The team left the ice, the sound of their skates marching back to their locker room echoing through the halls.

Ric stopped and looked back at the rink. He shook his head and glanced over at Lock who stood next to him.

“He’s a fucking machine,” Lock muttered. “He never stops.”

Truer words had never been spoken.

Together the friends watched the hybrid continue to run drills. They watched for about five minutes, then they headed to the locker room and left Bo “The Marauder” Novikov alone on the ice—exactly where he seemed to belong.

CHAPTER 6

Bo shot through the goal crease and slammed the puck into the net.

“Morning!”

That voice cut through his focus, and without breaking his stride, Bo changed direction and skated over to the rink entrance. He stopped hard, ice spraying out from his skates, and stood in front of the wolfdog.

He stared down at her and she stared up at him. She kept smiling even when he didn’t. Finally he asked, “What time did we agree on?”

“Seven,” she replied with a cheery note that put his teeth on edge.

“And what time is it?”

“Uh . . .” She dug into her jeans and pulled out a cell phone. The fact that she still had on that damn, useless watch made his head want to explode. How did one function—as an adult anyway—without a goddamn watch?

Grinning so that he could see all those perfectly aligned teeth, she said, “Six forty-five!”

“And what time did we agree on?”

She blinked and her smile faded. After a moment, “Seven.”

“Is it seven?”

“No.” When he only continued to stare at her, she softly asked, “Want to meet me at the track at seven?”

He continued to stare at her until she nodded and said, “Okay.”

She walked out and Bo went back to work.

Fifteen minutes later, Bo walked into the small arena. Blayne, looking comfortable in dark blue leggings, sweatshirt, and skates, turned to face him. He expected her to be mad at him or, even worse, for her to get that wounded look he often got from people when he was blatantly direct. But having to deal with either of those scenarios was a price Bo was always willing to pay to ensure that the people in his life understood how he worked from the beginning. This way, there were no surprises later. It was called “boundaries,” and he read about it in a book.

Yet when Blayne saw him, she grinned and held up a Starbucks cup. “Coffee,” she said when he got close. “I got you the house brand because I had no idea what you would like. And they had cinnamon twists, so I got you a few of those.”

He took the coffee, watching her close. Where was it? The anger? The resentment? Was she plotting something?

Blayne held the bag of sweets out for him and Bo took them. “Thank you,” he said, still suspicious even ashe sipped his perfectly brewed coffee.

“You’re welcome.” And there went that grin again. Big and brighter than the damn sun. “And I get it. Seven means seven. Eight means eight, et cetera, et cetera. Got it and I’m on it. It won’t happen again.” She said all that without a trace of bitterness or annoyance, dazzling Bo with her understanding more than she’d dazzled him with those legs.

“So.” She put her hands on her hips. “What do you want me to do first?”

Marry me? Wait. No, no. Incorrect response. It’ll just weird her out and make her run again. Normal. Be normal. You can do this. You’re not just a great skater. You’re a normal great skater.

When Bo knew he had his shit together, he said, “Let’s work on your focus first. And, um, should I ask what happened to your face?” She had a bunch of cuts on her cheeks. Gouges. Like something small had pawed at her.

“Nope!” she chirped, pulling off her sweatshirt. She wore a worn blue T-shirt underneath with B&G PLUMBING scrawled across it. With sweatshirt in hand, Blayne skated over to the bleachers, stopped, shook her head, skated over to another section of bleachers, stopped, looked at the sweatshirt, turned around, and skated over to the railing. “I should leave it here,” she explained. “In case I get chilly.”

It occurred to Bo he’d just lost two minutes of his life watching her try to figure out where to place a damn sweatshirt. Two minutes that he’d never get back.

“Woo-hoo!” she called out once she hit the track. “Let’s go!”

She was skating backward as she urged him to join her with both hands.

He pointed behind her. “Watch the—”

“Ow!”

“—pole.”

Christ, what had he gotten himself into?

Christ almighty, what had she gotten herself into?

Twenty minutes in and she wanted to smash the man’s head against a wall. She wanted to go back in time and kick the shit out of Genghis Khan before turning on his brothers, Larry and Moe. Okay. That wasn’t their names but she could barely remember Genghis’s name on a good day, how the hell was she supposed to remember his brothers’? But whatever the Khan kin’s names may be, Blayne wanted to hurt them all for cursing her world with this . . . this . . . Visigoth!

Even worse, she knew he didn’t even take what she did seriously. He insisted on calling it a chick sport. If he were a sexist pig across the board, Blayne could overlook it as a mere flaw in his upbringing. But, she soon discovered, Novikov had a very high degree of respect for female athletes. . . as long as they were athletes and not just “hot chicks in cute outfits, roughing each other up. All you guys need is some hot oil or mud and you’d have a real moneymaker on your hands.”