Page 16

I’m still holding Ragnar’s hand when we push through the worn wooden door of Gershwin’s.

It sticks a little, like always, the top hinge threatening to give out with every swing.

The heavy thud behind us cuts off the last of the stifling afternoon air and replaces it with the scent of old wood, fryer oil, and a faint undercurrent of stale beer.

The place isn’t much to look at. It’s like a dive bar and a jazzy speakeasy had a baby, and then that baby got a little weird.

There’s an upright piano in the corner with an old sign promising live music Thursdays, even though nobody but Spags has touched it in months.

String lights zigzag across the ceiling, half of them burned out, and signed photographs of regulars and old Quarry Creek legends cover the walls.

Most of the guys I work with are up there somewhere.

Ragnar’s still wearing my scarf. It’s a ridiculous, mustard-yellow thing I crocheted during my freshman year of college.

I was trying out a crafty phase, and it’s a little wonky.

Apparently I can’t count—at all—but it has been through a semester abroad in Manchester, a failed road trip to Niagara, food poisoning, two GRE tests, and one nasty break-up.

Technically, the breakup itself was fine.

It was the relationship that had rotted.

It looks good on him. My scarf. The yellow compliments his copper beard, and while the thing is oversized on me, it fits him perfectly. Like I counted out my chain stitches with him in mind.

“Welcome to Gershwins.” I have to stand on my toes to make sure he can hear me. The bar isn’t deafening, but it’s not quiet either.

“I l-l-like it,” he murmurs, leaning in a little so only I can hear. His accent curls around the words, and I valiantly try to ignore the little tremors it sets loose in my belly. It has to be the heat, or I’m in heat. Something is causing my hormones to whip through me like class five rapids.

“Wait ‘til trivia night,” I tease. “Vic and Spags get obnoxious. Quinn cheats. Tristan leads us into battle like she’s Napoleon or something. It’s a total disaster. Better than reality TV.”

His mouth twitches into something close to a smile, and that feels like a win. Even if I’m positive the man has never watched trashy television in his life.

We’re the last to arrive, again. The others are already gathered around the biggest booth in the back.

It’s one of those wraparound monstrosities with cracked vinyl seats and a sticky table that’s been here since prohibition probably.

Spags spots us first, raising his hand in a lazy wave, and the rest of them follow suit.

They don’t even let us sit down before the questions start.

“Oh, so it’s a thing now?” Maddie grins as we approach, elbowing her sister. “Pay up.”

“Not a thing,” I say quickly, because I know how this works. Once you let them start, there’s no stopping it. I should have worried more about the team gossip tree. It’s insidious. Do people think women gossip? We have nothing on professional hockey players.

“With matching accessories?” Spags points to the scarf, his brows raised in a way that’s all too knowing.

I snatch my hand back from Ragnar’s like it’s on fire. He glances down at our untangled fingers, then back up at me, one brow lifted, like he can’t figure out what my problem is.

“It was… cold,” I blurt, knowing it was the wrong this to say when six sets of eyes alight with victory. Dammit, I should have just shrugged. Confirm nothing. These bloodhounds now know they’re on to something big.

“It’s seventy-seven degrees,” Tristan deadpans, taking a pull from her beer as she raises one white blonde brow. “Rags is sweating.”

“I made cake,” I add, like that’s a reasonable explanation for anything.

“I think I’ve seen this film before…” Vic singsongs, and the rub of it is, he’s right. I distinctly remember the rumors flying about him and Tristan… rumors they denied until they were blue in the face. And then the photos hit the tabloids.

“Man, if this is just friends, what the hell does dating look like?” The birthday girl adds as the whole table chuckles.

“It’s not like that,” I say again, sliding into the booth next to Quinn.

Ragnar hesitates a second before settling in on my other side, the scarf still looped around his neck like a promise I didn’t mean to make.

His thigh presses to mine in the tight space, warmth spreading from my hip to my knee.

“We’re just working together,” I explain, hating how defensive it sounds. “That’s it.”

Also, didn’t Ragnar tell me he’d handle the idiots? Is this payback for sending Quinn to accost him? I deserve it.

Erik, Quinn’s husband and Vic’s twin, squints at us, frowning. “Because you know people wouldn’t approve?”

He doesn’t have to be specific for all of us to know what he means.

Tristan and Vic. The storm that was. The lectures from management about professionalism and optics and not shitting where you eat.

The lectures that only seemed aimed at Tristan, although they’re the ones that made her work with Vic, that sent her to Vegas with him.

“Drop it,” Robbie says, quiet and stern from his end of the booth. “She said it’s nothing. It’s nothing.”

I nod in thanks, even if I can’t help but wonder how many of Robbie’s rumors are true.

A whirlwind rekindled romance with a high-profile ex.

In the most unlikely of places. Both of them refusing to talk to the press.

Or talk about their summer at all.Spags being surprisingly tight-lipped about his time volunteering with the youth camps in Robbie’s hometown.

There’s a story there, but if Robbie isn’t going to pry into mine, I can return the favor.

“We’re just f-friends,” Ragnar says, voice quiet. “Sadie i-i-is helping m-me with s-s-something.”

“Hey Rags,” Spags leans across the table, grinning. “Can you teach me how to find a friend like Sadie?”

Vic and Robbie both reach out to smack the back of the younger man’s head and something shifts.

Ragnar leans back, arm stretched along the back of the booth, casual as hell.

He lifts his chin, rolls his shoulders back.

He seems bigger like this. A brick wall.

For once, not smiling, he seems like a force to be reckoned with.

His fingertips barely graze my shoulder, and I pretend not to notice.

The air between us hums. I suck air into my aching lungs.

My cheeks burn. “We aren’t—”

I’m not even sure how I was going to finish that statement. We aren’t dating? We’re not, but I already said as much. Sleeping together? I know that was what Spags implied, but…I sneak a glance at Ragnar out of the corner of my eye. It’s not that I wouldn’t want to….

“Yet,” Spags says, winking.

“Spags,” Maddie grins sweetly, “Repeat after me: I’m sorry Sadie, I’m sorry ólaffson. I shouldn’t stick my nose where it isn’t wanted. I’m an idiot.”

He repeats her word for word, waggling his eyebrows like a cartoon character, and I bite my lips to stop from laughing. Spags might be an idiot, but he’s our idiot.

“No one would say anything,” Vic, the captain, says. “You don’t need to confirm or deny, but just know we’d never rat you out. Not when management is...”

Tristan claps a hand over his mouth, but it sounds like he mumbled the words “a bag of dicks,” from behind her palm.

“And we like you guys,” Quinn adds, “Not that I’m ever around the Arctic administration. Me or Erik.”

It makes my stomach pitch, and not entirely in a bad way.

They’d stand up for me. And Ragnar. I already knew they would.

I wouldn’t spend my free time with these dummies, or help them lose at trivia every week, if I didn’t have some trust in them.

But it’s not just me. Ragnar too. I hope he understands what they aren’t saying.

The loyalty they’re offering him. I can’t bring myself to turn and study his expression.

“I couldn’t help him with that anyway,” I blurt. Something sour and sharp crawls up my throat. “I’m not exactly a good relationship example. My ex can attest to that.” And I’m not looking for someone, anyone, else.

It gets quiet for a beat too long, and perhaps I’m not a good socializing example either. That was probably an inside thought. No one wants to hear about ancient history relationships, but sometimes my mouth runs off with checks I can’t cash.

Ragnar’s hand twitches against the booth, his thumb brushing the top of my shoulder, and I know he caught the bitterness in my voice.

I didn’t mean to let it slip. Didn’t mean to let any of that ugly stuff surface.

But here it is, crouched in my chest like it always is when this kind of talk happens.

Images flash uninvited through my mind — Christian’s smug grin, the way he’d knock me down with a word, then act like it was my fault for being so sensitive.

The way my parents kept playing devil’s advocate, asking if I couldn’t be more understanding.

It’s half the reason I’ve kept the gritty details of our relationship under wraps.

We’ve split. As far as mom and dad are concerned, it was an amicable choice. He hasn’t attempted to come after me.

I shove it all down.

Everyone is staring at us like we’re an Olympic ping-pong match-up.

Their eyes bounce from Ragnar to me and back to the goalie again.

My brain goes utterly blank. Embarrassment floods me and I wonder if I’ve taken on too much by agreeing to help my friend.

I am out of my element. Again. All the years I spent carefully studying the people around me, gone.

I have no idea why I agreed to this. Other than there being no chance I wouldn’t.

Years of anecdotal data vanishing in a whiff of metal ozone.

“Well,” Ragnar says quietly, “I w-wouldn’t need h-help there.”

I can feel the tips of his fingers brush along my exposed shoulders. Once, twice, he’s stroking my heated skin. I shiver.

Heads turn. Robbie whistles low.

“Bold,” Erik mutters, grinning into his drink.

Even Vic looks mildly impressed.

Quinn blinks. “Wait, what now?”

Is my brain still working? It feels like it might be leaking out of my ears.

“S-Sadie is h-helping me l-l-learn to be m-more social. But I d-don’t need h-help with women,” Ragnar says, so casually it feels like a slap. His accent softens the edges, makes it sound more like fact than brag.

The table explodes. Spags slaps his palm on the sticky wood. Maddie laughs so hard she has to cover her mouth. Even Tristan cracks a genuine smile.

“Damn, Rags,” Spags shakes his head. “Who knew you were such a cocky bastard under all that quiet Viking energy?”

HELLO?!?!?!?! My brain yells. He let me give him a whole lecture about feelings and benefits and friendship…. And he’s GOOD WITH WOMEN? My Ragnar?

There’s no reason for me to feel possessive of him, but I do. He asked for help because he said he doesn’t know how to talk to people. But he knows how to pick up girls?

“So you’ve got rizz.” Spags cackles. “Ever need a wing man? I could—” He cuts off on a strangled sound. I can imagine Maddie yanking on his leg hair to shut him up.If she did, she gets another cake.

“Wait, so you, like, date?” Tristan cocks her head to the side. “Sorry, that was an insanely rude question. Do not answer.”

“You know what?” Quinn smiles. “I believe it. Us redheads are fiery. Both in and out of bed. Right, babe?”

Erik coughs up a lungful of beer.

“How?” Spags asks, even as he flinches and ducks another smack from Maddie.

“I’m not trying to be an asshole,” he says, hands up to protect his face.

I brace myself for something careless and cutting, something about talking to women.

Spags isn’t a bad guy. He just doesn’t allow his brain the time it needs to process before his mouth opens.

“But how is he good with women, if he needs the trainer’s help to talk to normal people? No offense Sadie.”

My eyes narrow. I wonder if he can tell I’m glaring a hole in his head. I glance to my right, hoping Ragnar isn’t backtracking with all this talk, not after all the work he’s done today. Except he doesn’t look upset at all. He’s smiling softly. Arm still stretched out along the back of the booth.

“You don’t n-need to talk to g-get laid.” Ragnar trails his fingers down the edge of my arm. His free hand brushes his copper hair off his forehead. Is the world moving in slow motion? It might be. “You just h-have to know w-what you’re d-doing. A-and do it well.”

The men at the table whoop with delight. The women shriek with laughter, and I try to get my lungs to work properly. Breathing is supposed to be automatic, right? Or semi-automatic?

“D-don’t worry Sadie. I’m n-not going to m-make a p-pass at y-you. But…” His voice pitches low enough that only I catch it, and I shiver as his breath coasts over the shell of my ear. “If you’re e-ever i-interested, just say the w-word. Anytime… anyplace.”

My stomach flips. There’s heat pooling low in my belly and a flutter in my chest that is probably dangerous.

Any time.

Any place.

I swallow hard.

The conversation moves on because thank god it has to, and the birthday cake pulls everyone’s attention. But even an hour later, my heart is thundering against my ribs, and Ragnar’s still watching me out of the corner of his eye.

When he finally gets up to leave, running his hand down the length of my braid, the others call out goodbyes—See you at practice. Thank you for coming. Take care. Pet Howl for me.

But Ragnar only looks at me.

And in hindsight, that should have been a blinking neon sign smacking me upside the head. I’m in so much more trouble than I thought. And it’s only day one.