The Way The Rain Comes Down: Part 2

And thus the next part in our mini-saga with Mr. Price. :o)

...the song muse for this story

...and of course a few more shots of our muse.

Part 2

“You play for who?!” she questioned sincerely.

“The Montreal Canadians,” I said, letting out a laugh of disbelief.  “Did you ever hear of the NHL?”

“Isn’t that hockey or something?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.  We don’t have ice hockey in Iowa,” she said quietly.  “But it does seem like a big deal up here.  Come to think of it, I guess you do look familiar!” she exclaimed suddenly, turning towards me in her seat.  “Are you a goalie or whatever?”

“Yeah,” I said, unable to smile at her sparkling blue eyes.

“You are on a big billboard across the street from my work!”

I nodded my head and laughed.  “Yup, that would be me,” knowing exactly which billboard she was speaking of.

“Huh,” was all the more she said on the subject.  “So if you play for Montreal, why don’t you have a French accent like the rest of the crazy people in this city?”

“I’m not from here.  I’m actually from British Columbia,” I informed her, unable to hide my smile.

“Oh,” she said.  “I wish I could speak French,” she spoke almost to herself.

“I’m not that fluent,” I admitted.

Her eyes grew wide as she looked at me confused.  “But you spoke to the officer in French…”

“I did, I said I’m not that fluent, but I have learned enough to get myself out of a traffic ticket,” I winked at her.

“So I’m not getting a citation?” she asked slowly, her eyes somehow growing even bigger.

“If I send that guy the pair of hockey tickets I promised him, you should be good as gold,” I smiled broadly.

She turned back forward in her seat and shook her head like she was dumbfounded.  “Damn, you’re awesome,” she breathed.

“I know,” I grinned until she playfully punched my shoulder.

The small talk then ended, she was too busy giving me directions to her house.  10 minutes later we were pulling into her driveway.  “Shit!” she cursed in a loud whisper as she frantically dug through her purse. 

“What?”

Punching the seat dramatically on either side of her, she growled through her teeth, “My house key is on the same ring as my Jeep key…”

“Okay?”

“I gave my key to the tow-truck guy…” the tears suddenly began welling up in her eyes.  I easily got the feeling she was teetering on an emotional breakdown, but this just confirmed it.

“Miss Greth…” I began, realizing I had never even asked her name as we talked about the timeline of shitty events that happened prior to our grocery bag clash.

“It’s H-H-Hailey,” she stuttered. 

“Hailey,” I said easily, laying a comforting hand on her shoulder.  The name really seemed to fit her.  “Is that your apartment up there?” I asked, pointing to the door above the large garage.

She nodded her head while she wiped from tears from her face.

Normally I would have found it pathetic for someone to be crying about not having their house keys, but knowing I had helped in making this day miserable and the fact that I thought she was undeniably adorable, I was not going to judge.  “Does your landlord live near by?” I asked, trying to help.

“He does, but he doesn’t get back from his vacation until tomorrow evening…”

“Well that poses a problem,” I agreed slowly, quietly taking in the apartment.  There was no way I could even trying to crawl through the tiny window and the door didn’t even have a pain of glass to break so that we could unlock the door.  “And I’m assuming you don’t have any family close by?”

“No.  They, like all of my friends, live in back in the States.  My job brought me here a little over a year ago…” she said sadly.

“Hmm…” I said, taking a moment to think about.  I had an extra room at my apartment that had a bed in it.  I was going to ask her to come over for dinner…I guess it wouldn’t be a huge deal to have her stay over too…  “I have an extra room you can stay in,” I blurted out, my voice seeming suddenly loud in the quiet space of my truck.

“I’m sure I can figure something out…”

“Well, look.  How about we at least go back to my place, get you some dry clothing since you’re shivering like a leaf, make some dinner and then maybe we can get a hold of the tow-truck driver so that way we can get your house key,” I suggested.

She looked up at me with her deep blue eyes, wiped away an errant tear and nodded.  “Okay.”

He only lived about 15 minutes from me in a newer, ritzy apartment complex.  It was actually the complex I had been looking at when I first moved here last year, but they didn’t have any vacancies at the time, so I was stuck with the place I was now living at.

It hadn’t really bothered me that I didn’t have any close friends in the area until today.  Sure, I had a few co-workers that I hung out with on occasion, but I didn’t feel comfortable calling them to ask if I could stay with them.  Then again, it probably didn’t seem very smart going to a total stranger’s place.

Maybe it was the way he smiled at me, his calming demeanor or it could have been the simple fact that I found him really sexy and I couldn’t get the dirty thoughts from my head every time I looked into his amber eyes, the same amber eyes I stared at on a daily basis when I looked out my office window and at the billboard he adorned.  Either way, warm, dry clothing and food sounded like the most perfect thing at the moment and a step towards feeling semi-human again.

Before I could even get my own door open, Carey already had all of my stuff piled in his arms.  “Here, take my keys,” he said when I went to take at least one bag from his arms. I looked at him reluctantly but after he furrowed his brow, I un-looped the key ring from his pinky finger and followed him to his apartment door.  He waited patiently for me to unlock it and laughed when I had to push my whole body against the door just to open it.  “That door has stuck like that ever since I moved into the place last year,” he chuckled.  “It only gets worse on days like these.”

“Well with the day I’ve had thus far, I’m surprised I didn’t just fall flat on my face,” I joked.

“You’re in neutral territory now,” he chuckled, quickly shucking off his boots at the door and carrying my stuff through the living room and into the kitchen.  It was now that I noticed he had been wearing cowboy boots.

“What, so neutral territory means my bad day is over?” I called out while balancing myself to get my rain boots off, still thinking about how just maybe my luck was beginning to change and how I was a sucker for any boy in cowboy boots.

“Sure!  Why not?”

“Forgive me if I’m making too quick of an assumption, but you seem way too laid back and happy go lucky…”

“As opposed to…?”

“As opposed to every other guy I have met all my life,” I exaggerated, slowly shuffling towards the kitchen while I took in his spacious apartment.  Neutral colors adorned the walls and floors.  There was a dark brown, suede, oversized sectional that took up most of the room and on the wall hung a large flat-screen TV.  A few pictures hung on the walls, but the things that stood out to me were the framed hockey jerseys that hung on either side of the TV and on a shelf on the opposite wall, there were fancy belt buckles sitting on it.  I didn’t know much about hockey, but I didn’t really think they would be cowboys.

“Then you obviously haven’t met the right one’s,” he grinned, walking into the living room to find me still staring at the buckles.  Without missing a beat he proudly pointed at them.  “I won them in the rodeo this year.”

“Rodeo?” I asked curiously.

He looked at me and smiled shyly.  “Yeah, it’s what I do in the off-season.”

“Do a lot of the guys do that?”

“Yea, you have heard of cowboys, right?” he asked in a humored tone.

I laughed and nodded my head.  “I’m from Iowa.  Every farm-boy wishes he was either a city-slicker or a cowboy.  I just meant do a lot of the hockey players do the rodeo thing?’

He leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms, chuckling.  “I’m definitely in the minority.”

I nodded and looked at the picture hanging next to the shelf.  It was Carey, in the middle of roping a calf.  It was a beautiful picture, he had perfect form and it almost seemed like he was born to be in the saddle.

“Lots of cowboys in Iowa?” he raised an amused eyebrow.  His face was so animated, making it all too hard not to smile.

I giggled, “Lots of wanna-be’s I guess.  We have a lot of farms, so yeah; horseback riding comes standard in the town I grew up in.”

He smiled easily.  “I’m definitely what you’d call ‘a wanna-be’…”

“But it seems you won some awards already,” I pointed out, not letting him belittle himself.

He nodded in acknowledgment and pushed himself off the wall, making his way towards the kitchen.  “I can only compete in certain events because of my contract with the NHL.  They don’t want me doing anything too dangerous that might put my career in jeopardy.”

“Oh, I see,” I said quietly, following him down the hall.

“Do you ride?” he called back.  Something in his tone of voice had me thinking he wasn’t entirely insinuating horses.

I began going through her grocery bags, picking out the things that needed to be refrigerated.  When turned to put the milk in the fridge I found her standing there studying me, with her arms wrapped around herself shivering.

“Shit, why didn’t you say anything about being cold!  I completely forgot!” I scolded her.  I grabbed her wrist and led her upstairs to get her some warm, dry, clothing.

When we got to my bedroom, she stood firmly outside the door and waited for me.  Smiling at her sudden shyness, I couldn’t help but realize I might have forgotten what it was like to have a girl around who had some sort of couth.  Many of the women I had brought home as of late had no problem being forward and assuming.  For that reason, I found Hailey even more attractive.

I grabbed a pair of flannel pants and one of my hooded sweatshirts and handed it to her as soon as I walked out of the room.  She had taken off her coat, revealing her soaking wet jeans and a long sleeved white shirt that was also saturated.  Seeing her without her coat, confirmed that she had a svelte body, but not one that looked like a teenage boy; she had curves at all the right areas.  I was never one for the stick thin girls, I would rather not be afraid of breaking them if I just touched them the wrong way.  “Um, hopefully the length won’t be too bad,” I shook my head in an attempt not to stare at her hardened nipples and the lacy outline of her bra that was easily seen through the wet, white, shirt.  “Sorry that they’ll prolly be huge on you, but at least the pants have a draw string on them,” commented.

“Anything will be better than wearing this wet stuff,” she sighed, gratefully taking them from me and smiling, seemingly not aware of my gawking.

“If you want a hot shower, you are more than welcome to get one…”

“Are you sure?” she asked hesitantly.

“Yup.”  I led her to the bathroom, showed her where the towels were and then left her alone.  As soon as she locked the door, I ran into my room, got changed into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt and went back downstairs to busy myself with making dinner, attempting to keep my mind from thinking too much about the fact of her being upstairs, naked, in the shower.

For a boy, he seemed to keep a clean place, but I had the distinct feeling he paid for someone to keep it that way.  After all, he was a professional athlete; he had more than enough money for a maid.   

As soon as he said something about hot shower, I couldn’t resist.  Only a hot shower was going to warm up me up at this point.  Standing there for a good 20 minutes, I allowed the scalding hot water to run over me.  When I got out, I wrapped myself in a soft, oversized towel and began snooping around the bathroom.  Nothing too out of the ordinary could be found.  Shaving crème, a Gillette razor, face wash, a few yummy smelling colognes, one toothbrush and one tube of toothpaste; confirming he did indeed live here by himself. I giggled when I found a small pile of dirty laundry lying in the corner, with a pair of his boxers lying on top. 

I combed through my hair with my fingers and threw it back in a loose ponytail.  Slowly, I got dressed, laughing to myself when I found myself rolling the top of the flannel pants at least 6 times after tying them as tight as they would go.  It was more of the length that I was worried about.  In no way did I need to trip over them.  The last thing I did was pull the sweatshirt over my head.  To no surprise, the XL hooded, Carhart sweatshirt was more like a dress on me.  I turned my head and breathed in the clean smelling material that was tainted with the smell of cologne.  No matter how many times a guy washed their clothing; one could never get their scent out of it.  Of course, I wasn’t minding a bit because he smelled delicious.

Still smiling, I walked out of the bathroom and quietly snuck down the hallway, and dropped my clothing in the dryer.

“Oh good, you found it,” Carey said, completely scaring me to the point I had to grab at my chest to remind myself to breathe.

“Way to scare me!” I squeaked.

“Way to look like you shrunk several sizes,” he laughed at me.  I hit the button on the dryer and shuffled over to the doorway of the laundry room, towards Carey.  “I’m fairly sure you gave me the largest stuff possible,” I frowned playfully, finally feeling a bit more like a human, but also a little more self-conscious due to the fact that underneath the large clothing, I wasn’t wearing a stitch of underwear.  I also noted he had changed into something more lounge worthy.  His grey Habs shirt wasn’t form fitting, but it revealed his strong arms and his shorts showed off his very muscular legs.  It was becoming apparent that the shower was not the only thing warming me up. 

“Not my fault you are short,” he chuckled, tugging lightly on my pony-tail as he followed me down the hall and back downstairs to the kitchen.  I took a seat at the breakfast counter and watched as he prepared our dinner.  I began emptying some of the bags on the counter so that I could at least get the salad together, but I stopped when I pulled out a bottle of wine from the same bag the bread was in.

“Did I ruin your plans for tonight?” I asked quietly.

He turned, saw me holding the bottle and quickly turned back towards the stove.  Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t hide the red that was climbing up his neck to his ears.  “Nope.”

“Are you sure?” I pushed.  “I mean, I can leave…”

“And go where?” he laughed.  I opened my mouth to give an answer but I closed it when I realized I had no answer.  “Um, actually, I was planning on asking you over for dinner…but when I got back to the parking lot you were already gone,” he said quietly, turning towards me when as he finished his story and sending me a look that had me breathing a little quicker than usual.

This statement only caused me to blush and bury my head in the sweatshirt like a turtle.  It also made my body tingle with a new anticipation and I was fairly sure it had nothing to do with being hungry for food.

She slid her head into the sweatshirt, leaving only her bright blue eyes out, to look at me.  She blinked, doe-eyed at me and all I could do was smile.

“Would you have said yes?” I asked, unable to help myself.

She shrugged silently before answered, “Maybe.”

“So what, are you going to act all shy around me now?” I played, leaning on the counter, closing the distance between us.

“Maybe,” she said again.

“Don’t worry Hailey, there are no expectations,” I said sincerely, despite the fact my dick was screaming that I was lying.  Any glimmer of hope and I was making my move.

I heard her quietly giggling, still hidden in the sweatshirt.  “While there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with expectations, I do appreciate your help this evening,” she spoke, obviously a little more nervous about the situation than she let on.  She took a deep breath and then looked me, her smile made it to her eyes; finally emerging from the sweatshirt she asked with a wink, “Do you have a cork-screw?”

Down boy.