He’s batting his eyelashes and smirking as he holds my hand. God, does he have any idea how suggestive that sounded? Or how hot he is?
I take a step back, forcing him to drop his hold. “Oh my god. Stop making it sound like you’re offering me sexual favors,” Iscold with a laugh. “My body doesn’t understand that the hot straight man isn’t interested in me when you say things like that.”
Okay, that might have beentoohonest. But he should know how he sounds right now. It isn’t fair. I’m expecting him to look embarrassed, or maybe concerned at what I’m implying, but just like before with apparently not caring what his realtor thinks, he doesn’t. If anything he looks… smug, maybe?
His smile only grows as he gives me a once-over. “Well, how are you so sure I’m not? I really want your help here.”
What the actual fuck? Being okay with someone assuming we’re together is one thing, but that comment was something else entirely. Hudson has jokingly flirted with me before, but that went much farther than anything he’s said in the past.
Obviously he’s still joking though. Maybe he has said things like that and it just feels like more because of where we are and everything we’ve been talking about. He hasn’t suddenly decided after weeks of living together that now is the time for him to make an actual move. We were literally just talking about rumors, and he didn’t say they could actually be true. He didn’t deny it when I called him straight.
“Okay, okay. No need for the cheesy porn script,” I tease, playing along with his tone. “You already know I’ll help. You’re basically asking me to design my dream home without worrying about it being my money I’m spending. I can’t think of anything better.”
“I can think of a few things,” he says, and then he fucking winks. He’s looking at me the same way I look at chocolate, and he needs to drop this joke before I drop to my knees.
Gathering all my strength, I chuckle awkwardly, and I know my cheeks are heating but there’s nothing I can do about that. There’s only so much of his pretend flirting that I can take. I need to move on before I really embarrass myself.
“So, are you going to put in an offer?”
His smile returns to his normally cheerful one, far less suggestive than moments ago.
I miss that look. But I know it wasn’t real. And if it isn’t real, I don’t want to see it from him. Someday I’ll find someone who actually wants me. Not someone who’s asking me to help them do something or to fix a problem they have. I have to believe it’ll happen even though a huge part of me doubts anyone will ever see me that way.
But I really hope it does—that I’ll tour a fancy house with them, and we can really buy it together for our future family.
But I know that person isn’t Hudson.
And as much as I do think we’ve become friends, if I wasn’t offering him a media-free place to live, if I wasn’t going to help him design this house, I’m not sure I’d have him in my life at all.
So this casual cheerfulness is better. Real. Normal.
Normal is good.
“Yeah, I’ll go talk to Jason.”
15
HUDSON
“Damn it,” I groan as the ref blows their whistle, ending the play.
“Chicago, number 96, two minutes for tripping.”
I hang my head as I enter the penalty box. I wasn’t trying to trip that guy, but my stick did ended up under his skates, so I can’t even complain since it was a good call. I’m not having the worst game of my career or anything. Thanks to Bell and Martin, I’ve actually gotten two assists tonight, but I’ve been distracted. I’m usually able to tune out the rest of the world and only focus on hockey when I need to, especially during a game, but tonight I’ve caught myself glancing up at the owner’s suite more than I’d care to admit.
I know Adrian watches most of the home games from there with his friends, and despite it being about twenty rows up from the ice, it’s easy for me to pick him out of the crowd. Ever since Ollie suggested I might be overlooking how I really feel about Adrian, I’ve been trying to have an open mind about the possibility.
I don’t want to dismiss what he said, and I don’t think I should, because if I’m being completely honest with myself, therehas definitely been more than one moment where I’ve thought about kissing him and what it would be like. Or moments where I wanted to hold him in a way that I don’t typically think about wrapping myself around my other friends. Now that I’ve given myself permission to go there, I’ve even wondered what it would be like to do more than just kiss him.
But I also want to be really confident in how I feel before I make any major changes. Despite how casual I might have been with Adrian when he expressed his concerns about someone assuming we’re together, I do understand how big of an impact an announcement like that would have on my career, especially so close to the end of it.
There have only been a few openly queer professional hockey players, all of them in lower leagues than the NHL. If I did decide that I wanted to be in a relationship with Adrian, especially if I did so publicly, that would overshadow everything else I’ve accomplished as a professional hockey player. My multiple cup wins, any record I hold for the team on games played or points in a season, no one would care. All I’d ever be known for would be my sexuality. There’d be speculation about my interactions with teammates, my marriage, hell, my divorce isn’t even finalized yet. No matter how cooperative I’ve been with Shelby’s lawyers, it would probably complicate that.
And now I want to adopt. I have no idea what implications that sort of media attention would have on my chances of being approved for adoption. I meant what I said when I told Adrian becoming a parent is my priority. I don’t want to do anything that might jeopardize that.
So I’m not planning to make any big changes as far as my relationship with Adrian goes anytime soon. I’m just allowing myself to think about the possibility,eventually.And apparently by doing so, I’ve become so distracted I’m earning stupid penalty minutes. We’re up by two with four minutes left in the third. Mypenalty could shift the momentum in Toronto’s favor and lose us the whole game. I need to focus. I can think about Adrian and how perfect the tour earlier today wasafterthe game.
Toronto’s goalie starts banging on the ice to warn them my time’s almost up, and I shake my head as I stand, trying to physically rid myself of distractions. It doesn’t exactly work like I’d hoped; I still don’t feel as locked in as I’d like, but Anderson still manages to hold them from scoring anything else, and we get the win.
