8
Mac
Mac had texted Rachel approximately seventeen times in the three days since their coffee date.
Well, sixteen texts and the accidental meme of a cat sitting on a keyboard controlling the world one email at a time, which technically counted, but probably shouldn't.
He was trying to play it cool. He was failing spectacularly.
Rachel:You're thinking very hard about something. I can tell from here.
Mac looked up from his phone to find Rachel watching him from across the ice rink entrance, a small smile playing at her lips. She wore jeans and a soft gray sweater that made her eyes look impossibly warm, her hair loose around her shoulders instead of in her usual librarian bun.
She was beautiful. Mac's brain short-circuited for a solid three seconds.
"I was thinking," Mac said, pocketing his phone and crossing to her, "about how you're going to be terrible at skating and I'm going to have to hold your hand the entire time to keep you from falling."
"That's very presumptuous."
"You told me you've never ice skated."
"I said I haven't skated since I was twelve." Rachel raised an eyebrow. "Maybe I'm secretly a figure skating prodigy and I've been hiding it from you."
"Are you?"
"No. I'm going to be terrible and you're absolutely going to have to hold my hand." Rachel's smile widened. "But I wanted to make you work for it."
Mac's heart leaped. Three days. He'd known this woman for less than a week and she was already making him feel things he'd never felt before. Dangerous things and wonderful things.
"Come on," Mac said, offering his hand. "Let's get you some skates before you change your mind and run away."
"I don't run away from things."
"You ran away from the library today."
"That was strategic repositioning for the date, not running." But Rachel took his hand, her fingers cold against his palm.
The Evergreen Cove rink was small, nothing like the professional facilities Mac had trained in on camps when he was younger, but it was home. The smell of ice and rubber, the sound of blades cutting across the surface, the echo of voices in the cold air. This was Mac's world, the place where he felt most himself.
"Okay," Mac said, kneeling to help Rachel with her rental skates. "Rule number one: don't lock your knees. Rule number two: lean forward slightly. Rule number three: when you start to fall, which you will, don't try to catch yourself with your hands."
"These rules are very reassuring."
"I'm being realistic." Mac finished lacing her skates and looked up at her. "But I promise I won't let you get hurt."
Something flickered across Rachel's face. Trust, maybe. Or the beginning of it.
They stepped onto the ice together.
Rachel immediately grabbed for the wall, her ankles wobbling like a newborn deer. "Oh God. I'm going to die."
"You're not going to die." Mac skated backward in front of her, moving with the easy grace of someone who'd been on skates since he could walk. "Look at me. Not at your feet. At me."
Rachel looked up, her knuckles white on the boards. "I hate this."
"No you don't. You hate feeling out of control. There's a difference." Mac held out both hands. "Trust me?"
"We've been on one date, Mac. That's not enough time to establish trust."
