Breakout (A Dallas Demons Hockey Romance) Read online

  I’m editing my first show. The moment is so significant in my career. If I do it well, they’ll keep me around, and quite possibly create a position for me. Or at least enough work that I can pay my bills without dipping too much into my trust fund.

  Of course, the other part of my feeling of gratitude is for Niko.

  We stayed up late talking last night, and I know he said he doesn’t date coworkers, but like Kenley pointed out, I’m wondering if that is true.

  Or if I’m changing his mind about that.

  I move down the hallway toward my cubicle. Nobody is here yet, and I’m meeting with Kimberlee Shelton in an hour. Kimberlee is the new host of Demons Magazine. She was hired this past summer, and she wanted to meet with me to discuss how she wants to be edited for the show.

  I frown for a moment. I’ve seen Kimberlee’s work so far this season, and I can’t say I’m a huge fan. Sometimes she fawns over the players and tries to sound hip, like answering the question for them because she knows them so well. And prior to getting this job? She was a contestant on a reality TV dating show. Not exactly stellar reporting credentials, but sadly, I know this is how TV can work. She’s gorgeous, has been on a top 10 TV show, boom, she lands an on-air gig.

  I turn the corner. I instinctively glance at Niko’s office. And to my surprise, the light is on, and the door is open. My heart does a little dance, and I see that he’s working at his computer. I rap the frame of his doorway, and he turns around, his face lighting up when he sees that it’s me.

  “Hey, just in time,” Niko says, getting up from his chair. I step inside his office, and he picks up a Starbucks red cup and hands it to me. “By the way, you need to tell me what your drink order will be after the holidays are over.”

  My heart holds still. “After the holidays?”

  “Yeah. Gingerbread won’t be around forever, you know.”

  Now my heart is pounding. Yes, I know that could mean nothing, but the expression in his gorgeous blue eyes tells me he means more, even if he isn’t acting on it.

  “Hmmm,” I say, taking the cup from his hand, “I’ll have to consider that one, Niko. Some answers only come with time.”

  He studies me for a moment. “Yeah, I think you’re right about that.”

  There’s this undercurrent between us, and it’s raw and electric and it’s all I can do keep myself from kissing him.

  I clear my throat. “So why are you here so early?”

  Niko rubs his hand over his face, his fingertips slowly grazing across his stubble. “I woke up early and couldn’t get back to bed. So I hit the gym and then came over here to catch up on my music cue sheets from the road.”

  I nod, knowing the sheets are logs of all the music used in a show and legally have to be done to compensate composers and publishers.

  “What workout did you do?” I ask, taking a sip of my latte.

  “Boxing. I like to work the bag, spar, jump rope. Other days I lift.”

  Okay, the image of Niko boxing and punching is way too hot for me to handle at this time of the morning.

  Right. I can’t handle this image at any time.

  “Oh,” I say, trying not to think of what his abs and biceps would look like if he were to take off the navy V-neck sweater he’s wearing.

  “Do you like to work out, Lexi?” Niko asks, sitting back down at his desk.

  “I love yoga,” I say. “And barre work. I go to a studio that has those classes, and some dance, so I usually do all three. Then weights at the gym.”

  “Well rounded,” he says, grinning at me.

  He reaches for his coffee, and once again that tattoo peeks out from underneath the sleeve of his sweater, teasing me.

  “What does your tattoo say?” I ask, curious.

  Niko takes a sip of his coffee and places the cup back on his desk. He pushes up his sleeve further to reveal all of it, and heat surges through me when I see the beautiful Greek letters tattooed across his gorgeous olive skin.

  “Γνώθι Σαυτόν,” he says softly. “Know thyself. I never want to be anything I’m not so this is my reminder to live my life my way.”

  I connect the meaning to his past, his fight to be his own person despite what his family wanted him to be, and how he stayed true to his dreams in spite of it.

  “It’s you,” I say. “I love the meaning behind it.”

  “Thank you,” Niko says, and much to my disappointment, he tugs his sleeve back down again. “So today’s your big show edit. Nervous?”

  “No,” I say honestly. “I know I can do this.”

  Niko flashes me a bright smile. “I love your confidence.” His eyes sparkle. “However, I’ve seen the previous shows so you have every right to think you can do them better. I doubt you’ll misspell a Russian player’s name in graphic, which I saw last week.”

  I cringe, and Niko laughs.

  “How did that even happen?” I ask, incredulous that kind of mistake made it on air.

  “Welcome to TV,” Niko quips.

  “Well, not on my watch,” I say firmly.

  “You have two things in your favor,” Niko says. “First, you care. Second, you love hockey. That wouldn’t get past you.”

  “You’re forgetting one more thing.”

  Niko raises his eyebrow. “That you can spell?”

  I laugh. “No.”

  He flashes me that grin, the one that reveals his dimple, and, oh shit, it’s hard to keep my pulse under control when he does that.

  “Okay, so the third element is not spelling or the ability to check it.”

  “Third,” I say, pausing to take a sip of my coffee, “I take pride in my work. I’m a professional, and I care that it’s right. And how I perform reflects on both you and Ryan. I would never let either of you down.”

  Niko’s expression grows serious. “I don’t think you ever could do that, Lexi. In any way.”

  I feel my breath catch in my throat. I love the way he’s staring at me with such complete faith in his eyes. Kenley’s advice flashes through my head, and I know we’re more than coworkers here. I know it.

  Niko clears his throat. “So I can’t do lunch today because it’s game day.”

  “New York,” I say.

  “Right. But if you are game tomorrow, we could have lunch. Depending on your schedule.”

  Happiness fills me. “I’m editing a high school basketball show, but I think I can tear myself away for a few minutes to eat.”

  And I’d work late for hours on end if it meant spending time with you.

  “Perfect,” Niko says. “So lunch it is.”

  I smile. “Well, I’ll let you get back to those music cue sheets,” I say, nodding in the direction of the computer screen.

  Niko groans. “A necessary pain in the ass.”

  I laugh. “And thank you for the latte.”

  “Don’t forget to pick your new flavor,” Niko teases.

  “I won’t,” I say, walking out the door.

  I grin as I head toward my cubicle. More than ever I believe Kenley’s words. There is something more than friendship between us. The hurdle of not dating a coworker can be cleared, I know it. It might take time for Niko to see that, but I’m more than willing to wait.

  So I’m editing my first show today, I’m having lunch with Niko tomorrow, and I can’t help but think my life is more than perfect right now.

  This is hell.

  I glance over at Kimberlee, who is running her fingers through her platinum-blond locks, ones that she has told me no less than five times she just had a Keratin blow out done to make it extra gorgeous. Oh, which is why she was two hours late for our meeting this morning—she was able to “squeeze” in this appointment, and she knew it was a priority over our session because she�
��s on-air talent.

  “Make sure you keep the close up shots of me,” Kimberlee says, taking a sip of her Starbucks drink. “And if you need help understanding what to do, I have a DVD of how I like to be edited. You know, from my days on Rate Me to Date Me! if you need help.”

  I zero in on her Starbucks cup and notice first, her perfect French manicure, which unlike my nails—battered by keying all day—is utterly flawless and that her cup is marked up as “Non Fat, ½ Splenda, ½ Raw Sugar, ½ Equal, 2.5 shots espresso, 2 pumps sugar-free Vanilla latte.”

  Of course.

  “I’m going to give you a great edit, Kimberlee,” I say, forcing a smile on my face.

  Kimberlee wrinkles her delicate nose. “But you’re new at this.” She tosses her golden mane over her shoulder and stares at me. “I can’t afford to look bad, Lex.”

  I clench my teeth. “I promise you, nobody wants you to look good more than I do. That’s my job, and I assure you, the show is going to be great.”

  I glance past her to the window in the editing suite, and amazingly, there has been an endless parade of men walking by ever since Kimberlee arrived.

  I resist the urge to roll my eyes and bring up something I want to show Kimberlee on the screen.

  “There’s one thing I’m going to edit here,” I say, going to the time code I had jotted down earlier, “You mispronounce Nate Johansson’s name here. It’s YO-han-son. Not JO-han-suhn.”

  And how the girl got this wrong after working on the show since August is baffling.

  Kimberlee is fishing through her Elizabeth and James bucket bag, not even glancing up at me.

  “Um, we’re not in Sweden,” she says, annoyance creeping into her voice. “The American way to pronounce it is the way I said it.”

  It’s all I can do not to burst out laughing.

  “And Nate and I are buddies, actually,” Kimberlee continues.

  “Are you now?” I say, as I can’t wait to see where this is going.

  Kimberlee retrieves her lipstick and expertly swipes it across her pouty lips, giving them a fresh coat of a perfect nude shade to compliment her faux-bronzed skin. “Yes. At one time, I had my eye on him, you know, but it’s best not to get involved with anyone on the team since I cover them.”

  Yes, and him being madly in love with Kenley might have been the bigger issue, but hey, whatever.

  “Right,” I say. “Now, back to his name. I can’t let that go on the air like that. It’s my job to catch errors, and I have to disagree with you, his name needs to be YO-han-son. That’s how the game announcers pronounce it.”

  Kimberlee shoots me a look. “Nobody cared before, and I’m right.”

  I resist the urge to smash my head into the editing keyboard.

  “Well, I’m passionate about hockey, and I care that this show is right, so I’m going to edit that part out and let you do a voiceover for it. If you can do that this morning with Corey in audio, that would be awesome. I’ll leave the feature intact, but I’m going to clean up his name in the intro.”

  Kimberlee snaps the top back on to her expensive lipstick case, and I know she is mentally snapping my head in her hands.

  “Well, you’re the editor,” she says. “So I’ll go do that with Corey now if you insist.”

  Fantastic. I finally get to work on my dream show, and every week I’m going to do battle with a reality show castoff who is here simply because she’s hot and knows somebody. Not because she knows hockey.

  “Now, I need to run,” she says, scooping up all her stuff and standing up. “I’ll do that voiceover, but then I have some work to do in the field. And I have a very important meeting at the arena today.”

  She looks down at me, a superior smile playing at her lips. Kimberlee is begging me to ask her what, so, since I had to be firm about the editing, I play along.

  “Oh, what’s that?” I say, shifting my gaze back to the screen in front of me and adjusting the volume on her voice, which is too low at the moment.

  “A meeting with Niko Xenakis.”

  Now she has my full attention. “Oh?”

  Kimberlee nods. “Yes. I want to meet with him to get some storyline ideas, and nobody knows that better than the producer.”

  If you were a reporter worth a crap, you’d already know the storylines.

  “Niko would be a great source,” I say honestly.

  “Yes, and he’s hot, don’t you think?”

  I feel my face grow warm. “What?”

  “Niko’s a catch,” Kimberlee declares. “Players are off the table, but Niko isn’t. And he’s the fish I intend to reel in.”

  She marches toward the door, her thigh-high black-heeled boots clicking against the tiles.

  “Oh, Lex, have a good day.” She pauses and whips out a bottle of perfume, spraying it on her slender neck. “And make me look good. Niko’s watching.”

  Kimberlee turns on her heel and flounces out the door, leaving a trail of expensive perfume in her wake.

  And my stomach in knots.

  Kimberlee is after Niko.

  Jealousy consumes me as I stare at her image on the screen. Not that Niko would want her, of course.

  Right?

  I mean, he didn’t even bat an eye at Kenley when he met her.

  But Kenley wasn’t available.

  Kimberlee is.

  I swallow hard and stare at her perfect image, her perfume swirling in the air around me, and I feel sick.

  With uneasiness in my chest, I begin to edit the woman who has made it clear she’s after the only man I’ve ever wanted.

  The game is on, apparently.

  I’m not the only one who wants Niko.

  And I pray that Kimberlee isn’t going to screw everything up between us.

  Chapter 13

  The One Online Dating Service Profile Question: You’re in the early stages of a relationship. A holiday is approaching. Do you ask him/her to spend the holiday with you? Is it too much? Too scary? Too bold?

  My write-in answer: Dare I even ask Niko to Thanksgiving dinner? Would it freak him out? Especially because we’re just coworkers? How do I ask him without making it sound like a date, but more than friends? I’ve never felt more clueless in my life . . .

  “Sweetheart, are you sure can’t take off work to come to Aspen?” Mom asks as she folds some sweaters to put into her suitcase. “It doesn’t feel right to have Thanksgiving there without you.”

  I watch as she lines up her cashmere sweaters and gently places them in her black Prada suitcase. It’s Monday night, and I came over to have dinner with Mom and Dad after a hellacious day editing Kimberlee’s God-awful footage and trying not to obsess over her meeting with Niko today.

  Which is proving to be statistically impossible to do, but at least talking to my mom is forcing me to at least hit the pause button on that train of thought.

  So here I am, sitting in my mom’s room as she gets ready to leave for our cabin in Aspen. She always goes a week early to get everything lined up for all the guests coming in, but this year, for the first time, I won’t be one of them.

  “Mom,” I say, tracing my fingers over the silver tone-on-tone stripes in her duvet, “I was asked to edit a hockey game the night before Thanksgiving and the night after. This is when staff people are off, and this is my chance to do edit highlights for the game intermissions. I really want to do it.”

  “But it’s the holidays.” Mom pauses and locks her hazel eyes on mine. “I can’t imagine a holiday without you. Maybe we should stay here instead.”

  “No,” I say firmly. “You know Dad needs to ski to decompress. He loves Colorado. And the rest of the family will be there, too.”

  Mom nods. She knows I’m right. Dad is the CFO of an oil company in Dallas and
has a very high-pressured job. He needs to be in Aspen to step away from work, if only for a week.

  “Well, maybe we can fly you in and back on Thanksgiving Day,” Mom says hopefully.

  I shake my head. “No, I can’t take the chance of being stuck. I have to show I can step in when needed. I’m going to prove to them I’m reliable and that I can cut a live show edit in addition to a magazine.”

  “But you won’t be with family,” Mom says.

  “Mom,” I say firmly, “I’m going to have Thanksgiving at CiCi’s. I’ll be with Amanda and Kenley. It’ll be fine. I won’t be lonely, I promise.”

  I wonder what Niko will be doing, I think, hitting the play button on thoughts of him. He hadn’t mentioned the holiday in our conversations. Would he fly back to Baltimore for the day? I bet his family would insist on tha—

  “A holiday with CiCi, I can’t even imagine,” Mom declares, interrupting my thoughts as she goes back to packing things into her suitcase.

  I stifle a laugh. Mom has always thought CiCi was a bit much. Mom was forced to spend time with CiCi while Kenley and I were growing up, but now that Mom and Dad moved to a different suburb and we’re adults, she doesn’t have to anymore.

  “It will be entertaining, that’s for sure,” I say, smiling. “But I’ll miss you. And your amazing cornbread dressing.”

  Sadness filters over my mom’s face, and I stand up and hug her.

  “You can make me Thanksgiving dinner when you get back,” I say, reassuring her.

  Mom steps back from me. I study her carefully, her porcelain skin and light-blond hair that is so different from my own looks. No, Charlotte Stewart didn’t give birth to me, but she chose me.