Illicit Love

Chapter 3

A week had passed since Gabriella and Carl's sexscapade. The two had not talked since then. In the morning, Gabriella had slipped out before Carl even woke up, and she's been too busy with school and training to even think about him. Beforehand, though, they both knew that it would be a onetime thing, just to clear the sexual tension between them. They both had gotten their fill of each other.

Just as Gabriella had begun to grab her books as her class ended, her phone started ringing. An unknown number was calling her. Normal people wouldn't answer unknown calls, but in her line of work, it was a necessity. "Hello, this is Gabriella Kreider," she answered, thinking the caller may be a judge for her next competition, which was only two weeks away.

"Why are you so formal when you answer the phone?" the voice on the other end asked. It was a deep voice, and a familiar one at that.

"John fucking Moore. How the hell did you get my number?" she asked in a sing-song voice. John could detect a hint of laughter in it through the phone.

"When we were out at the club last weekend, I stole your phone and texted myself from it," he answered as if it was the most obvious thing ever. She quickly told him that he was ridiculous. "That may be, but what would be more ridiculous is if you were to say yes to my next proposal."

"And that would be...?" she questioned.

"Come get coffee with me?"

Gabriella smiled at the simple gesture. It isn't often anymore for a guy to call a girl in the middle of the day just to ask a girl to get coffee with him. She made sure to make a mental note to herself, saying that John was a sweet boy. "I would love to. I'm at Stern right now. Are you close by?"

"I'm sitting in the Starbucks across the street staring at you, if that's what you mean by close by," he retorted. Squinting her eyes, Gabriella spotted the brunette sitting by the window seat, waving wildly at her. She immediately hung up the phone, needing time to formulate a response to his comment.

As she walked in the door, Gabriella noticed that there was already a second cup on the table, waiting for her. Waltzing over, John flashed her a friendly smile. "Did you stalk my recent Starbucks transactions, too?" she questioned, noticing he had gotten her her favorite drink.

"Lucky guess," he said with a shrug. As she sat down in the seat opposite him, he slid over a small pile of various sugar packets. "But I wasn't going to guess on the sugar. I hate when I don't get the right amount of it in my coffee." Gabriella laughed before thanking him, knowing exactly how he felt.

"So what brings you over to my neck of the woods?" Gabriella asked, taking a small sip of her cappuccino.

He leaned over the short table, and took a quick glance around the store. "Well, I'm actually here on a mission," he replied, lowering his voice to make it sound more secretive.

"If the mission is to get in my pants, then I'm afraid to say that you are failing miserably," she whispered back, a coy smile playing at her lips.

"No, believe it or not, I'm not that kind of guy. I don't sleep around just for shits and giggles, especially not with my teammate's little sister. But being friends, on the other hand, is not off limits."

Gabriella let out a sigh of relief at his response. Because of her one night stand, she had been avoiding her brother and all of his teammates all week. It was a rather tiring task. She had only said yes to John because he had seduced her with his sweetness. Being friends was something she could handle, and even embraced.

"So is that your mission: stalk me until you befriend me?" John absolutely adored her sass.

John folded his hands in front of him, as if he were a father about to chastise his daughter. "Not quite. I'm actually here to talk about your partying ways." He had a look of utter seriousness of his face.

Gabriella felt her heart drop. Her partying ways? He had to be talking about last Friday night, for it was the only logical conclusion. Does he know that she left with Carl? Or worse: does Chris know about her whereabouts on that evening?

John noticed that Gabriella had a nervous look on her face. "Why do you look like you've seen a ghost? I was only going to tell you that all the guys, Chris included, wanted you to come to the Halloween party tonight."

After registering John's words, she could finally feel the blood rush back into her face. "Oh nothing. I just realized that I got an answer wrong on my test today," she lied, quickly recovering from her stumble. John gave her a questioning glance, not completely buying it. Something fishy was behind that mood swing, but he decided to brush it off for now. "So a Halloween party? I don't even have anything to wear."

"And that's why I'm here. Brass, Krieds, Hags, and I are going as part of the seven dwarfs. We need a Snow White, and I'm here to be your credit card. So grab your coffee and your cute little face and follow me!"

***

After an hour and a half of shopping, Gabriella finally owned the perfect Snow White outfit. She felt slightly bad for John, forcing him to follow her all over the city while she tried on several different outfits, but he didn’t seem to mind too much. In fact, John just enjoyed spending time with Gabriella. The two joked the entire time, quickly becoming friends. Although, Gabriella had a tendency to like anyone who would offer to hold her bags while she went shopping.

The party started in another hour after she returned to Chris' apertment, which gave Gabriella the perfect amount of time to shower, change, and do her makeup before the rest of the guys were supposed to show up to pick her and Chris up. After placing her red hair bow into her head, she quickly sprayed her long, cascading curls so that they would hold throughout the night. Glancing at the clock, she noticed that the boys would be here any minute. She quickly de-robed herself, revealing her bra and thong to anyone who may have been in the room with her.

“Alright Gab, I know I joke a lot about how I like when you don’t wear actual clothes around me, but this is a little much,” a deep voice boomed from the bed. Gabriella quickly spun around to catch a glimpse of her intruder, John, before slamming the door of the adjoining bathroom closed. Although she had no body issues, she wasn’t comfortable with John seeing her nearly naked. Yes, they were friends, but they weren’t that close yet. And she didn’t want Chris to walk in and come to a drastic conclusion.

“John, I’m coming outside to put my costume on. Either you leave the room, or close your eyes.” She waited for his okay before opening the door, just enough to peak her head through. John lied face down on the bed, his head covered by the pillows. She threw on her clothes hurriedly, stopping only to glance at herself in the mirror before grabbing John’s hand to usher him out of the room and over to the kitchen.

Gabriella wasn’t sure how she felt about seeing Carl again. No doubt, their night last weekend was an adventure for both of them. The sex was fantastic, and she would be lying if she said she hadn’t been thinking about it all week; but at the same time, they both knew that, should they ever do it again, they faced a greater probability of getting caught. That night is meant to be kept a secret. She could only hope that a detectable air of awkwardness would not be present between them.

Upon entering the kitchen, Chris, Derick, and Carl were already there. They all looked adorable in their cargo pants and beanies. The only way you could tell them apart, however, was by their t-shirts, which stated who was which dwarf. Chris was Grumpy, Derick was Happy, John was Dopey, and Carl was Sleepy.

Gabriella quickly noticed that her brother’s eyes were angrily fixated on some object, but the way Carl looked over every square inch of her body made her forget that she was still holding John’s hand.

“Gabriella Kreider, you are going to a Halloween party, not a strip club,” Chris growled. His anger didn’t faze her. She had dealt with it her entire life, and had learned how to tune it out. She was only capable of drawing herself away from the blonde’s gaze when John dropped her hand.

After coming back to her senses, she countered, “Chris, it’s not even that bad. You can see what? Two inches of my stomach and like two-thirds of my legs. I could go naked, you know.” Her wittiness earned a laugh from everyone but Chris, who suddenly felt guilty for attempting to slut-shame his sister.

“I know, but I also know these guys are horny bastards. I just don’t want you to get hurt,” he said with his big, puppy dog eyes. Not wanting to get into an argument, Gabriella simply crossed her arms across her chest and chewed on the inside of her lip, holding back her true thoughts.

“She looks like the kind of girl that can handle herself,” Derick observed.

Poor boy, Gabriella thought. He doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut.

Silence ensued in the room. No one wanted to say anything to upset either one of the Kreiders. Finally, John had the balls to say that they should get going.

Somehow, the seating arrangement was made so that Gabriella was sitting in between Carl and Derick in the back seat of her brother's car. The sexual tension between her and Carl, needless to say, was immense. She begged that Chris would drive faster, because the awkwardness was eating her alive. She couldn't stand awkward situations like this.

As soon as Chris parked the car, Gabriella immediately rushed Derick out of the car. "Why are you in such a hurry? Eager to find a guy to take home to thoroughly fuck you?" Derick joked.

The remark caused Chris to shoot daggers towards Derick, while Carl stated at Gabriella with a knowing smile. "No you idiot. I have to pee," Gabriella responded. It wasn't a complete lie, she did have to use the ladies room, but she easily could have held it for a while longer.

After a quick detour to the ladies room, Gabriella made her way over to the VIP lounge area where she knew the guys would be. She had stopped for a moment after entering the area to look for her group of boys when she was tapped lightly on the shoulder. When she turned around, she was greeted by an unfamiliar blonde woman who was dressed as Cleopatra.

"Oh my god! You're Gabriella Kreider! What are you doing here?" the woman said excitedly.

Gabriella flashed the woman her brilliant smile. "Yup, that's me!" she sang.

Just as she was about to admit that she didn't know who the blonde was, Marc Staal, who was clad as an Egyptian man, came to her rescue. "Linds, you just scared the poor girl." He quickly draped his arm around the blonde. "I'm sorry, Lindsay just really likes figure skating."

"Oh it's okay! It's not every day that I get recognized as being my own individual. Most people know me for being Chris' sister," she admitted.

Lindsay suddenly looked as if a lightbulb just went off in her head. "Well that makes a lot more sense," she stated, mostly just to herself. "The whole Kreider thing just went straight over my head. Well, in case you haven't guessed it, I'm Lindsay, Marc's wife." She stuck her hand out and Gabriella graciously took it, before formally introducing herself. "Just so you know, I know everything about everyone on this team. If you ever need to know something, come to me."

"Good to know. Now, if you'll excuse me, my dwarfs are waiting for me," Gabriella said politely upon seeing the four boys staring at her. Before leaving, however, she and Lindsay quickly exchanged numbers.

The night was spent solely in the VIP area by the whole team. Since it was Halloween weekend the rest of the club was more crowded than usual, and no one wanted to deal with crazed fans. Everyone just socialized, using the night as a team bonding night. Gabriella was happy for this because it allowed her to get to know the players and WAGs better.

She was especially grateful that Carl had kept his distance all night. Gabriella needed more time to get over that night. Resisting his advances would have been a serious struggle. What Gabriella didn't know, however, was that Carl had been eyeing her all night long, waiting to make his move.

The night was nearing its end, the only event left being the costume awards. The Best Dressed Couple Award had gone to Stephanie and Derek, who had gone as Mario and Princess Peach. The best group costume, unfortunately, went to Del Zotto and Boyle, who went as the Power Rangers. The single-handed best costume of the night went hands down to Zuccarello, who had decided to embrace his inner hobbit for the night.

It was almost 1:30 in the morning, and although that didn't seem that late, many people had already left the club. Gabriella found herself with Mats, Carl, Derick, and Chris. John had decided to cab it home instead of waiting for the rest of them to want to leave.

"Alright guys, we need to do some serious planning now," Derick stated just after making sure John wasn't going to return to the lounge.

The boys around her nodded their heads in agreement, but Gabriella felt left out. She felt as if they were having a silent conversation without her. "About what?" she questioned.

Derick looked at her, completely baffled. "John's birthday, of course!" he shouted. "It's in two weeks, and we plan to celebrate," he quickly explained.

"I've already made the reservations at the restaurant and ordered the cake," Mats informed us.

"I've got the tickets and backstage passes for Pippin," Chris interjected.

"Pippin?" Gabriella inquired. As far as she was concerned, Pippin was a Broadway show.

"Yeah, John has this weird obsession with musicals..." Carl drew out. Gabriella couldn't stifle the laugh resulting from the response. She had trouble imagining a tough hockey player having a love for dainty, lady-like shows. She would have to give him shit for that.

"Gab, I got you a ticket, too, so don't make plans for that weekend," Chris said sternly. He knew her and John had bonded that afternoon, and he knew John would want her to be there to celebrate.

"Chris, I can't. My competition is in two weeks." She couldn't believe that Chris had forgotten about it. That's basically all she has been talking about for the past week. She had even bought a plane ticket for him already, since he had pinky promised her that he would come.

Chris let out a profanity under his breath. "We'll talk about this tomorrow." Chris politely excused himself before getting up to use the restroom.

"It's been fun guys, but we better head out," Derick chimed, referring to Mats and himself. Gabriella quickly gave them both hugs before they left.

Carl couldn't help but get jealous when Brassard had lingered for a moment too long, knowing the brunette wouldn't be giving him any hugs goodbye tonight. She had been avoiding him all night, although Carl had been doing just the same. Had he been anywhere near her soft locks or warm, bare skin, he wouldn't have been able to control himself. Hell, even just sitting on opposite ends of the small plush couch alone almost gave him a hard-on. He thought one night of her would be enough, but clearly it wasn't. But he knew that it had to be. That one night was bad enough, doing it again would be playing with fire.

"And then there were two," Carl sighed, trying not to let the crack in his confidence to be evident. He didn't like how just being near her drove him crazy. He felt vulnerable, and Carl Hagelin refused to be weak.

Gabriella pretended not to hear him. She needed to keep her composure. Chris should be back any minute, although she noticed this was a particularly long bathroom break. For a boy, that is.

When Chris finally returned, he wore a smirk on his face. Gabriella rolled her eyes, knowing exactly what that meant. "You two have to find your own way home. Gab, don't even think about coming back to my apartment for the next 12 hours." With that said, he turned and left, leaving Carl and Gabriella in an awkward position.

"He was gone for seven minutes. How the hell did he find a chick to fuck in seven minutes?" she asked no one in particular, in a complete state of disbelief. Whoever he was going home with didn't even try to play a game with him. What fun is that?

"He's young and famous. It's not that hard. Any girl in this city would love to get a piece of him," Carl replied. Gabriella gave him a look of disgust, knowing that Carl must get the same treatment. "Come on. I'll get you a cab back to your dorm."

"That would be fantastic, but my keys are at Chris' and my roommate isn't here tonight." She silently cursed her brother who had screwed her over for no-strings-attached sex.

Carl thought about it for a minute. His decision was dangerous, and would definitely be a test of his will-power. "You can sleep in my guest bedroom."

Gabriella's eyes went wide at the suggestion. She wanted to say no, knowing what was likely to come of this. But at the same time, that was half the reason she agreed to it.

After a silent ten minute drive to the Upper West Side, the two cautiously made their way into Carl's abode. It was smaller than Chris', but had a view of Central Park that was to die for. As Gabriella went to admire it, Carl disappeared down the hallway. When he came back, he held an old Michigan hockey t-shirt.

"I figured you can wear this to bed. It'll probably be a dress on you," he chuckled, trying to lighten the heavy atmosphere. Turning around, she flashed him a small smile. "I'll show you where the bedroom is." She followed his lead down the small hallway, into a moderately sized bedroom. It was in perfect condition, as if it had never been used.

"Thanks," she whispered, lightly, finally taking the shirt out of his hands. Without thinking, she quickly stripped down to her bra and thong before throwing the shirt on, which was just long enough to cover her butt cheeks.

Carl sucked in a breath at the sight. He couldn't believe she had just done that in front of him. It was like she was trying to torture him.

As soon as she realized what she had done, her cheeks turned a deep shade of crimson. She had done everything in her power to avoid him all night, but she had just stripped in front of him. How stupid could she be? "I am so sorry," she stuttered.

"If you need anything, I'll be across the hall," he said quickly, needing to get out of the room as quickly as possible.

Gabriella let out a small sigh as the door clicked shut. She couldn't tell if it was relief or disappointment she was feeling at the moment. Confused, she climbed into the comfy bed, where she tossed and turned for five minutes before getting out. Her feet somehow led her towards his room, and her hand somehow opened the door. Carl was laid out on top of his bed, on top of the covers, in only his boxers.

He lifted his head up off the mattress, propping himself up on his elbows. "Do you need something? A glass of water?"

Gabriella chewed her lip nervously. She didn't want to be one of those girls. "Carl, are you going to fuck me already?"