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CHAPTER SEVEN

ELLIE

My first kiss had been with Brennen Tate.

Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh.

I couldn’t believe it. Maybe it wasn’t my first kiss.

It’s possible I imagined the whole thing, since there were countless slippery places around the rink.

The odds were high that it was all a figment of my imagination caused by a knock-out fall.

To be sure, I pinched myself hard on the side of my arm.

It immediately turned red and would likely leave a tiny bruise. Real life had happened.

Did this mean that tonight would be a date? The idea that I would get my first kiss and my first date on the same day was too much for me to contemplate. Thankfully, the team coming through the tunnel broke my spiral.

“Hey, you, missed you this week,” Matty said with a wink as he took to the ice. He did a quick figure eight and then returned to where I stood at the boards. “You miss me?”

How was I supposed to answer this? Honestly, I hadn’t even thought about him because Brennen occupied all my thoughts, but I didn’t want to be rude either. “I’m sure plenty of people missed you while you were gone.” I thought that was a pretty good noncommittal answer.

“Yeah, but I want to know if you were one of them.” Darn it. My brilliant response hadn’t thrown him at all.

“Yo, Matty, are you here to skate or fuck around because if it’s fuck around, you need to get off the goddamn ice so the rest of us can get our shit handled,” Brennen snarled as he skated by.

Matty winked at me before he joined the formation on the ice.

He and Brennen exchanged a few more words, but they were too far away for me to hear the chirping.

Until recently, I’d assumed they were mostly friends, but now they acted like enemies.

I wasn’t the only one who noticed because the other guys on the team exchanged confused looks.

“Gentlemen, stop the goddamn pissing contest and get started on your stretches. I don’t have time to solve your fucking problems before I retire.” Coach sounded angry, which was enough to motivate the guys to begin the process of loosening their muscles in preparation for today’s practice.

No lie, this was my favorite part of hockey. I never watched the games because I didn’t really understand more than the basics, but the stretching? I watched it every single chance that I got. It was the hottest thing I’d ever been lucky enough to witness in real life.

The guys would spread out on the ice, and it was pure poetry.

They moved their bodies this way and that, but my attention always landed on the same target: Brennen.

As the goalie, he needed more flexibility than the rest. So he’d take to his knees and stretch the muscles of his inner thighs and hips.

More often than not, that involved a movement that looked exactly like he was thrusting into something.

Or some one . In my mind, it was me he drove into while the heat of his oversized body blanketed mine.

Since Brennen had just given me my first kiss, I figured he’d be okay with some ogling.

Just a bit. I couldn’t keep my eyes off him, and every time his hips dropped, his eyes would come up and meet mine.

It truly felt like he was sending me secret messages, and I hoped I received what he intended.

Coach Hampton shouted something to the team, but Brennen’s eyes never wavered.

I wasn’t sure what this all meant or why Brennen had kissed me, but I knew Brennen wasn’t a jerk, so fingers crossed, there wouldn’t be any teen romance movie reveals.

Please don’t let this be a “date the nerd to win a bet” situation.

“Tater, you gonna block the shots next time?” Johnson, starting center, called from down at the end of the table. The rest of the guys hooted at his question.

“You gonna take any shots next time?” Brennen shot back.

The guys smacked each other’s shoulders as they shit-talked good-naturedly at each other.

I’d missed the beginning of the conversation because I’d stopped at the restroom before joining them at the table.

The only empty chair was next to Brennen, which suited me fine.

Even without their gear, all the guys were bigger than I was.

I barely qualified as short, but my lack of muscles made me considerably smaller than all of them.

Surrounded by them, and attempting to squeeze between their oversized bodies to reach the empty chair while not invading their personal space, was a feat.

But with a tap and a nudge, I managed to get into my spot.

“Eep!” The minute I sat down, the chair was yanked over until there was no space between Brennen and me. The heat radiated off him like a furnace, and as someone who was perpetually cold, the proximity was welcome. I stared at him in disbelief.

“You belong over here,” Brennen whispered in my ear. The wisp of his breath against my ear sent shivers down my spine. Being the object of Brennen’s intense focus was heady stuff.

The air in the room went still when he draped his arm across the back of my chair.

Brennen moved my hand to his thigh and entwined our fingers, and I thought I’d pass out.

His fingertips traced my palm and strummed against the veins of my wrist. Each movement shot sparks through my nerve endings, leaving my entire body on tenterhooks.

Shifting in my chair didn’t help relieve my chubbing dick, and I prayed Brennen wouldn’t notice my problem.

“You okay?” Brennen asked.

I shot him a furtive look. The one he returned was deceptively bland, but he glanced down at my tented slacks.

He knew.

When I looked up, a few of the guys were giving each other knowing glances. Thankfully, no one said anything about Brennen’s public claiming. Matty gave Brennen a mocking smirk from the other side of the table, and Brennen countered with a predatory grin.

“What are you doing?” I leaned over and hissed in his ear. I needed this equipment job to finish out the year. If his over-the-top behavior was a joke I wasn’t in on, I needed to nip it in the bud quick.

Finally, he said, “I’m letting them know where I stand.” His voice was gentle but firm.

“Is that something they need to know?” A massive part of me wanted to sit back and enjoy whatever he was imagining between us.

Fighting against the person I wanted more than anything in the world made no sense.

I knew next to nothing about hookups, relationships, or dating, but I knew conversations were almost always required.

“It’s something everyone needs to know,” Brennen answered. The cryptic response was unhelpful.

“And what is it?” I asked. Our conversation had garnered a lot of attention around the table. The guys weren’t hiding their interest or their eavesdropping. Gah, I shouldn’t have asked my question here. But since I had, I needed an answer so I could brace myself.

“That you’re unavailable.”

The noise of the raucous restaurant faded into the background as the weight of his words settled around me. Brennen searched my face, and I knew he was trying to convey something important, but I wasn’t sure I understood the message.

The laughter around the table turned heads as other diners turned to watch us.

The boys spent the next two hours finding every possible dig at each other and then adding whatever they could make up on the spot.

Brennen joined in a few times, but for the most part, he sat back and watched them mess with each other.

What I didn’t expect was how attentive he was to me.

He made sure I had a drink, retrieved my fallen napkin, pretended not to notice when I kept my phone in my lap to read a little, and double-checked if my food was correct.

When the server dropped off the bill, I reached for my wallet.

Brennen put a hand on my forearm with an incredulous look.

“What are you doing?”

I looked at him, the cash on the table, and then back at him again. “Getting my wallet so I can pay.” I didn’t understand the confusion.

“You’re not paying,” Brennen whispered in my ear.

“But there won’t be enough to cover the tab or tip.”

“When you’re with me, I pay.”

Well, shoot. Now what was I supposed to do?

He knew money was tight for me, but I still wasn’t a charity case.

I’d never expected him to buy me dinner since he’d invited me to be his roommate, maybe friend.

And since I was no longer being forced out of my dorm room and was able to keep snacks in the kitchen, I didn’t have to buy food on the fly from vending machines or the corner store, and I’d been saving money.

But Brennen’s expression hinted that his statement had nothing to do with my lack of money.

Brennen saw my conflicted hesitation. His hand, which covered mine, squeezed me gently. When I glanced up at him, his eyes were soft. “Please let me get your dinner.”

He phrased his statement as a request, but I knew it wasn’t.

It felt like a command. A directive, at least for the moment, from someone who insisted they were taking care of me tonight.

Absolutely no part of me wanted to fight Brennen over a check.

So I didn’t. With a nod, I eased my hand out of my pocket.

“Thank you for dinner,” I said quietly.

“You’re welcome.”

“Brennen, I don’t understand where this is coming from.”

“When we get home tonight, I’ll explain everything.”

Curiosity was killing me, but Brennen had never been anything but kind and helpful. He’d get the benefit of the doubt from me, even if I was about to explode with the need to know how and where this change had come from.

It would be fine.

It was not fine.

“I’m sorry… You did what?”