The Keeper (Playing to Win, #1)

by Bella Matthews

But for my entire life, I’ve been the good girl. The smart girl. The girl who trained harder, longer, and more often than anyone else. I’ve been the perfect daughter. Perfect partner. And the perfect Kingston. What I’ve never been is irresponsible. I deserved more from them than this tonight. But I’m not going to waste my breath trying to argue that point because everyone in this room still sees a baby instead of a grown woman. And married or not, that’s not going to change.

What do you do when you can’t shake a funk? Everly I remember that I have a great ass and things could be worse.

Becket Kingston came into my life a week after my mother died. I was an angry teenager, mad at the world. He didn’t try to change me or fix me or force me into some fucked up box that would fit the Kingston mold. Instead, he spent time getting to know me. Setting boundaries and proverbially knocking me down whenever I stepped over them, which I did, a lot. He never raised a hand and rarely raised his voice. No. He used his words. He led by action and demanded I follow. That’s how Becks works. Probably why he’s spent the past decade as a US senator. He earned every ounce of respect I will forever have for him. Even if I don’t tell him enough. So if he wants to be pissed I drunkenly married his baby sister in Vegas, he’s earned that right. But it’s not going to change anything. Madeline Kingston is my wife. And I don’t care what anyone else in this family thinks about that.

“As long as my wife wants to stay here, this is where I’ll be. With as close as she is to her family, I don’t think she’ll ever want to leave.” I lean back in my seat and cross my leg. “I’d like to finish my career in Philadelphia, if I can, but that’ll be up to you.” “Hurt my fucking sister and I’ll make sure you never play another minute of professional hockey again. You won’t be able to tend goal on a fucking development team in some no-name town in Canada when I’m through with you.” His knuckles turn white from his grip on the edge of the desk behind him. “Do we understand each other?”

“Loud and clear, Max. But it goes both ways,” I tell him as I stand from my chair. “Pretty sure I’ve already proven I’d die for your sister. How about you let her live her life like the intelligent, independent woman she is, and you try not hurting her? Because I’m pretty sure she’d be hurt if she knew you were assuming she couldn’t stand up for herself.”

She’s incredible. And she’s mine. She told me so, even if she can’t remember it yet.

“You fucking stalking her now too, asshole? Gonna get her drunk, again?” I turn when I hear Jace Kingston’s pissed-off accusation but not fast enough to block the right hook he throws. Fuck.

I move in front of Lindy and wrap my arm around her, keeping her behind me. “I don’t care who the fuck you are. You don’t talk to her like that.” “Oh yeah, asshole?” He lowers his voice. “Why? Because she’s your wife? What a joke.” “No, jerkoff. Because she’s your sister, and she deserves more respect than that. If I wanted to defend her because she’s my wife, you’d already be on your ass with a broken fucking nose. Because unlike you, I don’t hit like a pussy. Then she’d be pissed at me too.”

She turns to me and presses a kiss to my cheek. “Play nice and try not to piss him off more than he already is.” “Yeah, Easton. Stop breathing because it’s pissing me off,” Jace mumbles, and Lindy glares. “Ignore him,” she whispers and circles her arms around my waist. “And maybe try not to kill him during your first practice.”

“It’s always been you. The answer to all those questions is you, Madeline Kingston. It was you when we were too young for me to admit it was you. It was still you when I wasn’t a good enough man for it to be you. It’s been you every night in my dreams, when I’m not strong enough to save you. When you slip through my fingers and I lose you before I wake up in a cold sweat, unable to shake the image of you dying in front of me from my brain.”

I grab her glass of wine and finish off what’s left of it. “Fine. I want him. I’ve always wanted him. But not like this.” “Then how do you want it, princess?”

“I love you, Madeline Kingston,” he whispers, a quiet prayer from his lips. “You’re not allowed to die until we’re old and gray and lying in bed together. And then you have to wait until I’ve been dead for at least ten minutes, so I never need to know a world without you in it.”