He laughed before coming toward her. “Please don’t. It’s my mess, I’ll get it clean.”

Kissing her lips, he brought her in against his strong chest, his mouth devouring hers and hoping to distract her from his disaster of an apartment. When they parted, since he knew that time was against him, he smiled against her lips. Looking into her sweet green eyes, he was mesmerized by them as his chest ached. She really came home with him. She was really married to him. She was his. They were going to do this.

“I love you, sweetheart,” he said, his voice rough with emotion for this gorgeous woman.

She smiled, her cheeks warming with color as she slowly moved her fingers through the stubble on his jaw. “I love you, even if you are messier than hell.”

He chuckled before kissing her nose and then letting her go. “I’ll call you before I come home in case you’re hungry or something.”

“Sounds good. Bye, have a good practice.”

“Thanks, babe,” he said, flashing her a grin before running out the door. Something about saying goodbye to her as he left for practice really pleased him. While he didn’t want to leave her, he liked that she kissed him goodbye and wished him well.

It was real, married people shit, and he liked that. A lot.

Rushing to the arena, he couldn’t stop thinking of Lacey. He worried about her being alone but then pushed that aside. His lady was strong, and he had no doubt that she could take care of herself. He wouldn’t even be gone that long, and then he and JT would clean the shit out of that apartment, get ready for the delivery of her stuff, and then he would need to call the Realtor to find them a house. While he loved that his apartment was so close to the arena and everything else he needed, it wasn’t big enough for Lacey and her office and then him and JT.

Arriving at the arena, he looked at the line of cars of his teammates and knew he was late.

“Fucking hell,” he said, rushing to park his truck before sprinting toward the door. The last teammate always did extra laps per Shea Adler’s rules. While Karson could probably use the extra cardio since the only cardio he had been doing was sex, he really wasn’t in the mood. When he entered the locker room though to see all his teammates, almost all dressed, he knew that laps were in his future.

“Thirty extra laps,” Shea said as he passed Karson. “Welcome back, by the way.”

“Thanks, Cap,” Karson said, his shoulders falling. Everyone chuckled and razzed him as he headed toward his locker, shaking hands with the men who were not only his teammates, but his brothers.

When he got to his locker, JT glared at him. “Hey, fucker.”

Chuckling, Karson said, “Good to see you too.”

“Whatever, asshole. Where have you been? Is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” Karson said, pulling his shirt off as he toed out of his sneakers. “Everything is great.”

“What happened?” JT asked, annoyed. “Obviously, I’m not asking to get some generic answer.”

Setting him with a look, Karson said, “Aren’t you a ray of sunshine this morning?”

“Fuck you, where have you been?”

Karson really need to reevaluate his relationship with his asshole, but meeting his best friend’s gaze, he could tell that there was genuine worry in his eyes.

“Aw, Jordie Thomas cares about me,” Karson teased, batting his eyes, but that just pissed JT off more.

“King, stop fucking around,” he warned and Karson laughed.

“I got married,” he said like it wasn’t that big a deal, even though he knew it was.

Talking stopped around him as thirty pair of eyes cut to him.

Apperently none of them saw his facebook.

“What?” JT asked. “Did you say you got married?”

“Yeah,” Karson said with a grin, dropping his pants and boxers before putting on his underwear that had his cup built into it. He should have felt weird with the whole team staring at him with his cock out, but he was in a hurry to get ready.

“To who?” Phillip Anderson asked. “I didn’t think you were seeing anyone.”

“I wasn’t,” Karson said, pulling his body armor shirt on. “I dated her about ten years ago, we met up in Chicago, flew out to Vegas, and got married.”

“’Cause that’s something sane people do,” Erik Titov said, receiving a few laughs.

Karson chuckled as he nodded. “Sane people don’t push away the mother of their child when they love her, but who’s judging?” Karson said, and that shut Erik right up.

“For real?” JT asked. “You really did it?”

Holding up his hand that held a black metal wedding band, he grinned. “Sure did.”

“Holy shit,” JT gasped with a shake of his head.

“Well, I guess congratulations are in order then.” Shea’s voice boomed through the locker room. Holding up his Gatorade bottle, he said, “To King’s new marriage.”

“To King,” the whole room toasted and Karson smiled in appreciation.

Then Shea said, “We’ll have to go for beers one night. First round’s on me.”

“I’d like that, thanks, Cap.”

“No problem. I’m looking forward to meeting her.”

“She’s amazing.”

Shea laughed. “She has to be to get you to fly to Vegas to marry her.”

Karson’s face warmed as he nodded. Bending down, he taped up his socks just as Coach yelled, “Did King finally decide to show up to play?”