotely linked to hypoglycemia, vibrating through her fingers.

If she pounced on him now, where would they stand afterwards? Could she plead that what happened in the elevator stayed in the elevator?

“Can’t eat them,” he said into their growing silence.

Right. Absolutely. Samantha gave herself a mental shake then laughed to cover the clash of feelings tumbling around inside. Thank the stars for Nick pulling them back from the edge.

“Nothing,” she announced a minute later as she replaced the last piece of paraphernalia back into her bag.

“Not even a Tic Tac?”

“Sorry,” she said as his stomach growled.

Which left them with nothing to do and very little distance separating them. Just a nine-by-nine area laden with two carts and two grown adults trying to ignore their chemistry. Until finally Samantha’s addled brain realized there was something she could do other than Nick.

Books. Of course!

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I need something to take my mind off my stomach.” And my ovaries. “So pardon me ignoring you but I think I’ll read.”

Then, rising to her knees, she leaned over and reached into her cart, grabbing the first book she touched – a Marshall Grover – before reclaiming her spot and opening the book.

Nick figured it was as good a ploy as any to take his mind off the temptation only a hand’s reach away, so he followed suit, ending up with a Rita Summers and for the next forty minutes they read. Or at least he pretended to, in between sneaking peeks of Sam, of whom he was exceedingly conscious.

Her every breath and wriggle, the little furrow between her brows and the constant press of her teeth into her bottom lip made him want to kiss her there so badly he couldn’t even read the words in front of him.

Thoughts of her exchange with Timmy tonight didn’t seem so funny anymore. He’d burned with jealousy watching the two of them chat, watching her stroke that God-awful, stupid necklace which sat majestically against her décolletage in her V-necked T-shirt like some voodoo high priestess wearing an ancient relic.

Witnessing Sam flirt with Timmy had made his skin itch and the more his gaze dwelled on her mouth the more he knew there were bigger problems for them to worry about than growling stomachs. Like, how was he going to stop himself from touching her?

From kissing that kissable mouth? And how he should be the only one doing that – ever.

“You’re not seriously going to see Timmy, are you?”

She startled a little at his voice but didn’t look up from her book. “I might. He was nice.”

Oh for fuck’s sake. Enough with the nice already. “His name is Timmy .”

“I know. It’s kinda cute, don’t you think?”

Nick snorted. “Sure, for a toddler.”

Finally glancing up from the book, she rolled her eyes at him. “Okay. His name was a little… unexpected. But he seemed lovely and he didn’t rubbish Jess’s necklace, which is more than can be said for you.”

“Well he wouldn’t, would he? With a name like that you would expect him to have an appreciation of early childhood art.”

“The man can’t help his name.”

“Think about it, Samantha. Can you really imagine calling out his name while you’re doing the wild thing with him? It’ll sound like you’re calling a dog.”

She huffed loudly but Nick could see her lips twitch then press together as if to stop herself from laughing. But then her stomach chose that moment to let out a thundering growl and Nick’s went out in sympathy and they both burst out laughing.

“We’ve been in this elevator together too long.” He grinned. “Our stomachs have synced.”

She laughed again, her necklace rattling a little from the movement, drawing his gaze like a moth to flame. The blackened shards of cannelloni hung in all their broken, uncooked glory. It was completely unappetizing but right now it looked like a goddam feast and Nick wanted nothing more than to eat it right off her neck.

“You know,” he said, his laughter ebbing, “we’ve had a food source all along.”

Her laughter also petered out as she glanced at her chest. “No.” She looked up, her eyes meeting his as she shook her head. “I might be starving but I am not that desperate.”

Nick knew how she felt except now the idea was out there, it wouldn’t go away. Eating food off her skin, even uncooked and dyed black, was suddenly all he could think about.

Pushing to all fours, Nick quirked an eyebrow. “Just a nibble?”

“Nick.”

He wasn’t sure if the tone in her voice was a warning to stop or a plea to come closer. All he knew was she was watching him intently and nothing could have stopped him creeping slowly forward, watching her watch him get ever closer.

“ Nick. ”

Her voice was husky and tremulous, still sounding halfway between invitation and warning as he inched closer. He stopped when he could get no closer, his fingers brushing the denim of her thighs, his head angling to access her neck, the pulse of her carotid a hypnotic flutter.

“It’ll taste awful,” she whispered, a hitch in her breath.

“To hell with the pasta,” he growled, lifting his chin, bringing their mouths level, the husky stir of her breath playing on his face. “I’m not hungry anymore.”

Nick closed the distance between them, his lips pressing to hers and he knew he was wrong. So wrong. He was very, very hungry.

Hell, he wanted to spend the rest of his life kissing her.

The kiss escalated dramatically along with his heart rate and, before he knew it, they were both on their knees in the middle of the lift, trolleys on one side, the back wall of the lift on the other, his body burning up as it pressed to hers, his hands sliding to her ass, cupping it, urging her closer, stoking and soothing the ache in his groin at the same time.

Yes. This . With her . Only with her.

Nick pushed his tongue into her mouth and devoured the nonsensical noises of pleasure rising from her throat, giving her some of his own as she ground against him muttering, “ Yes, Nick. God, yes ,” turning his already raging boner to stone and he knew he’d willingly stay in this broken-down elevator forever if she kept saying his name like that.

Like only he could make her feel what she was feeling.

Nick was used to women calling his name, screaming it as he drove the puck toward the net, but this wasn’t adulation or hero worship. It wasn’t performative.

It was the real deal.

As one, they sank to the floor, her legs spreading to accommodate him then clamping around his hips, holding him tight and moaning his name like she couldn’t get enough. And he knew exactly how she felt, his skin sizzling, his breath heaving, almost crazed with the desire to feel her clamped tight around him from the inside.

Then the phone rang.

It pierced their passion as easily as bullets through butter and Nick sat back abruptly as if he was a horny fifteen-year-old sprung by an angry father. His heart thundered in his ribcage as he dragged in breaths, watching Samantha lying motionless, blinking in confusion as if coming out of a trance, her chest moving as erratically as his.

“Nick?” she asked, clearly as nonplussed as he as to how they’d gone from sitting upright and reading to horizontal and grinding on each other.

The phone jangled on his last nerve and, on autopilot, Nick stood and turned away, taking the two paces in its direction, opening the door and snatching up the receiver.

“What?” he demanded, his voice ragged as he tried to collect himself.

“The elevator should be going any minute now.”

The voice was the same as before. Male. Older. “Oh… great… thanks.”

“And just so you know, should you and the young lady decide to pick up where you left off, the elevator has security cameras.”

Nick looked above his head and saw a partially hidden camera. Well, fuck. He hadn’t even thought about cameras. The last thing he’d wanted was to put on some OnlyFans show for a bunch of bored security guys. Or worse, have footage going viral of Hawkeye and an unknown woman getting it on in a broken-down elevator.

He waved at the camera. “Thanks for the warning.”

“Can’t be too careful, sir. I think the NHL can do without another sex tape incident.”

Nick gave a half laugh, remembering the scandal from the start of the last season that had sucked up way too much airtime. “Thanks again.”

By the time he replaced the phone, Samantha was on her feet, busying herself with collecting her bag and replacing the books and the elevator had whirred into action. Five floors later it touched down and the door dinged then slipped open.

“Can we never talk about this again?” she asked as they pushed their carts out.

Right now, as Nick tried to wrap his head around the startling speed of what had happened, it didn’t seem like such a bad suggestion. “Sure… okay. What happens in the elevator stays in the elevator.”

“Plan,” she agreed.

And that was that.