I felt the change in him as he turned his head slightly to sever the connection between our mouths. The sudden lack of contact sent a shiver through me, as if I’d been submerged in an ice bath unexpectedly.
Oh my god. What just happened? Why did he stop like that?
He carefully brought both hands up from where they held my body up to rest on my cheeks, removing each hand fully before bringing them down to rest again.
Gone was the delicious slide of his hands, leaving my nerve endings sparking as his fingers trailed over my skin.
He took my face in his hands, mimicking the way he’d held me last night so that I would agree to him driving me up here.
Except this time, he used his hold to bring our foreheads together, not saying anything at first.
We stood there, both trying to bring our heaving breaths under control.
Ash closed his eyes, making it more difficult to figure out any clues as to what he was thinking. At least he hadn’t pushed me away and walked out the door.
Watching him walk away from me after that kiss would have been crushing.
The seconds ticked by like hours as I waited for him to tell me what brought our kiss to such an abrupt stop.
I sure as hell wasn’t going to be the first one to break the silence. I knew if I opened my mouth, I’d either apologize out of habit or say something that revealed the hurt that had started to seep in around the edges of the desire I felt for him.
If Ash told me it was a mistake, then I would deal with it. It would hurt like hell, but I’d dealt with so much pain, what was a little more?
Before I could go into a complete freakout spiral, Ash spoke.
“Cade, we shouldn’t do this,” he sighed. “We have to stop before things go too far. I can’t do this with you.”
“Why?” I croaked, hurt that I’d taken a chance on my instincts, only to be rebuffed.
“I care about you a lot. . .” He trailed off, letting go of me completely.
Instead, he gestured to our identical beds before moving to sit on the side of his bed that faced mine. He wrung his hands a couple of times before settling them on his knees.
His unsteadiness allowed me to relax enough to take the few steps and sit across from him.
Feeling extra vulnerable since I was just in my briefs, I grabbed one of the massive pillows on the bed. It covered the middle of my body like a shield, as if it could block out whatever discomfort was about to happen.
Now that the rush of the kiss had cooled off, Ash looked either sad or guilty. The reasons for either undoubtedly sucked and were definitely not things I wanted to hear. Unfortunately, he’d been awesome to me since the day we met, and the least I owed him was to hear him out.
“I’m going to lay it out for you, Cade.” He blew out a breath, as if preparing himself for what he had to say. “There are a lot of reasons why that kiss shouldn’t have happened, but the most important is that you’re vulnerable right now, and I’m not the guy who’s going to hook up with you after you’ve been through a massive amount of emotional stress. Your mom, the team, and. . .” He let the last item on his list hang in silence.
“My dad,” I finished for him.
Well fuck, we were being this honest with each other, I could admit my dad was an asshole under the polite terms Ash was using.
“Right. The second major problem is that I’m your coach, essentially the assistant to your boss. It wouldn’t be ethical. I would never do anything to hurt your career, but I’m still in a position of power over you.” He pressed his lips into a firm line. The concern on his face transformed into a darker emotion, deep lines furrowing his brow.
I took the moment to jump in as he seemed to be considering the problem that was Frank Kelly, and his position with the team. The difference was that I knew nothing would ever change with my dad.
Hooking up with Ash wouldn’t make him responsible for any part of my life. My dad’s temper and my mom’s illness were my problems, not his. I’d been handling things on my own for years. Now I needed to figure out how honest I wanted to be about hockey. “Are you saying I don’t know what I want? Because I think I made that pretty clear a few minutes ago,” I tried to keep the disappointment out of my tone, flicking my hand to the now-empty space at the end of our beds. “I’m a hundred percent sure that I can decide that for myself. Not to mention, I know you would never do anything to jeopardize my career or my place on the team.”
I angled my chin up slightly, not quite trying to look defiant, but I didn’t want him to think I couldn’t take care of myself either.
“Any day before this one, and I wouldn’t hesitate to agree with you. But we’re both running on little sleep and even less food. The hospital thing was not fun, to put it mildly. Hell, Cade, I’m stressed from all that went down, and I can’t imagine how you’re feeling.”
His hands moved up to swipe through his hair, holding the top part back for a second, before letting his hands drop again.
With the haze of my desire clearing, I could see that he was telling the truth.
