Beer and hockey.
That’s where it’s at.
I didn’t know what “it” was and where “it” was, but I was currently sitting at the hockey arena, a beer in hand, watching some holy hottie hockey gods on the ice, so yeah, I was thinking I was where “it” was supposed to be. Life was good. Beer and hockey.
“I gotta take a piss.”
I stifled a grin because only my roommate, who looked like a real-life Barbie, talked in a way that in no way was Barbie-like at all. Made me love her even more for it.
I gave a nod. The second period was ending, and I glanced at my beer. It was a third empty.
I made a decision, right then and there. Because I was decisive—it’s a word that I had to recently explain to a parolee of mine, and I had to explain in detail to the nth degree. She didn’t know what setting goals was or what being decisive meant. I’d enjoyed the conversation. Her eyes were glazed, and her drug test was negative, so I knew it was the topic boring her. Too bad. We both had to endure that conversation, though it wasn’t her that had me needing my current beer. It was the three parolees after her that I checked on. All of them together made me need the last beer, and my next beer was being dedicated to the two home visits I’d be doing tomorrow.
Not looking forward to those, but it was part of the job. So as Kelly was making her way to the stairs, I went right behind her.
Kelly drew the eye. Platinum-blonde hair. A slender and almost model-like body. Blue eyes. Barbie, like I said. She got looks from males and females, and I understood, especially after her recent boob job. She’d been my roommate since college and after. The only time we’d taken apart from each other was when she’d moved in with a boyfriend-turned-fiancé, who was now an ex-husband. He’d cheated on her, so she got a decent-size settlement from him, and I got my best friend back. Score for me, sucked for him. But the thing I loved about Kelly was that she was flexible. I came home and told her I needed a drink, and she said she won two tickets to the New York Stallions hockey game. It was meant to be, the way I was figuring.
She glanced back, saw me following her.
I tipped my cup up and drained it to her unspoken question.
She turned, going the rest of the way with a laugh. Almost like we’d done this before (because we had), she went for the bathroom, and I went to the beer concession stand.
“Oh, ho, ho, ho. Hey there.”
The jovial greeting sounded out from one of the workers, a big burly guy. I had to take a second to appreciate what I was seeing. I knew this guy. He’d been a parolee in the past, not mine, but I’d been in the hallway a few times he had a disagreement with his current parole officer at that time. He liked to go by the name Jimi Hendrix, but we all called him Jimmy. And with Jimmy, unfortunately, there’d been a lot of disagreements.
So, he was on parole a lot.
“Jimmy.” I was scanning him up and down. He’d lost thirty pounds, which I caught because I needed to know that for my job, but on him, it was barely noticeable. The guy was six five and 310. Or now, 280? I was also noting the beer he was serving. “How are you doing?”
He caught my tone, and his grin upped a degree. “I’m off parole. You don’t need to be worried about reporting me. Finished it, got a good place to live, and got this job. I’m working at a grocery store, bagging groceries, too, Miss Jess.”
That was another thing about Jimmy. I was normally Officer Montell, but Jimmy somehow got away with calling me Miss Jess. A couple of his coworkers were checking me out like I was his ex-lady, and I saw the speculation in their eyes. I had no interest in dating either of them.
“You wanna beer, Miss Jess?”
“Uh . . . sure.” Felt odd taking a beer from a past parolee, but okay then. As he was pouring, still seeing some of the interest from his coworkers, I reached into my purse for my phone and my badge. The badge got hung around my neck. I didn’t need to brandish it here, but they saw it, and it did the job. The interest fell flat, and I got a couple sneers instead.
I pulled up Travis, a coworker, and sent him a text.
Jess: Jimi Hendrix is off parole?
He buzzed back almost right away.
Asshole Coworker 1: Yeah. Why?
Jess: Just wondering, saw him. He looks good.
Asshole Coworker 1: He in trouble?
Jess: Nope. Bye.
My phone buzzed again, but I didn’t like Travis. The feeling was mutual, more than mutual actually. Derek Travis. He’d been up my ass for as long as I’d been working as a parole officer. Didn’t know why or what his problem was since they needed female parole officers. I did my job, did it well, and only butted heads with him a couple of times. But I’d asked about Jimmy because I needed to make sure, and he’d answered. The topic was done as far as I was concerned. I wasn’t going to give him any reason to bug Jimmy, but sometimes they lied, hence the text.
“Here you go, Miss Jess.”
Even with Jimmy’s outbursts or disagreements, I always liked him. He couldn’t handle his temper at times, but he was usually funny about it, swinging on himself more than swinging on others. Ninety-five percent of the time, he didn’t want to hurt anyone else.
“What do I owe you, Jimmy?”
His smile was almost blinding, his two massive hands resting on the sides of the register and his big frame hunched forward and down. That’d been one of his old habits, I was remembering too. He tried to make himself smaller than he was, usually to make others feel more comfortable around him.
“Nothing, Miss Jess. It’s on me.”
I glanced to his coworkers, seeing one watching us with a bit too much interest for my liking. I leaned closer to Jimmy and lowered my voice. “Are you sure that you got the cash on you?”
He started to bolster up, his mouth opening, a pink color coming to his neck, more than what it was, but I kept on. “Because I know you travel with as little cash as necessary. Your heart’s in the right place, but if you find yourself short on the exact cash, I wouldn’t want someone to notice and let your boss know, if you get my drift.” My eyes darted to that coworker trying to listen in. He’d washed the same two-by-two inches of counter eighteen times now.
Getting my drift, Jimmy’s shoulders sank even lower. “Sorry, Miss Jess. You’re right.” He told me the amount I owed, and I handed over the cash. When he started to give me the change, I waved my hand, indicating he should keep it. He was putting it in their tip jar when I headed off.
Going to the stairs, I scanned for our seats. Kelly wasn’t there.
Knowing I’d need a bathroom break myself before too long, I sipped my beer and headed in the direction Kelly had gone.
The line was too long at the first one, but being the slightly buzzed savvy parole officer I was, I knew there’d be more bathrooms farther away from the main area. I kept going, and I had half my beer sipped before I found a door. It said “bathrooms” and had an arrow, so I was following the arrow.
I surged through, and oh crap.
I was in the exit stairwell. I’d made a mistake.
I turned, reaching for the door, when I heard just above me, “—hear about it. I do not care.”
I moved back, angled my head. He wasn’t all the way up to the next floor, but he was halfway up to the top. His back was turned slightly toward the stairway, and he was talking on the phone. “Yes. Yes.”
I should go. That was a private call, not my business.
I pushed the door handle to go out, but nothing. The door was locked.
I was locked inside.
Well, shitters.
I had a beer. I’d soon have a bladder that would need to be emptied, and that guy was still on his phone.
“—wait. Someone is here.”
Oh, double shitters.
I turned when he started down the stairs.
I called up, “I’m sorry! I didn’t know these doors . . .” I trailed off as he turned the corner, now facing me and coming down the stairs directly to me. And I trailed off because good gracious, this man was one of the most beautiful men I’d ever seen.
He had pretty features. His eyes were a gray-hazel color, and yes, even from this distance, I was struck at how clear they were. His cheekbones were set wide on the sides of his face, but he had such a square jawline that it worked for him. He was rugged but handsome and hot all at the same time. I was putting his height at six four. Weight at 210. He was dressed in some seriously nice threads, all business suit. His shoes were the expensive kind, like what I would joke that a Wall Street dude would wear to a hockey game. At seeing me, he paused, but then a wicked grin slowly spread over his face, and that knocked me back a bit too.
It was almost a nice punch to my sternum, one to shock me more than incapacitate me.
He spoke into the phone: “Excuse me a bit.” I could hear the other person talking, but he ended the call and put his phone into his pocket. “Hello.”
He was looking me up and down, looking like a bored cat who had come across a mouse and had a new toy to play with.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt your phone—”
“On the contrary, thank you very much.” He came down a few more steps. “I needed an excuse to get off the call.”
I shifted backward, giving him space—or myself space—as he continued until he was on the step right above, looking down. “I was looking for the bathroom.”
“These are the stairs.” His voice was a low baritone croon, and he was still doing the eye thing where he wasn’t just assessing me, but he was reading my soul, and he was enjoying whatever he was reading. If I were a character in a book, I might’ve likened him to a vampire. I almost started laughing because how ridiculous was I? Getting nervous with this guy, who it was very apparent was in a whole different tax bracket than me. But normal me wouldn’t have cared. Normal me wouldn’t have stuck around this long either.
I nodded as he stepped down, facing me directly. “I realized. There’s a sign that said ‘bathrooms’ and pointed in here. I came in, not remembering the doors lock behind you.”
“Right.” He still had that smile, his eyes sparking up. “Because if you read the sign on the door, it would’ve said ‘emergency exit only.’ And that it locks.”
I refused to flush for this guy. Nope. But the back of my neck did get heated. A little bit.
“Yeah. My mistake.” My tone was cool, and I was giving him the look to back off.
That seemed to amuse him even more. “What’s your name?”
I bristled. “None of your business, how about that?”
His eyes went to smoldering. This guy wasn’t normal. “Sass.” His tone went soft. “I like it.”
That made me bristle even more. “Excuse me?” I shifted back, getting in a stance as I automatically started thinking how to handle him if he made a move.
As if reading my mind, or feeling the air shift, he drew back. The smoldering effect lessened, but just a little. It was still there. I was still amusing him, and I didn’t know how I felt about that either. “You have no idea who I am.”
I frowned. “That gets you off or something?”
His grin turned inward, showing off a dimple.
God. The dimple. What female didn’t have a thing for a cheek dimple? That wasn’t fair. Some of my bristling eased up.
He chuckled, still in that baritone, and it was sensual too. “Apparently it does with you. Trust me. I’m just as shocked as you seem to be.” His eyes sharpened. “Are you here with someone?”
I straightened out of the fighting stance I’d assumed and relaxed, only slightly. “My roommate.”
Another spark of interest in those eyes of his. “Is your roommate a significant other? Or just a roommate?”
Damn. He was direct, and fast about it.
If I’d been at the bar and in the mood for a one-nighter, this conversation would have a whole different ending. I liked guys who were direct. A lot.
“She’s my best friend.” I saw the next question forming, so I added, “And she’s straight.”
His head lowered, those eyes of his softening. “And you? Who are you into?”
My throat swelled up. I didn’t know why, but I felt entranced by him.
He took a step closer, slowly.
I couldn’t tear my gaze away, and I couldn’t take a step back. I didn’t want to.
A part of me was railing at myself, in the back of my head, but my heart was pounding, and my throat was still swollen. My body was heating, and an ache was forming between my legs.
This man, what was he doing to me?
This reaction didn’t happen to me, ever.
“Who are you into, Miss . . . ?” His head cocked to the side, like he could lure me into answering him.
I wanted to do just that too.
My lips parted from surprise, but then his eyes shifted to my shirt, and everything changed. Abruptly.
He’d been seductive and coaxing. And then nothing. Frigid cold.
I even shivered, feeling his withdrawal though he hadn’t moved a muscle.
I followed his eyes down to my sternum. My badge was sticking out from my jacket, but when I looked back up, I sucked in my breath. His eyes were on me, and they were not friendly. They were hostile. All that flirting was gone in an instant.
“You a cop?” His tone was flat, cutting.
“I’m a parole officer.”
His phone started ringing again, and he fished it out of his pocket. Without saying a word to me, he hit accept and turned to go back up the stairs. “Hey. Hold one moment. I’m heading for the door. Open it for me.”
I couldn’t suppress a shiver as he disappeared around the turn, going up the last set of stairs.
Thump!
The door opened. Sounds from the hockey game filtered into the stairwell, and then they were muted again.
I waited, but nothing.
He’d gone.
What the hell had just happened?
Also, I was still locked in.
