CHAPTER15
Ronan couldn’t take his eyes or his hand off of Calista as the elevator descended.
“Banned from your own old office. Do you want your office back?” Calista asked Dahlia, who stood in front of her.
Was Calista being supportive or troublemaking? Ronan found himself curious, though none of this was his business.
Dahlia stared straight ahead and shrugged. “I definitely don’t. It’s attached to Dodo’s office suite.”
Calista tilted her head, and her silky hair shifted against her back. The strands brushed his hand, triggering X-rated images. “It doesn’t have to be. I need the blueprints.”
Dahlia snickered.
“How can he ban us?” Calista sounded confused, but her voice shifted to worried. “It’s only from that one office, right?”
Ronan wanted to hug the concern in Calista’s voice away. He kept his gaze on the numbers of the descending floors. To his left, his teammates were talking about the bar they were headed to next, but his attention was on the women’s conversation. He should have kept his distance and taken the stairs. He curled his fingers inwards, not caressing Calista, but holding firm.
“Dodo’s not banning us from the stadium, the ban is from his office and Willow’s.” Dahlia reassured her cousin.
“Oh, no, we can never go in his office again.” Kiernan said in a sing-song voice. “Or at least thirty percent of it.”
They all laughed.
Calista’s posture eased, and while Ronan appreciated his teammate lightening the mood, conversely, he was a touch jealous that Kiernan had been the one to make her smile.
The elevator reached the ground floor.
“We’ll make your current office better,” Calista said to her cousin.
“While the lawsuit is in play, we’re limited to the changes that Dodo signs off on.” Dahlia reached forward and held the door-open button. “That’s not necessarily a bad thing, we don’t want to misstep while we’re in the middle of negotiations.”
The Canadian got out first and braced his big arm on the elevator door to hold it open for the rest of them to exit.
Calista still looked concerned.
Ronan wanted to take her back to his place and kiss her until her stress melted away, and her expression changed back to the one she usually looked at him with—happy excitement—like he was king of the ice. Holy hell.
Calista moved forward, and it took everything for Ronan to let his hand drop as she walked away.
“Drink, Captain?” Kiernan asked.
Better to have a drink with the guys than to do something stupid like follow Calista and ask her out. “Why not?”
Kiernan reached behind his back and revealed he’d taken a second liquor bottle from the special stash.
* * *
Late the next morning, Ronan swore he could smell vanilla lotion at the ice rink, which was impossible. Calista was in the stands, but at the other end of the stadium, simply watching practice. He was huddled with a bunch of practice weary men. She wasn’t luring him over. He was being an imaginative idiot. Probably because he’d dreamed all night of her in the mermaid tank luring him in.
Coach waved to get their attention. “Ain’t going to lie, men, a change of ownership is not convenient right now.” Coach stood in front of them, telling it to them straight like always. “But we play the puck that drops.”
The dancers filtered onto the other end of the ice. They wore puck bikinis, black round circles that barely covered their assets.
Willow was in tow and managing them. She lined the dancers up in two groups.
The men around him shifted to get a view beyond Coach, and their heads tilted left or right depending on their positions.
Willow dropped her arm and the dancers at the front of the line laid on the ice on their frontal pucks. The women behind them grabbed their ankles and lifted them, spread, as if they held wheelbarrow handles.