Chapter Nineteen
Nate
Iwas the first at the rink on Monday morning.
Well, no. Felix, our equipment manager-slash-junior-coach was always here first. Of course.
“Morning, Felix. Slept at the rink again?” I called over.
“On a pile of sweaty jerseys, yes,” he replied without cracking a smile. “Are you feeling okay?” He raised an eyebrow at me.
Shit. Am I that obvious?
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
Felix furrowed his brow, then checked his battered wrist watch.
“It’s 7:45 in the morning. Either your house burned down or something’s off.”
“Yeah, woke up early for a change. Thought I’d work on my shot.”
And I’m spiralling, and my flat was too quiet.
“Uh-huh.” He didn’t believe me. “The pharmacy down the street opens in fifteen minutes. Tell me if you need me to pick up something for you.”
“No, I just need—”
“Your skates are here. I just finished sharpening the blades.”
“Thanks,” I muttered and grabbed the pair. I was desperate to hit the ice.
The smell of the locker room calmed my nerves but everything felt…off. I’d barely slept but sleuthed until the early hours of the morning. My brain replayed everything in a loop: Vee’s hands, his voice, round one, two, his pointed tongue licking his cum right out of my ass, that fucking mirror.
I kept my head down and stood there with my hands curled in the hem of my hoodie until someone cleared their throat behind me.
“Mornin’?” Bo pitched it like a question.
I turned around and forced a smile on my face.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asked me in his soft, Swedish lilt.
“Nothing. I’m—”
“Don’t even fucking try, Nate. You look like you got hit by a truck.” He paused and tilted his head like an inquisitive cat. “Or laid REALLY well.”
Oh my God.
Heat crept up my neck, and I frantically looked anywhere but at Bo’s wolfish grin that exposed his fangs.
Earth, swallow me whole.
I fucking despised my brain for taking this as another opportunity to catapult me back into Vee’s shower on my knees.
Bo glanced at his smartwatch, then gripped my upper arm and marched me to the door without another word.“We’re… we’re leaving the rink? Right now?” He hummed and handed me my coat that I hadn’t even realised he’d grabbed. “You need pastry therapy.”
I followed him past the gear room and through the set of glass doors.
“You don’t believe in pastries.” Bo was the one person on the team—except for Guns—who kept one hundred percent to his healthy diet.
He snorted. “Some problems can’t be solved by a salad.”
Can’t argue with that.
We set off in the direction of Bo’s apartment.
I shoved my hands into my pockets and stared at the pavement under my soles. We walked in silence. He’d roast me in a bit, but I was thankful for a few moments of respite—until Vee popped up in my head again.
Five minutes later we reached a small bakery by the royal gardens.
“You need to order for me,” I muttered when we reached the door. “My German is still shit.” I’d never been great at languages.
“I know,” Bo chuckled as we entered the heavenly smelling place.
The scent of fresh coffee mixed with sugar and spices from the first Christmas treats enveloped me, and I choked up.
This place felt warm and safe, and it calmed my frayed nerves.
My teammate ordered coffee and some pastries from a motherly woman who clearly recognised him.
She joked with him in German and slipped two extra cookies on our plates with a little wink.
I wished I could fully appreciate how special it was that Bo shared this ritual with me, but the lump in my throat threatened to choke me.
He carried our tray past the counter and into a cosy sunroom full of plants. Only a few pensioners sat at a table in the corner. Bo picked one by the glass fronts for us.
“Nice place.”
He ignored me and took a bite of his pastry.
“I never thought I’d see you eat a pastry.”
Bo ignored this, too, and just made a throwaway gesture with his hand that sent sugar flying across our table.
He grimaced and licked the remaining sugar off his fingers.
Then he leaned back in his chair, folded his massive arms before his chest, and levelled me with a look out of his mossy green eyes. He waited for me to speak first.
“Something happened in the forest,” I blurted out because, fuck, I needed to talk to someone about it. I’d contemplated telling my mum on the phone when I’d called her. But I’d never discussed my sex life with my parents, and I wasn’t desperate enough to start when I was an ocean away.
Bo raised an eyebrow, then reached out for his coffee cup. He nodded at me as if to say, “Keep going.”
“Do you remember this guy, Kleini, or whatever his name was?”
“Klongi.”
Knew it.
“He thought he was clever, okay? He told me to grab a net from the shed, and head into the forest and set a trap for a—”
Bo sat up straight and his handsome face pulled into a terrifying grimace.
“Han gjorde vad? Den d?r j?vla d?rfan! What a fucking asshole,” he added when he realised he’d switched to Swedish, which only happened when Bo August Persson was Mad with a capital M.
“Yeah, I have no idea why I did it, but ah…”
“You were drunk, Nate. That Bavarian beer is strong, and you are just a tiny human.”
“I’m 6'5".”
“Tiny,” Bo confirmed.
“Anyway, I actually caught an Elvertritsch, that’s what the creature’s called, and—”
“You caught one?” he interrupted me, on the verge of laughing.
“I did, his name is Vee, and he’s a forest ranger. He took me back to his place and we sort of...”
“Hooked up?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I muttered.
Tears leaked out of Bo’s eyes and trickled into his dirty blond beard. “That is the dumbest and most on-character thing you’ve ever told me.” He sobered up a bit and waved a green hand. “But why do you look like that, then? Was it shit?”
I buried my face in my hands and groaned.
I can’t believe I’m discussing my sex life with my teammate in a German bakery.
“It was great, actually.” I took my hands away. “And then his colleague called, and he just shut down and pushed me away. I don’t even have his number or address or anything. He probably doesn’t want to see me again, anyway,” I rambled.
Bo reached out and took hold of my wrist.
“Nate, stop.” He waited for me to stop talking. “Breathe.”
This was such a Vee thing to say that I fucking burst into tears.
“You really like him, don’t you?” Bo said in a gentle voice.
“Yeah, I do.”
He squeezed my arm, then let go, and emptied his coffee cup.
“There’s something else,” I hedged. I’d spent way too much time thinking about it yesterday, and the words would burn a hole into my tongue if I didn’t get them out.
“I always thought I was straight. I mean I messed around with some guys in college but that’s…
normal, isn’t it? Just some dudes getting off together. ”
“Yeah, that’s totally normal.” Bo pressed his lips together and nodded. Good-natured mischief sparkled in his eyes.
“But I think I like…people. I don’t care about gender. I just—I liked him. I wanted him.”
Still do.
He nudged me with his foot.
“Hearts, not parts.”
I met his eyes over my cup.
“You, too?” I asked when I’d swallowed the huge gulp of my almost-cold coffee.
“Oh no.” Bo leaned back and grinned so wide he flashed his fangs at me. “I like cock.”