I tap my smart watch to see the time. It’s two in the morning. I sit up as the door to the basement opens and a small crack of light appears at the top of the stairs. I know it’s him and my body floods with this warm, light feeling. I try to mentally stamp it down, but it’s impossible. I didn’t realize how badly I wanted him to come to me until he does.
I watch as his long, muscular body starts down the stairs. Bare feet, thick muscular legs covered in loose hunter green plaid flannel pajama bottoms, a perfectly rippled bare stomach, broad slightly freckled shoulders, and those hot-as-fuck pierced nipples. He stands still when he reaches the bottom step. Maybe he’s just adjusting to the darkness. Maybe he’s changing his mind.
“Get over here. Now.” I don’t even recognize my own voice, it’s so heavy with want.
He moves wordlessly. And before I know it, his shoulders are covering mine, his hands are moving through my hair and his lips are on mine. He tastes like toothpaste and he smells like soap and, god damn, I’m already rock hard.
He pushes me down into the mattress and lets out a disgruntled groan as his hands yank and pull at the loose blue t-shirt I’m wearing. “Why the fuck are you so clothed?”
I smirk. “Why are you so horny?”
“Because you’re all I can think about,” Noah confesses and my heart grasps for that infernal thing I hate more than anything in the world— hope. And it pulls me right out of the mood.
I grab his shoulders and firmly push him back. Our eyes lock in the dim light. “Do you know what you’re doing?”
My hands are still on his shoulders and I feel them drop and sag under my grip. He looks away, focusing on the small scrap of duvet cover between our tangled legs instead of on me. “No. I’ve never…” He swallows. “I want to though. With you.”
“Want to…?” I blink.
He looks up, his gaze pinning me with its certainty. “I want to be with you. I want to suck you, and be sucked by you, and fuck you if you’ll let me. And be fucked by you. I want it all, Luke.”
“That’s a lengthy to-do list,” I retort because sarcasm is my default when I’m completely out of my element, which doesn’t happen often. He smiles fleetingly before leaning in and kissing his way up the side of my neck, sucking and nipping and bringing my dick to life again. “Your dad, if I remember correctly, is an early riser, so we don’t have time for everything. And you, bi-sexual Bambi, need to go slowly.”
He bites down on the side of my neck and the sharp jolt of pain almost immediately turns to a pulse of pleasure. I wrap a hand into his dirty blond hair and yank him back. He’s smiling, pleased with himself. “That’s going to leave a mark.”
“Yeah? Good.” He grabs my face in his hands and kisses me hard and long. “Also, I wasn’t talking about doing everything tonight. I want lots of nights.”
Oh shit.
I grab his shoulders and push him off me again. He groans so loud I shush him. “I’m not out.”
“Yeah. I know,” Noah replies simply. “Is that what this is about? You think I’ll out you? Is that another reason you’ve been such a dick to me since I was traded to the team? Because I know who you really are?”
I swallow and get up off the bed. I can’t just sit anymore. I have this mounting pile of conflicting emotions building inside me and it’s making me antsy. Hope, fear, desire, anxiety, trauma. “I spent all of college waiting for you to tell Justin.”
“I never did.”
“I know. And then you got drafted and I’ve had this fear floating around in my brain that you might tell a teammate, or a friend, or, worst of all, a reporter.” I run a hand over my hair and down my neck, my fingers rubbing the spot he’s nipped. “And I can’t ask you to, like, find yourself and then not tell anybody. But I also don’t want to come out. At the moment.”
He’s sitting on the side of the pull-out, his feet on the ground and his hands pressed into the mattress on either side. His head is tilted up, watching me intently, and I can’t miss the look of pain on his face. “I was young when I caught you, yeah, but I wasn’t stupid. Or an asshole. I knew, even then, that outing someone was a monstrously cruel thing to do. I’m also a hockey player and so I understand why you aren’t out. The league is a homophobic piece of shit. Yeah a ton of actual players would be fine with it, but the old, shitty white men that run things wouldn’t be. They’ve proven that with their actions time and time again.”
I sigh as guilt and shame fill all the little holes in my heart the other emotions aren’t. “I’m not ashamed of who I am but I’m not giving this league, or anyone else, a chance to punish me for it. My parents did and that was enough. I don’t deserve it.”
“You don’t,” Noah agrees and he stands up. “I’m not asking you to come out. I don’t know if I’m going to tell anyone about who I am now. I mean, I didn’t exactly go around announcing I was straight so why should I announce I’m not? I’m not asking you to suck my cock at center ice while the puck drops, Luke.”
I can’t help but smile at the absurdity of that, especially coming out of his mouth. He smiles back at me and reaches for me. His hand cups my shoulder and then he lets his palm slide down my arm, slowly, leaving goose flesh in its wake. He reaches my wrist, wraps his strong hand around it, and pulls me to him until our chests bump. His lips graze across my jaw. “So what are you asking me?”
He contemplates that question for a moment. “I’m asking you to please let me push you back onto that bed and suck your cock.”
Oh fuck. If only I could turn off my brain. I’m usually great at that. But this is Noah Prince. My best friend’s little brother. My teammate. And a guy I’ve had indecent thoughts about since he first stepped into the locker room and I realized he was all grown up. And pierced.
My hands go to his nipples now, and I let my thumbs brush the barbells. He makes a noise in the back of his throat. “And then what?”
“All the other debaucherous things on my to-do list,” Noah whispers and sucks my earlobe between his lips.
“That will take time. Like I said, you’re a rookie. A baby at this like Bambi.” I huff out a pant because fuck he’s pushing our hips together and the friction of our cocks rubbing is heaven on earth. “This is new and it can be confusing and… rough.”
“I like it rough.” He grabs my shoulders, turns us and pushes me roughly, back onto the bed, as if to prove his point.
