Chapter 13 - Karter #2
“Then, for now, don’t think about it,” I told him. “You don’t have to figure out the AD, and you don’t have to figure out the rent tonight.”
Aleksey’s head snapped toward me, his dark eyes hardening. “Real easy for you to say that. Just hit pause on the rent problem for the night. What’s a couple hundred bucks to a Johnston?”
The urge to pull out my phone and transfer him the cash was almost blinding.
It would take two seconds. But I knew enough about Aleksey to know that was a bad idea.
Handing him charity right now would be like lighting a match at a gas station; his pride would ignite, and he’d throw me out and lock the door.
So, I kept my hands off my phone and met his glare head-on. “I’m not saying the bill disappears. I’m saying you’ve got a night shift ahead of you, and starving on my floor isn’t paying your mom’s rent. So just eat the damn food.”
The fight drained out of him. We sat in silence until he finally relented, grabbed the food I offered him, and picked up the plastic fork.
For the first time all week, neither of us was waiting for the other to throw a punch.
Aleksey stabbed a fry with his plastic fork. A few nights ago, Matt left your door wide open.” He chewed, looking straight ahead. “I saw a busted skate lace tied to your bed frame.”
I furrowed my brow at the sudden change in topic. “You were staring at my bed?” I asked.
“Just the frame. What’s the story?”
“It’s from the first goal I ever scored.” I stole a fry from his carton. “I was a kid. I kept it.”
“You keep garbage as a trophy?”
A beat of silence stretched out. “Well, you keep an empty room and a duffel bag.”
Aleksey snorted, a half-laugh that sounded surprised out of him. “That’s different.”
“Is it?”
“Yeah. I actually own the garbage. You’re sentimental over broken laces.”
“I’m sentimental over one broken lace,” I said, stealing another fry from his carton. “Singular. I don’t make it a habit.”
A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Johnston collects trash. Noted.” He nudged my leg playfully with his foot, leaving the pressure of it there a second too long.
A soft snort escaped me.
A beat later, the amusement drained slowly from his face, his gaze settling on me with a heavier, longer weight. “So you were, what, six years old when you scored that goal?”
“Seven. And it was a breakaway.”
“Breakaway.” He said it like he was testing the word for lies. “Against a goalie who probably still had trouble standing up.”
“He was very upright,” I admitted. “Until I deked him.”
“Deked him.” Aleksey shook his head, but the smirk hadn’t faded. “Nice move.”
“It was.” I looked at his hands cradling the styrofoam container for a moment, then nodded towards the phone sitting dark by his work boots. “Earlier, you said your mom texted you about rent?”
Aleksey stared at his half-empty food container. The edge to him was gone, leaving just exhaustion. “Yeah,” he said, his voice quiet. “I’m sending money over to her tomorrow.”
“After your shift?”
“Right after.”
I grabbed another fry. “She works a lot?”
“Double shifts at a nursing home,” he said, keeping his eyes on the floor. “She cleans offices at night, too. She does whatever it takes to keep things running.”
Up until tonight, everything between us had been a high-speed collision. Shoving each other against walls, hiding in back hallways, just trying to get off without getting caught. It was always frantic.
But sitting on his floor, eating lukewarm fries and just talking, the adrenaline dialed back.
Aleksey slid off the mattress and settled onto the floor next to me, his shoulder pressing against the same cracked plaster wall. His knee knocked into mine and stayed there.
For the first time all night, he looked at me without the usual guarded tension.
“Why do you keep doing this?” he asked.
I forced my expression to remain neutral. “Doing what?”
“Not walking away.” His voice dropped quieter. “Bringing me food. Putting up with my crap. I’ve given you an easy out. You could’ve just taken it and stayed in your room.”
Reaching up, I traced the thick scar on his jaw. “I tried that. It sucked.”
Aleksey held my eyes for a heartbeat. Then he tilted his head and pressed his mouth to mine.
I gave in immediately. Every other time we’d hooked up, it had been frantic—shove each other against a locker, grab what we could before someone walked in. But this wasn’t that.
He took his time, kissing me slow with none of the usual desperation.
We spent the next twenty minutes or so sitting against the plaster wall, trading lazy kisses and talking in low voices about nothing in particular.
Eventually, the talking faded out. The sheer exhaustion of Aleksey’s schedule caught up with him, and his head dropped onto my shoulder. A minute later, his breathing leveled out. He was completely out, his solid body resting against my side.
For a second, I thought about shaking him awake and heading back to my own room. But instead, I carefully leaned forward and tapped his phone screen where it sat on the floor.
His lock screen still showed an alarm set for eleven-thirty, about five minutes from now. I swiped the alarm off, pulled out my own phone, and set a silent vibrate timer, making a mental note to wake Aleksey up in ten minutes’ time.
Sliding my phone back into my pocket, I didn’t move a muscle. I just sat there, listening to Aleksey’s breathing and the radiator tick.