I shifted to his mid-back, letting my hands slide in slow lines to chase the muscle groups that had picked up the slack. He went suspiciously still.
“Uh, that’s not my shoulder, Doc,” he said.
“Not a doctor.” My fingers pressed into the band of muscle running beside his spine. Tight as steel cable. “You’ve been compensating. Overworking everything around it to make up for the weakness there.”
He didn’t argue, which told me more than anything he’d said out loud today.
“Here,” I said, nudging slightly. “Feel this?”
I increased my pressure enough to unlock the knot buried underneath. It shifted under my thumbs like something trying to wriggle free. Theo’s breath hitched. Then broke. Then turned into a low, unguarded groan that sank straight into the floor and somehow into me too. My insides vibrated with it. My skin prickled with goosebumps.
“I thought the goal was to keep me on the ice, not kill me,” he said through strained, panting breaths.
“Oh, wasn’t I clear before?” A cheeky grin played at the corners of my mouth. “The team will have to drag you through finals, ‘Weekend At Bernie’s’ style.”
A laugh burst from him, or maybe it was a sob. I couldn’t tell. But once it was over, I found the release in his back I’d been looking for. Slowly but surely, his breathing synced up with mine.
“Middle of your thoracic erector,” I said, but the words came a little rougher than intended. “It’s doing way too much work.”
His hands flexed over the edge of the table, fingers digging into the synthetic leather. “Keep talking dirty like this, and we’re gonna have a whole other erector problem.”
Smooth. And also funny. But I was relieved he couldn’t see my face. This wasn’t the time for messing around. I paid him back by increasing the pressure some more, and sliding my thumbs all the way up to the base of his skull.
“That… ugghhh… holy shit.” His knuckles went white. “Keep— keep going. Don’t stop.”
I shouldn’t have liked hearing him say it like that, all breathless and choked-up. I really, really shouldn’t have.
My hands moved down again, slower this time, mapping the places he tensed before he could brace for them. He reacted instinctively with little shifts, quiet grunts that bled into relief. The kind of noises I only heard when someone’s body stops pretending for them.
Eventually, his breathing deepened. Evened out. He’d gone loose and supple under my touch, all that bravado melting into a version of him I hadn’t seen before. Not even last night, when everything nearly came apart.
“This didn’t happen overnight,” I said quietly, leaning over him to get into a stubborn spot between his shoulder blades. My hair slipped forward and brushed his arm; I felt him notice it even though he said nothing. The tension was there. “You’ve been pushing through this for weeks.”
“Longer,” he said. “Couldn’t mess up our cup run.”
It was staggering, his sudden vulnerability. That, and how willing he still was to risk everything for the game.
“You could’ve ended your career if I hadn’t stepped in when I did.”
He turned his head toward me, cheek pressed to the table. His voice was low, flatter than usual. “I know.”
My hands stilled.
Just for a second.
Just long enough to feel the weight of his admission and what it meant.
I forced myself back into motion, kneading yet another hard line of tension. “You’re going to have to trust me, Bouchard. And you’re going to have to allow yourself to be fixed.”
“Not sure which part scares me more,” he said with a tight, dry laugh.
His back rose under my palms as he took another slow breath, and it hit me how close we were, how shielded this room felt from everything we were worried about. Playoffs, promotions, all of it mere background noise.
“Hopper?”
“Hmm?”
His eyes were closed. Mouth drooped open like he’d start drooling at any second. “Whatever you’re doing… don’t stop.”
