Cade: Fire And Ice: A Second Chance Hockey Romance by Jessica Lake, Alana Hart

a plastic folding sign advising people to watch their step. As she talked to Cade I watched her face with fascination as the internal war between her anger at him and her attraction to him raged across it.
    "Sign here, please. Cade."
    She dragged out the last word girlishly: 'Caaade.' It made me start laughing again and she threw me a cool, disapproving glance.
    "You're lucky your friend could pay for this, young lady. You would be in a lot of trouble if he hadn't stepped up."
    I looked up at Cade.
    "You paid for this? Cade, what? You didn't -"
    "Let's go, Ellie. We can talk about it in the car."
    He led me out to the parking lot, keeping an arm around my waist as I stumbled around like a drunk. By the time I was in my seat I'd forgotten about the fact that he'd paid for my treatment so I just sat there staring at him with a big dumb smile on my face.
    "Are you hungry, Ellie? We should go get something to eat."
    The mention of food jerked me partially back to reality. Food. My brothers. It was almost seven o'clock and I knew they wouldn't have had any dinner yet.
    "I have to go home. My brothers are there. They won't have had any dinner yet."
    I'd told Cade a little bit about my family life, although I'd glossed over my mother's alcoholism as a vague and unspecified 'sickness.' He knew it was my job to feed and clothe and care for Jacob, David and Baby Ben.
    "Let's go grocery shopping then. I'll come over."
    "No, Cade..."
    "No, what? No groceries? Or no coming over?"
    I shook my head tiredly.
    "I don't have any money. On me, I mean. It's at home. And you can't come over because of my mom, you know that."
    Cade suddenly leaned across the center console between us and took my face gingerly in his hands, not wanting to hurt me. He looked right into my eyes.
    "Ellie, stop being so fucking stubborn. We're getting groceries. I don't have to come in and eat with you but I'm buying you groceries. You just got assaulted. And when those painkillers wear off, you're going to be feeling terrible. The last thing you need is to be worried about what your brothers are going to eat. So we're going to the store and that's that."
    I didn't have it in me to argue so I just nodded as tears started to leak out of my eyes again. Cade brushed them away with his thumbs, still looking at me.
    "You can't keep pretending that you've got everything under control all the time, Ellie. You have to be willing to accept help from others."
    "From you, you mean, right?" I replied, looking back at him. "Because believe me, Cade, no one else has any interest in helping me."
    He winced a little when I said that and glanced down.
    "Yeah, Ellie, from me. I want to help. I want you to tell me why those girls did this to you so I can make sure it doesn't happen again. I want to make sure you eat properly. I want to make sure you have enough blankets to sleep in that freezing trailer. This is normal. This is what you want when you care about someone."
    "I know what it means to care about someone!" I interjected, defensively.
    "I know! So you should understand why I want to help! Wouldn't you do anything to keep your brothers warm and safe and fed? That's all I want. To make sure you have all of those things, too."
    I started bawling then. Really properly losing it in front of Cade and, unusually, given my typical tight grip on my emotions, I couldn't seem to stop. He didn't ask me to, either. I think maybe part of me waited until I was alone with Cade to sob like that because I knew he wouldn't shame me for it or tell me to stop. Instead he just held me as best he could in the car, stroking my hair, which was tangled with dried blood, and kissing my face until I calmed down a little.
    "So," he said, tenderly tucking a lock of hair behind one of my ears, "can we go get some damn groceries now, Miss Stubborn Pants?"
    I laughed a wobbly, hiccup-y laugh and nodded yes.
    People stared at me at the grocery store and I wasn't sure if it was because of how I looked or because