Page 8 of Full Body Hit, Part 2 (Alpha Omega Hockey #6)

It felt like a date .

The way he looks at me sometimes makes me burn up.

Makes me feel as if I’m about to be devoured.

Yeah, how about no.

“It was kind of weird,” Chase settled with saying.

There was a pause. “Weird?”

“Not bad weird. Just…it’s so different from how he used to act, you know? It can be a lot. Sometimes I wonder if things are just going to switch up again.”

“Right. I mean, that makes sense. Might be a good idea to give him a chance, though.”

“No, yeah, of course. Kind of funny that you’re saying that, though. I thought you’d be stomping over here to keep him away from me.”

Aunix gave a wobbly laugh. “Well. I mean. As long as he doesn’t pull that shit again. He gets one chance. And then I really will be marching to yours.”

“So scary.” Chase laughed.

“And don’t forget it.”

Chase grinned into a pillow. His body was still restless, though. The heat that had built in Auston’s apartment lingered, a fever that was begging to be broken.

“Daddy…”

Aunix snorted. “I know that tone.”

“I hadn’t come in weeks before yesterday. You’re torturing me for no reason.”

“Is that what I’m doing?”

“ Yes .”

“I just like knowing you’re being good for me, baby.”

Chase groaned, already getting stupidly wet. “Then don’t I deserve a reward? If I’m being good?”

Aunix hummed mock-thoughtfully.

“ Daddy .”

Aunix chortled. Chortled . Like a dick .

“You are so mean.”

The laughing just got worse. “It’s fun watching you squirm, baby.”

“You’re not even watching me right now,” Chase muttered.

And yet, in the tangled, messed-up core of him, there was a thin thread of relief as Aunix denied him.

He didn’t want to test what he’d think about the moment his inhibitions were lost to pleasure.

***

Distance. That was what Chase needed between him and Auston. A quick hello and chat during practice, an excuse about being busy for lunch—it couldn’t be that hard.

Sammy eyed him up and down. “What’s wrong with you?”

Chase flinched from where he was sitting on the bench in his stall. “What? What are you talking about?”

“Why are you hiding?”

“What? I’m not hiding. I’m sitting .”

Sammy peered at something over his shoulder and returned that evaluating stare at Chase. “What’d he do?”

“Who?”

“Auston,” Sammy hissed, probably loud enough for the Alpha in question to hear them.

“Nothing! Oh my God, he’s fine . He’s nice to me now. Promise.”

“Okay. So why are you running away every time he so much as looks at you?”

Chase scoffed. “You’re imagining things. I’m not— eep .” Chase clutched his heart as he lifted his head to see Auston standing right there, eyebrows raised, hands on hips.

“There you are.”

“Oh, hey.” Chase coughed, trying to clear the wobble from his voice. “There you are. What’s up?”

“Not much…haven’t seen you these past few days.”

Chase laughed. Or tried to laugh. It sounded kind of weird. “What are you talking about? We saw each other yesterday at practice.”

Auston opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. “Right. You…okay?”

“Yeah, totally. Super.”

Auston nodded slowly. “All right. I’ll leave you to it, then.”

Chase watched him turn and walk to his own stall, gut a small, tight ball.

Shit . Was Auston…upset? About Chase avoiding him?

That didn’t make sense, though—they’d only just started hanging out, and barely at that. It wasn’t as if there was proof that Auston liked him.

If you ignored all the time and attention and care he was showing Chase lately.

Shit .

Chase sprung up, scrambling after Auston. He barely caught Sammy rolling his eyes as he passed him.

“Wait. Um—how are you doing? Sorry, I’ve been kind of busy lately.”

Auston quirked his head at him. “Yeah? What have you been up to?”

“Oh, um…stuff.”

Auston’s lips twitched, a smile here and gone. “Stuff. Cool.”

“Don’t make fun of me. I have very interesting hobbies, you know.”

“Oh, right, yeah. I forgot how interesting stuff can be.”

Chase got vehemently defensive of his very much existent hobbies. By the time he was finished, they were walking out of practice together, heading to grab some food.

Which was fine. What was a little lunch, really?

It was…good. Auston was actually kind of funny when he wasn’t being an asshole, telling a story about his first years in the NHL when everybody still shared a room on the road. How he’d woken up one time to his roommate buck-ass naked on the floor.

“That wasn’t even the part that surprised me…it was the ketchup all over his pubes. I thought someone had cut his fucking dick off.”

Chase covered his mouth, but the laugh still burst out loudly. “Oh, my God.”

“Cocaine is a hell of a drug.”

Chase’s eyes widened. “No! You didn’t…”

Now it was Auston’s turn to laugh. “Kid, things were different back then. Now guys are swearing off coffee .”

“Well, actually, regular consumption of caffeine is…never mind,” Chase trailed off at Auston’s unimpressed look.

“Chekov used to eat three hot dogs as a pre-game meal and two after. And he scored more than a hundred points in ten of the seasons he was in the game. You can have a damn cup of coffee.”

Chase couldn’t help but grin. “Kids these days, huh, old man?”

Auston tried to glower, but the smile peeked through, the softy.

Chase was in a floaty mood for the rest of the day. Even the following morning was bright and cheery despite having to get up at dawn—they had a game in Denver the following day, and they were flying in early to habituate to the altitude.

Chase usually sat with Sammy on the jet, but he was too stumped to say no when Auston waved at the seat beside him—right by the window like Chase liked.

“You prefer that one, right? Not the by the aisle?”

Chase nodded mutely. Why had Auston noticed that?

It should have been awkward, but Auston didn’t focus on him, concentrating on whatever he was doing on his phone. Chase couldn’t help but relax—maybe a little too much, seeing as he woke up a few hours later drooling on Auston’s shoulder.

“Oh my God,” Chase said as he sat up. “I’m so sorry.”

Auston waved it away, stopping Chase’s stream of apologies by putting his big, warm hand on his head and rustling his hair a little.

It shut Chase right up, body going tense and hot and spinny at the simple contact.

But nothing they did crossed a line. It was friend stuff. He was allowed to have friends—it wasn’t as if Aunix would mind.

And yet he kept that little detail to himself. That night, when Aunix asked how his day had been, he didn’t mention his impromptu nap.

It just wasn’t important, anyway.

***

Games at home were always better.

The familiarity of their own ice, their fans surrounding them, the cheers that swelled when Chase did something right.

Everything just clicked lately. The hesitation from the first few months in the league had receded, a shadow in the distance that barely touched him anymore.

He was panting hard as he fought for the puck against the board, one of the Portland Orcas they were playing crowding him from behind, shoving his stick into the small of his back.

Chase didn’t let the pain phase him. He froze the puck with his skate until he glimpsed Auston in his periphery, and kicked it right to him.

Coach had started to put them together a lot more after finding out they did extra practice a few times a week. As much as Chase wanted to put some distance between them emotionally, it was fucking amazing to play with him—to learn from him.

Auston skated backwards with the puck. They were in the offensive zone, Orcas circling, trying to force a turnover.

Vince, who had also been upped to the second line on defence, was hovering on the blue line, there to take the puck from Auston’s pass and then send it over to Obi, their other second-line forward.

Chase rushed behind the goal, skates slicing into the already chipped ice to make it to the other side and position himself. He slipped between two Orcas and—

The hit came out of nowhere. There was air, and weightlessness, and then his back was hitting a hard, cold surface, lungs locked up, the bright lights of the arena blinding him.

He groaned, forcing his diaphragm to relax. He’d been hit in the sternum—there would no doubt be a bruise blooming there later, but he managed to drag in a breath, calming his galloping heart.

At least it hadn’t been his head. He’d probably be carted off to concussion protocol due to knocking his helmet in the fall, but Chase could tell it was nothing like last time.

He tapped his forehead, trying to clear his ears, but…that wasn’t his pulse throbbing.

That was an Alpha growl.

Chase sat up slightly, stunned at the chaos surrounding him.

A full-on scrum had broken out. There were people scuffling beside the boards, two referees trying to pull them apart. There were a few Orca-Spirit pairs holding each other from joining in the fray.

And then there was the fight happening feet away from him.

Auston’s face was already bloody. His helmet was off, hair wild, stuck to his forehead with sweat.

At least his opponent was missing his head gear too, trying to take a swing, but Auston was fucking ragdolling him, hand fisting in the neck of his jersey and shaking him violently as he connected another hit to the guy’s face.

“ Okay ,” a referee shouted, jumping in and trying to get Auston off whomever he was pummelling.

Auston didn’t let go, though. His eyes were glowing, teeth bared, spit on his mouth. He looked like he was about to kill someone.

Sammy was suddenly there, crouching beside Chase. “Jesus, are you okay?”

“Help me up,” Chase ordered, and Sammy didn’t protest.

A medic was shuffling his way to them, but Chase waved him away.

“I’m okay,” he told the man.

Auston’s gaze snapped to him. It was the distraction the referee needed to finally break up the fight. This time, Auston let himself be herded away, attention on Chase, so intense it was a physical touch.

Chase watched as Auston was guided off the ice—not the penalty box, but straight through the tunnel to the locker room.