So for his next act as a pigheaded-to-the-point-of-stupidity man, he’d left and never looked back, never called, never apologized, never did anything. Instead he re-lived the moment in his head over and over until he wanted to find a secluded mountaintop and holler at the top of his lungs.
That’d been five days ago. Hey, he wasn’t counting but math happened to be his strong suit, and he had a memory for dates. He also had a memory for Izzy, for her seductive perfume, her sweet smile laced with sexy wickedness, for her long legs that tantalized him in his dreams. For her everything.
He’d been an idiot. It wasn’t like him to be so jealous and out of control. But Izzy did something to him, and he couldn’t think straight when it came to her. He never should’ve gone there, but he’d done it anyway, because this damaged part of him buried deep inside couldn’t fathom that she wasn’t just like all of the other women he’d fallen in love with since junior high.
His mother always said that he knew how to pick 'em, and he guessed he did. It didn't matter how many times he tried to convince himself that Izzy was different, that old doubt had crept in, and his insecurities when it came to women crept up on him and hit him over the head with a baseball bat, leaving him bruised, beaten, and crazed, like a wounded tiger.
Shit.
Why couldn’t he be more like his best buddy Cedric, who’ve loved them once and left them? Not Cooper, he pictured a long-term relationship with every one of his girlfriends, while they used him as a stepping stone and cheated on him the first chance they could get.
His last serious girlfriend had taken him for everything she could get monetarily, sold all the sordid deets of their affair to any gossip site that’d pay her money, and screwed around on him with a country music star. He’d thought he was in love with her, and she’d played him for a fool until he’d returned early from a game because of an injury and found her screaming her lungs while humping a stranger in Cooper’s own bed. After he’d booted them out, he’d thrown the mattress off the second floor balcony into the pool below.
That’d been two years ago. He promised himself he’d never journey that road again, yet he’d started down it with Izzy.
Some guys never learned. Cooper didn’t want to be some guys. He was better off without her, better off without a serious woman in his life, especially one who got under his skin like she did. Hell, he’d never been the jealous type, never been five kinds of possessive—not like he’d been with her.
Izzy brought out the worst in him. He didn’t need that. He was bad enough without a woman’s assistance.
He needed a nice woman like his mother, quiet and agreeable yet strong, able to hold down the fort and stay unwaveringly faithful while his dad was away for long tours of duty, and willing to relinquish control when he returned. His parents were the perfect match, and until he found it himself, he’d stay single. Izzy was so not that woman. She had opinions for her opinions, did her own thing, and had to have everything her way. A little like him.
Joker, his half black, half white cat, rubbed around his legs. Cooper absently petted his silky fur. “Be glad you don’t have to worry about women, female cats, whatever they’re called.” He thought for a moment. “Pussies?” He almost laughed.
Joker stared at him and blinked, not finding his joke funny and giving him that look cats give an inferior being.
Joker might be right. At least, in this instance.
Chapter 2—Faking It
Cooper walked into the team owner’s office later that morning, feeling like shit from lack of sleep and not in the mood to play nice with management, but he’d do it anyway.
Ethan Parker and Cooper had a truce of sorts. Cooper hadn’t been happy about the new owner uprooting his team and moving it to Seattle, but Cooper was ultimately a team player when it came to hockey. He’d play in Antarctica if that was where his team was.
He still didn’t one-hundred-percent trust Ethan, but he didn’t trust easily, and Ethan had betrayed that trust by insisting the team was staying in Gainesville when he damn well knew it wasn’t. Besides with one more year on his contract, Cooper had the option to take his game elsewhere next year and fully intended on exploring the possibilities. His agent was putting out feelers already.
“Sit down, Coop.” Ethan pointed to a small set of leather chairs flanking a couch.
“You wanted to see me?” Cooper sat on the edge of a chair, feeling like he’d been called to the principal’s office, a familiar place back in his school days.
“For the past several days, you’ve been avoiding me.” Ethan pinned him with one of those glares that said the man was on to him, but Cooper refused to squirm.
“My mother tells me you made a bit of a scene at a charity function last Saturday.”
“It wasn’t exactly a scene. I just didn’t like how that asshole quarterback was dancing with Izzy,” Cooper defended himself.
“Izzy was just doing her job.”
“I don’t like her job,” Cooper groused, hating being called on the carpet for something so stupid.
“I wasn’t aware you got a vote regarding her career path.”
“I don’t,” Cooper said quietly, staring down at his hands. He could feel Ethan’s eyes on him, dissecting him, judging him, and he felt like an even bigger ass for it.
“Well, next time you decide to barge into a black-tie affair dressed in jeans, call me first. You haven’t met my mother yet, but trust me when I tell you it’s not wise to piss her off.”
Cooper lifted his head. “It won’t be a problem.”
“It won’t?” Ethan’s eyes bored into Cooper’s.
“Yeah, we’re through.” Cooper stared over Ethan’s head at the Space Needle in the distance.
Ethan nodded slowly as if digesting this piece of information. “Then I expect this next task I’m assigning you won’t be a problem at all, and you’ll handle it like the professional you are.”
“Next task?” Cooper snapped his attention back to Ethan and tugged on his collar, sensing some invisible noose tightening.