"Calder, I—" My voice broke, my nails scraping against the counter.
"I know," he growled, his pace never faltering. "Come all over my cock, Billie.Now."
And I did.
He didn’t stop. Didn’t let up. His grip on my hair tightened, his hips snapping forward as he chased his own release, his breath coming in rough, ragged bursts.
"Fuck—Billie?—"
His voice was a groan, a prayer, a curse, and then he was coming too, his body shuddering against mine, his cock pulsing inside me as he spilled into me with a rough, guttural sound. His fingers stilled on my clit, his other hand sliding up to grip my shoulder, holding me there as his body jerked with the last of his release.
For a long moment, there was nothing but the sound of our ragged breathing, the way his body pressed into mine, the way his heart pounded against my back. He didn’t pull away. Didn’t let go. Just stayed there, buried inside me, his forehead pressing to the back of my shoulder.
I could feel the way his breath hitched, the way his fingers twitched against my skin, like he was fighting the instinct to hold on tighter. His lips brushed the back of my neck, soft and warm, and I shivered, my body still humming from the aftershocks.
"Christ," he murmured, his voice rough. "You ruin me."
I didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Because the truth was, he ruined me too.
Somehow, we wound up back in his bed. His sheets smelled like him—sweat and soap and the faintest hint of cigarette smoke clinging to the fabric. I traced the scar on his shoulder with my fingertip, following the jagged line from his collarbone down toward his bicep. Old. Faded. A story he’d never told me.
I should’ve asked.
But the words stuck in my throat, tangled up with everything else I wasn’t brave enough to say.
What are we? What happens now?
The questions burned, but I swallowed them down. Some things didn’t need answers. Not yet.
His breath was slow and steady beside me, his chest rising and falling under my palm. The morning light slanted through the blinds, painting stripes across his skin. I memorized the way the ink on his ribs shifted with every exhale, the way his lashes cast shadows on his cheekbones.
This wasn’t real.
I knew that.
The rink was waiting. The cameras. Nate’s smirk and the way he’d look at me like I was something he’d already won. The whispers, the side-eyes, the way the world would try to shrink me back down to size the second I walked out that door.
But here?
In this bed, with his fingers tangled in my hair and his heartbeat under my ear?
For one day, I let myself pretend. Let myself borrow this version of a future where I wasn’t a problem to solve or a story to spin. Where I was justhis. Where the weight of his arm across my waist was a promise instead of a complication.
I didn’t ask for more. Didn’t demand words he wasn’t ready to give.
I just pressed my lips to the scar on his shoulder and let the quiet hold us both.
And he didn’t ask me to leave.
Chapter 26
Calder
The truck’s engine growled under me as I pulled into the rink’s parking lot, my knuckles white on the wheel. The steering wheel still smelled faintly of her—vanilla and sweat, the kind of scent that clung to my skin even after she’d left.
Two days.
We hadn’t left my bed all weekend after that quick practice. Hadn’t bothered with clothes or excuses or the outside world. Just her legs tangled with mine, her laugh rough and warm against my throat, the way her thighs trembled when I?—
