Page 10

July

It was one of the wildest, most exhilarating days of Zach’s life, and it still wasn’t over yet.

The team had held a press conference this morning, introducing Gavin to the public, and like everyone had expected, it’d been absolute chaos.

Ever since the Evergreens had released an announcement that Gavin had signed the contract, the media had gone berserk.

It was a good story. Zach knew just how good of a story it was. Coach returns to the scene of his early success, after being off the grid and out of hockey for years due to the traumatic death of his wife?

Everyone was eating it up, even more than Zach—and he thought Gavin, too—had expected, and he couldn’t help but worry that the fever-pitch excitement was actually going to scare Gavin off.

He was just rejoining the land of the living after all, and Zach imagined just being around people must be overwhelming.

Nevermind the wild packs of press pushing him for his opinions on everything from the pedicabs dotting the Portland streets to the Evergreens’ upside to if he was going to start Jones and McCoy on the same line.

Then there were all the questions about Finn. His dad had naturally opened his mouth and made a few comments during a podcast, because Morgan Reynolds was notoriously incapable of leaving anything alone.

“That guy,” Gavin had muttered, after they’d finished the press conference and he’d gotten a second to catch his breath, Zach ushering him to a quiet room.

Zach couldn’t say how he really felt about Morgan, because that was too tangled up in what he knew about what had gone down between him and Hayes. But he could still say, with one-hundred-percent honesty, “We need to do what we can to insulate Finn from all that.”

Gavin nodded. He twisted the water bottle in his hands. “We’ll see what we can do.”

It suddenly occurred to Zach as he leaned against the wall that this was the first time they’d been alone together since Gavin had come to Portland.

It had been a whirlwind, no question. After a few weeks of negotiations, Gavin had come to town to sign the contract, but of course Swift had been there, along with about half a dozen PR representatives, making sure every second of it was documented.

They’d gone to dinner, after, and sure enough Sidney Swift had been there, along with several other members of the athletic director’s staff .

There’d been no opportunity to get Gavin alone, to talk about what they were doing. To ask—if he managed to actually get up the nerve—if one of the reasons Gavin had come back to Portland had been for him .

Just the question was breaking Zach’s mind apart. He’d never have even considered it, but that moment on the couch had happened. Zach might’ve dismissed it, but then unlike what he’d expected—unlike what Gavin had insisted, over and over again—Gavin had actually fucking taken the job.

Hayes had been the one to say it. Texting him when they’d gotten past the initial contract negotiation and Zach had felt like he could tell him what was going on: I can’t fucking believe I was right. Are you freaking out?

Maybe Hayes was his best friend, and he’d normally tell him everything, but even typing it out felt too real.

Too much an actual possibility.

So he just sent Hayes a thumbs-up. He’d replied that he didn’t know Zach was chickenshit now.

Honestly, that was fair.

But he was trying to not be chickenshit now.

It still wasn’t the right time, but they were alone together.

“If I didn’t say it,” Zach said quietly, gaze glued to Gavin, like he could have ever looked away, “I’m really happy you took the job.”

The corner of Gavin’s mouth quirked up. “Me too, actually. Despite all that.” He waved towards the door and the no-doubt ravenously hungry media that were still salivating on the other side .

“Yeah,” Zach said. “I’m sorry—I knew it would be crazy, but I had no idea it would be that crazy.”

“Me either.” Gavin tipped his head back and let out an unsteady sigh.

“It’ll calm down,” Zach said. “This is the worst it’ll be.”

“Hope so.” He sounded tired. Exhausted, really.

This must really be a shock to his system. For the last four years, by his own admission, he’d barely even shared a meal with anyone. And now he was dealing with dozens and dozens of people.

Zach wet his lips, feeling suddenly, horribly nervous. More nervous than he’d been even before he’d pulled up to Gavin’s cabin in Michigan.

Hayes would tell him to stop being such a chickenshit. He was telling himself to stop being such a chickenshit.

“Why did you . . .uh . . .take the job?” Zach asked.

He certainly never expected that Gavin might just bluntly, blatantly, look at him and say, because you asked. Because you’re here.

So he couldn’t even be disappointed when Gavin said, “Because it was time to do something again.”

“I get that,” Zach said, nodding earnestly. Understanding that. When he’d first quit the NHL, he’d spent two aimless months living off his not-insignificant savings and wondering, without much urgency, what the fuck he was going to do with the rest of his life.

He couldn’t imagine doing that for four years .

It was probably a fucking miracle Gavin hadn’t lost his mind .

“I didn’t even realize it, until you blew into my life,” Gavin said wryly. “My therapist told me six months before that I needed to change things up, but I thought he was full of shit. Until it turned out that he wasn’t.”

“Uh, well, glad it was me,” Zach said. He wasn’t handling this. He wasn’t even really doing this. At least not in a non-chickenshit way.

“Maybe it could only have been you,” Gavin said with a quiet earnestness and a solemnity in his expression that made Zach’s heart beat a little faster.

“I . . .” Zach didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t known they would do this, or do this so soon. He’d imagined he’d need to work a hell of a lot harder to navigate the conversation to what had nearly happened between them in Michigan.

But then Gavin kept talking, gesturing with the water bottle. “I wouldn’t have let anyone else get close, but you were my player. I knew you. And I had so many good memories of coaching you. It was easy to let you in, even a little. Once I did, I realized just how fucked up I’d gotten.”

This was not the way he’d hoped the conversation would go.

Not, You grew up and I saw you differently than before, but you were my player. And, I had so many good memories of coaching you.

For those handful of moments on the couch, Zach had been convinced Gavin no longer saw him as the kid he’d coached. But now, Gavin had gone out of his way to emphasize that to him, Zach still was.

It was frustrating and Zach didn’t like it .

“Oh,” Zach said. Not sure what else he could say that wouldn’t make his disappointment obvious.

Because he couldn’t deny that ever since Gavin had called him and told him he’d changed his mind about the job, he’d expected that someday they’d be back in that place.

That the distance between them would shrink to nothing, and one day, Gavin would tilt his head up, that look would be back on his face, and Zach would close the distance between them.

It might take time, but eventually they’d fit together like two puzzle pieces that had finally gotten out of their own way.

“Yeah, I’m glad you came to Michigan,” Gavin said, chuckling easily, like the only possible reason Zach ever would’ve come to Michigan was to offer him the job.

It could still happen , Zach argued with himself. Yes, it could. But the more Gavin insisted that Zach was still a kid, still his player, the harder it would be to ever bridge that gap.

“Me too,” Zach said, swallowing hard.

Hayes would tell him he was fucked, then probably add that he was better off.

But Zach didn’t know if he agreed. Wasn’t sure if he’d ever agreed, but now that he and Gavin were going to be working together for the foreseeable future, he already knew his crush wasn’t going to go away.

Considering the way his heart had stuttered when Gavin had walked into the room this morning, hair cut, still curling just around the tips of his ears, freshly shaved, pressed slacks hugging his perfect thighs and a tight polo emphasizing just how wide his shoulders were, there was probably no hope for Zach.

He was in this, whether he wanted to be or not .

Whether Gavin was in it or not.

“Besides,” Gavin said, smiling, “you left your card for a reason. You knew I’d reconsider.”

Part of Zach wanted to tell the real truth. Why he’d actually left the card. Sure, yes, the job had entered into it. Had there been some faraway, nearly impossible fantasy of Gavin calling him for a hookup? He wanted to deny it, even to himself, but he knew the truth.

But he wasn’t going to share that. It was embarrassing enough that Gavin was still mentally thinking of him as that nineteen-year-old kid. Awkward and gangly, without an ounce of game.

He’d been good on the ice, and that was it.

Twenty-seven-year-old Zach was different.

“Right, yeah. That’s why I left it. The job,” Zach said. His voice didn’t even sound convincing to his own ears.

But if Gavin wasn’t convinced, his poker face was too good to give it away.

He wanted to say something else, to make it clear that he’d certainly had other thoughts, other non-coaching thoughts, but between the way Gavin had shoved him back into the ex-player box to all his utterly platonic assumptions, Zach didn’t even know where to begin.

Gavin hadn’t left him any room.

The door opened, and Sidney Swift walked in. “Oh, good, you’re getting some quiet,” he said to Gavin, who nodded.

“I . . .uh . . .I need a moment,” Zach said.

It was stupid, he was already having a moment.

But he couldn’t confess to Hayes how wildly disappointing this was in front of Gavin.

Besides, Sidney was already going over the rest of the day’s schedule and Gavin was nodding, clearly absorbed in what he was saying.

Nobody was going to miss Zach. Not for five minutes anyway.