Page 49 of On the Power Play

The woman pressed on. “Oh, yes. She auditioned twice and finally got it. She’s gorgeous—long blonde hair and green eyes—and shockingly flexible.”

Jack kept his expression serious, and it made the whole thing even more hilarious. “You’d have to be. Those routines are demanding.”

Delia couldn’t do it anymore. She turned to hide her smile. Demanding? The elevator dinged and the woman tried to beat her bags into submission so she could exit onto her floor.

“Here, let me help.” Jack grabbed one of the suitcases and hoisted it over the other, then reached for the second one and dragged it out onto the blue swirled carpet.

“Well, aren’t you just the sweetest.” The woman stopped between the doors with arms out like a bouncer, blocking Jack’s path back to the elevator. “Can I give you Allison’s number? I have to tell you, she’s talked about you—well, she and her friends talk about you all the time. Hoping they’ll run into you at the bar in Calgary or something. They see other Blizzard players there sometimes.”

Jack smiled like he was meeting his girlfriend’s parents on grad night. “Well, maybe we’ll run into each other?—”

“Let me give you her number and maybe—” The woman stopped as Delia tapped her arm.

“Ma’am, do you mind letting my boyfriend back onto the elevator?” She smiled sweetly as the buzzer on the elevator started to complain.

The woman’s eyes widened. “Oh! I didn’t even see you there.” She turned back to Jack. “I’m sorry, you’re dating someone?” she asked, like she couldn’t believe he’d two-timed her Canadian-Football-League-dancing daughter.

“I am.” Jack slipped past her outstretched arm to stand next to Delia again in the elevator. It was all instinct that sent Delia’s arm around his waist. Jack was still in his coat, so it was like she was holding a marshmallow, but her heart still doubled its beats.

The woman watched in dismay as the doors closed, and once they started to move, Delia stepped away and dropped her arm. “Sorry, I?—”

“No. It was logistical.” Jack smirked, parroting her words from earlier.

“Right.” Delia nodded. Once she saw that Jack wasn’t put off by her little show, she finally let out the laugh she’d been holding in. “Can you believe she just tried to set you up with her daughter? By telling you how flexible she was?” Jack raised an eyebrow, and Delia’s laugh turned into a groan. “Right. Hockey player. You have irrational confidence.”

Jack snorted. “What is that supposed to mean?”

The elevator doors opened on their floor, and Delia stepped out only to realize she didn’t know which room they were heading to. She waited for him to take the lead. “It means you guys all believe the sun shines out your asses. Of course every mom would want their daughter to sleep with me.”

“Please, tell me more.” Jack walked past her and turned right. “And that was a terrible impression, by the way.”

Delia ignored him. Her impressions were excellent. "Every hockey player I've ever met thought he was God's gift to women, that's all I'm saying."

Jack stopped in front of room 1228. "You sound a little jealous." He fished in his pocket for his key.

“Jealous? Uh, no. Annoyed, maybe? Here are all these attractive men who aren’t emotionally available because they’ve had boobs in their faces since high school. Maybe if women ignored their thirst for men in uniforms or their twisted biological propensity for latching onto anything resembling toxic masculinity—” She stopped, realizing that Jack was leaning against the doorframe, watching her. The walls pressed a little too close.

“No, please. Tell me how you really feel.”

Delia pursed her lips. “I think I’m done.”

“Are you?” Jack smirked. Delia nodded, then glanced down at the key in his hand. He swiped it over the door handle.

As the door clicked open, any remaining thoughts jumbled together and lodged in her throat. She was going into a hotel room with Jack Harrison. Her fake boyfriend whom she’d just touched in the elevator because she didn't want some mom to set him up. Maybe he wanted to be set up with a CFL dancer, had she considered that? This wasn't a real relationship, and she'd prevented him from meeting some woman who was apparently quite flexible.

She on the other hand was not flexible, not even after doing pilates and yoga in her living room twice a week for the last month. She'd pulled a hamstring trying to lower her heels in downward dog, and it still wasn't fully functional. Then she’d berated him for liking boobs and?—

"Delia?"

“Hmm?”

Jack waited, holding the door open for her. Delia clenched her hands and walked through.

“Have you ever dated a hockey player?” he asked, shrugging off his coat.

“Uh, no.”

He threw his coat over the back of the armchair. “Well, there’s your problem.”