That—that seemed to land. His gaze went softer, almost glassy. “Okay,” he whispered.
He shifted back on the bed, awkward with the blanket still swaddled around him. I helped tug his shoes off, then the hoodie that had seen better days, until he was down to a soft worn t-shirt and sweats. He moved slowly, carefully, like his muscles weren’t entirely convinced they belonged to him yet.
“Do you want a shirt?” I asked. “I can find you something from my bag or steal something from Ignatius’s closet and we’ll swim in it together.”
He shook his head, a faint flush creeping up his neck. “I’m fine.”
He lay back against the pillows, blanket pulled up to his chest. For a second he looked awkward, like a giant kid who didn’t know what to do with his limbs in a space that wasn’t a locker room or a rink.
“You going to stand there and stare at me all night?” he asked, voice rough but teasing.
“Tempting,” I said. “You’re very pretty.”
The flush deepened. “Phoenix.”
“What?” I stepped closer, perching on the edge of the mattress. “It’s true.”
He looked away, his fingers twisting in the blanket. “Are you…staying?”
I froze for a second, because the way he asked it—quiet, almost casual, but with something raw underneath—hit me right in the ribs.
“Do you want me to?” I asked, because I knew he wasn't just talking about tonight.
He exhaled. “Yes. But I’ll understand if it’s…too much.”
“Too much what?”
“Everything,” he said simply. His eyes flicked back to mine. “The dragon, the Council, my father, the lawyers. The attention. The fact that you almost got kidnapped and incinerated because of me.”
“Hey,” I said softly. I reached over, took his hand again. “You didn’t almost incinerate me. In that room? You blew up restraints and glass and a lot of expensive equipment. You didn’t even scorch my shirt.”
“You weren’t in my way,” he murmured.
“I’m always kind of in your way,” I said. “That’s a design feature.”
He tried to smile. It wobbled. “Phoenix…”
“Look.” I slipped my legs up onto the bed, sitting sideways so we were almost facing each other. “Is it a lot? Yeah. If I wrote a list of things that terrify a former street rat with a talent for pissing people off, ‘dragon politics’ and ‘angry rich fathers with lawyers’ would be right at the top. But I’m still here.”
He swallowed. “You might not want to be tomorrow.”
“Then we’ll deal withtomorrowtomorrow,” I said. “Tonight? I want to be exactly here. With you. In this bed. Without any more old men trying to kill you or bind your soul or audit your taxes.”
He let out a breath that almost counted as a laugh. “You’re mixing threats.”
“All your threats are mixed,” I said. “It’s part of your charm.”
He stared at me for a long moment. Then, very quietly, he said, “I want you in my future.”
Something inside me stuttered.
He kept going, words coming slowly, like he was tasting each one to make sure it wouldn’t explode. “I don’t know what that future looks like,” he said. “I don’t know if I’ll still be playing, or if the league will let me, or if the dragon will behave, or if my father will be shouting about me in newspapers for the next decade.”
I squeezed his hand.
“But when I think about…after,” he continued. “When I picture getting up in the morning, going to practice, coming home. Or not going to practice—” his mouth twisted “—and doing…whatever people do when they’re not hockey players anymore. When I picture myself in ten years, twenty years…” He swallowed. “You’re there. In all of it.”
My chest clenched so hard it almost hurt.
