Page 52 of Breaking the Ice

Hey, at least you have your phone calls.

The phone calls were great. Infuriating, yes, but also great. When he did finally fall asleep each and every night, Gavin’s voice was echoing in his ear.

Of course, that usually meant he woke up from hot and unsatisfying dreams, hard as a rock and leaking in his boxer briefs, wishing that the other side of the bed wasn’t empty.

Cold fucking comfort.

Remember when I said in July you were in deep? I didn’t mean it. You’re in deep now.

You’d know.

Don’t worry, I’m not staging any interventions.

Yeah, well, it wasn’t my fault your ex is an asshole.Not yours either.

Hayes didn’t answer right away. Zach groaned under his breath. He hadn’t meant to piss Hayes off, and now he was going to be worrying all night that he’d inadvertently made his best friend feel even worse about his personal life when he’d only been trying to help Zach withhis.

There was a noise in the doorway. Zach glanced up and Gavin was standing there.

“Everything okay?”

Zach realized he’d been sitting here in the dark, staring at his also-dark phone.

Well, that wasn’t weird or anything.

“Oh yeah, I’m good,” Zach said, plastering on a smile. It wasn’t even that hard, really. Hewantedto smile whenever he saw Gavin. Wanted to do a whole lot of other things, too. The frustration only came because hecouldn’t.

“Good,” Gavin said.

It wasn’t a very long walk to Sullivan’s. They were probably close to halfway there, when Gavin said, “I’d rather be grabbing a drink with just you, you know. I . . .”

“Yeah,” Zach said uselessly, when Gavin didn’t quite finish that sentence. Not that he’d probably have finished it the way he wanted him to, but the thought was nice.

“Sidney is annoying,” Gavin said, chuckling under his breath. “And if this team keeps playing the way they did tonight?”

“He’s gonna be on your ass constantly.”

Gavin sighed. “Constantly.”

“Winning’s better than losing?” Zach offered, repeating what Hayes had just said.

“Always,” Gavin said, the corner of his mouth tilting into a smirk. “But if that’s true, you have to tell me what you were doing in your office, frowning at your phone.”

“I . . .uh . . .it’s Hayes.”

“He’s okay?”

“Oh yeah. He’s good. Probably gonna have another fifty goal season, frankly. But . . .well, I think he’s lonely.”

“No boyfriend?”

Zach barked out a laugh. “No.No. He’s sorta hung up on someone, someone he can’t have, and it’s fucked him up, forever.”

Gavin shot him a knowing look, intense and a little hot around the edges. “It’s not you, is it?”

“For the hundredth time, Monty and I are just friends.”

“Well, it would be okay if you weren’t.”