"It's over. I ended it an hour ago."
"An hour." He laughed, and the sound was ugly. "So you dumped your boyfriend and came straight to the one rink in Salt Lake where I skate. What, you thought I'd feel sorry for you? Kiss it better?"
My throat tightened. I swallowed against it and made sure my expression didn't change.
"I didn't know you'd be here."
"Bullshit."
"I didn't. I came because I needed ice." My voice was steady, which surprised me. "Ice is the only place I feel safe when everything else falls apart."
The hard line of his mouth softened. His shoulders dropped half an inch.
"You should have called first." The edge in his voice had dulled slightly. "Warned me. I have a life here, Joel. I have a team that doesn't know anything about me, and it needs to stay that way."
I looked away.
"You get to be out." He stepped closer, his voice dropping. "You get to hold hands with pop stars and walk red carpets and nobody tries to end your career for it. I don't—" He stopped, and started again. "I lose everything. Do you get that? Everything I've worked for my whole life, gone, if anyone finds out."
“I get it, Red.”
His jaw was tight. "What do you want from me, then? Why are you here?"
The bruise on my cheek was throbbing in time with my pulse. I shoved my hands in my pockets to hide the shaking.
"I thought Milo would make it stop." The words came out before I could weigh them. "Being with someone. Having something that looked like a relationship. I thought if I just tried hard enough—"My throat had gone tight and I had to swallow before I could continue. "It didn't work."
"Make what stop?"
"Wanting you."
The parking lot was silent. I kept my eyes on the cracked asphalt because I couldn't look at him while the words hung between us.
"That's not fair," he said quietly. "You don't get to show up after three months with a bruise on your face and say thingslike that." His voice cracked. "You don't get to just—fuck." He pressed his hands against his eyes. "Fuck."
I kept my hands in my pockets. If I touched him now, he'd bolt.
He dropped his hands. His eyes were bright in the darkness.
"Tell me to leave," I said. "I'll get in an Uber and fly back to Colorado and you'll never have to see me again."
He didn't say anything.
"Just say it, Red."
Somewhere in the distance, a car alarm started, then stopped.
He unlocked the truck.
"Get in," he said. "Before someone sees you."
His apartment was in a complex near the arena, the kind of place that housed rookies and call-ups. He pulled into a spot at the back of the lot, away from the streetlights, and killed the engine.
Neither of us moved.
"This is stupid," he said finally. His hands were still on the wheel. "This is so fucking stupid."
"Maybe."
