Chapter 3
TAYLOR
I could live with being bumped down to the third line for one game. Coach did that whenever he brought in a Rainier for a conditioning loan, which had happened three times since last season. It wasn’t a demotion for me, just a way to ease the injured player back into the game. No skin off my nose.
But whether we were top line, fourth line—whatever—I wasn’t sure I could handle being linemates with him .
I’d known Vasily was coming up. It wasn’t exactly a big secret when the NAPH team sent someone to the minors, no matter if it was for disciplinary reasons, to get their shit together, or because they were about to come off injured reserve.
When someone was coming down, we all knew about it.
Vasily had been practicing with the Rainiers this past week, and we’d known he’d be here as soon as they left for their road trip.
I’d had a solid week to mentally prepare for this, and now that he was here…
I was not mentally prepared. At all. Not for him to be here, and sure as shit not for him to be centering my goddamned line.
That was stupid, though. So what if he was here? We’d met at a club. We’d danced for a few songs, and we’d made out a little, and then he’d told me he wasn’t interested. End of story. No big deal.
Right. No big deal. Which totally explained why just hearing his name made my stomach roil with renewed embarrassment. Seeing him here? On the ice with me and my teammates? Ugh. Fuck my life. That would make it a breeze to concentrate during practice, wouldn’t it?
Hell, that temporary drop to the third line was probably just as well. I’d play fewer minutes and have less opportunity to make an ass of myself while I was too focused on my linemate.
Wasn’t much I could do about it, though, so I focused intently—well, tried to—on the drill that Coach Watts, our offensive coach, was laying out.
It was a zone entry drill we’d done a million times before, so I knew it by heart, but I hung on his every word.
I concentrated hard on every gesture he made and every line he drew on the well-worn whiteboard.
Not on the broad-shouldered player standing six feet away from me. Not on the memory of watching him walk away. Not on how much I’d been kicking myself for months for even thinking I’d had a shot with Vasily fucking Abashev.
The whistle blew. Wait, what? What were we doing?
Oh. Right. The drill.
The zone entry drill.
The one I could run through in my sleep.
Where… was I supposed to…
I snapped out of it about two seconds before one of my coaches probably would’ve had my head, and I took my place in the defensive zone.
Coach Watts blew the whistle and passed a puck to Vasily.
Immediately, Vasily, Cameron, and I flew into the neutral zone.
Waverly, one of our defensemen, was poised and ready to stop me, so I barreled toward him.
At the last possible moment, I whipped the puck across the ice.
It connected with Vasily’s tape. He sent it back to Cams, who very nearly overskated it.
Cams recovered, though, and he snapped the puck on goal.
Hoskins batted it away with his paddle, but still, it was a good effort.
Not bad for our first drill as a line, and despite being distracted all to shit, I hadn’t made any mistakes.
“Nice job,” Coach Marks called out to us as Coach Watts got the second line started. He gestured at me, then Vasily. “Wils, let’s try to keep it onside on the next pass, yeah?”
I winced. I’d been offside? Shit, probably. I’d been so focused on not focusing on Vasily that I’d lost track of where both of my linemates were. Enough, apparently, to put us offside.
“Got it, Coach,” I called out, and I did. Next run, I’d be onside, damn it.
I was, too… and completely borked my pass to Vasily.
Fuck’s sake.
It took all I had not to snap my stick over my thigh.
It wasn’t even that bad of a mistake, but I was pissed.
I hated myself for being distracted to the point it affected my play.
I hated myself for caring that Vasily was here.
Who the hell cared about him? So what if he’d rejected me?
So what if he hadn’t noticed me when we’d gone to training camp before?
He hadn’t been under any obligation to do anything in either of those situations.
And he might not have even remembered me from the dance club because really, who remembered everyone they ever ran into on a dancefloor?
I sure didn’t, and I was stupid to think he would.
It had just sucked, registering on his radar like that only to get rejected. And now he was here. Playing on my team. On my line . Thank God it was only for his conditioning loan instead of him being down here for longer: this was already going to be the longest two weeks of my goddamned life.
I mostly pulled my head together enough to get through practice without making an ass of myself. My passes weren’t as clean as I would’ve liked, and that embarrassing flubbed attempt to shoot into a wide-open net would probably haunt my sleepless nights for years to come. Ugh.
When practice was finally over, I couldn’t get out of the building fast enough. I showered, dressed, shoved some food into my face, and got the hell out of there. Striding across the parking lot, I stuffed my hands into my pockets and glared straight ahead, ready to get the hell out of?—
“Wils!”
My nickname in his voice stopped me dead in my tracks. I turned around as Vasily came out of the building, hands tucked into his jacket pockets. I gritted my teeth, bristling as our eyes met, but I tried not to let it show. “Uh. Hey.”
“Hey.” He stopped a few feet shy of me and studied me. “We met over the summer, didn’t we?”
I wanted to snarl back that, yeah, no shit we’d met.
But maybe it hadn’t been much of anything to him.
I’d just been another guy he’d crossed paths with in a club.
It wasn’t like he’d been into me, so why remember me after dancing and making out for less than a song?
He’d probably banged half the guys in Seattle since then, so I was lucky he’d recognized me at all.
So I just coolly replied, “Yeah. At that club downtown.”
He cut his eyes away from me.
“I won’t tell anyone if that’s what you’re worried about,” I said. “It wasn’t exactly my proudest moment either.”
Vasily looked at me again, eyebrows up. “What do you mean?”
I laughed humorlessly and rolled my eyes. “What am I going to tell people? ‘Hey, let me tell you about that time I thought Vasily Abashev was into me, and then he fucking rejected me and left me standing there like a dumbass!’” I scoffed, shaking my head. “Yeah, that secret’s safe with me.”
He stared at me as if he didn’t even understand what I’d said.
I was pretty sure it wasn’t a language issue—he could stumble over his English a little during interviews, but I thought that was more nerves from having cameras and microphones shoved in his face.
Otherwise, he’d always seemed to speak and understand pretty effortlessly.
Maybe he didn’t remember how things had gone down that night.
It was possible it was all bigger in my head than it was in reality—I’d usually handled rejection well, but admittedly, that night had stung.
Probably because it was him . Because I’d stupidly let myself entertain the idea that he might want me and wouldn’t bail the second he saw something better.
I didn’t even know why it bothered me so much.
People got rejected in clubs all the time.
I was probably just mad at myself for stupidly thinking Vasily Abashev actually wanted me.
Whatever—I had no business being mad at him, myself, the world, or anything else.
It just stung, so I was pissed. It was what it was.
He narrowed his eyes a little, searching mine. “Did you know who I was that night?”
I pushed out a breath through my nose. “Of course I did.”
“Why did you not tell me?”
“Tell you what? ” I threw up my hands. “That I’m a no-name hockey player you’ve never heard of on the farm team?”
He scowled and looked away. “You’re on the farm team for the Rainiers. There was always a chance we’d play together.”
“Uh-huh. And who the fuck cares? I was on the farm team for the Aces, too, and you never noticed me then either.”
Vasily’s head snapped toward me, his eyes wide.
I laughed bitterly. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.
We went to the same training camp for three years and you never noticed me.
We even did drills together. But the only time I ever crossed your fucking radar was when you danced with me and made out with me and then rejected me.
Now we’re stuck together for two whole weeks—you just can’t ignore me like you did at fucking training camp. ”
His lips parted. “What? What are you?—”
“Don’t act like you didn’t. I was one of the lowly prospects and farm team kids, so no shit, you didn’t notice me.”
“I…” He shook himself. “Listen, I?—”
“I get it,” I growled. “You’re there to be a star, not pay attention to?—”
“Training camp is a lot of pressure for us too,” he snapped, suddenly angry. “And the last two years before I came to Seattle, I was just trying to figure out how to get through another season on the same team as the man I couldn’t make myself dump.”
That smacked me so hard, I almost had to take a step backward. “Wait, what? It was that bad for?—”
“It wasn’t great,” he gritted out. “And it was hard to play through. It was hard to just exist, never mind play hockey. With him .” Vasily shook his head.
“I wasn’t ignoring you or anyone else. Did I notice you?
No. I’m sorry. I didn’t.” He threw up a hand.
“I was just trying to keep myself together. Just like I was at the club.”
Well, fuuuck.
Now I felt like a dick.
“Oh,” I said quietly. “I’m… Damn. I’m sorry. I didn’t…” I rubbed the back of my neck and blew out a breath. “I didn’t realize you had that much going on.”
“No one did,” he said just as softly. “No one except him.”
I swallowed.
“So the night I met you,” he went on, “I thought… I don’t know. I thought I could put myself out there. Maybe even hook up with someone. But…” He shook his head.
I cocked a brow. “So, it wasn’t me, it was you.”
Avoiding my gaze, he nodded. “It wasn’t you. For what it’s worth, I didn’t hook up with anyone that night. Or any night since.”
I blinked. “You… really?”
“Really. When I said I was leaving, I meant it. I went home. I wasn’t… My head, it wasn’t in a good place. And the rest of the off season, it still wasn’t.”
Oh. Shit. Now I really felt like a dick.
“I mean it,” he said quietly. “It had nothing to do with you. You’re…” He laughed almost soundlessly and looked me up and down, a faint and fleeting grin breaking through the shyness. “There was nothing at all wrong with you.”
I gulped. Oh. Wow.
Then the grin was gone and his shoulders fell, as did his gaze. “I wanted—I just wasn’t as over him as I thought I was. It wasn’t a good place for me to be. With you or anyone else. I’m…” He paused for a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”
Chewing my lip, I nodded. “Yeah. I get that. And I mean, look, you weren’t obligated to go anywhere with me.
Or to sleep with me. Whatever.” I waved a hand.
“It was the part where you seemed so into me, and then you just, like… I don’t know.
You just suddenly weren’t. That was kind of a kick in the balls. ”
It was impossible to explain that without being pathetic.
Especially since I couldn’t explain to him that I’d had a wicked crush on him since long before either of us had even walked into that building.
He hadn’t known. He couldn’t have known.
And it wouldn’t have made him any more obligated to screw me. It just… sucked to get rejected.
“I get it now, though,” I whispered. “I don’t think I’d have been in a great place right then either.
Especially if everything I heard about you two is—” I snapped my teeth shut.
Shit, that probably wouldn’t help, reminding him just how much of his breakup had been splattered all over social media and the tabloids.
Hockey players didn’t usually even warrant that much coverage, but apparently a nasty breakup between a couple of queer teammates was sensational enough to gossip about.
Vasily raked a hand through his hair and exhaled. “ Everyone in hockey knows about me and my ex. It was…” His cheeks colored, which was annoyingly cute. “It sucked. Going from such a private relationship to such a public breakup.”
I grimaced. “Yeah, that doesn’t sound like fun.”
In fact, I recalled seeing some images of him in the aftermath.
In among the usual shots of players leaving the bus and walking into a hotel or the arena, there were pictures of him with downcast eyes and a pained expression.
Even when he was signing things for fans, his usual smile was gone.
I couldn’t imagine how much the whole shitshow had taken out of him.
And if I’d felt like a dick before…
I exhaled. “Listen, I think we got off on the wrong foot about, well, everything.”
“Maybe,” he admitted.
“I’d like to buy you a beer,” I offered timidly. “If you have time.”
He studied me for a moment. I wondered if he was trying to figure out how to reject me. Again.
Before I could rescind the offer out of cowardice, though, he said, “All right. Sure.” He gazed around. “I, uh… I don’t know much about this area.”
“It’s all right. I know a place we can go.”
I gave him the name of a sports bar nearby, made sure he had it on his GPS, and then we headed to our respective cars.
And all the way there, I hoped a beer would be enough to smooth things over.