Puck Prince (Houston Scythes Hockey #1)

45. Callie

45

CALLIE

I’m stretched onto my toes, trying to wedge books on the top shelf of my already overstuffed, microscopic office closet when a hand suddenly covers mine.

I yelp and spin around, but Spencer, ever calm and collected, doesn’t flinch as he finishes sliding the books into place for me.

“You scared me.” I laugh a little. The office the university gave me is small enough that two people can barely fit inside. He’s standing so close that our bodies brush with every breath.

It’s like this every time we’re together.

Every time we’re alone, anyway.

When the team is around, he doesn’t look at me or smile in that way that practically melts me into my shoes. We can’t go to any of the restaurants in town together. Even walking to our cars together at the end of practice is against his rules.

But my office in the far back corner of a long, dim hallway is always where he finds me. It felt illicit and exciting at first.

Now, I feel like a dirty little secret.

“You look good today,” he rumbles. His hand is braced on the edge of the shelf above my head, boxing me in.

“Thanks.” I swallow the nerves clogging my throat. “But you shouldn’t be here.”

He curls his hand, fingers brushing along my cheek. “Why not?”

“Because I told you ? —”

“You told me you didn’t want to be a secret forever. And you won’t be.” He twirls a strand of my hair around his finger. “Not forever.”

I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be sweet or not, but this is not the Spencer I had dinner with all those weeks ago. He took me to a little Italian hole in the wall outside of town and asked me what it was like being a woman in a male-dominated field. He listened to me complain about men never taking me seriously, about his teammates hitting on me constantly, about everyone assuming I must sleep with all the men I work with.

He seemed to actually care.

Now, I don’t think he’s even hearing me.

“I don’t want to be a secret at all, Spence. You don’t want to tell the team about us, and that’s fine. But it means there is no ‘us.’ I’m sorry.”

I really am sorry.

At the end of our date, he walked me to my car, thanked me for a great evening, and asked if he could kiss me.

I drove home convinced I’d just had the last first date of my life.

Now, it’s over before it could even begin.

“How sorry?” His lips pull into a smile as he leans over me, shoving me back into the closet. A box jabs me in the spine, and I wince, but he keeps coming.

This is not the Spencer I thought I knew.

“I really should get back to–”

He burrows his face into my neck. “You smell good, too.”

“Spencer.” I push against his chest. “We shouldn’t. We can’t.”

“Why not? We’ve been seeing each other for a while.”

We’ve been on one undercover date and had several ill-advised makeout sessions in my office. That doesn’t qualify as “seeing” each other.

“We’re at work, and I… I don’t know if I’m ready.”

He jerks back just far enough to look at me. “What are you, a virgin?”

“Of course not,” I answer. It’s not a lie. “I just don’t want to sleep with a guy who doesn’t want to be seen with me in public.”

Spencer frowns, his jaw tight. “And I’m not going to call some chick my girlfriend when she doesn’t even want to touch me.”

There’s a sharp edge to his words that feels dangerous.

“Spencer.”

“I’ve been good to you, Callie. But you’ve been cold to me. I don’t think it’s fair.” His hand finds my hip, his fingers digging into my skin. “I feel like you’re leading me on. You tease me, but you won’t let me close.”

“I’m not teasing you, I’m ? —”

“Good. Then let me touch you.” He kisses my neck, and I try to squirm away from him, but he shoves me deeper into the closet.

“Spencer, stop.”

I push harder on his chest, but he doesn’t budge.

I thought him being so big and broad was a good thing, but I feel trapped now.

“Spencer, stop!”

“What the fuck, Callie?” he growls. But he backs away.

All I feel is relief. Finally, I can breathe.

But when he looks at me again, the darkness in his eyes chills me to the bone.

“Why do you have to make this complicated? Why do you have to ruin this for me? I was so fucking close, but you won’t just spread your legs like I know you want to. Maybe the guys were right about you, ice queen.”

My eyes fill with hot, angry tears. “What are you talking about?”

“It was a bet!” He lets out a bitter laugh. “Me and the guys made a bet over who could get you in bed first. As you know, I love to compete. But I didn’t realize you were gonna make me put a ring on it before I could get inside of you.”

He’s being so crass; it’s making me sick.

I can barely understand what he’s saying except that it’s bad—really, really bad. And I want him to leave.

I shove on his chest again. “Get out.”

But Spencer’s mouth just tugs into a sinister smile. “No.”

I blink up at him, unsure where to go from here.

Unfortunately, Spencer has a plan.

“I could’ve gotten you drunk at dinner and carried you to my bed, but no, I was a gentleman about it. You, on the other hand, are a bitch. And I’m tired of waiting.”

Spencer stands in front of me again, his chest against mine. He’s staring down at me with a rage in his eyes that would make the devil cower.

He grabs me by the back of the neck and forces my mouth to his.

His lips are cold and hard, smashing my lips against my teeth. Blood bursts in my mouth, and I twist my face away. “What are you doing?!”

When I try to push him away, he grabs my wrists and pins them behind my back.

“I’m going to win that bet.”

The memory takes hold of me, strangles me. I pull oxygen in and out of my lungs in great, heaving gasps.

I don’t know what to do.

Where to go.

He’s out there.

I press my back to the bathroom door, staring at the tiled walls all around me. I’m trapped.

Spencer is doing this on purpose. He planned this whole thing. The paparazzi. The blocked exit. All of it.

After he attacked me in my office, I waited until he was gone—until everyone in the building was gone. And then I left.

When the university contacted me a few days later, I told them I resigned for personal reasons and left it at that. I never told anyone. Not even Kennedy. Uncle Randy knows more of the story than anyone, but even he doesn’t know what happened in that closet.

But rumors simmered until they came to a boil. Someone saw us out to dinner at an Italian restaurant weeks earlier.

Someone else claimed to have seen him slipping into my office.

Without me breathing a word, Spencer was suspected, and he was pissed.

I blocked his number, moved to another city, and got a new job, but Spencer is relentless.

So very relentless.

And as I sit in a shaking puddle on the bathroom floor, I know that he is never ever going to stop.

I put my hand on my stomach and try to catch my breath.

I have to do something. I can’t just sit here and wait for him to find me. I can’t risk what he might do to me… to my baby.

But what can I do?

I can scream, but it would cause a scene, and I’d be in even more headlines. The paparazzi are literally camped out waiting for the juiciest story they can get.

I could tell Kennedy, but I don’t want her anywhere near Spencer Santos again—not if I can help it.

Yelling for the manager, pulling the fire alarm, trying to squeeze myself through a too-small window and having to be cut free—no, no, no.

I hear a noise in the hallway and freeze. I slowly press my ear to the door, trying to listen for any sound of him.

Is he still there waiting for me?

Oh god. Oh god.

I squeeze my eyes shut and pull my phone out.

I know what I want.

What I need.

All I can do is pray he’ll pick up the phone.