It hit him, as he said it, that he wanted that to be true. That was why Noah saying he loved him was important. That was why he’d been so murderously angry with Rafe.
He wasn’t sure where he was even supposed to start, but there was a part of him that wanted Noah to be his. Not just his best friend, not just his roommate, but his partner. His one-and-only.
Jace had never had a more terrifying thought in his life, but there it was. Clear as a mid-summer day, front and center in his mind.
He had no idea what the hell he was going to do about it, though.
Chapter Fifteen
Joe was exactly as Noah remembered him—tall, dark, and gorgeous. His smile was still capable of lighting up a room, and it was directed straight at Noah the moment he saw him. Everyone in the locker room looked over to see who the new guy was.
Noah rushed in for a bone-crushing hug, laughing the whole time. Sometimes, he wished things had worked out between them, but what they wanted from life was too different. Joe was always flying off to some business meeting far away, and Noah, well… he valued quiet evenings in front of the TV too much to deal with it. Joe had told him once that he was never going to settle down, not until the Grim Reaper caught up with him. That was the moment Noah knew their relationship wasn’t going anywhere.
He was glad they’d stayed friends, though. Especially right now.
“You haven’t aged a day!” Joe enthused, pulling back from the hug to look at him, keeping both hands on his shoulders. Joe was an intensely physical man, and Noah had always liked that about him. He liked to be touched.
“It’s been less than a year since I last saw you, so I hope not.” Noah grinned.
“So I hear you’re married now? Is the lucky sonofabitch here, or…?” Joe looked around for a likely candidate. He was in for a surprise.
“That would be me,” Jace said, offering his hand. Joe shook it enthusiastically. He was obviously not heartbroken that Noah had moved on, which was good. Noah had experienced enough jealousy lately to last him a lifetime.
“I hope you know how well you did.” Joe beamed at him. “I tried to snatch Noah up when I had my chance, but he wouldn’t have me. You must be something really special.”
“He is,” Noah said. Jacewasspecial, though Noah was sure now that he couldn’t see it. After their conversation about being afraid of approaching people, Noah realized that Jace wasn’t really aware of how wonderful he was.
He would have loved the opportunity to show Jace exactly what he thought of him, but Jace had been quiet and distant since the incident with Rafe. Noah had put it down to processing and figured Jace wasn’t the kind of guy who wanted to talk everything to death all the time.
It seemed more important than ever to win this game, though. That would almost certainly help Jace’s mood.
“So what do they call you? Out there, I mean?” Jace nodded in the direction of the stadium.
“Destructo Joe.” Joe grinned. “You’ll see why.”
“Get dressed.” Noah instructed, pointing to Joe. “I have to give a pep talk.”
Noah climbed onto one of the benches in the middle of the room and whistled loudly to get everyone’s attention. Most people at least nodded in acknowledgement, which he knew was as good as he was going to get.
Team captain he might have been, but he’d lost a lot of support over the last few weeks because of all the crap that had gone on. He needed that back if they were going to come out on top this season.
“Okay, so, you all did great last week, but you know that with the new points system we need to win by a bigger margin this week if we’re going to be invited to the national competition. This is game seven of eight, so make it count. I know we’ve had a few setbacks, but we’re weathering them now. Just this once, we’re borrowing Joe from the Philly Brollers.” He paused to nod to Joe, who raised a hand so everyone could see him. “And we’re gonna go out there and kick ass.”
A ripple of agreement and nodding ran through the locker room. Noah figured that was good enough, and got off the bench to put the rest of his gear on.
Everyone else followed his lead, and soon enough, they were skating out to the bench to take a few last-minute instructions from Coach Williams.
While he was listening, Noah spotted a sign someone in the bleachers was holding up.
Nyquil + Noah Way, it said, and there was a big, red heart drawn around the words.
The fans, obviously, didn’t remember the game as the near-disaster it was. They remembered that Noah and Jace were cute together. They remembered the teamwork, and they probably remembered Jace carrying Noah off the track, too.
Noah remembered being sore the next day, and Jace putting cream on his bruise. The thought, combined with the sign, gave him butterflies. Jace cared about him.
Caring should have been enough. Noah was just being greedy by wanting anything more than that. He had a lot more than most people ever got right now.
It was hard not to compare Jace to Joe, though. Joe was the kind of man people dreamed about meeting—gorgeous, confident, conventionally successful and a constant source of fun. They’d never been on a boring date, and the sex had been great. Joe was a generous, practiced lover whose technique was, in Noah’s experience, unsurpassed.
