Team Niklas (The Saints Team #3) by Ally Adams Read Free Book Online

kept his hands around my
hips. He leaned his head back on the sofa seat and closed his eyes. I applied
the ice to his bruised socket and he winced slightly at the sting of cold.
    “I’m really sorry, Nik,” I
whispered. “I told you we were jinxed.”
    “We’re not jinxed, Sah-sha,” he
growled. “You’ve just got a dickhead…”
    “Ex-husband,” I said, finishing
for him. It was the first time I had said ex-husband out loud and I felt a
tinge of pain. I had loved Adam once, maybe still loved the Adam I remembered.
Now it was officially over. I was a divorcee at twenty-three—my first real life
failure.
    “How long were you married?” he
asked.
    “Four years. We met when I was
studying journalism; I was nineteen, he was twenty-four. He’s a photographer, works
for The Daily . We met on a job—there was this artist getting great
reviews for his avant-garde work. So, the college magazine sent me to cover it
and he was there for the paper. I guess we just clicked. We were married three
months later—my folks hated him.”
    “Yeah, well I can imagine them not
being too excited,” Nik said. “They have this clever girl at college with a bright
future and she runs off and marries a photographer she’s known for a minute who
is older and more advanced than she is.”
    “Yeah, thanks Dad for summing that
up,” I said. Nothing I hadn’t heard before.
    Nik chuckled and repositioned
himself slightly under me—great we could both feel it now, his huge erection
pressing through his training pants against my jeans. Apologies if I’m
squashing it.
     “It’s not like I gave up college
or anything just because we got hitched,” I told him, “but it was a pretty wild
ride. Anyway Saffron’s the reliable one, I’m sure they expected nothing less
from me.” I continued to defend myself which is strange because I never really
gave a fuck what people thought and probably still don’t. Why did I need to
make myself look better in Nik’s eyes?
    “So you’re impulsive, Sah-sha,
umm, I must remember that,” he said, momentarily opening the one eye that was
ice free to study me before closing it again.
    “No, just not very sensible when
it comes to love, I think. It was new to me… that sort of insane passion… it
doesn’t matter. It crashed and burned. His photographic talent was best fueled
by drugs and you need money to buy drugs and you know the story.” My voice
tapered off, I’m tired of talking about it now… enough.
    I felt Nik’s hands squeeze my
hips. “It gets easier,” he said.
    “Got some experience in this?” I
asked.
    “Never been divorced, but we’ve
all got our skeletons,” he said. “You’re special, Sah-sha.”
    I laughed.
    “But you can’t take compliments,”
he said and he pulled my hand and the ice away from his eye, he blinked open both
eyes and looked at me.
    “I think you’re amazing,” he said.
“Shh…” he stopped me from interrupting him again. “No denying it, no shrugging
me off. I want you to say thank you, Niklas, you are right, I am amazing,” he teased
me.
    I bit my tongue between my teeth
and made a face at him. “That’s not going to happen,” I said, “and not because
I’m insecure or have low self-esteem, I know exactly my strengths and
weaknesses.”
    “I know some of them too,” he
said.
    “Already? I doubt it,” I said,
impatiently. Yeah I’m so transparent that Nik can sum me up in a minute.
    “You’re beautiful and trusting but
you’ve had your wings clipped so now you’re cautious and licking your wounds.
You trust your family and close friends but you’re not going to make the same
mistakes again,” he said, watching me and not stopping for breath. “You’re
ambitious and creative, you need very little company. You’re a bit hyper and if
you didn’t design, work, exercise and do flips down your catwalk you would probably
be clawing the roof. You want to make your own mark, you dress how you want to
dress regardless of