After a moment, he rolled off, pulling me with him so I lay sprawled across his chest. His hand idly stroked my back.
“Thirsty.” I smacked my lips together a few times. His chuckle was contained in the depths of his chest. Probably too tired for any more exertion.
“You keep any water in this establishment?”
I got up on shaky legs, all hazy and soft around the edges from the night we’d just shared. Landon’s arms were warm around me, steady, a weight I didn’t want to leave, but my throat was parched, and I needed to fix it fast.
“I’ll get us some,” I murmured, barely able to keep the grin off my face.
“Please,” he said, voice thick and lazy, still in the same position as when I was in his arms.
I padded through to the kitchen, completely naked, feeling ridiculous and elated at the same time. Every step made me grin a little wider, and averting my eyes from the mess helped keep the smile in place. The night had gone better than I ever imagined—everything I’d held back, every fleeting thought of him, all the tension and longing—it was gone, replaced by warmth and this overwhelming happiness that made my stomach flutter.
This was what it was supposed to be like. Supposed to feel like.
I grabbed two bottles of water from the fridge, twisting the caps off with fingers that still trembled slightly from what Landon had just done to me.
Then my phone buzzed on the kitchen counter. I had half a mind to ignore it and just go back to the Landon-shaped bubble waiting for me in my bedroom.
Lifting the phone, my heart did a little flip when I saw James’s name on the screen. A text message that read:
“This isn’t over.”
20
Landon
Practice was already rolling when my skates cut onto the ice, drills looping in muscle memory while my head stayed somewhere else entirely.
Pucks rattled off boards. Whistles snapped. Frost Bank hummed with that weekday echo, empty seats watching us sweat for nobody but ourselves. I moved through passing lanes, took the puck, gave it up again, legs doing the work while my brain replayed a door splintering inward and Nicole’s voice climbing past anything I’d heard from her before.
I had wanted something to happen with her. That part wasn’t complicated. I liked her. Liked her stubborn streak, the way she took up space without asking permission. The sex itself hadn’t shocked me. That part fit too easily. It was everything wrapped around it that sat wrong. The shouting. The crash. My fist meeting James’s jaw before my head caught up.
“Switch.”
Coach’s voice cut across the ice. I pivoted without thinking, took a return pass from Grayson, sent it back on a tape-to-tape feed that earned a nod. My hands were steady. My head was not.
Another rep. Another loop. I caught Mason watching me as we reset.
I drifted toward him as the drill broke, shoulder bumping his pad to get his attention.
“Hey. I need a minute.”
He didn’t even look at me, just pointed his stick toward the far end. “Coach is gonna eat us alive if you bail again.”
I tipped my chin toward the bench. Coach had his back to the ice, phone pressed to his ear, one hand on his hip.
“He’s busy,” I said. “I won’t be long.”
Mason sighed, long-suffering, and peeled off with me toward the boards. “You’ve got thirty seconds.”
I didn’t bother easing into it. “I got home last night and Nicole was arguing with her boyfriend.”
He barked a laugh. “Perks of thin walls. Saves on cable.”
“That wasn’t it.”
He finally looked at me then. I could see the joke still hanging there, waiting for confirmation.
