Page 12 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 1

The same crap continued happening when we got off our treadmills and picked up dumbbells. Mr. Successful just had to go with a few more pounds even though it made his face twist and contort with exertion. And me? I had to match him, at least. I was the captain, so I was supposed to show strength. Especially to someone who, by default, didn’t respect me.

My arms felt like jelly by the end of the fourth set. I saw no way to get our heads aligned this way, but I wasn’t exactly planning on saying that to Coach Murray’s face.

It was close to the end of our training that Cameron was leaning against a wall and his smart watch lit up. The short sound was awfully familiar; a trill that practically ended before it had started. My eyes skipped down his arm, glossy with perspiration, and caught the icon on the display just as Cameron silenced it.

“Tsk.” That was all I said.

“What?” he demanded, pushing himself away from the wall. He came over to me to do his bench press set, adding twenty pounds of weights and waiting for me to answer.

“Nothing,” I said.

“No. It’s something. What is it?” he asked. His tone was clipped and snappy and his eyes narrow.

I inhaled and held my breath for a moment or two. “It’s just… Who the hell needs a Grindr notification on their watch? Can’t it wait?”

Cameron rested his hands on his hips and swayed his shoulders as he stepped up to me. Those couple of inches he had on me really mattered in moments like these. He was looking down on me and I was the one having to lift my chin and gaze. “And it doesn’t bother you to think I might be fucking around?”

“Hmpf.” I had a sudden urge to retreat. Whatever you do, don’t picture him fucking anyone. “As if I care what you do off ice.”

“Apparently, you do. Why else would it bother you that I have Grindr on my watch?” His expression was so smug that I wanted to wipe it off his face somehow. A few things came to mind, but I pushed them all aside.

“It’s just rude,” I said. “We’re here to align our heads and you’re busy with some fuckboy.”

“Oh and you did so well aligning. All you’ve done was one-up me at every turn.” The fucker slow-clapped. “What camaraderie. Well done, Riley. True team building right here.”

I slapped his hands away with a lazy swat, but he wiggled one around and grabbed my wrist. “Get off,” I barked.

“Listen to me,” he said, venom in his voice finally on full display. It had only taken him five days to show his true face again. I considered myself lucky that I hadn’t fallen for the quiet, brooding persona he showed everyone. “What I do in the privacy of my room is none of your business, Brooks. I’m a grown ass man with a life that isn’t your concern. And just because you used to know me and we fucked, like, five times, that doesn’t give you any right over my affairs. Now, grow the fuck up and let’s get this thing done so we can go back to our separate lives until Monday. Okay?”

And that patronizing ‘okay’ at the end really rubbed me the wrong way. I spun my arm around and he lost his grip on my wrist, but I caught his. “It wasn’t five times. We fucked every Sunday for months. Get your facts straight, asshole. And I’m not intruding on your shit, but excuse me if it’s not a hoot to hang out with my ex while he’s on Grindr.”

The moment my words were out, I regretted the fuck out of them. How I wished to inhale really deep and suck them all back in. Instead, I bit my lip, intentionally hurting myself just to distract my brain from the mountain of embarrassment.

He picked up on it. And you could trust the fucker to go down the trail with the most pain. “Ex? What the hell are you talking about, Brooks? We never dated.”

“I misspoke,” I muttered and released him, then stepped back. “Just do your set.”

He stared at me for a while longer, then added five more pounds of weights and dropped onto the bench. He did his set, then got up to let me do mine. And I would rather be damned than take off any of the weight. I was just as strong as he was.

Though it was a real struggle, I did three sets. The third one nearly killed me, but I huffed and puffed and got the bar up.

Cameron did his fourth and crossed his arms on his chest when I went for my final one. “You can take some of the weight off.”

“Oh, can I?” I mocked. “Thanks, Doctor Gym.”

“Fuck you.” He spun on his heels while scoffing the words out.

In the meantime, I took a deep breath and prepared to suffer. Just ten reps. That was all I had to do before I could go home without tucking my tail between my legs. Ten little reps. I could do this.

The moment I freed the bar and lowered it to my chest, I knew I fucked up. My arms weren’t even burning. They were completely numb at this point. The iron bar was touching my chest and I began to exhale, which was the worst thing I could have done. Trying to push the bar off my chest, I saw only two ways forward. I would either have to tilt the bar and drop the weight on one side. Or, ideally, I would let the thing suffocate me and never suffer Cameron’s gloating for this disaster.

“For fuck’s sake,” he muttered somewhere far away. My vision was narrowing as I pushed all my cells to burn the last of their energy to no avail.

A shadow dropped over my face and Cameron towered from somewhere above my head. He spread his legs and his loose shorts revealed a few inches of his thighs from my perspective and he grabbed the bar with both hands, then lifted it off of me.

When Cameron tugged the bar back to the safety of the bench, I growled, “No,” and yanked it down. He could assist me if he insisted, but I wasn’t leaving with fewer reps.

He groaned and squeezed another curse, then obliged. With one hand, he provided just enough extra strength that I could get the initial lift off my chest. My breathing was all wonky, but that was equally because his crotch was ten inches away from my face as it was because of the effort it took to lift the weight.