“Really?”
“Yeah, so try to keep it clean out there,” he jokes as he walks away with my shoulder pads, and all I can think of is great, now I really better not start checking out Reid’s ass.
I turn, and there it is. Reid’s perfect round ass. He’s leaning over, rummaging through his bag in the bottom of his locker, and as much as I’d love to spend the next hour just staring at it, I turn awaybefore someone catches me gawking, and I head for the showers. Seeing as most of the team is done showering, by the time Reid gets in here, they’ll all be gone, and we can take advantage of one of the few places in this arena that doesn’t have cameras. Thank you, Bobby, the night guard. His shift finished about the same time I was getting here, and we’d chat until one of the trainers or medics arrived and he could let me in. Apparently, it’s not a good idea to skate without someone fully trained in first aid on-site. And I guess given Reid’s still partly-swollen nose, they’re not wrong.
“I put your phone on the shelf in your locker,” Reid says, his voice drifting through the shower wall on my left.
“Thanks. I can’t believe I might actually have a place of my own. Fuck, I’ll have to get furniture. I’ll need a bed and a fridge, oh, and a couch and television, and kitchen stuff, plates and bowls and cups and stuff.”
“I didn’t have to worry about any of that,” Reid says, and I slowly turn off the shower. “Everything was just . . . there.”
“You have a new bed, though,” I say, remembering the nights we spent doing all sorts of wonderful things on top of it.
“I ordered it online when Benji and David asked if they could have their own rooms. They used to share a room before our parents died. About a year later, they asked me to move into the master bedroom, so we spent the weekend sorting our parents’ stuff, donating their clothes, and putting most of the other belongings into the attic. I thought it’d be weird to sleep in there, but I almost felt closer to them being in their space. It’s one of the few things that’s new inour house, and I picked it because it had a good star rating and had next-day delivery. I didn’t even have to leave the couch to get it.”
“I love that almost everything in your house has a memory attached to it. We moved so much that I don’t really have anything like that.”
“We can make new memories with the things you fill your new place with.”
I’m not sure if it was a slip of the tongue or he meant to say “we,” but I don’t care. I love the way it sounded, and if I have my way, I’ll be making all sorts of memories in my new place with Reid, both the sweet kind with sunflowers and spaghetti, and the spicy kind tangled up in my new sheets.
“Yeah, we can, starting with you coming shopping with me for a bed.”
“You want me to come with you to pick a bed?” he asks, and I open my shower stall door and check around the room for anyone else lingering inside. When I’m sure the coast is clear, I prop my head over the stall door, and he glances over his shoulder, bare ass glistening with water and soapy bubbles.
I make a biting motion with my mouth, then whisper, “If you’re going to be in it as often as I hope, it seems only fair you help pick it out.”
“You should get out of here before someone catches you creeping on me in the shower,” he chuckles.
“So you’ll come with me?”
“I’ll come with you. If you got the place. Now get out of here and go call your mom.”
“Meet back at your place later?”
“You better,” he replies, and I take a final look at his perfect ass and then head back out into the locker room to dry off and change, my semi making that achingly difficult. Reid steps out, towel around his waist, just as I’m pulling on my hoodie, and I groan.
“I just got this thing to calm down, and you walk out like that?” I ask, and Reid immediately scans the room, eyes wide. “Relax, everyone’s gone to the sports bar for celebratory drinks. I said we’d meet them there after you got out.”
“You didn’t get the place?” he asks, with a sad frown.
“I haven’t called her yet.”
“Why not?”
I glance down at my growing erection, and he laughs.
“Do you not have any self-control?” he chuckles.
“Have you looked in the mirror lately? No one could have self-control staring at that.”
He blushes with a sweet smirk on his lips, and I cover my eyes with one hand, playfully peeking through my fingers. “Stop looking all adorable, that’s worse.”
“Go cool down outside. I’ll meet you there in a few minutes,” he says, and I leave before I jump him in the middle of the locker room, which definitely does have some cameras. I just don’t know what areas exactly they’re focused on.
Maybe Bobby will give me a tour of the security office so I can get a sneak peek at what the cameras are looking at. But if I have my own place, I won’t need to find secret spots we can hook up, because we’ll be able to fuck until we fall asleep in each other’s arms, naked and exhausted and totally blissfully happy. Okay. I need to call my mom.
Chapter twenty-eight
