Page 202 of The Pucking Coach's Daughter

I slap my hand over his, stopping his upward trek.

“This feels like a game of chicken,” Penn comments. His palm touches my knee. “Ready, princess?”

He moves higher. Inch by inch. Until his pinky grazes where my upper thighs meet?—

I stop him with a hand on his wrist.

His sweatshirt is damp.

I go still and stare at his arm. The black SJU sweatshirt Carter gave him… I grab at his sleeve, pulling it away from his skin.

No.

No, no, no.

When I meet Penn’s gaze, there’s an expectancy in his expression I was not ready for.

Penn is L.?

Penn has been L. this whole time?

I shoot to my feet, but he snags my hand and pulls me right back down.

“What did I miss?” Oliver asks.

I twist around. “Like you don’t know?”

His brows furrow.

Okay, maybe he’s innocent in this.

But Penn?

“How could you?” I face him again. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

He doesn’t seem perturbed by my reaction. If anything, he seems… amused?

I rip my hand out of his grasp and practically crawl over Oliver to get away from him. I shake out my limbs. Now he’s got me rethinking every single conversation—both with Penn and L. They were the same. Are the same. But…

With shaking hands, I text Carter that I’m not staying. I don’t know where to go that Penn won’t follow, until Carter’s reply comes in.

Carter

Go to my apartment.

Please?

Okay.

I have no idea if I’ll be able to get in or not—it doesn’t really matter, I guess. Before I’m even out of the arena, I fall into a quicker pace. I run the whole way to Carter’s apartment, thankful at least that the arena isn’t too far from SJU territory.

I glance over my shoulder a few times, more worried about being followed by Penn than anyone else. He would follow me, I know that for sure. But I really don’t know what else he would go to—the lines he would cross to get closer to me.

Why?

My throat closes. I make it onto Carter’s street. It’s all familiar in an aching way. Not like just a few hours ago, when we came here with him. Walking up to his apartment alone reminds me of before my world imploded.

When things were nice and easy.