Caution on Ice - SR Grey Read online

  Boys of Winter #4

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Books by S.R. Grey

  About Caution on Ice

  Chapter One: Ghosts from the Past

  Chapter Two: Starting Over

  Chapter Three: Under Pressure

  Chapter Four: K-Y Jelly and One Necessary Lie

  Chapter Five: A Chance

  Chapter Six: Diablo Chicken and a Confession

  Chapter Seven: You Spin Me Right Round

  Chapter Eight: Ouch, My Ass

  Chapter Nine: When it’s Right, it’s Right

  Chapter Ten: Arties or Aphrodisiacs

  Chapter Eleven: Dick Measuring Contest is Really No Contest at All

  Chapter Twelve: So it Begins

  Chapter Thirteen: Protecting Chloe

  Chapter Fourteen: Part-Time Roomie

  Chapter Fifteen: Voyeur Bunny

  Chapter Sixteen: Purple Rain

  Chapter Seventeen: Moving In

  Chapter Eighteen: The Game is Awesome and so is Aubrey

  Chapter Nineteen: Love Bubble

  Chapter Twenty: Thumper

  Chapter Twenty-One: No News is Not Necessarily Good News

  Chapter Twenty-Two: Graham to the Rescue

  Chapter Twenty-Three: A Hundred Dirty Things with a Sex Toy

  Chapter Twenty-Four: Full-Moon Crazy

  Chapter Twenty-Five: Escalation

  Chapter Twenty-Six: Uh-Oh

  Chapter Twenty-Seven: Eat Your Heart Out Area 51

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: Where’s Jack?

  Chapter Twenty-Nine: A New Meaning to Bless This House

  Chapter Thirty: A Coming Storm

  Chapter Thirty-One: She Did What?

  Chapter Thirty-Two: Fighting Back

  Chapter Thirty-Three: This One’s from Me, Asshole

  Chapter Thirty-Four: Jack!

  Chapter Thirty-Five: Like Rabbits

  Chapter Thirty-Six: Jack Has a Surprise

  Chapter Thirty-Seven: More Than Words

  Epilogue: Embrace the Unexpected

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Destiny on Ice

  Copyright Notice

  Boys of Winter series

  Destiny on Ice

  Resistance on Ice

  Complications on Ice

  Judge Me Not series

  I Stand Before You

  Never Doubt Me

  Just Let Me Love You

  The After of Us

  Inevitability duology

  Inevitable Detour

  Inevitable Circumstances

  Promises series

  Tomorrow’s Lies

  Today’s Promises

  A Harbour Falls Mystery trilogy

  Harbour Falls

  Willow Point

  Wickingham Way

  Laid Bare novella series

  Exposed: Laid Bare 1

  Unveiled: Laid Bare 2

  Spellbound: Laid Bare 3

  Sacrifice: Laid Bare 4

  Dylan Culderway is more than hockey’s top defenseman. He’s the kind of guy who’s always there to help a friend. Plus, he’s a true gentleman. More importantly, certainly to the ladies, is that Dylan is hot enough to melt ice.

  Dylan’s no womanizer, though. He doesn’t have time for love. Seems he’s too busy running away from his past.

  Or is he running to his past?

  When Dylan meets Chloe Tettersaw, the pretty new girl in town, everything changes. A relationship and love are no longer off the table. But it’s not all smooth sailing. When a mysterious stalker makes Chloe’s life a living hell the couple find themselves, and their burgeoning love, tested.

  Little does Dylan know this may be his chance to rewrite history . . . and maybe this time he can make things right.

  The past and present are about to collide for Dylan and Chloe.

  Are they ready?

  Can it heal their damaged souls?

  Or will it tear them apart?

  Caution on Ice is the fourth standalone novel in the bestselling Boys of Winter hockey romance series.

  **STANDALONE NOVEL**

  **EACH BOOK IN THE BOYS OF WINTER SERIES FEATURES A DIFFERENT SMOKING HOT HOCKEY PLAYER’S STORY**

  Ghosts from the Past

  I hail a taxi cruising down the snow-covered road, and as I do, the bitter wind cuts through the thin wool of the long black coat I’m wearing.

  Shit, I should’ve packed something heavier, a jacket with down maybe.

  I sigh as I remind myself, “Yeah, you should’ve done a lot of things differently.”

  Shivering from the cold, or maybe it’s from memories creeping in, I wonder how I could’ve forgotten how cold Buffalo is in late December.

  “You, of all people, should have known better.”

  There are those words again—should have.

  “Fuck,” I bite out. “Why is the goddamn taxi taking so long to get over here?”

  Shielding my eyes from the snow blowing around, I squint to find it’s stopped at a red light.

  Ah, okay.

  This delay gives me more time to think. But hell, I’d rather not. I’m trying to forget this city was once my home.

  It’s too late as ragged bits of the past come at me like a freight train. Because of where I’m headed today, a place I’d rather not visit, but I must because it’s where the past and the present collide. And who knows? Maybe I’ll find some peace.

  Yeah, right.

  I may be in Buffalo for hockey, but my past is here for good, beckoning me, calling me, haunting me.

  See, I lived in Buffalo a long time ago, back when I was a boy and not serious at all about the sport I now play professionally. It’s funny to think that hockey ultimately saved my ass. If I’d never picked up that first stick, who knows where I’d be today?

  Nowhere good, that’s for sure.

  I wouldn’t be what I am—a twenty-seven-year-old Stanley Cup champion, standing on a corner, hailing a cab in a two-thousand-dollar coat.

  “A two-thousand-dollar coat that’s shit in the cold,” I murmur as I shiver some more.

  Too bad it’s not the freezing cold that’s cutting me to the bone. It’s not; it’s the demons from my past. Those bastards are colder than ice, and unlike this transitory cold, will never go away.

  You should’ve done more to save her, one of those demons from the past reminds me now.

  “But I was just a kid,” I protest to this one, named Guilt.

  That’s no excuse, Guilt hisses in my head.

  Thank God the taxi is pulling up. Because I’m really losing it here.

  Ice crunches beneath the spinning tires as the cab slides to a slippery stop.

  “Hop on in,” a young, friendly male driver says when I open the back door.

  I jump in and before he can utter another word, which is what it looks like he’s gearing up to do, I snap, “Can we just get going already?”

  The scruffy kid, who can’t be more than nineteen, peers back at me in the rearview mirror.

  “Someone chasing you, man?” he wants to know.

  “You could say that,” I mutter.

  “Hey, I don’t want any trouble,” he says as he twists around to face me, looking worried as hell. “Maybe you should get out and wait for another ride.”

  “Wait a second, kid. You’ve been the only cab to drive by in the past twenty minutes. I was freezing my balls off out there.”

  “There’s a hotel down the road,” he offers, “and cabs are always lined up outside.”

  “Yeah, I know.” I sigh. “That’s where I’m staying.”

  Before he can ask what I’m doing a mile up the road, and why I didn’t just grab a rid
e at the hotel, plus before he doesn’t really kick me out, I try to explain.

  “Look, I needed a walk to clear my head. I have a lot on my mind. That’s why I’m so desperate to get moving.’”

  “Ahh, I see. The walk didn’t work, did it? For clearing your head, that is.”

  “No, it didn’t,” I say.

  “Sorry, man.” Totally chill now that he knows I’m not running from the law or something, the driver places the cab in gear. “So where do you want to go?”

  “Uh, I need to go to United Cemetery.”

  Frowning back at me from the mirror, he says, “You know they don’t plow much up there this time of year, right?”

  “I know, but it’s really important I go.”

  “Okay,” he sighs. “I’ll give it a shot.”

  “Thanks.”

  The kid’s pretty quiet as we start out, leaving me with nothing to focus on but why I’m going to a snowy cemetery in the dead of winter.

  Fuck, not again.

  I look around to latch onto something—anything—to talk about. And wouldn’t you know it, hockey comes to the rescue once again when the driver slips on a knit cap that’s blue and has a Buffalo Sabres logo.

  Quickly, I say, “The Sabres are looking really good this season, yeah?”

  Since they’re the reason why I’m in town with the Las Vegas Wolves, the team I play for, I know all about them. This is so perfect.

  With a big grin, the kid replies, “Yeah, they’re playing balls to the wall, man. There’s a game tonight and I think it’s a lock. I mean, sure, the Wolves are good and all, but they’ve been struggling lately.”

  “They sure have,” I murmur.

  This is all too true. Our team’s been in a real slump. We’re even dropping in the standings like a goddamn rock.

  Ever since one of our best players, forward Nolan Solvenson, got hurt, we can’t seem to get it together.

  But we better turn it around soon, and fast. Otherwise, we can kiss a second Stanley Cup goodbye.

  “You plan on watching the game?” the kid wants to know.

  “Uh, you could say that since I’ll be there.”

  “No fucking way! That’s super cool, dude.”

  He glances back at me but clearly doesn’t recognize me from the Wolves roster. He thinks I’m just a fan.

  If only he know. Maybe I’ll tell him before it’s all said and done.

  Focusing back on the road, he laments, “I haven’t been to a game in, like, forever. Seats are just too expensive.”

  Hell, I can’t leave a true hockey fan hanging, even if he will be rooting for the competition.

  It’s time to come clean. “I could get you a ticket if you want,” I murmur.

  “Dude…” He laughs. “You must really have some major connections. Do you know a player or something?”

  “Funny you should ask,” I reply, chuckling.

  I share with him then that I am a player, and he exclaims, “No fucking way!”

  We come to a red light and he turns around to study me, no doubt trying to figure out who I am.

  “You must be with the Wolves,” he says at last. “I’d recognize you if you were a Sabre.”

  “I am with the Wolves,” I confirm.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Dylan Culderway.”

  “That’s right! Defenseman, top line, I know who you are now.”

  “You got it.”

  The light turns green, and he turns back around, muttering as he does, “A professional hockey player in my cab”—he shakes his head—“amazing, man.”

  After a minute, I reiterate about the tickets and he’s, of course, all in.

  I go on to make the necessary calls while he drives, our destination not far now.

  I feel good that I made someone’s day, but that feeling doesn’t last long as we travel through the open gates of the graveyard.

  Somber now, I ask, “Do you mind waiting for me? I shouldn’t be all that long.”

  “Sure.” The kid gestures to a clump of birch trees a few yards away. “I’ll pull up over there, give you some privacy.”

  I look ahead at the trees and I’m shivering again. They’re white as bone and skeletal without leaves.

  How very appropriate, I muse.

  Before I close the door, I remind the kid, “I’ll be back in a few.”

  He nods and drives away.

  Alone again in the cold, and with the ghosts of the past coming back to life, I take a deep breath.

  Fuck, it’s freezing.

  I turn away from the wind to start over to where my mother is buried.

  My mother who died too young…

  My mother who died in front of me…

  My mother who died at the hands of my rotten stepfather…

  I couldn’t stop any of it from happening, and that’s what tortures me day in and day out.

  If only I could make some sort of amends maybe I’d heal for good. That’s what this trip to a bone-chilling graveyard is all about.

  Too bad I know it won’t help in the end. It never does.

  Only thing going to save me now is saving someone else…to succeed where I failed.

  I wonder who she’ll be.

  Starting Over

  On a day near the end of December, all that’s left of my old life is in the rearview mirror.

  I mean that quite literally, seeing as my brother, Graham, just moved me up from Phoenix.

  A couple of days ago I was there.

  And now I’m here in Las Vegas.

  I chose this city because my brother lives here. Not to mention, he’s the one who talked me into this move. I was hesitant at first, but that all changed on Christmas Eve. Good thing Graham had already found me a place to live. He’d even paid the first two months’ rent.

  He’s a good brother like that. That’s why I hope that someday he finds someone who truly appreciates him. He’s a prince, and he deserves a worthy princess.

  But fairy tales will have to wait for now, and for the both of us.

  All these thoughts of princes and princesses have me asking Graham, “Will I ever be happy again?”

  He glances up from the laptop he’s been pecking away on. “Where’s this coming from, Chloe?”

  We’re both seated on the floor in the living room of the apartment he secured for me. It’s not really an apartment, per se; it’s one half of an adobe-style duplex. I love it because there are no close neighbors. The tenants in the half connected to mine moved out right before I arrived, and the other units are a ways away from mine.

  “I don’t know,” I say, getting back to his question. “I just hope I made the right decision.”

  Graham shoots me an are-you-kidding-me look, and I feel compelled to clarify.

  “Wait. I know I made the right decision in leaving. There’s no question about that. I’m just wondering if I should’ve stayed in Phoenix.”

  My brother and I were born and raised there, so, in a way, it’ll always be home. He lived there for a long time too, back when he played professional football.

  Smiling, he assures me, “Las Vegas will feel like home soon enough.”

  “Yeah, well, I hope you’re right.”

  Focusing back on whatever he’s doing on the laptop, he murmurs, “You need some furniture, Chlo. I think that’ll help transition you.”

  Aha, that’s what he’s up to!

  “Hmm, what exactly are you working on over there?”

  We’ve been hanging out on the hardwood floor for over an hour. I’ve been reading—well, trying to—a romance novel on my Kindle. I think that’s why I’m stuck on fairy tales.

  Graham turns the laptop so I can see the screen.

  “I knew it!” I exclaim.

  He’s up to exactly what I suspected—ordering me furniture.

  I left Phoenix in a hurry, so I am rather light on worldly possessions. Still, I insist, “You don’t have to buy me anything. I applied for a job at that coffee shop do
wn the street. So I’ll have income rolling in soon enough.”

  “When did you have time to do that?” he asks. “You just got here two days ago.”

  I shrug. “What can I say? I move fast. I walked down yesterday and filled out an application.”

  “Good for you, Chloe. Good for you.”

  I know he’s proud I’m moving on. Graham is all about forward progress, and not just on the football field.

  I continue, “They’ll probably hire me since I’m twenty-six, not a teenager. I overheard the manager talking to an employee, and she was going on and on about how hard it is to find reliable help these days.”

  “It sounds like you’re in,” he says with a nod.

  “So, see.” I wave my hand around the empty room. “I’ll have this place furnished in no time.”

  “Chloe…” He gives me a look. “Just let me do this for you.”

  I give in because it makes sense, seeing as it would take a while to save enough to buy as much as I need. He knows this, and so do I.

  “Buy away,” I say at last.

  I confer with him on some things, but let him choose other stuff on his own. Truth is that I trust his judgment. He’s four years older than me, and it’s always been this way.

  Graham is thirty but looks much younger, probably because he rocks surfer-dude good looks—messy blond hair, massive muscles, piercing blue eyes.

  It’s then that I look up and notice those piercing blue eyes are fixed on me.

  “What?” I say.

  “I was just asking you a question.”

  “What question?”

  “What size TV would you like?”

  “Oh… Wait. Skip the TV. You’ve done enough for me already.”

  He has. So far, he’s ordered a sofa, two plushy chairs, a coffee table, a dinette set, and a bed.

  But Graham insists, “You’re getting a TV, Chloe.”

  He returns to the browser, scrolling away and making me mutter, “Oh, Lord, you’re impossible.”

  “Hmm,” he muses, ignoring my commentary, “I think the 75” will look good on your wall.”

  “And just why do you think I need such a huge TV?” I question.