Page 12 of The Dating Coach (Hearts on Ice #4)

The motel room was exactly what you'd expect from a place called "The Highway Haven"—wood paneling that had seen better decades, a carpet pattern designed to hide stains, and a painting of a lighthouse that seemed to watch us with judgment.

The nor'easter had turned what should have been a three-hour drive home from the cabin into a highway shutdown, forcing six people to cram into the last available room at the only motel for miles.

"At least it has three beds," Karen said optimistically, then immediately claimed one by throwing herself across it. "Dibs on this majestic queen-sized throne!"

"That's a double at best," Henry corrected, eyeing the bed with suspicion. "And I'm pretty sure something died in that comforter. Recently."

"Then it's haunted and therefore more interesting," Karen declared. "Frank, Mia, we're having a séance later. BYOB – Bring Your Own Banshee."

I stood by the door, dripping steadily onto the questionable carpet, trying not to look at Liam.

The front desk clerk had assumed we were three couples, and neither of us had corrected him when he'd handed over the keys with a knowing wink.

Now we were here, in a room that seemed to shrink with every passing second, and I had no idea how to navigate this.

"I'll take the chair," Liam offered immediately, gesturing to a vinyl monstrosity in the corner that looked like it had survived from the 1970s through sheer spite.

"Don't be ridiculous," I said. "You're six-two. You won't fit."

"I've slept in worse places," he insisted. "This is luxury compared to sleeping on a bus floor."

"No one's sleeping on floors or chairs," Karen announced. "We're all adults here. Adults who can share beds without it being weird. Henry, you're with Frank. Mia, you're with me. Gemma and Liam get the other bed. See? Problem solved."

"But—" I started to protest.

"Unless you want to share with Henry, who I can personally attest kicks like a mule when he dreams," Karen continued smoothly. "Or Frank, who sleep-talks entire hockey plays. Your choice."

"It's true," Frank admitted. "Last week Henry recorded me calling a power play in my sleep. With hand signals."

I looked at the last bed – a double that would barely fit two people, with sheets that had probably been washed but still seemed suspect. Then I looked at Liam, who was determinedly studying the lighthouse painting like it held the secrets of the universe.

"Fine," I said, aiming for casual and missing by miles. "But if you hog the covers, I'm pushing you off."

"Noted," he said, and was it my imagination or did his voice sound strained?

We took turns using the bathroom to change out of our wet clothes.

The heater wheezed to life with concerning noises, providing minimal warmth and maximum anxiety about potential carbon monoxide poisoning.

By the time everyone was in sleeping clothes – or in Frank's case, boxer shorts and a vintage Pinewood Hockey tournament shirt – the awkwardness had reached peak levels.

"Nightcap?" Henry suggested, producing a flask from somewhere. "Bourbon. The good stuff."

"Define 'good,'" Karen said, but she accepted the flask anyway.

We ended up sitting on the beds, passing the bourbon around and playing Never Have I Ever like it was freshman year, while Mia slept peacefully.

The alcohol eased the weird tension—or at least gave me an excuse for the warmth spreading through my chest that had nothing to do with Liam sitting close enough for me to feel his body heat.

"Never have I ever," Karen said, clearly tipsy from her small share of bourbon, "pretended to be bad at something to make someone else feel better."

Everyone drank, which led to a round of confessions about throwing games, failed tests, and miscellaneous deceptions.

"Never have I ever," Frank continued, "wanted to kiss someone in this room."

The silence that followed was deafening. Karen drank immediately, winking at everyone. And Liam... Liam raised the flask to his lips while looking directly at me.

I drank too, the bourbon burning away any pretense that this was still just business between us.

"Well," Karen said into the charged silence. "That's not awkward at all. Moving on! Never have I ever..."

The game continued, but I'd stopped paying attention. Every nerve in my body was aware of Liam beside me, of the way his thigh pressed against mine, of how his fingers brushed mine when he passed the flask. The room was too hot despite the failing heater, and I couldn't blame it on the alcohol.

Eventually, exhaustion won out over awkwardness. Henry was the first to crash, sprawling across his half of the bed with Frank complaining about his starfish tendencies. Karen and Mia curled up together, my sister looking younger and more peaceful in her sleep.

Which left Liam and me, sitting on our bed, very carefully not looking at each other.

"I should..." I gestured vaguely at the bed.

"Right. Yes. Sleep." He stood so quickly he almost hit his head on the low-hanging light fixture. "I'll just... bathroom. Teeth. You know."

He fled, and I took the opportunity to burrow under the covers on the far side of the bed, creating a barrier of dubious motel pillows between us.

I could do this. I could share a bed with Liam Delacroix without combusting or doing something stupid like finding out if his lips were as soft as they looked.

When he emerged from the bathroom, I pretended to be asleep, regulating my breathing as he carefully slid into his side of the bed. The mattress dipped with his weight, and I had to fight not to roll toward him like some kind of touch-starved magnetized particle.

For a while, we lay there in the dark, both clearly awake, both pretending otherwise. The heater had given up entirely, and I could feel the cold seeping through the thin walls. I shivered involuntarily, pulling the inadequate blanket tighter.

"You're freezing," Liam said softly.

"I'm fine," I lied through chattering teeth.

"Gemma." Just my name, but the way he said it made something flutter in my chest. "Come here. Just for warmth. I promise I'll be a perfect gentleman."

"Your promises aren't the problem," I admitted into the darkness. "Mine are."

The confession hung between us, more honest than anything I'd said in daylight. I felt him shift, and then his hand found mine under the covers, warm and steady.

"Tell me about the first time you knew you wanted to be a doctor," he said, and I recognized the deflection for the gift it was.

So I told him about being eight and watching my grandmother fade away from cancer, how helpless I'd felt, how I'd decided then that I'd learn to fight death itself.

He told me about his first time on ice, how the cold and speed had felt like flying, before it all got tangled up in expectations and competitions.

We traded stories in whispers, hands still linked between us, and somehow that single point of contact felt more intimate than anything else we could have done.

I told him about teaching myself to swim in the community pool because my parents thought competitive sports were "unladylike.

" He confessed how his father’s disappointment loomed every time he lost a match.

"What's your biggest fear?" I asked, emboldened by darkness and the strange intimacy of a terrible motel room.

"Waking up at forty and realizing I lived someone else's life," he said without hesitation. "You?"

“Being abandoned,” I admitted. “I’m terrified that if I’m not useful, people will leave me. Everyone I’ve ever trusted has either walked away or betrayed me. Sometimes I think I push people away just to control when they go.”

His thumb stroked across my knuckles, gentle and reassuring. "I'm not going anywhere, Gemma."

"You can't promise that," I whispered. "No one can."

"Watch me," he said, and the fierce certainty in his voice made my eyes burn.

I turned toward him then, our faces close enough that I could make out his features in the dim light filtering through the curtains. His eyes were serious, intent, filled with something that made my heart race.

"This was supposed to be simple," I said. "A business arrangement. Chemistry help for dating lessons."

"Nothing about you is simple," he countered. "And I don't want simple. I want complicated and brilliant and fierce. I want late-night chemistry sessions and terrible motel rooms and your sister stealing my fries. I want you, Gemma. All of you."

"You don't know what you're asking," I breathed, but I was already leaning closer, drawn by invisible forces stronger than my fear.

"Then show me," he challenged softly. "Stop protecting me from your complications and let me in."

The last walls crumbled. I closed the distance between us, pressing my lips to his in a kiss that was question and answer all at once. He made a sound low in his throat, his free hand coming up to cup my face, thumb stroking my cheekbone as he kissed me back with devastating gentleness.

It wasn't just a passionate kiss. It was slower, deeper, a conversation in touches and sighs.

I tasted bourbon and promises on his lips, felt weeks of careful control dissolve under the patient exploration of his mouth.

When we finally broke apart, breathing hard, I felt exposed in ways that had nothing to do with clothing.

"Gemma," he started, but I pressed a finger to his lips.

"Don't," I whispered. "Don't make it more than it is. Not tonight. Just... let it be this."

He studied my face for a long moment, then nodded. But when he pulled me against his chest, when I felt his heart racing to match mine, I knew we were both lying. This was already more. Had been more since that first tutoring session, maybe since that first confrontation at the tutoring center.

We fell asleep like that, tangled together like we'd been doing it for years instead of minutes. His arms around me felt like safety I'd never known.

When morning came, bringing weak sunlight and the sounds of our friends stirring, we woke slowly. That soft, unguarded moment before full consciousness, where his lips pressed to my temple and I burrowed closer.

Then reality crashed in. We sprang apart like guilty teenagers, avoiding eye contact as we gathered our things. The drive home was full of careful distance and studied casualness, everyone pretending not to notice the way Liam and I couldn't look at each other.