Sasha. Not Alex. He can’t ever be anything other than Sasha Storm. He’s my freaking coach. Nothing more.
Nothing proved that more than his refusal to say more than a few words to me at the rink the other day.
“Good game. Y’all played amazing,” I told their captain when we finally reached each other in the lineup.
“Good game.”
“Good game.”
“Good game.”
“Good game.”
It continued until we’d shaken the hands of each player, then skated to the bench. Coach’s eyes met mine, and I wished for the billionth time I could fall into his arms and find solace in his bed the way I had that night at the club. Pinpricks of fire pelted my eyes and nose until tears threatened. I looked away. I couldn’t let myself think of that night. There were too many obstacles in our way. Too much at stake for the both of us.
But he was everywhere. Forgetting him and the way he made me feel would be so much easier if I didn’t see the man every day. The only way I could see him more was if we livedtogether. And as much as the idea appealed to me, not the whole commitment living together thing, because that would be ridiculous. I just met the man. I spent one night in his arms, but the idea of having someone, a Daddy-type someone that I could turn to when things got to be too much, too real… that was the goal.
The only problem… the only Daddy-type I knew was Alex, otherwise known astheSasha Storm, my freaking coach.
And he was the only Daddy-type I wanted, because he ticked all my boxes.
An older Daddy Dom?
Check.
Hotter than Hades?
Check.
Knew hockey?
Check.
Understood the commitment the sport took?
Check.
Liked things on the rough, kinky side and not just the caring, nurturing side?
Check.
But I couldn’t have him, and I didn’t have the heart to go looking elsewhere, because I found what I wanted with Alex. Only to have Sasha ruin it for us both. I ignored how crazy that made me sound. To anyone else, he wasn’t two different men,but to me, he was. Inside this building, and whenever I thought about hockey or the team, he was Sasha, but every other moment of every day, he was Alex.
We trudged toward the locker room, all of us barely functioning. The moment I stepped into the room, the melancholy turned to rage.
TWENTY-THREE
SASHA
Our first game.
Our first loss.
This loss… fuck me, this loss shouldn’t have happened. And I couldn’t even pinpoint what the fuck went wrong. All I knew was everything had. The defenders didn’t defend. The goaltender didn’t block the easy shots, and the forwards couldn’t seem to find the net. Hell, these boys were elite athletes. Every one of them has played on some of the best teams out there. Fucking Malachek was on the last Olympic team and helped bring home a gold medal yet he skated like he was in the U14 league.
And worse still… we lost to the worst team in the fucking league.
The team was shook up. You could see it on their faces and in the way they held themselves. They came off the ice and walked into the locker room, shoulders slumped, chins tucked until they lay on their chests, skate-encased feet barely moving.
