Blue Lines: The Assassins Series: A Loveswept Contemporary Romance (36 page)

Puck bunnies.

His mind was telling him to walk away but he didn’t. He wasn’t sure what he was thinking
as a smile came across his face before reaching for a puck one of the girls had held
out for him to autograph.

“Are you ready for the season?” one of them asked.

Erik nodded as he signed the paraphernalia they held out for him. “I am; are you guys
ready?”

“So ready,” one of them cooed. “Can I take my picture with you?”

Erik glanced up as his heartbeat quickened. The girl was gorgeous, slutty gorgeous,
the way he used to like his females. Pinning her with a grin, he said, “Through the
fence?”

She nodded, bringing one of her lips between a set of perfectly, straight, white teeth.

“Yeah, unless you want to climb over, I promise, we’ll take good care of you.”

Erik chuckled, his cock straining against the zipper of his jeans. He tried to ignore
it, tried to ignore the girls, but it was hard. Closing his eyes, trying to get his
head straight, he took in a deep breath when someone called his name.

“Titov, come on.”

Erik looked over his shoulder to see Phillip calling after him. Thankful for the distraction,
he waved goodbye to the bunnies and walked over to Phillip. Reaching his best friend,
he saw that he was upset.

“What’s wrong?” Erik asked as they entered the back entrance.

“My sister has been calling me all week,” he said, moving his hand through his hair.
Like him, Phillip didn’t have a great childhood, but unlike Erik, Phillip wasn’t fucked-up
from it. His dad left when he was young and his mom turned to drugs. She died soon
after he joined the Assassins, leaving behind Phillip and his older sister and her
daughter. He thought that when his mother died all the crap would have stopped, but
apparently his sister followed down the same path as their mother and was deep into
drugs, too. One would think that no one could overcome such a crap-ass family, but
Phillip had.

With a shake of his head, Phillip said, “She wants money, says my niece is starving.”

Erik nodded. “Do you believe it?”

“No, I know she just wants money for God knows what, but I was thinking of sending
the money to Claire myself, but then I know how she is; she does anything for her
mom.”

Erik shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t think you should send it. I’m pretty sure Claire
is okay; if not, she would call you.”

Phillip nodded. “Yeah, I didn’t think of that. Thanks.”

“No problem,” Erik said, trying to walk away, but Phillip stopped him.

“What were you doing?”

Erik shook his head. “Nothing.”

“I saw your face. You were flirting with those girls.”

Erik made a face. “I was not, I was signing autographs. Don’t worry, it was nothing.”

But it was everything.

What was he thinking?

Phillip shook his head as he started to walk away, but Erik stopped him. “Okay, maybe
it is something.” Phillip turned with a knowing grin as Erik went on: “I don’t really
know if I love her or not. I thought I might but I’m not sure.”

“What? What happened? You told me you guys were solid only a couple of days ago,”
Phillip said with a frustrated look on his face as they entered the locker room. “They
are just whores; don’t let them fuck with your head.”

“No, I got hard, Phillip. I wanted to put my dick so far down that girl’s throat and
get lost in the pleasure,” Erik confessed, shaking his head. “If I loved Piper, why
would I want that?”

“Dude, we are men. We all want sex all the time. It’s okay. It’s not like you did
it.”

“But I could have.”

“But would you?” Phillip asked.

Erik shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Phillip paused as he shook his head. “Hey, Shea,” he called, causing Erik to whip
his head around. “Does your dick get stiff when you see other girls?”

Shea made a face of disgust as he shook his head. “What kind of question is that,
Anderson?”

“It’s a good one. You are a married man. I need to know if when I get married, I’ll
still have that problem.”

The guys all laughed as Shea shook his head. “No, I love my wife; she is enough for
me.”

“Liar,” Lucas said, throwing a sock at Shea. “We are men, and we live, breathe, and
think sex every chance we get. If you don’t get hot when you see a hot piece of ass,
then you aren’t a man.”

“I don’t agree. I think that my fiancée is enough. I don’t even have to look at another
female,” Tate answered.

“There is a difference from not having to look, to having a pair of perfect tits in
your face,” Karson King, a defenseman, said. “No man can look away from that; if he
can, then his woman has him pussy-whipped and I commend them.”

“Yup,” Lucas said with a nod. “I have the finest wife ever. Nice tight ass, great
tits, and
man, a mouth that can bring me to my knees, but when I pick my son up from school
and his teacher gives me this look, I swear my cock goes so hard, man,” he said with
his eyes closed, making some of the guys laugh while others shook their head. “Ah!
I just want to smash something, but it goes away before I even get home. I don’t want
her; I want my wife. It’s not a big deal as long as you don’t act on it.”

Erik didn’t know who to believe. All he knew was that he was in trouble because he
was worried that he was on the brink of fucking up and hurting Piper, which was the
last thing he wanted. He thought he loved her, he thought they were moving forward,
but with one glance down a girl’s dress he suddenly didn’t know what to do.

With a heavy heart, Erik started to suit up. He had no clue what he was going to do
but he knew that he needed to figure it out. The baby was coming soon and it wasn’t
fair to anyone if he couldn’t get his shit straight.

Man, he was fucked.

* * *

Piper threw her pencil down as she leaned back, stretching her back out as her little
man kicked and moved through her. She loved these moments, treasured them, but she
did not like the moments when she was cringing with pain from those stupid Braxton
Hicks. The night before was horrible; she had been hurting all night and didn’t get
much sleep. She was so scared that the Braxton Hicks pains were actually more. She
was afraid that she was starting labor and was going to have her baby on the living
room floor, because everyone told her not to worry, those pains were not a big deal.
She had even called Harper and then Elli to ask them, and they said the same thing,
that it happens and Piper was fine.

Something was off, though, something didn’t feel right, and that made her nervous.
Moving through the house, she made her way to the back room, where Dimitri would sleep.
The walls were a beautiful teal color with black trim. All Dimitri’s furniture had
been set up, his crib looking pristine in the middle of the room because she hadn’t
hung his letters yet.

Looking at the mural she had been working on since they had come up with a theme she
had to admire how perfectly it was coming along. A team of whales playing a team of
dolphins in a backyard game of ice hockey; under the ice were schools of fish and
sharks cheering them
on. It made no sense and was totally unrealistic but Erik had loved it. It was sweet
and each of the little whales had all of their friends’ jersey numbers, including
a number for Dimitri.

Even though she would love to have Dimitri in her arms, she needed him to wait. Hopefully,
he wasn’t like his daddy, impatient as hell. She wanted him healthy and perfect. When
she brought him home from the hospital she would rock him to sleep in the beautiful
black rocking chair that Alla had sent her. She needed her body to be strong and to
hold her baby just a few more weeks. She prayed for that, because things weren’t ready
yet.

* * *

Letting out a pent-up breath, she reached for Dimitri’s letters. She was going to
glue bright teal and black ribbons on them before Erik got home to hang them.

Piper was putting a ribbon on the second
i
in Dimitri’s name when she heard the front door open, which got Stanley barking.
She smiled as she hollered out, “Hey, babe, I’m in the baby’s room!”

“Okay,” she heard him say.

She listened as he moved through the house and was surprised that he didn’t come straight
back to the nursery. After a while, he finally did and she could tell he had had a
hard day. Leaning against the door he looked over at her as she continued to glue.

“How was camp?”

He shrugged, looking extremely tired. She felt horrible for him, wanted to come over
and hug him, hoping to make it better.

Taking in a deep breath before blowing it out, he said, “Fine.”

“That’s good. Was it nice to see everyone?”

He gave her a quick nod. “Yeah.”

Well, doesn’t he have a lot to say?
she thought with a smile. He must have been more tired than she thought and who could
blame him? She was exhausted and she hadn’t skated all morning like he had.

Looking up at him, she asked, “Do you still want to help me hang these letters?”

“Sure,” he said as he moved into the room, grabbing the hammer and nails before getting
started. Since he obviously didn’t want to talk, Piper didn’t say anything either,
as they hung the
letters. She could tell that he was upset about something or maybe just worn-out.
Did he not have a good day? Did something happen?

“Is everything okay?”

He nodded, not looking at her. “Yeah, I have a lot on my mind.”

“Wanna talk about it?” she asked.

He looked down at her, his eyes sad as he shook his head.

“No, I’m fine. How are you? Have you had any of those Hicks?”

She shook her head. “I’ve been okay, nothing like last night.”

“That’s good,” he said with a nod before hammering another nail into the wall.

“I have been thinking about something, though,” she said, eyeing him, seeing if he
wanted to talk anymore.

He turned to look at her. “Yeah?”

She bit her lip before looking up at him. She wasn’t sure if she should bring it up
but she kind of already had. “I think after I get done with Emmaline’s book, I want
to do something else.”

He was emotionless in a way; he just continued to stare at her. “Oh?”

She nodded as the idea became more real to her. She’d been thinking about this last
night as she lay in bed fighting the false contractions and really, it was a great
idea. She hated what she was doing, she was ready to quit, and if Erik was going to
back her up that was all she needed. “Yeah, I think I want to do murals for a living.
I know I could get Elli to hire me for stuff and I was thinking about calling that
girl who painted Audrey’s stuff to join me, like go into business with me.”

Excitement was written all over her face as Erik continued to stare at her. When his
head started to move from side to side, her smile fell.

“How long have you been doing the books?”

She shrugged her shoulder, not knowing why that mattered, but she answered anyway,
“A year and a half.”

“Okay, so you don’t think that you should give it a little bit longer than that before
you give up? I mean you can’t keep doing this Piper; you have to settle down, be an
adult.”

Whoa.

“I am an adult, Erik.”

“No,” he snapped. “You are acting like a child; you can’t keep doing this. You have
to settle down. What are you going to do, get tired of being a mom and give the baby
to Harper or something? I mean shit, Piper.”

He threw the hammer down, pushing it away as he looked up at the ceiling. Piper was
speechless as she blinked up at him.

“What the hell, Erik? That’s a little harsh, don’t you think? I wouldn’t do that.”

Erik shook his head, running his hand through his hair as he started to pace the room.
Something was seriously wrong and she had no clue what it was.

“What is your problem?” she asked.

He stopped, pinning her with a dirty look. “Maybe that was harsh, but Piper, it is
ridiculous. You can’t make your mind up about anything and you change your mind constantly
and it drives me insane,” he said, letting out an exasperated breath. “I can’t help
but think about myself. Are you going to get tired of me? Leave me?”

Her eyes widened as she shook her head quickly. “No, Erik, why would I do that?”

“Because I’m a fuckup. I can’t commit and I fucking can’t keep it in my pants. I told
you I wasn’t the guy for you and instead you convinced me to stay around, that maybe
I was worth it, but I know I’m not.”

Piper’s heart kicked up in speed. She felt like her limbs were going numb as she took
in deep breaths. “Erik, you are not a fuckup. What is wrong with you? Where in the
world is this all coming from?”

He let out a long breath as he shook his head. “Piper, I don’t know, I’m freaking
out because you are so fucking indecisive and all I see is you leaving me once I give
you my heart.”

“Erik, no, I wouldn’t do that. I love you.”

He scoffed, shaking his head once more. “How can you say that? How can I believe you
when you say you used to love drawing for authors but now you don’t, or dancing, or
whatever else you used to do?” Piper was already shaking her head.

“Those are careers, and you are my husband—yes, I say husband because when I said
‘I do,’ I meant it. You are the man I want for forever,” she said as he looked away,
shaking his head. “Erik, I love you, I have for years, and you are the only thing
I’m sure of. I know that it is supposed to be me, you, and Dimitri for the rest of
my life. How can you think that I would think anything differently?”

“I don’t know.”

Piper dropped the ribbon she was holding, coming to stand in front of him. When she
reached for him he immediately pulled away “Erik, I am not Katria; I am not going
to hurt you.”

He shook his head, taking a step back. “I don’t know if I can believe you, Piper.”

He moved his hands down his face, letting out a strangled breath as he looked everywhere
but at her.