Page 122 of Offside Attraction

Idon’tgoafterhim.

That’s the first thing I notice—my skates planted, my body frozen, my hands still half-open like they’re expecting him to come back. Like muscle memory hasn’t caught up to reality yet.

Dakota Miller walks away from me, and I let him.

My lips burn where his were. Not in a good way. Not clean. It’s sharp, electric, like my body’s been branded with something it doesn’t know how to carry. My chest feels too tight, my breath coming in shallow pulls as I stare at the empty space he left behind. The ice beneath my skates suddenly feels unstable—slick, unreliable—like the ground just shifted under my feet and I didn’t see it coming.

Fuck.

That wasn’t supposed to happen.

I drag a hand down my face, fingers trembling as they pass my mouth. I can still feel him—his anger, his heat, the way he kissed like he was trying to punish me and himself at the same time. Like he’d waited years to do it and hated himself for wanting it even as it happened.

I’ve taken hits harder than that. Broken bones. Blood in my mouth. Losses that should’ve wrecked me.

None of them felt like this.

Dakota didn’t kiss me because he wanted me.

He kissed me because hefeltme.

And that’s worse.

I swallow hard, jaw locking as I stare at the ice where his stick fell, where our helmets lie discarded like evidence of a crime we’re both pretending didn’t just happen. I told him to hit me. I told him to take his shot.

I didn’t expect him to takethis one.

The worst part—the part I don’t want to admit even to myself—is that when he shoved me away, when he looked at me like I’d crossed a line I could never uncross, my first instinct wasn’t anger.

It was fear.

Because for the first time, I don’t feel like I have control anymore.

I don’t move for a long time.

The rink is quiet, quiet in a way that feels accusatory. Like it’s watching me. Like it saw everything and is waiting for me to explain myself.

I can still feel his mouth.

That’s the problem.

It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t careful. It was heat and anger and years of shit packed into one reckless moment—and I let it happen. No. Worse. Istartedit.

My jaw tightens as I stare at the ice, at the faint scuff marks where his skates scraped when he shoved me away. I deserved that. Deserved more than that. Because the second my lips hit his, my brain went blank in the most terrifying way possible.

I didn’t think.

I felt.

And fuck me, it feltright.

That realization lands like a punch to the ribs.

I’ve kissed girls before. Plenty of them. Easy, expected, forgettable. A performance I knew how to do without ever really being there. But this—Dakota—this wasn’t anything like that. There was no script. No control. Just this sharp, dangerous pull that made my chest ache and my hands shake like I was standing too close to the edge of something I couldn’t come back from.

This was my first time kissing a guy.

And it had to behim.