That’s all it was.
That touching him had felt like grabbing a live wire—charged and dangerous and impossible to let go of—was irrelevant.
“You’re brooding.”
I opened my eyes to find Tyler watching me from across the aisle, coffee in hand, his expression caught somewhere between bemused and concerned.
“I’m resting.”
“You’re brooding. I know the difference.” He took a sip of his coffee. “Want to talk about it?”
“Nothing to talk about.”
“Uh-huh.” Tyler’s tone suggested he didn’t believe me for a second. “You’ve been weird since Sunday, walking around with this dopey look on your face.”
“I don’t have a dopey look.”
“You absolutely have a dopey look. Murph’s been doing impressions.”
Great. That wasexactlywhat I needed.
“It’s nothing,” I said.
Tyler studied me for a moment, then shrugged. “Okay, but when you’re ready to talk about whatever’s going on, I’m here.”
“There’s nothing—”
“I know, I know. Nothing to talk about.” He smiled and settled back into his seat. “Get some rest, Cap. Long flight ahead.”
I closed my eyes again, but sleep was impossible.
My brain kept cycling through the same questions it had been asking for three days.
Why had I touched him?
Why had it felt like that?
And why couldn’t I stop thinking about it?
The flight to Seattle was five and a half hours ofturbulence, bad airplane coffee, and Murph’s running commentary on every movie available on the in-flight entertainment system.
I spent most of it pretending to sleep while actually staring at the ceiling and spiraling.
By the time we landed, checked into the hotel, and dragged ourselves to the arena for a light practice, I was running on fumes.
Thankfully, Coach kept the skate short—enough to shake off the travel rust—and by mid-afternoon, we were back at the hotel with the evening free.
Most of the guys scattered to their rooms to nap. I collapsed onto my bed and stared at the ceiling, phone in hand, composing and deleting texts to Jacks.
Me: Made it. Seattle is wet.
Delete. Too boring.
Me: Survived the flight. Murph only annoyed me 47 times.
Delete. Too focused on Murph. Wealwaystalked about that moron.
Me: Missing Tampa already.
