I’d heard Jock’s attorney had insisted Bria remove the video. Her attorney complied with their requests, but I had no idea how she felt about everything.

Geneva gathered up towels and stuffed them in a large canvas bag. Our eyes met, and I had to smile. Just looking at her made me smile. Talking to her made my day. Imagine what fucking her would do.

She glanced at her brother and back to me. “Good luck with brother dearest. That video brought everything to the surface again. I wouldn’t want him to take a hunk out of your gorgeous ass.”

I chuckled. “Thanks, I might need luck more than ever today to keep my ass intact.” Every day after practice, she made a point of speaking to me before I started my daily torture with her brother in the net. I’d come to look forward to these short exchanges. Some were snarky, some were encouraging, and some were just pure Geneva. Either way, my afternoon wouldn’t be complete without those few words from her.

She winked at me, stuffed the last of the towels in the bag, slung it over her shoulders, and sauntered off. My eyes were drawn to that ass of hers, and I enjoyed the view until she disappeared from sight.

“Gorgeous ass, huh? Don’t let Jock see you drooling over his sister like that,” Steele said from behind me. I jumped, not realizing anyone had been around to hear our little exchange.

“Fuck you,” I said and pushed off the boards to skate out to where Jock was talking to Coop. Steele’s wicked laughter followed me.

I waited until Coop finally skated away, and the entire arena was empty. With only a nod of his head, Jock skated to the net. I dumped out the waiting bucket of pucks and began to shoot them toward the net, working as fast as I could, slamming them into the net from all directions. On the tenth one, I aimed for the spot between Jock’s legs and hit the back of the net. I raised my stick in celebration and did a little dance on the ice. Jock hated it when I did that, but I did it anyway. He’d get even more determined at that point, making it doubly hard for me to score, but I lived for the challenge.

We kept it up for an hour until we were both sweating profusely and our bodies were spent. Jock pulled off his mask and wiped his face on a towel draped across the top of the net.

“Good workout,” I said, attempting to make conversation as I had every time we finished our drills together. Usually, Jock grunted something unintelligible or cursed at me under his breath. This time he did neither.

He met my gaze with an assessing one of his own, as if he were sizing me up for the first time, evaluating my strengths and weaknesses of character, rather than my physical abilities. He almost smiled, but his eyes were as hard and unyielding as they had been. In fact, the anger and dislike so clearly written on his face every time he laid eyes on me were dimmed considerably. I sensed we’d crossed some invisible boundary, because he appeared more receptive. I had to try one more time.