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Gavin had to give Zach full points for returning them to the status quo after The Conversation.

He wasn’t sure he’d be able do it—or to do it so effortlessly—but Zach had managed it. Like maybe it hadn’t mattered after all. But Gavin knew that was a friendly, easy lie to tell himself, because he’d seen the disappointment swamp Zach the second before he buried it.

“Thanks,” Gavin said. “You’ll let me know how it goes?”

Zach rolled his eyes, his smile affectionate. “Of course. When haven’t I?” He gave Gavin one more shoulder pat, and then Gavin was watching his back as he walked out .

It was getting late, and he should head home, but he didn’t want to let himself have what he craved that easily, so he made one more perusal of his inbox.

Slotted between an email from a Red Wings scout asking for a ticket to Friday’s game and a forward from Sidney about this weekend’s media schedule was an email from Jon.

He hadn’t been avoiding Jon necessarily. He’d gone to his appointments. Dutifully answered in single words whether he was giving himself healthy physical release. Yes . Whether he thought about Zach when he did it. Yes .

Had even told Jon about The Conversation, even though it had been the last thing he wanted to admit to.

Had even accepted Jon’s disapproving face, because he knew he deserved it.

But he also refused to discuss why he’d drawn the line he had, no matter how much Jon pushed him to talk about it.

Gavin opened the email, knowing he’d asked for every bit of the guilt trip that was probably awaiting him.

Let’s have another call before the weekend, Jon had sent, I want to really dig into this hangup you have about dating.

Yeah that was not going to happen. Was never going to happen.

But he also didn’t want to put Jon off. That would only make him more insistent in the end, and he wasn’t going to ghost him the way he’d done in Michigan. That had been wrong, and felt wrong .

Gavin hit reply. Why do I have to talk about it? You know why, and it’s a valid reason. But we can schedule something Thursday.

Jon’s reply was nearly instantaneous. Before Gavin could even close his email.

Just because you believe it’s valid doesn’t mean it’s actually valid. Thursday, 11:30 AM.

Gavin let out a heavy sigh and closed his laptop. Headed home, totally not already dreading what Jon was going to say to him on Thursday at 11:30 AM.

He had leftovers at home, which he pulled out of the fridge and stuck in the microwave.

After his chicken and rice was hot, he sat down on the couch and cleaned his plate because he knew he should.

Dealt with three more scout emails on his phone, as the Sharks-Kraken game played out on his TV. Celebrini and Smith were going to be something in three to five years. Just watching them like this, bringing young, hot blood to the sport, made Gavin glad that he was coaching again.

He was just debating whether he wanted to keep watching or turn it off after the last intermission when his phone rang.

Gavin didn’t even need to check the screen to know who it was.

“Hey,” he said.

He should get off the couch and go to the bedroom. He wouldn’t want to do it after he was done talking to Zach, and he was trying not to be so fucking desperate to get off these days that he couldn’t make it to the bed. But he didn’t move.

“You have the game on?” Zach asked .

“They need better offensive pieces so they’ll actually consistently play Celebrini and Smith together,” Gavin said absently. “I get the idea of putting them on separate lines, spread the talent out a bit, but it’s such a fucking waste of good chemistry.”

Zach made an approving hum.

“Give them five years and the right pieces around them and they’re the new Matthews-Marner,” Gavin said.

And that got Zach’s attention. “No way,” he said. “Celebrini’s not ever gonna be the natural goal scorer that Auston Matthews is.”

“He’s eighteen fucking years old,” Gavin argued, enjoying riling Zach up more than he wanted to admit to. “Give him some time.”

Zach harrumphed.

“You never think anyone is as good as Matthews. I think you’re in love with him.” As soon as the words were out of Gavin’s mouth, knowing and teasing, he knew they were a mistake.

He’s not in love with Auston Matthews; he’s in love with you.

And Zach had never said that, of course, but it wasn’t a stretch to imagine that Zach might believe that to be true.

Gavin wanted to apologize, but would that only make it worse? Probably.

“In love with his hockey maybe,” Zach said hesitantly.

“Right. That’s what I meant,” Gavin said, even though that wasn’t true at all.

On the TV screen, Smith sent a gorgeous no-look pass through traffic, and the puck hit Celebrini’s tape like he’d been born and then designed to receive it, and a second later, the lamp lit.

“Okay, they’re good together,” Zach allowed. “Imagine how good together Mal and Ell are gonna be next year.”

“I don’t have to imagine it, I see it every day. The scouts in my inbox agree.”

“More of them?”

“It’s funny how Jones wasn’t on anyone’s radar when the season started.”

“Because Nichols played him wrong last year.”

“Or playing him with McCoy was the thing that unlocked his potential.” Part of Gavin worried that was true, because if that was the case, then the opposite could be true, too. With all the interest in Elliott, the chances of him going to Toronto to play with Malcolm were slim.

Not for the first time, he thought of whether he was doing Elliott a disservice by not forcing him to play without Malcolm.

“I know what you’re thinking over there.” Zach’s tone was soft but chiding. “There’s enough time to figure that out. And do you really want to deal with the fallout of that decision?”

“No,” Gavin said honestly.

Elliott was dramatic enough but when thwarted, Malcolm could be a total pain in the ass, too. And both of them together, riding his ass, if he separated them? Gavin wasn’t inviting that kind of pain to his already complicated enough life.

“Good. Me either.” Zach chuckled. “I have an early meeting tomorrow with my advisor at Koffee Klatch. You want me to bring you your regular? ”

If Gavin was a better, stronger man, he’d say no. He’d say no to coffees, to shared breakfasts and lunches and dinners, especially to these phone calls. But he wasn’t better or stronger.

“Yeah, that would be great. Thanks.”

“Of course,” Zach said.

Guilt pinged him. The same guilt that would evaporate in ten minutes, when he stripped off his clothes and let himself touch his half-hard cock, imagining the whole time it wasn’t his fist wrapped around it.

“You know you really don’t have to—”

“I want to,” Zach insisted.

And that was the whole problem, wasn’t it? He’d tried to make this easier, but he’d only made it harder. Because Zach didn’t even act angry with him. Disappointed, sometimes. Once in awhile, he’d catch Zach looking at him, pensive and regretful, but he never seemed pissed.

It would be easier if he got mad.

“Alright, well don’t let me stop you,” Gavin teased, tongue feeling thick in his mouth. He pushed away the compulsion to ask what else Zach wanted.

Because nothing was going to send mixed signals like turning these perfectly innocent, if somewhat intimate, phone calls into phone sex.

Even if Gavin wanted it so badly his fingers shook with it.

“You couldn’t, even if you tried,” Zach said seriously.

Gavin had tried and look where that had gotten them. Back in the same space, Gavin’s back to the wall, cornered in a hard place. No relief in sight.

Well, a little bit of relief .

The horn sounded on the game, and it ended.

“I’ve got an early morning like I said, so I should get some rest,” Zach said reluctantly. He always sounded like the last thing he wanted to do was end the call, even though he was usually the one to instigate it.

“Yeah, you should. Me too,” Gavin agreed.

A minute later the phone was on his bedside table charging, and he was stripping down in his bedroom, throwing his clothes in the hamper and the dry cleaning bin, letting himself finally fall to the bed.

Sometimes there were so many fantasies in Gavin’s head that when he finally let himself have this, he couldn’t pick just one.

But tonight, it was easy.

Zach had two to three inches on him, and at least twenty-five pounds of muscle.

It would be easy for him to crowd Gavin against the bed.

Easy to push him down, hold him down. Wrap Gavin’s wrists in his big, capable hands.

He’d be gentle, but so firm. Not taking away Gavin’s ability to decide, necessarily, but taking away all the noise in his head that claimed, over and over, that he shouldn’t .

“So good for me,” Zach would murmur as his head dipped low, a lock of his hair slipping down across his forehead.

Gavin’s heart leapt and then raced away with the last of his self-control.

He usually tried to wait a little longer, but he’d waited as long as he could tonight.

His hand drifted down his torso, his skin already damp with anticipatory sweat.

Between his thighs, his cock was so hard it was aching, and he wanted to touch himself more than he’d wanted anything in a very long time .

Anyone who claimed you hit a sexual lull at forty hadn’t ever had Zach Wheeler around all the time, tormenting him with his sweet eyes and bright smile and wide shoulders and general Zach-ness.

But Zach wouldn’t let him go the rest of the way, his fingers digging into his hip.

“Not yet,” Zach murmured into his ear. His lips skated down the sensitive line of his neck, and it was so good, so fucking electric, Gavin actually groaned out loud.

He wasn’t even feeling it, not for real, but that didn’t matter.

This felt like the realest thing he’d felt in forever—at least since last night.

“Don’t make me wait,” Gavin pleaded.

The sweetness in his gaze dimmed, darkened. And that was so hot Gavin’s hips nearly shot upwards. It was only the delusion that Zach was here, Zach was controlling every touch he got, that kept them flat against the bed.

“You gonna beg me?” Zach asked.

He didn’t want to beg; but he wanted to beg so badly he was dying for it, at the exact same goddamn time.

“No,” Gavin lied.

“I think you will,” Zach said, cocky and smug and so fucking hot Gavin was dying with it.

Dying for it.

Gavin wet his lips.

Zach covered them, kissing him deep and slow, spinning it out until he didn’t have a prayer of not sliding his fingers those last few inches or working his hips as he fucked up into his fist.

Zach lifted his mouth from Gavin’s. “You wanna come? ”

Gavin nodded, wordlessly, past speaking, because the white-hot clench in his stomach and the lump in his throat wouldn’t let him.

“Then you’ll have to beg me.” Zach’s lips teased the corner of his mouth again, little glancing touches, not giving him anything he wanted or needed, as the pleasure fizzed right up his spine.

“Please, please ,” Gavin finally groaned. “Let me.”

Zach’s smile was intimate, private, meant just for him. “Let go, G,” he said gently, and that shouldn’t have been as hot as it was, but he went supernova, shuddering as the orgasm crested over him.

Every single time he didn’t think he could come any harder, but then he impossibly did.

With shaky hands, he wiped up his mess and then flopped back onto the bed.

Guilt was inevitable; it always filtered through the pleasurable endorphins no matter how good the orgasm was.

Maybe it would be different if it was real . If it was really Zach touching him, murmuring encouragement against Gavin’s mouth, because he wouldn’t be denying him and using him in the same breath. But it couldn’t be real. He’d already decided that it couldn’t. That it wouldn’t .

But even the way it sort of felt like shit after didn’t stop him from riding the high during , or from him chasing after it with every ounce of determination he had.

He should do better, be better, but he couldn’t help himself.

And, it could always be worse. He could be leading Zach on by actually having Zach share his bed.