“Thanks,” I muttered and grabbed the pair. I was desperate to hit the ice.
The smell of the locker room calmed my nerves but everything felt…off. I’d barely slept but sleuthed until the early hours of the morning. My brain replayed everything in a loop: Vee’s hands, his voice, round one, two, his pointed tongue licking his cum right out of my ass, that fucking mirror.
I kept my head down and stood there with my hands curled in the hem of my hoodie until someone cleared their throat behind me.
“Mornin’?” Bo pitched it like a question.
I turned around and forced a smile on my face.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asked me in his soft, Swedish lilt.
“Nothing. I’m—”
“Don’t even fucking try, Nate. You look like you got hit by a truck.” He paused and tilted his head like an inquisitive cat. “Or laid REALLY well.”
Oh my God.
Heat crept up my neck, and I frantically looked anywhere but at Bo’s wolfish grin that exposed his fangs.
Earth, swallow me whole.
I fuckingdespisedmy brain for taking this as another opportunity to catapult me back into Vee’s shower on my knees.
Bo glanced at his smartwatch, then gripped my upper arm and marched me to the door without another word.“We’re… we’re leaving the rink? Right now?” He hummed and handed me my coat that I hadn’t even realised he’d grabbed. “You need pastry therapy.”
I followed him past the gear room and through the set of glass doors.
“You don’t believe in pastries.” Bo was the one person on the team—except for Guns—who kept one hundred percent to his healthy diet.
He snorted. “Some problems can’t be solved by a salad.”
Can’t argue with that.
We set off in the direction of Bo’s apartment.
I shoved my hands into my pockets and stared at the pavement under my soles. We walked in silence. He’d roast me in a bit, but I was thankful for a few moments of respite—until Vee popped up in my head again.
Five minutes later we reached a small bakery by the royal gardens.
“You need to order for me,” I muttered when we reached the door. “My German is still shit.” I’d never been great at languages.
“I know,” Bo chuckled as we entered the heavenly smelling place. The scent of fresh coffee mixed with sugar and spices from the first Christmas treats enveloped me, and I choked up. This place felt warm and safe, and it calmed my frayed nerves. My teammate ordered coffee and some pastries from a motherly woman who clearly recognised him. She joked with him in German and slipped two extra cookies on our plates with a little wink.
I wished I could fully appreciate how special it was that Bo shared this ritual with me, but the lump in my throat threatened to choke me.
He carried our tray past the counter and into a cosy sunroom full of plants. Only a few pensioners sat at a table in the corner. Bo picked one by the glass fronts for us.
“Nice place.”
He ignored me and took a bite of his pastry.
“I never thought I’d see you eat a pastry.”
Bo ignored this, too, and just made a throwaway gesture with his hand that sent sugar flying across our table. He grimaced and licked the remaining sugar off his fingers. Then he leaned back in his chair, folded his massive arms before his chest, and levelled me with a look out of his mossy green eyes. He waited for me to speak first.
“Something happened in the forest,” I blurted out because, fuck, I needed to talk to someone about it. I’d contemplated telling my mum on the phone when I’d called her. But I’d never discussed my sex life with my parents, and I wasn’t desperate enough to start when I was an ocean away.
Bo raised an eyebrow, then reached out for his coffee cup. He nodded at me as if to say, “Keep going.”
