The Nature of the Game (Stick Side Book 2), page 25
Bisexual, Ash corrected more than once, like nobody wanted to acknowledge that bisexuality was a real thing, which was annoying and probably something that he’d have to deal with for the rest of his life, which was also annoying.
Oh, and playing his first game as an out player felt like it did every game maximized by a thousand thanks to the amazing support of the fans.
Finally freed of the press’s clutches, he headed toward the back exit that led to the secluded employee parking area. A handful of WAGs waited for his teammates by the door; Ash only had eyes for the lone male in the group.
WAGs really needed a new name. SASOs maybe? Spouses and significant others.
HTSTKBTTDAHP? Humans too stupid to know better than to date a hockey player. Professional athletes didn’t exactly lead quiet lives.
That last one was maybe too long.
He was chortling to himself when he reached Dan.
Dan’s smile grew, creasing his cheeks. “You look happy.”
“I am happy.” Ash pecked Dan’s lips with a chaste kiss, ignoring the dropped jaws of the WAGs. Dan rose onto his toes, twining his arms around Ash’s shoulders. Maybe Ash hadn’t been able to see him in the crowd tonight, but just knowing he was here had been enough.
Dan nuzzled Ash’s cheek. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Ash smiled stupidly and squeezed his waist. “How was your first NHL game?”
“My first . . .” Dan trailed off, dropping onto his heels. “Um, this wasn’t my first game.”
“No? I guess I just assumed.” Threading their fingers together, Ash led Dan into the parking lot. The night air was hot, and although not overly humid, still too humid for his suit. “What was your first one then?”
Lips pursed, Dan cleared his throat. “Tampa versus New York a few years ago.”
“Wait.” A few years ago? Ash stopped, right there in the middle of the lot. “You went to one of my games?”
Dan suddenly found a nearby beige sedan very interesting. He swung their arms between them. “Um, all of them?”
“Full stop. You’ve been to all of my games in New York City?”
Pressing his lips together, Dan shrugged, his eyes lit from within.
They’d been in the same building together? More than once? Instead of dwelling on the past, Ash shook his head and laughed, heading for his car. “I’m treating the teams to dinner and drinks at The Tavern. You in?”
“Teams, plural?” Hopping into the car, Dan slid on his seatbelt and shot Ash the side-eye. “That’s going to be quite the hefty bill.”
“Worth it.”
“Yeah. That was the most . . . interesting game I’ve ever been to.”
Ash started the car, but then sat with his hands loosely resting around the bottom curve of the steering wheel. He blew out a breath. Dan massaged his neck, fingers sinking into his hair. Felt so fucking good, Ash let out a grunt.
“You okay?” Dan asked, his voice quiet in the dim interior.
“I’m . . . kind of confused. I think I expected today to go a lot differently.”
“It’s nice when people can surprise you for the better.”
Ash turned his head on the headrest to look at Dan. “Did I ever tell you why I came out?”
“No.” Dan’s thumb traced a path behind Ash’s ear, making Ash’s neck erupt in goosebumps. “But I saw your interview from a couple of days ago. You said you wanted to show kids that they can be who they are and still achieve their dreams.”
“Yeah, that was part of it.” Ash laid a hand on Dan’s denim-clad thigh. Dan shifted closer, and in the quiet confines of the car, it felt like they were the only two people in the world. “There’s this kid at Try Out. Grant. He gets bullied at school for being gay, and . . . I guess I wanted him to know that he isn’t alone.”
“That’s really brave.”
“Or really stupid, considering I might’ve tanked my whole career in the process.”
“If you have, will it have been worth it?”
Ash frowned, squinting at Dan, and thought about the donations Teri said were pouring in to Try Out, and his new contract with Sport U Apparel, and the supportive emails from the teenagers he coached at Try Out, and all of the positive commentary that overshadowed the bad. “I think so, yeah.”
“Well then,” Dan said, a corner of his mouth kicking up.
“Well then.”
“The Tavern?”
“Fuck yes. Let’s go get drunk.”
Four days later, Ash felt like he was still drunk. Or maybe he was overly tired to the point where it mimicked being drunk.
True to his word, he and Dan—as well as most of the guys on his team and the Carolina team—had gotten hammered at The Tavern on Saturday night. Put a bunch of twenty-something men at a bar after a game, when the adrenaline was pumping, and the outcome was fairly predictable.
They’d been paying for it ever since.
First, there’d been the early morning Sunday flight to Raleigh for game two against Carolina, not to mention the game itself, where Carolina had put them through their damn paces.
Second, there was his team’s coaches, none of whom had been particularly impressed that their players had shown up hungover for the flight. They’d put them through a grueling late morning practice on Sunday, an extra-long practice on Monday once they’d returned to Tampa, and had them running drills first thing Tuesday morning until the rookies were puking.
After last night’s game against Florida, his team finally had a day off today before they flew to Orlando tomorrow for the final two games of the preseason, but Ash was so exhausted he could barely keep his eyes open on the way to . . . wherever Dan was taking them.
Pulling his travel coffee mug out of the cup holder, he took a hefty sip and looked out the window.
The further out of the city they drove, the more the storm damage changed from downed power lines, busted out windows, sagging fences, and missing siding and rooftop shingles to uprooted trees and swampy fields. The damage to the city was costly, but not as bad as it could’ve been had the hurricane landed as a Category 5 as predicted. And, due to the mandatory evacuation, there’d been minimal loss of life.
It was a reminder of how fragile life was and that it should be taken by the balls at every opportunity.
Dan pulled into the driveway of a boxy one-story home near the wilderness preserve and came to a stop. Stepping out, they met in front of the SUV.
“Now do I get to know what we’re doing here?” Ash asked.
Dan looked like a fallen angel: blond curls, black polo shirt, and pressed dark jeans. Dress casual Dan had said this morning, yet he hadn’t taken his own advice. Although, for Dan, this was casual. Ash was tempted to tumble him into the mud pit that was the front lawn, just to dirty him up a little.
Dan took his hand and they walked up the paved walkway to the front door. “I want to show you what I’ve been up to while you’ve been working the past few days.” He pulled a keyring with a single key on it from his pocket and opened the front door.
The house was not a multi-room home like Ash had thought. Instead, most of the walls had been torn down to form a square workshop. There were multiple counter spaces; a zillion tools that hung on wall pegs, burst out of drawers, or sitting in doorless cabinets; hand saws and electric saws; an entire shelf of rulers; and some kind of tube thing that was either used to suck out brains or dust, one or the other. Wood shavings clung to every piece of furniture, and an air conditioning unit chugged near the back. To the left of the entrance, a door led to what Dan said was a small kitchen and a bathroom.
Dan gave him a tour of the space, then stood in the center, hands on his hips, grinning. “So? What do you think?”
“I think I’m . . .” Ash ran a finger over a counter. It came away full of dust. “Confused.”
Dan rubbed his forehead and blurted, “This is my new workshop.”
“Your new . . . What?”
“I found Mrs. Sebastien on Kijiji. She’s the owner. This is her place.” He picked up a short, thin tool Ash couldn’t identify and tossed it from hand to hand. “She wants to semi-retire, and she was looking for someone to share the costs of this workshop with—mortgage and air conditioning and lighting and all that. We met on Sunday when you were in Raleigh? And we hit it off, so . . .” He shrugged. “She’s going to have the papers drawn up to make me a co-owner.”
“Co-owner?” Ash scrubbed his hands over his face. “But don’t you have a workshop in the Hamptons?” His foggy brain couldn’t make sense of anything.
“Yeah,” Dan said. “I do. The entire thing is about the size of that counter over there. Mrs. Sebastien said I could use any of the tools, but I have a whole bunch of my own I want to have shipped here and—”
“Dan.” Ash sucked in a breath scented of dust. “Are you moving here?”
Dan set the tool aside, gently, slowly, like he was buying time, and shoved his hands into his back pockets. Meeting Ash’s gaze head on, he said, “Yes.”
Ash’s lungs caved in, and as much as his head wanted to throw him back to the last time they were supposed to live together, he kept himself firmly rooted in the present. He cupped Dan’s face. “Are you sure about this? Your entire life is in New York.”
“No. My life hasn’t been in New York for a very long time.”
“What about Mitch?”
Dan’s brow creased. “What about him?”
“You transferred to the Burlington office to be closer to him. I guess part of me thought you’d head back there at some point.”
“Yeah, I did, but . . . I realized I don’t have to be geographically near him to be close to him. Mitch and I are on different paths, always have been. And that’s okay. My life is wherever you are. If you’ll have me.” Dan winced. “And I know I probably said something similar six years ago, but—”
Ash kissed him.
And then he kissed him again.
Dan chuckled into his mouth and pulled away. “I’m going to take that as a yes.”
Ash kissed him again, fast and wet, because he could. “No more living in the past, okay? For either of us.”
“You and me against the world?”
“Damn straight.”
A woman—Mrs. Sebastien, Ash presumed—emerged from the other room a few minutes later while Dan was telling him about his plans for his website. She was tall, with skin tanned the color of walnuts, a long face, and long hair that was either red or brown—Ash couldn’t tell which. She leaned into Dan for a hug and patted him on the back before extending a hand to Ash. “You must be Ashton. Dan’s told me a lot about you.”
“All lies.”
Her laugh was surprisingly deep. “I somehow doubt it unless you aren’t a talented hockey player who happens to be the love of Dan’s life.” Before Ash could parse through that, she turned to Dan. “Dan, while you’re here, can I show you the design for an armoire I’ve been commissioned to build? There are some intricate designs I think you might be better suited for.”
Dan leaned into Ash with a smile. “Do you mind?”
“Course not.” Ash kissed his temple. “Go crazy.”
He leaned back against a counter. Dan was shoulder to shoulder with Mrs. Sebastien at the counter opposite, talking as he sketched something on a sheet of graph paper. The sun shone in from the window in front of him, highlighting the dust motes that bobbed and danced, and when Dan laughed, appearing ethereal and delicate, Ash’s knees turned to water.
“Ash? Ash!” It sounded like it wasn’t the first time Dan had called his name.
“Huh? Yeah?”
Dan and Mrs. Sebastien were now on the other side of the workshop admiring long planks of wood in different colors. Dan was flushed, and he had a dark smudge on his collarbone, wood shavings on his jeans, and dust patches on his T-shirt. Wearing that grin and holding those sheets of wood, he looked like a cross between an exuberant child and a sexy calendar model.
No. Given the way Ash’s mouth dried up and his dick started to plump, Dan was definitely more sexy model.
“Ash? Seriously, are you okay?”
“Sure,” Ash croaked. “Why?”
“You’ve been staring at me for ten minutes.”
“Maybe don’t look so sexy and I wouldn’t stare.”
Dan went pink.
Mrs. Sebastien giggled.
Oh god! Mrs. Sebastien! She was right there and all Ash could see was Dan. Dan, Dan, Dan. As if they hadn’t spent Ash’s every available free second together the past couple of days. For fuck’s sake, Dan was living with him—temporarily. Maybe—and Ash couldn’t stop staring.
“Um, sorry about him,” Dan said to Mrs. Sebastien with a shrug. “Hockey players. I don’t think they have a filter.”
“Except in front of reporters,” Mrs. Sebastien corrected.
“Sometimes not even then. You should hear some of the things my brother’s said.”
And they were off again, chatting like teenagers gossiping in a school cafeteria.
Ash went outside for some fresh air before he gave in and stalked over to Dan to kiss him silly. That giddy smile on Dan’s face was making his heart do a fucking tap dance in his chest.
Heading to the car, he leaned against the hood. While he waited for Dan to finish geeking out over an armoire, he pulled his phone out and called his agent, only to get his voicemail.
“Scott, it’s Ash. Just calling to see if you’ve heard anything about a new contract. Give me a call back when you can. Bye.”
Sports blogs and TV channels were starting to speculate on why he hadn’t been offered a new contract yet and if it was related to his recent coming out. Having a boyfriend would no doubt complicate things further. Now he wasn’t just the guy who’d come out as bisexual; he was the guy who’d come out and lookie here! A boyfriend! Interest in Ash was starting to die down—slowly, but he could see it in how his phone no longer blew up as much—but as soon as he and Dan went public, the media circus would begin all over again. It’d put every lens on Dan, who was uncomfortable being the center of attention. Uncomfortable to the point of claustrophobia.
That being said, he shot off a quick email to Rachel giving her a heads up about him and Dan in case their relationship came to light before they were ready to come out.
The door to the workshop swung open.
“See you soon, Ash!” Mrs. Sebastien waved at him from the doorstep. “Dan, I’ll see you tomorrow.” She went inside and shut the door.
Dan walked up to Ash, grabbed his face, and kissed him smack on the mouth. “That armoire is going to look amazing once we’re done with it. I am pumped! Where to next?”
Next: Try Out Center for Youth.
Almost as soon as they arrived, Ash got voluntold by Masterson to order, pay for, and pick up lunch for everyone. On top of the Try Out staff, there were three contractors, nine of Ash’s teammates, and two teenagers who’d come in to help remove peeling wallpaper on their high school lunch hour.
Too bad neither of those high schoolers was Grant. Ash wanted to talk to him, make sure everything at school was okay. Judging by the email Grant had sent him, though, Ash was pretty sure he was no longer being bullied for his sexuality. Coming out in front of a reporter was really dumb, Grant’s email had said. But the jerks at school have left me alone since then, so . . . thanks?
Leaving Dan with Alex for Alex to give him a tour and introduce him around, Ash did as instructed and took the many lunch orders. For a guy who didn’t enjoy meeting new people, Dan was chatty and engaged. Maybe because Try Out existed for a good cause, or because Dan was in a good mood, or because these were Ash’s teammates and he wanted to make a good impression. Knowing Dan, it was a combination of all three.
Between Ash’s demanding schedule and the few hours Dan spent working daily on his laptop or checking in with his boss on the phone, and finally, finally organizing the crap in Ash’s living room and fixing up his yard, they’d watched movies, made dinner—not cauliflower pizza, god no, never again—taken jogs together, and spent a lot of time talking.
Oh, and one of the things they hadn’t done between the practices and the work and the cleaning up? Had sex. Or done anything of a sexual nature. If it was possible to die from blue balls, Ash was nearly there.
They’d indulged in lots of touching and kissing and more than one hot and heavy makeout session that left them both breathless. But as soon as clothes started coming off, Dan pulled back and made I’m-hungry or I-gotta-pee or I’m-tired noises. Ash had a plan to sit him down later and ask him WTF, because he was going crazy. If Dan needed more time before they slept together again, that was totally fine, but Ash needed to know so that he didn’t inadvertently pressure Dan or misstep in any way.
An arm came around his shoulders, and he looked over to find Alex grinning at him.
“What?”
Alex ruffled Ash’s hair. “The sappy smile’s a good look for you.”
“Fuck you, I’m not sappy anything. I’m an emotionally stable guy.”
Alex kept grinning.
“Fine,” Ash said on a sigh. “I have no idea what I’m doing.”
“Most people don’t when it comes to relationships.”
“You seem to be doing fine.”
“Please.” Alex snorted. “I’ve been taking it one day at a time since Mitch and I met. Things are even harder now that we’re living in different states again.”
“Still.” Ash elbowed Alex in the ribs. “You seem to be doing pretty good with the long-distance thing.”
Alex took his arm back and ran a hand through his hair. “I worry about him. Part of the reason he passed out last spring was because he was keeping himself extra busy because he missed me, and he wasn’t getting enough sleep. I don’t want him going back to that place.”
It had never really occurred to Ash how hard Alex and Mitch had it. Right now they were in different states because Mitch attended college in Vermont, but what about later? When he graduated? If he ended up playing in the NHL like he wanted—like he most certainly would. The man was too skilled a player not to—he could end up virtually anywhere, meaning that for however long Mitch and Alex played for the league . . . Jesus. They could be navigating a long-distance relationship for years.
