37. The One Where I Make a Friend

THIRTY-SEVEN

"You're shitting me!" My jaw dropped as we pulled up to Seattle's professional hockey stadium.

"No, Peach. I'm not shitting you." Parker laughed and shook his head. "You have such a pretty mouth for the dirty way you talk."

I rolled my eyes. "I can't be pretty, smart, funny, good in bed, and sweet, Parker. You have to take what you get."

"Yeah, I'm not really interested in you being sweet anyway." He opened the door and rounded the car to get Lily out of her seat. When he took off her blanket, I saw she was sporting the number four. He pulled out a pair of baby headphones and put them over her ears. She didn't immediately tug them off, but she felt around and looked at us like she was confused.

"Noah Kelly? You're letting your daughter wear another man's number?"

"Yeah, I might have an in with the team." He helped me tuck her into the baby carrier and slung the diaper bag over his shoulders.

"Meaning?"

"Kelly is Stassie and Ana's dad, my nieces."

The nieces he'd gone on and on about were Kelly's kids. Okay, I could get used to this hanging out with famous people thing.

"Holy shit. I can't believe we're going to a Leopards game." The Seattle Snow Leopards had been dominating the NHL for the past couple years. I wasn't the most knowledgeable about the sport, but any female smut reader knew who Noah Kelly was from his image in the hockey romance thirst traps. He was a massive, lumberjack-looking man with golden hair that was enviable to women everywhere. How did I tell Parker that I knew who he was from watching the videos of him doing his hockey stretches?

"You watch a lot of hockey?" He took my hand and led us inside through the main entrance. His tall frame easily parted the crowd in front of us, and we were through the metal detectors in less than a minute.

"Uh, you know I read a lot of hockey." I felt my cheeks warm but his back was to me.

"Oh, great. Hockey smut."

"What do you expect? I'm a smut connoisseur. I don't discriminate based on sport."

I felt his chuckle rumble where my hands were around his waist as we navigated to our seats.

"But baseball is your favorite, right?"

He couldn't see me roll my eyes. "Of course."

"Okay, we're a little late, so you head down there, and I'll grab some food." Parker pointed down to the seats where Peter and Brett sat with other guys from the team and a small woman whose focus was glued to the ice. He waited until he got their attention and they saw me coming down the stairs, then disappeared into the throng of people milling around.

I was a couple feet away when the woman jumped out of her seat and hammered on the glass, yelling profanities at the referee. I approached cautiously. "I don't understand why I get yelled at for swearing in front of the kids when you talk like that at games," Peter said to the woman.

"Because your kind of swearing is inappropriate, Peter. I'm just talking." She turned to me with a warm smile. "Hi, I'm Jo, Noah's wife."

I reached out to shake her hand. "I'm?—"

"Aurora."

My eyes bugged out, and I shook my head. Before I could correct her myself, Peter introduced me.

"You're terrible at guessing names, Jo. This is Parker's girlfriend, Del."

I didn't know what to process first, the fact that she recognized me as Aurora, or Peter calling me Parker's girlfriend. I didn't put my face on social media as Aurora very much. I'd gone to a couple signings in Chicago for small bookstores, but otherwise avoided attaching my face to my pen name. I wasn't ready for everyone in Roe to know I wrote smutty books. With my back to the boys, I shook my head slightly and pleaded with my eyes. I could only hope she knew what I was trying to relay.

Jo smacked her forehead lightly. "Right, Del! And this little cutie must be Lily Rose." She brushed her fingers over the fist Lily had grasping the collar of my shirt. "I've heard so much about you both."

She sat down and motioned to the empty seat beside her. Peter was making faces to Lily over my shoulder, trying to coerce her into his arms. It didn't work and he gave up.

"You reek of desperation, Pete." Brett smiled at Lily and gave her a little wave. "Hey pretty girl."

Two dimples formed on each side of her smile as she watched him. Her small kicks turned into ones I was pretty sure would have made a soccer goal. I slipped her out of the carrier and handed her to Brett.

"Sorry Peter, give it time."

"So, did I hear you right? Your husband is Noah Kelly?" She nodded. "Wow, you must be really proud. He's an amazing goalie."

She smiled. "He's an even better dad and husband." I watched her watch him use his large body to block a shot. He stood tall and sent it flying down the ice to his teammate. Two long seconds after the puck was out of his possession, a player collided with him and caught his skate with theirs. They both went down on the ice. The play moved on and the perpetrator skated away without a call.

"BULLSHIT!" Jo flew out of her seat to pound her fist into the glass as the ref skated past. "Get your cataracts removed you fucking geriatric. Why are they hitting our goalie?!" She gave the ref one more tongue lashing before sitting down with her arms crossed, a fierce glare on her face.

At that moment I knew Jo and I were going to be friends.

A few minutes later, Parker finally arrived with a ridiculous amount of snacks in hand. His arms were overflowing with popcorn, candy, a pickle I really hoped was for me, drinks, and a few other things hidden in his jacket. I was about to ask if he bought the whole concession stand when a little girl raced from the other side of Jo to wrap her arms around his ankles.

"Unk P!"

"Hey, Stassie girl!" he replied, giving off the same amount of enthusiasm she greeted him with. "Just a second, let me put this stuff down, and then I'm all yours." He chucked bags of chips at the guys behind us and unloaded the rest onto me and Jo.

I was pleasantly surprised when I was handed the pickle, my favorite candy bar, and ice cream. The combination was something a little more suited to my former pregnancy cravings, but I could see where his head was at.

"There something you guys want to tell us?" Jo asked while eyeing my selection.

"What? It's all her favorites." Parker shrugged, obviously missing the joke.

I laughed. "Not pregnant! I just like a little sweet with my salty."

Parker's head whipped toward me. "Was that something we were worried about?"

It wasn't possible, since we hadn't crossed that off the list yet, and I hadn't been with anyone since him, but we'd gotten so close that it took him a second to realize what it would take to make that happen.

"No." I shook my head and hoped the conversation would fade.

My silent prayer was answered by Stass pulling on the leg of his pants. "Up," she demanded in the cutest little voice I'd ever heard. Parker didn't stand a chance when she fixed her pretty brown eyes on his and practically begged to sit on his lap.

He helped her sling her legs over his, but she climbed up to stand on his thighs and yanked the zipper of his coat down. His face morphed into confusion until she pushed up the sleeve of his t-shirt to reveal the pink scar along his shoulder and bicep.

"Fixed?" She looked up at him while poking the ridged skin.

His chest rumbled a little. "Yep, all fixed."

"Unk P, no cry." She patted his head and made soothing shushing noises.

Jo rolled her eyes. "She's such a copycat. She watches me take care of Ana and mimics it with her baby dolls."

"Yeah, I was gonna say I didn't cry." He glanced at me as if I would think less of him for crying about taking a skate to the arm. I didn't want to imagine the pain he'd been in.

"Yeah P cry!" Stass nodded her head vigorously. "Cry so much and blood everywhere." She whooshed out her hands to illustrate the point to me.

"Was he tough and brave?"

"No, just baby." She petted Parker's hair.

Jo and Noah's oldest daughter was a riot. It made me excited for the next few stages with Lily. I couldn't wait to see more of her personality come out and hear her little voice.

"Well, you've met Stass." Jo looked around to find her youngest daughter in the lap of one of the Tempest players I hadn't met yet, Cory, the third baseman who was getting married over the weekend. "That's Ana. When she isn't with her dad, she's attached to Cory. I swear you birth them, feed them, and then they adore some man with a beard."

"I can relate." I angled my head back to check on Lily. She was happy as could be hanging out with Brett. "Hey Peter, watch this."

I scooped up a small spoonful of ice cream and watched Lily's eyes go wide. She reached for the spoon, I assume to jam the whole thing in her mouth, but I pulled her hands out of the way and zoomed it into her mouth like an airplane. She loved it. I passed the cup back to Peter.

"Give it a try."

He looked unsure that it would work but cautiously mimicked my actions. She was hooked after a couple tiny bites and held her arms out to him.

"Like mother like daughter," Parker mumbled. "Easily bribed with food."

"Only one more bite. Ice cream was the bait, now it's up to you to keep her."

I peeked over Jo's shoulder and accidentally snooped to see what she was doing on her phone. She was editing a video of her husband from the warmups today. I watched her post it and I recognized the username immediately.

"No way, you're the one making thirst traps of Noah?"

She turned to me with a conspiratory smile. We were racking up secrets by the minute. "So, you've seen my work?"

"I think anyone who reads romance has seen your work. Does he know?"

"Yeah, he thinks it's funny. I was kind of cranky about random women fangirling over my husband at first, but then I realized something." She used her hands to demonstrate her mind blowing. "I have the best access to give the people what they want. If you can't beat ‘em, join ‘em I guess."

That was hilarious. People had started wondering who was behind the fan account and how they were getting such scandalous material.

"Don't tell the boys. That was his one stipulation. They make fun of each other ruthlessly."

"Your secret is safe with me."

She winked. "And yours with me."

All reservations I had about Parker's friends went out the window as we dove into a hushed conversation.

We were pulled back into the game by Noah diving at the top right corner of the net, successfully blocking another attempt. Everyone in our section jumped to their feet and celebrated.

"That's my husband!" Jo screeched. He pointed to her and I watched them practically eye-fuck through the glass.

"Someone needs a babysitter tonight," I muttered under my breath, only meaning for Parker to hear it but Jo's head whipped around.

"Are you offering? I'll watch Lily for you some night while you're here."

Parker didn't hesitate. "Deal." When I looked at him he just shrugged. "I thought we might need a little mom and dad time."

If someone had told me in high school that this would be my life, I wouldn't have believed them.