Las Vegas Sidewinders: Drake (Book 2) (31 page)

If you enjoyed Drake
and Erin’s story, get ready for Karl and Kate! They’ll be steaming up your
e-readers on April 19, 2016… and there’s a sweet excerpt for you on the next
page!

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about my books and the Sidewinders, you can follow me online:

Las Vegas
Sidewinders: Karl (Book 3)

Chapter 1

The crowd at Franklin
Bank Arena in Las Vegas was deafening. Skating out onto the ice, Karl
Martensson felt a momentary rush before remembering that even though his team
was playing, he would be sitting on the bench. As the back-up goalie for the
Las Vegas Sidewinders, he’d played a fair number of games during the regular
season, but during the playoffs they went with their starter, Marco Rousch, who
never let Karl forget who was number one.

It was game seven of
the first round of the playoffs, and if they won tonight, they were going on to
round two. If they lost, they were going home for the summer. They were the
first expansion team in the history of the NHL to make it to the playoffs in
their inaugural season, and the game was sold out. No matter how exciting it
had been for the team, it had been a frustrating couple of weeks for him, especially
the last three games.

The Sidewinders had won
the first three games of the series as if they were unbeatable. Then the Los
Angeles Kings got serious, and beat them three in a row. Marco had let in six
goals the last game, yet Coach Barnett refused to pull him. Karl had
practically begged to be put in, but Coach had said they had a winning formula
and they were sticking to it. So Karl watched as the Kings scored goal after
goal, three games in a row. Now it all boiled down to tonight. If they lost again,
they were done.

While there was no
guarantee that he would have stopped those goals or changed the outcome of the
last three games, a change in game six might have changed
something
. Or
even tonight. But Coach Barnett had asked Karl to trust him.

“I know what I’m doing,
son,” he’d said in his quiet voice. “Trust me. You’re not going to be the
back-up forever.”

That’s what they’d told
him in Montreal, too, but here he was in Las Vegas, being the perpetual back-up
once again. At least Carey Price was a decent guy and Karl hadn’t minded
backing up what he considered the number one goalie in the NHL. Rousch, on the
other hand, was just an asshole. He constantly ragged on Karl about being
second best, and up until the last few games, he’d been able to say it with a
straight face. Letting in 14 goals in three games wasn’t anything to brag
about, though, and the Sidewinders were going to pay for it if they lost
tonight.

Karl looked up at the
stands, knowing his girlfriend Kate was up there watching with the other wives
and girlfriends. If there was anything that had gotten him through the last few
weeks, it was Kate, with her infectious laugh and big brown eyes. Seeing her
standing up with a big sign that said “#35 is #1—Karl Martensson!!!” made him
smile as he lowered himself into a split, stretching as far as he could go.

“Ready to keep my seat
warm?” Marco asked, skating past him on his way
 
back to the bench.

Karl grit his teeth,
reminding himself that Marco was 37 years old and hopefully going to retire
soon. Or maybe die of old age. Not quite 27, Karl still had his whole career
ahead of him, and Coach Barnett had told him that the number one spot was his
as soon as Marco retired. He looked up at the crowd again, finding Kate as she
and her girlfriends danced and sang along to whatever music was playing.

“Get your head out of
Kate’s pants!” Cody Armstrong, the team captain as well as a good friend,
skated by and tapped him on his mask.

Karl laughed, standing
up and skating over to the boards. His friend and roommate, Drake Riser,
stopped beside him, nudging him. “You ready?”

Drake was probably the
best friend Karl had ever had, in life or in hockey. They’d played in Detroit
together and now here in Las Vegas. They were roommates, although that was
probably changing now that Drake had married Kate’s best friend, Erin; they
were expecting a baby in the fall and looking for a house.

“Marco says one more
word to me, I swear to God I’m going to knock him into the middle of next
week,” Karl muttered, grabbing his water bottle and squirting some into his
mouth.

“You know he’s a
douche,” Drake shook his head. “Don’t let him get under your skin—especially
not tonight.”

“I know.” Karl put the
water bottle back and skated around the ice one more time.

Sitting in her seat,
Kate Lansing looked down at the ice where Karl was warming up. She could almost
feel the frustration oozing out of him, and she hoped he wasn’t going to knock
the snot out of Marco, although he definitely had it coming. The last two weeks
had been hard on him, and she watched with concern, but when he dropped down
into a split, she felt her cheeks growing warm as she thought about how limber
and toned he was. Just thinking about the hot sex they’d had this morning made
her stomach do somersaults.

They’d only been dating
a couple of months, but she was crazy about him. Sometimes it was a little hard
to concentrate when she watched him play because she kept imagining him naked.
Not to mention the fact that they were currently living on opposite sides of
the country, making their sex life not nearly as abundant as either of them
would have liked. But one way or another, summer was coming and he was going to
spend most of it with her in New York, where she ran a small but successful
public relations firm.

“Game’s about to
start—woo-hoo!” Erin Riser, Kate’s best friend, clapped happily. Twelve weeks
pregnant and still not showing, Erin was absolutely glowing. She was in the
Marines until June, when she would retire here to Las Vegas with Drake, her
husband of two months. They hadn’t known she was pregnant when they’d
spontaneously eloped back in February, but the timing seemed to have worked out
perfectly for them.

“This is so awesome!”
Suze Armstrong, Cody’s wife, was singing along to the AC/DC song playing on the
loud speakers. “TNT!” she sang, laughing with Erin.

Kate shook her head,
thinking they all looked ridiculous in their significant others’ jerseys. It
was a lot of fun, though. She really liked the women in their close circle of
friends. She just wished they weren’t all pregnant! Suze and their friend Molly
McCarran were both seven months pregnant, due a week apart in mid-June. Molly
was engaged to one of the alternate captains, Dom Gianni, and they were planning
an August wedding.

“Would you guys sit
down already?!” Tiffany Marcus, who was married to Associate Coach Dave Marcus,
was the only other one in their group who wasn’t pregnant and she was
constantly fussing over the pregnant girls. “You’ll be exhausted by the end of
the first period!”

“I keep telling them,”
Kate rolled her eyes. “But they don’t listen. I don’t want to hear a word about
swollen ankles or sore feet an hour from now!”

Molly stuck her tongue
out at Kate and blew a raspberry.

“Very nice,” Kate
chirped, laughing. “Pregnancy is turning you all into brats!”

“Maybe you should get
pregnant too!” Erin wiggled her eyebrows. “You and your Swedish love muffin
would make beautiful babies!”

Kate shook her head.
“We are nowhere near ready for that! Besides, I can’t imagine being pregnant!
It’s kind of creepy to think about something moving inside of me.”

“Not when it’s your
baby
!”
Molly laughed, rubbing her hand on her stomach. “Dom and I just sit and stare
at my stomach sometimes, hoping he moves.”

“Is it a boy?” Kate
asked in surprise.

“Yeah.” Molly grinned.
“Dom is so freakin’ excited, I don’t know what I’m going to do with him! He
keeps buying him things—I’m not sure how many 0-3 month onesies he thinks a
newborn needs, but we own at least a hundred!”

The girls laughed, and
Kate just focused on the ice. She still had a hard time thinking about Karl as
her boyfriend. Though Kate was a pretty girl, with long-lashed brown eyes and
thick, wavy chestnut-colored hair that fell below her waist, she was definitely
not like some of the other women here. Suze looked like a movie star with her
blond hair, blue eyes and stunning figure, even seven months pregnant. Tiff was
supermodel beautiful, almost six feet tall with strawberry blond hair,
startling hazel eyes and breasts men couldn’t help but stare at. She had a body
to die for, even after having twins, and men literally fell all over themselves
when she walked by. Another guy on the team was dating a movie star named
Rachel Kennedy and she always made Kate feel like she weighed 200 pounds.

Kate came from a rich,
successful family, but she’d battled her weight all of her life. She wasn’t
huge by any means, but a curvy size 10 figure on her 5’5” frame led to a lot of
cruel remarks in her circles. Several years ago, she’d gotten up to a size 16
but after Erin had been hurt in Afghanistan, she’d moved in with her to take
care of her and had dropped 30 pounds. Over the years, she’d come to terms with
her body but she’d given up on finding Prince Charming; every time she met a
potential prince, he inevitably walked right past her towards the girls who
were a size zero.

Then Erin had met Drake
and Drake lived with Karl. The night Kate met him, she’d almost spontaneously
combusted. Karl Martensson was 6’4” of super-hot Swedish hockey-playing
yumminess, and Kate still couldn’t quite believe he’d been with her for two
months. He told her repeatedly that she was gorgeous and that he loved every
inch of her, but old wounds healed slowly. When her mother had found out whom Kate
was dating, she’d actually laughed.

“Enjoy it while you
can, darling,” she’d said in her lilting voice. “You know he’s only looking for
a good lay, right?”

Kate tried not to
listen to her mother, but in the back of her mind she was afraid her mother was
at least partially right. Karl was definitely not just looking for a quick roll
in the hay; women lined up at every practice trying to get his attention. He
could have a different girl in his bed every single night and still not sleep
with all the women who went after him. But that didn’t mean he was falling for
her either; right now, she was convenient. With Drake and Erin recently married
and having a baby, Kate
was around by default and if nothing else, it gave him easy access to someone
willing to sleep with him any time he wanted—and the sex was that good.

Pushing away those
thoughts, she focused on the game. This was either going to be a really great
night, or a really bad one. The only good thing was that if they lost, no one
could blame Karl.

Losing to the L.A.
Kings meant the end of what had been an amazing season. Finishing with the best
record in the western conference, they’d broken records of all kinds and left
their mark on the hockey world. Sitting in the locker room after the loss, the
players were quiet and brooding. When Coach Barnett walked in minutes later,
after talking to the press, he shut the door behind him.
 
Walking to the center
of the room, he looked around proudly, his pale blue eyes sparkling despite the
disappointment he knew his players were feeling.

“I know this was a
tough loss, boys,” he said. “But it was a hell of a season. The most exciting
season of my career—and I’ve won a few championships. But this, what we built
this year, was special. I’m really proud of you. The other expansion team
didn’t have anywhere near the record we had, much less make the playoffs. Don’t
look at this as a disappointment—this was our chance to grow and learn. Next
year, we’re going to kick their asses.” He looked around for the last time this
season, at the players he’d grown to love, with only a couple of exceptions,
and then turned and left the room.

With a collective sigh,
the team started getting undressed. The press would be waiting for them, but
they had a few more minutes to collect their thoughts and get used to the idea
of being on vacation. Many of them had big plans. Cody and Dom were having
babies in a month or so, Drake was house-hunting and planning for a baby with
his new wife, Dom and Molly were planning for a wedding in August, and several
of the guys were going to play for different countries in the International Ice
Hockey Federation (IIHF) World Championship.

In a way, Karl was glad
to be done with hockey for the season. He’d put up with Marco’s snarky remarks
and arrogant attitude month after month, and though Marco had been a stellar
goalie most of the season, he’d dropped the ball in the playoffs. Karl should
have played tonight, but that wasn’t how Coach Barnett worked; he was loyal to
his players and technically, Marco had all the experience. Karl had never
played in an NHL playoff game, and at this rate, he never would.

Dressed in his street
clothes, Karl grabbed his bag and slipped around all the journalists who were
surrounding Marco, Cody and Dom, headed back to the lounge where he knew Kate
and the others would be waiting. He saw her right away, her long silky hair
bouncing down her back. God, he loved wrapping his fist in that hair and
breathing in the scent of her shampoo while he made love to her. She was
probably the only reason he hadn’t lost his mind the last two months, and she
was one of the only things keeping him in the NHL. He knew he could go home to
Sweden and have a starting position in the Swedish Hockey League, the SHL, but
even though it was the highest level of ice hockey in Sweden, it still wasn’t
the NHL. The SHL generally paid less and certainly didn’t get the notoriety of
the NHL. On the other hand, he would be
home
, near his family.