I laugh, the tension cracking just a little.
“Besides, it’ll be different with you,” Isabella adds. “There’s feelings involved. It’s so much better when it’s with someone you actually care about.”
There’s a beat of silence. And then Aurora groans, tipping her head back. “God, I miss sex.”
Isabella snorts. “Didn’t you just talk to Chase yesterday?”
“Yeah,” Aurora huffs. “And he lives three hours away. FaceTime can only do so much. That’s why I love my vibrator. It gets the job done and lets me nap in peace.”
I let out a laugh. My heart is so full it aches a little. I never thought I’d be able to have friendships like this. I’m so glad I found them.
“I don’t know what I thought this year would be like,” I admit. “But it wasn’t this. I never would have expected you guys.”
Isabella reaches over and squeezes my hand. “You’ve got us now.”
I smile into my glass, warmth blooming behind my ribs.
Aurora lifts her glass, smirking. “Here’s to not having it all figured out.”
Isabella rolls her eyes but smiles. “And to good friends.”
“And to vibrators,” Aurora says with a grin.
We all laugh again, and for the first time in my life, I feel like I belong somewhere.
29
AUSTIN
I’m not even ten minutes into practice, and I already feel like shit.
Not physically. Physically I feel great. I’ve got a full night’s sleep behind me, my legs are firing, and my passes are sharp. But inside? My stomach’s twisted and weird, and it’s not from the skate drills Coach just made us run. It’s because there are two things I’ve been thinking about nonstop since I woke up this morning.
One: I still haven’t told Maisie I know she’s Cherry.
And two: I keep replaying the way she looks at me.
I’ve never had a girl look at me like that before. Sure, they give me the sex eyes, lick their lips imagining what I look like naked. But Maisie… she looks at me like she trusts me. Like maybe I’m more than just the guy who knows how to flirt, kiss, and unhook a bra one-handed.
Which, for the record, I absolutely do know how to do. But that’s not the point.
The point is, I think I’m in trouble. Deep trouble.
My legs are burning, sweat dripping down my back, but all I can think about is Maisie. Maisie in my bed, curled intomy chest. Maisie blushing when I kissed her shoulder. Maisie, trusting me enough to let me touch her, to feel her soft skin and her racing heart under my hands, and still—still—I couldn’t say it.
That I know she’s Cherry.
I should’ve told her last night. Or this morning. Or the second I realized.
But I didn’t. I just held her and pressed kisses into her neck and told myself I’d figure it out later.
Only now it’s later and I still have no fucking idea what I’m doing.
I whip a pass across the ice to Cole, who fumbles it like a jackass.
“Jesus, Cole,” I bark. “You catching passes with your chin?”
He flips me off without looking. “Maybe if you didn’t throw it like a psychopath, I’d catch it.”
