Clipped by Love (Bellevue Bullies #2) Read online

  “Are Phillip and Reese excited?”

  Claire grins as she shrugs sheepishly. Everyone knows that her uncle would rather gouge his eyeballs out than accept that Claire and Jude are together. “Well, Phillip is Phillip, but Reese is really excited for me. They both think we are young.”

  Mom smiles as she nods. “You two are, but who cares? You’re in love!”

  I hear Lucy let out a breath of annoyance, and I lean into her to show her I love her. She was young when she married Rick, only twenty-three, but I truly believe the douche wasn’t made for her. She needs someone who’s gonna be there for her and be appreciative of her. Not someone who’s going to knock her up and smack her around when she doesn’t have dinner on the table.

  That’s why Rick doesn’t come around here. We all want to kill him.

  “Saw that fight, bro. I don’t think it’s good to fight the future in-laws,” I tease, and he laughs as Claire rolls her eyes. The fat lip from the fight between him and Claire’s uncle, forward Phillip Anderson of the Nashville Assassins, is coming in real nice. He looks like he has a growth on his mouth, but I don’t think Claire cares.

  “He had it coming.”

  “Weren’t you singing to him? That’s what the announcers said,” Jace says, leaning against the table, trying to fit in the screen.

  Jude laughs, and Claire can’t even hide her smile as he says, “Yeah, I was.”

  “What?” Lucy asks. “What were you singing?”

  “‘Rude’ by Magic! ” he says between his laughter. “Pissed him the hell off. It was great.”

  “You’re such an ass,” Claire says with a shake of her head.

  “You are! Don’t do that anymore!” Mom scolds, but even she is having a hard time hiding her grin. It’s funny and a really fitting song since Phillip was not about to give permission for Jude to marry Claire. Not that he needed it, but still, we are about honor and respect around here. It’s surprising that Phillip finally agreed, honestly.

  “I won’t. We came to an understanding. I think he likes me now,” Jude says, but I scoff.

  “Whoa, don’t get ahead of yourself there, guy,” I say, and everyone laughs as Claire nods.

  “I think tolerate is a better word for his feelings toward you,” she says, and Jude shrugs.

  “At least my family loves you,” he says, and we all are smiling. We really do love Claire. She’s good for Jude.

  “Yes, we do! So, a date?” Mom asks, but they both shake their heads before explaining that with the season and Claire’s burlesque club, everything is up in the air. We all talk a bit more about the engagement and the wedding. I’m ready to let them go, but we only talk twice a week and I like to listen to everything going on with them. So I suffer through the wedding talk just to watch my brother be happy.

  Remember, I’m the sensitive one, but Jace and Lucy already said bye, leaving only Mom and me.

  “Camp starts next week, right?” Jude asks and I nod.

  “Yup.”

  “I’ll be back, I’m gonna start dinner. Call me when you’re done talking hockey,” Mom says as she gets up.

  Jude then asks, “Going for captain?”

  “You know it,” I say with a grin. “I should get it. I think Jace and Frayer are wanting alternate. No one wants captain, so I should be good.”

  “Good, you deserve it. I heard Moss got picked up by the Wild though.”

  My face scrunches up. “What?”

  “Yeah, it’s superquiet right now, but the coach was messing up and they fired him. They want Moss.”

  “No way!” I say since I haven’t heard anything about this. “How did I not hear about this?”

  “Crazy quiet, dude, no one knows. The only reason I do is because I still talk to Moss.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I say since I’d forgotten that. “So who is the new coach gonna be? Raymond?” I ask, speaking of our assistant.

  “No, they brought someone new in.”

  “Who? Do I know them?”

  “I can’t remember his name. Rivers, maybe? He played for the Bruins, coached at some really big schools. He’s supposed to be pretty badass.”

  Hearing about the Bruins brings Baylor to mind, but I quickly stuff that away and nod. “Hope he’s not a dick.”

  Jude laughs. “He probably is, but he’ll make you great.”

  “Yeah,” I agree and let out a breath. I really don’t like change, and Moss was a great coach. It kind of pisses me off that none of us have been told this. “I bet that’s why we have to be there twenty minutes earlier on Monday. So they can tell us.”

  “Yeah, probably. There is some drama around this guy though from the board. Moss said he couldn’t get into it with me.”

  “What? But he can tell you he’s leaving for the Wild? Dude is selective as hell.”

  Jude laughs. “Yeah, for sure, but he told me not to worry, that you and Jace were gonna be fine.”

  “Cool,” I say with a nod.

  “How’s your wrister?”

  Deadpan, I look at my brother as he fights a grin. “What? I had to ask,” he says as Claire shakes her head.

  “Great! You told her?” I complain and Jude shrugs.

  “I tell Claire everything.”

  “He does,” she agrees as she leans into him.

  “Whatever,” I say, rolling my eyes. “There was nothing to tell.”

  “I beg to differ. That’s some intense stuff,” Claire says, her eyes widening as she moves her flaming red hair out of her eyes. “You should really call her.”

  “Yeah, because I have her number. I’ll get right on that.”

  “It’s 2015, you can find her number,” she suggests, and I wave her off.

  “She doesn’t want to see me or talk to me. I fucked that all up,” I say sadly, and even though it’s been two months, that doesn’t mean I haven’t thought about her every day since. I can still see her little baby hairs coming from the braid her hair was in and flying in the ocean breeze. The way her eyes lit up when she scored that goal against me. Or the way she felt pressed against my body. Or the taste of her sweet mouth. I’ve stalked every single one of her social media sites. The fact that I check her Instagram every day just to see if she changed her profile picture is downright pitiful. She has all her stuff on private though, so I only have her profile pictures to go off of. I mean, I can’t see anything. She’s locked down like the White House.

  Which I find very suspect.

  What is she hiding? Did she get a boyfriend? Why do I care if she got a boyfriend? Maybe she had a boyfriend the whole time? I mean, so many questions that really shouldn’t matter to me. But every day, I look and I ask, what would happen if I messaged her? Would she even answer me? And if she did, would it be more than a simple fuck-the-fuck-off? I have no clue because I’m too big of a coward to try. It doesn’t matter though, and the sooner I realize this, the better. Because I’m never going to see her again, I’m never going to message her, so really, I need to let her go. Hockey is about to start, and girls are about to be falling into my lap in no time once the C is put on my chest.

  So yeah, I need to let her go.

  The problem is, I’ve been trying to do that since Florida.

  And no luck so far.

  I can smell the ice.

  Someone is skating.

  Oh, the sound of the puck.

  I’m home.

  And man, I’m so fucking excited.

  Following behind my teammates, we all go on the ice before playing around with the bucket of pucks that were left for us as we wait for the coaching staff. Word got out about Coach Moss leaving, not from me of course, and so we are all excited to find out who the new coach is and if he’ll be worth a damn. I did a Google search on a Coach Rivers but couldn’t find anything, so I’m pretty sure Jude didn’t have the name right. I tried to find something on it, but like Jude said, it’s pretty damn quiet and that makes me nervous.

  Taking the puck, I pass it through my legs and then kick it u