Page 101 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 3

“He’ll be fine,” I assured him. Toby was someone who had so easily fallen into the banter and communication style of the team that I didn’t worry about him taking it too seriously. He was probably playing it up himself for the views. The whole “rising star” thing wasn’t taking off as much as he’d hoped. I was glad he didn’t begrudge Griffin and me for stealing the spotlight. He probably knew that neither of us had wanted all the attention.

We went into a diner off campus and ordered a bunch of snacks. A woman in her fifties with a hairnet on her head served us when the order was ready, and she cocked her head in a friendly and curious way. “It’s you boys, isn’t it?”

Griffin grinned like he was the king of Hollywood Boulevard. “The hockey ones, yeah.”

“Aw, you’re sweet,” she said. “My son watches the show. Says you boys are the best part of it. Says you’re funny.”

“Funny?” I asked.

“Cute,” she explained. She pushed the tray across the counter. “Don’t let fame get into your head. Breaks relationships like that.” She snapped her fingers and turned her attention to the next customer in line.

Griffin threw his head back and laughed. We walked to a table with our snacks, and he bumped into me before we sat down across from each other. “Hear that? We’re cute.”

“And transparent like cellophane,” I reminded him.

He sucked his teeth. “Doesn’t bother me what people think they know.”

But what they really knew was a whole other thing. And that made sense to me. We had something far more fragile and tenacious than what the show viewers imagined. Though they got the spicy part right in fan fiction, this thing of ours was new and far too easy to break to be exposed to public scrutiny. Even our friends were in the dark.

When we returned to the team house, it was mostly asleep. Guys were in their own rooms, lights more or less off, and the silence settled around us like a comforter. As soon as the doors closed, pretenses fell away. I spun around and pinned Griffin against the door, kissing him like it was our first time.

“Cruel,” I whispered against his lips. “Having to look at you all day from a distance.”

He grabbed my wrists and turned us around, pressing me against the door with all his weight, my hands trapped above my head. “Makes this all the hotter.”

He wasn’t wrong. The simmering, sizzling anticipation that had been building all day long was finally reaching its climax.

Griffin’s mouth was on mine again before I could even breathe out his name. The kiss started deep, already burning, and it made my bones forget their purpose. His hands dragged over my sides, drawing lines over fabric that felt suddenly too heavy, too hot, too wrong between us.

My breath hitched as he tugged my shirt free from my jeans and slipped his palms under it. His touch was scorching, rough in the best way, familiar now, but every time he touched me felt like a first.

“God, Andrei,” he whispered against my skin, voice hoarse and wrecked. “You’re all I thought about the whole damn day.” His fingers trembled as they lifted my shirt and felt my torso. “Since you stepped into the locker room, I couldn’t look away.”

I smiled because I knew. I’d seen the way his eyes lingered when we passed each other in the rink, the almost innocent brush of his hand when no one looked. “Then stop thinking,” I murmured, pushing the words into the seam of his throat. “Just do something about it.”

He did.

The weight of him was solid and hot, his body a wall of muscle and desire. He lifted me slightly, pressing me harder into the door until I could feel the pounding of his heartbeat against my chest. His mouth found my jaw, then the sensitive spot just under my ear, where his breath made me shiver.

I tangled my fingers in his hair and tugged just enough to make him look at me.

He smiled, soft and reckless. “You’re all I want.”

I adored that he didn’t mind saying those words aloud. Even if I knew them in my heart, it felt better to hear it.

And then there were no more words. Just the sound of us, the quiet gasps, the rasp of fabric, the faint thud of the door behind my head. My shirt hit the floor first, then his. The air between us went molten.

He kissed down my chest with a hunger that was somehow both desperate and reverent, like he couldn’t decide whether to devour me or worship me. When his tongue traced the line of my stomach, I thought I’d forget my own name.

“Griffin…”

He looked up, eyes dark, pupils blown wide. “Tell me what you want.”

“You,” I said, voice breaking somewhere between a whisper and a plea. “Just you.”

He smiled that slow, dizzying smile that ruined me every time, and his hands slid lower, deliberate and sure, like he already knew every answer my body had to give.

He moved his hand over the hard bulge pushing against my pants, chuckled like a torturer who loved dragging it out, and leaned in to unbutton my pants with his teeth.