Page 49 of Burn Bright (Cobalt Empire #1)

BEN COBALT

M y mind keeps whirling back to that night. The couch. The “friendly” sleepover. After I cooled off and climbed back into bed, I thought about turning away from her. Letting a pillow separate our bodies. But I couldn’t resist shifting closer.

Harriet naturally reached for me when I brought my arm over her. She curled up into my biceps that I tucked around her frame. She let me hold her while we slept, and it’s those innocent hours underneath the blankets that I’ve replayed over and over just as much as the volatile quakes of her climax.

She left in the morning before my brothers even woke.

It’s been three days. Three fucking days and my brain has made about a million revolutions around her. She returned to her pull-out couch. I stayed on mine.

It’s better this way , I remind myself. She has a history of using sex transactionally, and I don’t want to risk her sliding into that loop with me. Separation is good.

My brain hasn’t picked up that message yet, but we’ll get there.

I comb some wet strands of hair out of my face. The showers at MVU’s gym have shit water pressure, but that’s about my only complaint today at tryouts. A true shock to my system considering I had a laundry list of complaints on my old team.

Former captain called me a “nepo baby” after every game—which sidenote: not an insult when it’s a fact—but he always made sure to sling it like a slight. The coach made me do more suicide drills on the ice than I care to admit.

Usually alone.

Usually after practice.

He’d have the assistant coach stay behind to blow the whistle. And fuck if I don’t hate that shrill sound in a near empty rink with no teammates around me. It ruined any peace I felt while skating.

So this morning, I fully expected some extra laps or an underhanded dig from at least one of the guys on the MVU team.

But the left wing gave me a slap on the shoulder like I already belonged.

The goalie invited me out for a beer. (I don’t think he knows I’m nineteen.) The center complimented my pivots.

It felt like the fucking Twilight Zone. I half-expected Eliot to pop out of the stands and tell me they were all actors he hired.

Turns out, it was real.

Coach Haddock even shook my hand at the end of practice, and it startled me for a long moment. With hockey, I had forgotten what it feels like to be treated like a functioning human being and not a sack of shit.

Only problem…I can’t like the team here.

I can’t start to love hockey again.

I won’t be in New York for the full season. Trying out was always more for Coach Haddock than myself, and he seemed grateful that every phone call and encouragement at least got me out on the ice tonight.

As I kick the apartment door shut, all I can think about is calling Harriet.

She’s the first person I want to talk to about tryouts, but it’s Monday night and she keeps her phone off while she’s volunteering at the hospital.

So I make my way farther into the quiet apartment, but I don’t fool myself into believing it’s empty.

Most of my brothers have participated in the shared calendar, so I know that Beckett is dancing in Giselle tonight, Tom’s band practice finished hours ago, and now that Eliot landed the role of Christopher Wren in The Mousetrap , he spends post-rehearsals in his room running lines.

Charlie hasn’t updated his portion of the calendar so he could be drowning in the Pacific Ocean, for all I know. I toss my gym bag and hockey stick on the couch, and my phone pings in my pocket. My stomach knots as soon as I see the text.

Dr. Wheeler

Ben. Are you around for your session? It was supposed to start 10 minutes ago.

Shit. Fuck. I completely forgot. I scrape my hand through my hair and glance around the apartment. I’ve been pretty strategic in doing my tele-therapy sessions on campus in a quiet study room. Last thing I want is for one of my brothers to overhear.

I could bail on Dr. Wheeler tonight, but if word gets back to my parents that I’m skipping sessions, it’ll give my dad more reason to encourage me to find a new therapist. And that’s a drum I don’t want to beat again.

Fuck it. I’ll just take the call here. Not in the bathroom—the lock hasn’t been fixed, and I’m not making that mistake a second time.

I slip into the coat closet, shut the door, and take my puffer jacket off the hook to bunch up at the gap between the floor and the door.

I’m not sure how soundproofed it is in here, but that’ll have to do.

Sinking onto the hardwood, I’m wedged between the wall and an umbrella. I shift a heavy bag off to the side, and I unzip it to see a bowling ball. What the fuck? I don’t even know which one of my brothers bowls.

Zipping it back up with one hand, I send a quick text with my other.

Ben Cobalt

Available now. Not for video chat though. Can you call?

Less than ten seconds later, my phone rings, and I answer it.

“Ben.” Dr. Wheeler’s voice is friendly and casual. “Is everything all right? You’re usually not late to a session.”

I rest my head back against the wall. “Sorry, I had hockey tryouts. I forgot to reschedule.”

Dr. Wheeler blows out a breath of surprise. “Hockey tryouts? You mentioned you didn’t want to play…”

“Yeah, about that.” I rest an arm on my bent knee, my limbs cramped in the closet. “I decided to give it a go. Coach Haddock has been nice…really nice.”

“You seem surprised.”

My brows furrow. “He told me I was faster than most players he’s ever seen at MVU. That I’m even good enough to make it to the NHL, like third-round draft pick good enough. So I’m just wondering if he’s blowing smoke up my ass.”

“Why would you think that?”

I laugh and run another hand through my hair. Memories torpedo through me in a crushing onslaught. “My old coach said the opposite. Said I would never amount to that. It’s just confusing. Who to believe.” I grind my jaw and try to roll out the tensed muscles in my shoulders.

A short stretch of silence bleeds over the phone before he replies.

“Of what you’ve told me about your old coach and your interactions with him, there is a chance he was singling you out because he thought you had an ego.

So it’s possible he never told you that you were good because he thought you already knew you were. ”

I try to process this as he adds, “He could’ve been bringing you down to humble you.”

I squint in contemplation. “To humble me?” Because of my last name. As if being a Cobalt somehow brands me with an overinflated, oxygen-sucking ego.

“It’s a theory,” Dr. Wheeler says. “Because there’s no real reason your new coach would lie to you.”

“If he wants me on the team this badly, he could just be telling me what I want to hear so I’ll join.”

“Why would he want you on the team if he didn’t think you were good?”

I circle around to the idea he’s using me for ticket sales, but he’s still shown no interest in publicity. Just shown interest in me…in my abilities on the ice.

Dr. Wheeler fills the silence. “If he thinks you’re good enough, then you’re good enough, Ben. It’s okay to believe that.”

My jaw aches. Muscles won’t relax. I’m not sure I’ll get there. Not tonight. Not talking to Dr. Wheeler. All I really want to do is hear Harriet’s voice.

“Yeah, okay,” I say hurriedly. “Anything else?”

Dr. Wheeler laughs. “I think I’m supposed to be asking you that.”

“All good in the neighborhood,” I tell him. “Classes great. Friends great. Brothers great. Sisters great. Nothing new to speak of.”

“Next semester, are you still planning to major in Ecology?”

“Yep,” I say, keeping up the lie I fed him last month.

“Good, good. It’s great to have goals.” Dr. Wheeler chats a little longer, and I give him some perfunctory answers before we end the call.

I’m about to stand and shake out my limbs when the closet door swings open. Fuck. Fuuuck.

Of course, it has to be Charlie on the other side.

His hair sticks up in five different directions. With his white button-down wrinkled and untucked in a pair of black slacks, he could have just finished fucking someone or had a meeting with a Fortune 500 company. When it comes to Charlie, you never know.

He leans a hand on the door, appraising me slowly. “What the fuck?” he asks in a causal, unbothered tone.

“What the fuck, what ?” I shoot back, my adrenaline suddenly surging even though he hasn’t really come at me.

He rolls his eyes. “You really need me to spell this out?”

I rise to my feet. “No, I don’t.” I’m waiting for him to move away because he’s blocking my exit.

He grips harder onto the door. “Why are you in the coat closet?”

“You’re the smart one,” I snap. “You tell me.”

He blinks. “Not a mind reader, but I see how you can get those two confused.”

“Fuck you,” I say with less heat. “I don’t have a bedroom; in case you’ve forgotten.”

“So shoving yourself into a four-by-four space makes total sense,” he says.

“Got it.” He opens the door wider and lets me pass him.

I’m halfway to the couch when he adds, “If you need privacy for a phone call, to jerk off, or just to get away from Eliot and Tom, you can always use my room or Beckett’s. One of us is usually not home.”

That stops me cold in the middle of the floor. I almost think I misheard him. I’m about to ask if he’s for real when I glance over and see him pop something in his mouth. He catches me staring and his brows rise like what the fuck are you looking at ?

Adderall? Ecstasy? Fucking Zoloft? I don’t know. It could just as likely be an Allegra to combat seasonal allergies, but there’s not a chance in hell I’m going to ask.

“I’ll be sure to use your room to jerk off in,” I tell him.

Charlie flips me off, then rotates his hand to check his watch on the same wrist. “Not that I care, but shouldn’t you be at some board game thing?”

Fuuuuck.

I check the calendar on my phone. Board Game Club starts in twenty minutes. How did I even forget that? How did Charlie remember? I grab my jacket on the back of the couch, and as I hurry out the door, I hear a faint, “You’re welcome.”