Then a late dinner, taking turns cooking. Once we ordered in because neither of us could wait long enough to prepare food before we were pulling each other’s clothes off.
The sex got better each time, though I didn’t understand how we kept finding new ways to wreck each other. We were learning what we liked. I savored making her gasp and dig her nails into my shoulders. And I pretty much came whenever she said my name in a breathless way when she found her pleasure.
On the second night, she showed me Plundering John.
I came out of the shower to find her on my bed, naked, with a purple silicone dildo that was—I had to admit—impressively sized for a human-made toy.
“You wanted to watch,” she said with that challenging glint in her eyes I was learning meant trouble.
I sat in the chair across from the bed, naked and still damp from the shower, and watched her work herself into a fever. The toy was thick enough that I could see the stretch, and jealousy surged through me that a piece of silicone was inside her instead of me.
But I felt something else underneath the jealousy. Awe, maybe. She was letting me see this. Letting me watch her chase pleasure without shame, her body arching as she worked the toy deeper. A flush spread across her chest, and her thighs trembled when she got close.
This was trust. This was her being completely unguarded.
And I couldn’t take it anymore.
I lasted maybe four minutes before I was on the bed, pulling the toy out and replacing it with my cock.
“Bigger,” I said against her mouth, thrusting deep enough to make her cry out.
“Yes.”
“Better.”
“So much better.”
“No ridges.”
“I’m addicted to your ridges.”
“As you should be.” I plunged into her harder, driving her to the brink and beyond.
The toy sat in her bedside drawer now, and I took a certain orc pride in knowing she wouldn’t be touching it again.
Three days of this. Three days of pretending we weren’t together at work and then coming home to a life that felt more real than anything I’d built in years.
Tonight was Friday and the regular season opener, the first game that actually counted.
The arena was packed by the time the team took to the ice for warm-ups. Twenty thousand people, give or take, spread out around us, all of them loud enough that I could feel the noise in my chest. I went through my usual routine. Edge work, positioning drills, plus a few practice shots that weren’t about scoring but about feeling the puck on my stick. The ice felt good tonight. Fast but not too fast. The kind of surface that rewarded clean execution.
Haley would be in the press box by now. I didn’t look up to confirm it, but I knew.
We lined up for the anthem, and the crowd stood. The singer’s voice carried through the building. I felt the weight of what was about to begin settling over my body and it felt good.
The puck dropped and the season began.
I played out of my mind. There was no other way to describe it. Every read was clean. Every positioning decision felt instinctive. I anticipated plays before they developed and adjusted my gap before forwards could exploit it.
A forward came at me hard in the second period, the same kind of hit I would’ve retreated from a month ago. My body wanted to protect my left side. My brain said no fucking way.
I skated into him, taking the contact, absorbing it through my core like I used to. Haley had shown me I could still do this. The impact rattled through my ribs, but I stayed upright, stripped the puck, and sent it up ice to Crim for a goal.
The crowd roared.
The assist wasn’t highlight-reel material, but it was the kind of play that made everyone around me better. I’d forgotten what it felt like to play without fear, to trust my body to do what it was built for.
In the second period, I killed a penalty with positioning that forced their power play into low-percentage shots.
