“Why would you look me up?I was never around, and I can guess what they said about me.”
Charlie fixed him with an expression of pure determination, his fine-boned jaw set, his lips a thin line.“If you knew about one person in the entire family who was even a little bit like you, wouldn’t you want to know all about them?”
If Ben let it, the emotion would choke him.“I’m sorry you were alone.”
Turning back to his chili, Charlie said, “It’s not your fault.”
By the time they finished eating, the digital clock on the oven read nearly midnight.Ben picked up Charlie’s things and showed him to the guest room Phil had gotten ready or, rather, had his cleaning service get ready.
“I’m down the hall,” Ben said.“If you need anything, or— If you needanything, come get me.”
Charlie looked set to claim he wouldn’t, but instead just said, “Thanks.”
After, Ben should have gone to bed himself.Morning skate started fucking early, and then he was going to have to start figuring out the school system in California and how to get a kid he had no legal connection to into it.He had no idea where to start.He’d researched a lot of topics over the course of his career, but family law in California was not one of them.
Ben didn’t go to bed.He didn’t sit down at the stupidly massive desk with the stupidly comfy chair in Phil’s guest room and start researching.
He went downstairs into the kitchen and let Phil pour him a glass of whiskey.
“So,” Phil said conversationally, throwing back half the glass.“Your niece is a nephew?”
“Seems so.”
“That why he needs a place to stay?”
“Yeah.My family is…my family won’t let him be himself.I’ll start apartment hunting in the morning.I know you don’t—”
“I don’t what?”Phil’s gaze was calmly assessing, giving nothing away.
“I know how most hockey players feel about people like Charlie.And about people like me, while we’re at it.”
“I’m not most hockey players.”
Surprising even himself with the suddenness of the movement, Ben pushed his chair back, legs scraping awfully over the kitchen floor, and got to his feet.“For fuck’s sake, stop being nice to me.”
Phil remained seated.Of course he remained seated; his knee didn’t work.“No,” he said.
“Why?”
Phil let out a long, gusty breath.“I can’t control a lot of things.I can’t make my knee heal up faster.I can’t make the team get along.I can’t control whatever you and Trout and Pulvermacher are saying about my contract running out in the summer.I can’t even make you tell me the truth about what you’re doing as a coach, even though we both know it’s not right.You know what I can control?”
Ben shook his head.
“I can control how I react.I can control how I treat people.Charlie needs a place to stay and people who accept him?I can do that for him.You need someone to help you coach a hockey team and not ask questions you can’t answer?I can do that for you.Maybe it turns out you were an asshole taking advantage of my kindness later on, but at least I will have been kind.”
When Ben inhaled after hearing those words, he understood for the first time what it meant to breathe easy in someone else’s presence.
“Careful,” he said and had to clear his throat around the emotion clogging it.
Phil arched an eyebrow.
“You’re making it hard not to kiss you again,” Ben clarified.
Those lines around Phil’s eyes crinkled up again.He spread his arms wide and jerked his shoulders up a touch as if to say,have at it.
There were a hundred reasons not to, but Ben set both hands on Phil’s shoulders, straddled his lap, and kissed him for all he was worth.
Just like the first time, Phil didn’t react for a split second before responding with heat and eagerness.Ben had acted in panic then, trying anything to shock Phil into silence (to great effect if he did say so himself).This time, he was aware enough of his own actions to relish Phil’s soft lips, his smooth, clean-shaven skin, and how eager he seemed to be kissed.
